Mind The ResponsibilitiesOne of the difficulties with this time of year is the lack of light. There are methods for dealing with this sort of thing: plan ahead to get home for frenzy of activity while the sun yet sits glum in the sky. Invest in lamps. Alternately, close down the house to the snug glow of the gentle bulb by the reading chair, kept company perhaps by a candle, and let the stereo take over to fill rooms with close warmth.
One trick I use from time to time is Irish Coffee: strong coffee, copious sugar, good cream, an a dash of whiskey in a cup. There is supposed to be whipped cream here, too, but I tend to reserve that sort of thing for festive times, and there is little festival in the air these nights. The problem I ran into this evening was a lack of whiskey - that bottle has gone dry, rinsed and set off to the recycling center.
Peterb is going to wallop me one for my next move: Self, I said to me, scotch is whiskey. You've got that. And its good stuff! Are not things made better by better ingredients? Is this not a fundamental (if lately learned) lesson of our childhood? Has it not ever been true? So I pulled the bottle of Sixteen Lagavulin from the rack, tipped a bit of it into the coffee, and let sip.
The result: sort of. All of the notes were there, but some of them did not play too well with the others. Each taste on laden tongue is evidence for both the tantalizing notion that there may well be a way to make this work, even as it makes it clear that this is strange territory, and there's a reason professionals do not put Lagavulin in coffee. Do not get me wrong: it's worth drinking. But it is weird.
As far as the stereo goes, my brother an I have been at work on each other again. Tonight, we started with an utterly incongruous cover, and soon enough the links started flying. We traded paths through American Bluegrass, British House, and Finnish Pop Music. We found things. My brother is now something of an actual artist; he stands in front of rooms full of people lingering in the dim with nothing but two turntables and an elemental story to tell, asking them to step forward and move. He succeeds in this. If you are in the right city on the correct night in the particular room, you will hear him do this. He finds good things.
The thing I found is down that aforementioned Bluegrass alley, a strange quiet lane of American music that seems to me to be ever waking up to stretch, look around, and meet the day with a small smile. The music makers down there don't mind not taking themselves too seriously. They sit in circles on stools in the corners of watering holes, where it's still possible to talk even while the band unwinds melodies at gentle paces. At this time of year on those places, the sweet smokes of hardwoods and leaves hang in the air at twilight.
I like the esthetic. I need to spend more time with esthetics; they're turning out to be important.
KlaxonMrs. Compass points out that one of the nice things about living here is that it takes a fair amount of effort to get far enough away such that one doesn't occasionally hear the tolling of church bells or the cry of a train whistle, stumbling around up there in the sky. She claims that this is useful, a happy sonic signpost that reminds us from time to time of good things. I am in agreement with her on this - there is still a fair amount of pleasant sounds from our past, zipping from hill to hill out here.
Local conditions play their part in this, too. I have mentioned the way the qualities of the air up here on this hill can wrap the sounds of the valleys in different ways. We are fortunate to have rivers, and they do even better at this. Some time ago I told the little story of the slow train singing on the other bank, the wet from the summer and the river making the song mournful and pure. On clean cool evenings, the trains down there next to the water make their tootling known up here on the hill, the sound vaulting over the valleys. The other night, a chorus of fire sirens woke up to blanket the earth with their insistence. The air made them seem close.
I suppose I should mention the ghost.
We were sitting in the living room, and the space was filled with music. Three Nordic sopranos, singing clear and strong. The ghost turned to me, and said, "where do you begin to find this music?"
There is little story to how I found about about them: I got lucky, and attended the appropriate concert. There are all sorts of good ways to find out about these sorts of things. There are copious resources online and in print, including a very expensive monthly, printed lovingly on glossy paper by people in Europe and sent here on boats. It might be best to look for that one at the local library; libraries can be great sources, too. One day after foraging at mine, I pointed out to the good folks behind the circulation desk that the CDs I was holding didn't come with the protective locking cases. They looked at them, looked at me, and then pointed out that no one was likely to ever steal them. So it goes.
