Taste Life

"We write to taste life twice, 

in the moment and in retrospection."~Anais Nin  

There are some foods I can almost taste when I think of them.  You too, right?  I'd love to know what yours are.  I will share a couple of mine, don't blame me if you smell them or get hungry.  Let's talk of Cilantro: the perfume of it is irresistible to me and every chance I get, I crush it between my fingers in to savor it the way this woman does in the John William Waterhouse painting.  It looks like she goes too far but I know exactly what she's after: she wants to fill her senses completely with the incredible scent in order to 

recall it's fragrance in her mind.  (My son says she looks likes she's making out with the rose, hehehe.) 

This time, things worth repeating...

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I want to hear what your favorite movie is.  My new favorite is Gran Torino with/ by Clint Eastwood where he is an opinionated son of a gun.  I like The Sweetest Thing with Cameron Diaz for laughter and love.  Another favorite "justice" movie I like is Tombstone with Val Kilmer offering to be your Huckleberry.  By the way, my DVD is missing and even though I know I can replace this easily - if you have it, I would like it returned with popcorn and some San Pelligrino water because you've had it for a long time.  Whoever you are. 

Apples and Cranberries are at the height of their deliciousness right now.  I mention it because a favorite drink for me once was hot apple cider this time of year and I my mind was drawn to the hot toddy thing and Sangria's.  I found this little something which appeals to the olfactory senses as well as is pleasing to the eyes.  Omit the brandy and share some with your little ones, it will quiet them for a moment.  You may want to take it easy on the sugar here, taste first then add.  I never require the amounts of sugar listed.  You're probably sweet enough, also =)  

Cilantro, Lime, and Chile in any dish simply rocks my culinary world.  Guess I'm easy.  Last night we enjoyed a Cilantro Lime Chile Shrimp with a rice noodle and braised Bok choy which

 is an Asian bitter green.  I enjoy this so much that I want to have it again and again but I translate it into variations in order that I may remain living at home.  Some discoveries are the Shrimp Taco

 version, the Chile Lime Cilantro Fajita a la slow cooker, and the clever Beef and Bean Empanada with Cilantro-Lime dip, it's a little sneaky but it satisfies the need.

This favorite knit pattern, which is knit on the diagonal and shown on the right, has been around for as long as I can remember.  It's easy, mindless hand work.  This little gem can even been done in much larger scale and created to be a pet blanket or for baby.  Something fun and out of the box is to use an acrylic  yarn and knit the dishcloth.  Most knitters only envision this in cotton but acrylic, that cheapy-do yarn is great because it doesn't hold on to the water or the bacteria so there is less if any odor and germs over time.  I've done this in the outrageous looking discount scary yarn and found that in this small scale, it is not nearly as atrocious.  Have you tried tawashi? You owe it to yourself to check it out.  Fun acrylic scrubbie patterns from Japan translated to English knit and crochet patterns such as this knit spiral tawashi shown here on left. Crochet version here.

And once, while attending some girly party of Bunko or the like, the host served popcorn.  It was a somewhat classy evening so I thought for a moment: Popcorn? As the evening wore on, ladies hovered over the popcorn like it was a cute guy whispering sweet nothings only to them.  It looked like ordinary popcorn and, being a little bit of a snob of course, I thought "it's just popcorn, what's the big deal?"  Well, I had some and it was more than "just popcorn" in was the kind of thing which makes you beg "what's in this?!"  For several seconds my taste buds were dancing with wonderment and gaiety. Yes, gaiety.  This stuff was delightful.  It turns out, it was White Chocolate Popcorn and this is the recipe.