books

  • Scarlet fever and other Little House stories

    We’re battening down the hatches here in Rhode Island: there’s a blizzard on the way! Josh and I both have a snow day (it never gets old), and we’re planning on waiting out the storm with movies, books, and cinnamon… Continue reading

  • Planning the garden

    Today I taught my first session with a new group of students: little guys (to me, anyway), 4th – 6th graders. We talked about reading and books and the program we’ll be starting tomorrow. The kids were fun, energetic, and… Continue reading

  • Luisa Weiss’ My Berlin Kitchen

    You know how there are books that grab you from the first page? You think to yourself, This is me. I see myself in this story. This was my experience with Luisa Weiss’ memoir My Berlin Kitchen. I was so enthralled… Continue reading

  • This meal brought to you by Christopher Columbus

    Ah, Columbus Day. I’m not sure there’s any other secular holiday more filled with angst and mixed feelings than this one. When I was little, we learned the basics of Columbus Day. We sang that catchy song, the one that… Continue reading

  • Canning fruit (II)

    Yesterday I recounted how my friend Nina and I decided to can 40 lbs of tomatoes. When I left off, we had just realized how much time (and patience) this project required. Nevertheless, we persevered. Once the crushed tomatoes had… Continue reading

  • Canning fruit (I)

    Last Sunday, over dinner at our local Ethiopian restaurant, my friend Nina said, “When can we can?” And thus began a rather silly and ultimately fruitful (heh) endeavor of canning 40 lbs of tomatoes. And making lots of canning jokes.… Continue reading

  • To make ice cream

    It’s been a busy summer, one full of transitions: family milestones, a move ten minutes down the road, exotic travel, a new school. This week I’ve been focusing on that last one, a new school, as we get ready for… Continue reading

  • Supposedly delicious (II)

    As I mentioned earlier, I love perusing the old cookbooks at the cottage to see what earlier generations enjoyed eating. People of my great-grandparents’ generation apparently cooked with quite a lot of lard in the 1930s, while those of my… Continue reading

  • Nutrition, 1903 style (II)

    Yesterday I posted some of my fan-girl thoughts on Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food and presented a nutritional table from The “Settlement” Cook Book. Now I’d like to think about what this 1903 table has to do with our eating… Continue reading

  • Nutrition, 1903 style (I)

    Now that we’ve gotten comfortable with the sorts of recipes available in The “Settlement” Cook Book, I’d like to take a look at the book’s attitude towards food. Before this project (and before I did some serious thinking about food… Continue reading