Here is a better story. I was digging around for podcasts. I found many on many subjects; I found one on the subject at hand. I listened to it, and found it to be good. I noted that it was tenth in a series, but the feed did not include reference to the other nine. I dug about in the links of the site, and lo, I found past podcasts. One of them opened with a lovely Pavanne, apparently from the soundtrack of the movie Orlando, a movie I have not yet seen (nor a book I have yet read). Wonderful Pavanne, that. If it is a period piece, it presupposes Beethoven's Seventh in a gentle echo. If composed recently the theft (such as it is) is in the opposite direction, but this does not detract. I will see the film, and listen to the rest of the soundtrack, and it will all undoubtedly lead me on to other things.
Amusingly, the ghost doesn't even like early music.
It Was Supposed To Be SimpleThe gang, as they say, is all here. My parents have made an intrepid trek across this state, that state, and some other state to find themselves here, hunting for the spare key. My brother had his own adventure full of amusing turns of events, not the least of which was leaving a car engine full of coolant on the streets of Maryland. We are all here, now. We are all cooking.
The plan was just to do (in our comfortable way) up a casserole for dinner. It's simple, it's heartening. Along the way, though, we've found ourselves also embroiled in: fresh bread, sausage stuffing, fresh cranberry relish. I have further evidence that four people can work in my kitchen. This is a brilliant thing.
The house is better suited to being full of people; coming home to bustle and faces was a gentle surprise.
Happy Thanksgiving. Eat well!
The Trick With The CoffeeThere's a trick to coffee. Find yourself a barista (any gender will do) that pulls a good shot with good coffee in a good space. Be their client until you are their regular; be humble, make no trouble, be predictable, and pay with as exact change as possible. Over time, let this become comfortable. Eventually, ask them to change your drink; ask them to make you an Americano, with a bit less water in it than usual. They may ask you if you want a long pull or a short pull - opt for the short pull, but with water, hot water. Take this cup of coffee to the side counter, and add to it four sugars and a healthy dose of cream.
This is, of course, unpardonable. But what you get, if things go right, is a cup full of hot coffee ice cream. I do not know why this trick works (it doesn't work any other way). For myself, I have annoyed my barista. I have ordered this for more than two years now, and these days I order something else.
Progress is also being made on the home front; with my brother here, we decided it was time to bust out the moka pot. We drink the stuff strong and sweet, with as much hot milk as coffee. It's fantastic. It is also a clear sign that I have too large a moka pot for those mornings when the house is empty of all but me.
I think there is a cat living under my porch. It is getting cold tonight; this does not bode well.
SecondsOne of the places we have here that makes us lucky is a fairly reasonable Brazilian steak house. If you are unfamiliar, these places are generally all about the meat: there is a cold bar from which you may build a remarkable salad, spiked with pickled morsels, and there is a hot bar, a sentry line of warming trays filled with all sorts of things, most of them involving pork in some way. The main part of the meal is ambulatory, though: the dining area is filled with wandering waiters, each with a sword of a skewer on which is freshly grilled meat. There are little doodads on the tables, on side red and the other green: if the green side is up, the waiters approach and offer you slices of whatever it is. If the red side is up, that is to signal that the table has had enough meat, really, and more meat would be a problem. In my experience, the servers ignore them when they are red and bring the meat anyway. An then we eat it, regardlessly. It's all good.
I try to limit my nights of massive meat intake these days; I am sad to report that I've not been to the steak house in quite some time. This is all Mr. Epee's fault. He throws parties that generally involve meat; he throws a party every Thanksgiving in the evening, and those nights are no exception to this rule. Leg of lamb, a turkey, a ham, a turducken. There is much meat, and much of everything else, too; the circle of people around Mr. Epee can bring it culinary, and Thanksgiving evening is the time to shine. People take food seriously here. It's what they do.
I am happy to claim space in that circle, although I have been woefully missing for much of these recent years. My brother and I ended up at Mr. Epee's house last Thursday. We brought my brother's apple sausage stuffing, which was a testament to my family's own attitudes towards food.
The night before, my brother noticed the pile of local apples in the pantry, made cold by the thin pane in the window and the lack of radiator within. "I could make apple sausage stuffing," he said. I pointed out that I had sausage in the fridge, good local stuff. He got to work. I was futzing with other things, so I didn't get to see him build it except from the corner of my eye, but he pulled down the saucier and lopped up the apples and minced sage from the garden and turned to me and asked me where the bread crumbs were. I fished them out of the pantry, and it turns out I was running low. We added some of the left over oat bread, but he frowned and needed more, so he said, "say, why don't we smash up some of those triple ginger ginger snaps from Trader Joe's and throw those in?" And we did. And I recommend that you do this, too, if you have a penchant for making apple sausage stuffing. It got compliments on Thursday night: the quiet compliments delivered with broad smiles.
