Spring has Sprung

Well not officially, but my pee smells like asparagus again, so it's real close.

NO-COOK FRIDAY NIGHT

On the menu tonight courtesy of St. Francis Fountain, the historical nerve center of hipsters in plaid and filth:

One malted milkshake (shown)
BLT with french fries (consumed in record time, not pictured)
One pack each of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Dark Crystal Trading Cards (inedible gum circa 1978)

D tried to go all "healthy" and order the Sides Platter which was soup, salad (is Thousand Island healthy?) and mac n cheese.
He didn't even want a bite of my bacon sandwich. Something's up. I think he's having an affair. With a Gelfling!

FRITTATA CRAZY!

I recently re-discovered how easy it is to whip up a frittata.
You can pretty much put anything you want in it (my grandma used ground beef and spinach), and it works for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

This morning's version had fresh corn, red onion, veggie sausage, kalamata olive, and Cowgirl Creamery feta and goat cheese.

The kicker was the tomato/basil mix I spooned on top after. Summery!

A few carbs never hurt anybody, so I toasted up some Acme sweet baguette and broke open a fresh jar of Knoll Farms fig jam.
Easy like Sunday morning...

I SCREAM

In case you hadn't heard, there's an ice cream revolution going on.
Like plaid and Ray-Bans, gourmet ice cream shops are trendy y'all.

If ice cream were a hipster, it would be Humphry Slocombe.
Some of Slocombe's unexpected flavors include salt and pepper, balsamic caramel, McEvoy olive oil, chocolate taragon, foie gras (seriously), and the already legendary "secret breakfast"--a hangover-friendly combo of Jim Beam and cornflakes.
I had that and the coconut sherbet, then went home and took some Lactaid.

If you don't want to ride your fixie all the way over to Harrison and 24th cuz your ripped, gray skinny jeans are too tight, and your I-have-way-too-many-keys-and-I'm-not-even-a-building-engineer keychain is too heavy, you can also check out more regular and mainstream flavors at 3 Twins, Xanath, Bi-Rite, and Mitchells.

But my absolute favorite new-to-me spot is Sketch in Berkeley on Fourth Street.
It's a husband and wife operation doing soft-serve made from scratch every day. If ice cream were a cute, understated, pure and loveable gal (like me), it would be Sketch.
They make homemade waffles to put underneath, and salted caramel to put on top.
This is not unlike my previous favorite chemically enhanced Hot Caramel Sundae at McDonalds, except it is. Thank the sweet Dairy Gods for that.
You can probably even get it with nuts.

Despite the howling coastal winds, it's summer!

FIRST TIME WITH MR. PICKLE

I've been innocent way too long about this whole pickling business.

So, yesterday at the farmers market I filled up a bag with four-inch kirby cucumbers intending to put them to work today.
Size-queens take note: with pickling, smaller is better; you can cram more in; they are sweeter and less likely to go soft and rotten.
Always something new to learn, see?

I went for a "half-sour" recipe from the Joy of Pickling, which seems to be the best resource available.
The basic idea is to ferment the cukes in spiced brine at room temperature for up to 3 days, then refrigerate them for a week or so before eating your way to half-sour heaven.
The most important thing is to keep the chilitos completely submerged, or you'll end up with a bum pickle.
This method isn't FDA approved or anything so I'll let you know how it turns out. I hope they are delicious!

After all that, we had Kelton and Alex over to watch the LA Lame-kers game. Grillmaster D fired up some sausages and corn on the cob, among things. Guess there was a theme today.
Go Magic!
Red Wings?!
Darnit.

SUMMER BOUNTY

List: corn, blueberries, strawberries, plums, nectarines, blood orange, avocado, red onion, tomatoes, little gem lettuce, garlic, portabellas and king trumpet mushrooms, cherries, rock cod, radishes, pickling cucumbers, dill (more on this later).
Score.

FIELD OF DREAMS

It was going to take something special to get me back on the blog.
Not Heidi and Spencer getting married, not Adam Lambert's gayness, something even more delicious.
The farm dinner we went to a few weeks ago, and D's subsequent Campylobacter poisoning (unrelated), were just the things.

Friends Kate and Aaron took us to Outstanding in the Field, a farm-to-table dining extravaganza, hosted by Santa Cruz native Jim Denevan.
This guy had swagger.
These traveling dinner parties happen all over the country (even in Canada, eh), pairing up a local farmer and chef for an outdoor dining adventure featuring the farm's products and the chef's expertise.
A few basics: you can't be a wimp about bugs or weather; it's probably not a good idea to wear five-inch heels (somebody did anyway); and you're gonna be dining with complete strangers, so buck up and make a new friend or take a Xanax already.

We were greeted in the parking lot by the first of many fresh-faced farmgirls that are part of the whole Outstanding experience. A stylish shuttlebus with Carnival Cruiseline upholstry carried us (at alarming speeds) over a secret bridge, up sloping hills to a peak atop Devil's Gulch Ranch.
Beautiful, even through the fog.

After a few glasses of introductory Stubbs Chardonnay and many rounds of superlative crostini (with fava beans, mint and fresh sheep's milk ricotta), we took a picturesque path through the vineyard for the pig tour.
Yes, pig tour!
We met day-old piglets and while it was hard to imagine them as dinner-ready in a few months, our guilt subsided once we encountered the aroma of slow-roasted porchetta warming on the grill, manned by Perbacco chef Staffan Terje.

The meal was a locavore's wet dream. Burrata cheese with grilled Zuckerman Farm asparagus. Devil's Gulch rabbit ravioli. The aforementioned pork with cherry panzanella.
And if I wasn't full by then, I definitely was after the beautiful Yerena Farm strawberry crostata with Bellwether creme fraiche was served up.
Swoon.
I went to bed singing EE-I-EE-I-O.