I brought bread; it's what I do. I whomped up a couple of loaves of Irish soda bread with currants and fennel in for Mrs. Compass, and then set to baking two loves of Durham wheat bread: flour, water, yeast, salt, time and heat. I brought them to the evening, set one out into the side board alongside the soda bread, and then sat in Mr. Epee's kitchen for an hour with the other loaf making toast in the wood burning fireplace, spearing slices on barbecue tongs and occasionally singing edges when the conversation became too interesting. After toasting, a bit of rubbed garlic, oil, and salt. I handed the first one to Mr. Epee's mother, there at the kitchen table: it's what I do. It is good to have traditions.
We ate; we talked. The flow of things spilled from living room to dining room to kitchen, only to be chased back out again due to logistical concerns. I was remiss in that I did not fulfill the other tradition of bringing a bottle of Tokaji, but next year, next year. Everyone left well, and everyone got home safe, despite the cranky skies.
I think I have enough chairs in the living room, now.
Just a TouchIt is a cold night, rain everywhere, football players falling like timber in sudden swamps. A vast and angry front moved through: I hear tell there's flooding to the south of me tonight. May the valleys be well. Nights like these call for a drink, and I have rum.
After putting the kettle on, I initially reached for the Internet to give me a recipe for hot buttered rum, but I put it back. I went instead to the shelf where the cookbooks sit, and pulled down an old one, written before butter was bad for you and oysters were somehow an ingredient in everything. The recipe was quint, and I mumbled into the kitchen to dig for the cloves just as the kettle began to pipe.
I can hear you laughing now: looking for a recipe for a hot buttered rum? Well. I got to hold a good book in hand, read the thoughts of people who lifted spirits a century ago. It was fitting, tonight.
A mug, some sugar, some cloves, some butter, some rum. Muddle. Fill the mug with hot, hot water. Stir.
Tipping HatI've mentioned before that I have hats: I have hats. I also have caps and things sitting about on shelves in closets. These are hats, it must be said, but they are not really proper hats. I have only seen caps tipped in film and television programs tangentially about sports, for example. I do not tip caps when I wear them; sometimes, though, I tip the hats.
It's a little strange to say that, these days. Not too many people wear a good hat, and far fewer in my experience go so far as to tip it. Pile on top of that the new meaning imparted in this medium right here, where I'm writing: I see far more hat tipping spread over the conversational web than I do walking down the street. It makes it even odder to actually do the thing, tipping an actual hat.
But I do. I need to be wearing one of the hats, of course (we're getting back into the season for that, now). I am something of an equal opportunity tipper, it must be said. Reactions are varied, although there are sometimes smiles. Sometimes there is confusion. Sadly, most times there is oblivion. Sometimes, I've got one of the hats on backwards (it is the kind of hat where you can do that) and when I reach for the brim I end up looking like an idiot. So it goes.
All of the leaves fell off of the trees with a thud over the holiday; management has been something of an issue. The more shocking change is that the yard has lost its cloister again: the sky is wide up there now, and all the lamps are spread out over the hills. From the porch this evening with a cup of tea, I saw the long line of lights that made up the parkway, moving slowly.
Something Of A SuccessThere were three pots of the blueberry jam I made this summer in the pantry; now there are two. The third one sits open in the fridge: we broke out the jam. We ate it on toast with a bit of butter, and it tasted deep and carefully sweet, a blue bordering on indigo, nicely set and lumpy with shining bits of fruit.
Also: no adverse gastrointestinal reactions. It is quite something to preserve summer for winter's table and not get anybody sent to the hospital in the process.
I should not worry so much. Folks have been doing this thing and eating this stuff in this way for centuries, and I learned the lore and was careful. The only thing I lacked before was the experience. I have a little of that now. It would not do to be over confident in future experiments, but just enough confidence is a welcome thing.
Onward!
All content under copyright by the author. Dancing is permitted. The strange deltic glyphs in the sand under tidal flow are a pleasure to watch in their deepening. Offer not valid in Kansas. We put it down and then we lost it. It all happens in the corner of the eye. Mail accepted for the bears in the basement. We have a dog, but we do not own it. Thank you.