{Eating, Garden}

Victoria, Victorious

6.17.10
photos by george billard

Rhubarb abounds at the moment. Driving along the little country roads out here, you see many a luxuriant patch with broad, lofty, ruffly green leaves and the occasional gorgeous flower soaring above. The markets are full of the celery-like stalks in shades that range from rose to raspberry. I’d been feeling a tad deficient for having produced such adamantly green rhubarb, but then I looked up the variety we planted and it turns out Victoria rhubarb is meant to be green! Naturally, it’s not the one most commercially favored, since everyone is attracted to the gaudy red stuff, but I’m now quite proud of my green stalks with the discreet hint of pink at the very base. It tastes just as wonderful, and I find the color makes a lovely counterpoint to the vivid strawberries with which it’s so often paired. Food52 continues to be an inspiration (even though my strawberry-fennel ice cream, nominated last week, did not win—#$@$%#!), and I think you’ll love this simple but flavorful poached rhubarb that I’ve topped with strawberry preserves that deliver a bit of heat. Make it now, before all that beautiful red (or green) rhubarb has seen its best days.

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It’s a Bird!

6.7.10


I’ve always been into birds. Where I grew up, in Santa Cruz, California, we had lots of bossy Stellar blue jays, noisy woodpeckers, seagulls, and hummingbirds that drank from our bottlebrush bushes. But I developed a great passion for spotting birds when we were in India. Gliding along the backwaters of Kerala in the South, binoculars glued to my face, I saw some truly exotic beauties—tiny, vividly colored kingfishers, long-legged herons, split-tailed drongos—and I was hooked! My girlfriend Lisa and I even kept a list of our sightings. It was truly a thrill to watch it grow. With the advent of spring, and G’s frequent replenishment of our feeders, our yard is full of bluejays, mourning doves (I adore their sorrowful coos), waxwings, red-breasted robins and lots of other little brown birds I have yet to identify. And on our forays beyond, we’ve encountered many others, such as the enormous turkey vulture, above. The fringe-like quality of its wings makes it easily identifiable, and they’re often circling in groups of three or four. This weekend we saw one hunched over a dead deer at the side of the road. They’re rather ugly, these carrion-eaters, and yet they have their place in the cycle. Read the rest of this entry »

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{Garden}

June Blooms

6.2.10


I know I just posted some pictures of flowers from my garden, but I couldn’t resist sharing this profusion of peonies. A couple of weeks earlier than usual, they all blossomed at the same time, weighing their branches down to the ground and reminding me of that old song June is busting out all over! I brought them inside by the armful and it’s truly an embarrassment of riches. You can just make out the one single-petal variety, like a shy young girl next to all the bosomy, full-blown ladies in white, pink and fuchsia.


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This Bud’s For You

5.31.10
photos by george billard

The heat came early this year and with just enough rain it coaxed out lots of flowers we normally don’t see quite this soon. We added a bunch of peony plants to our patch, and the new arrivals are already making beautiful music in the garden. G’s pampered rhododendrons seem happy, one group of lilies is up, the tiny roses are all abud, the succulent garden is colorful and my beared irises are standing tall. It’s a sight to behold.


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Spill, Baby, Kill

5.29.10


I am grief-stricken. Here are just some of the innocent creatures currently dying because of the gulf oil spill: Birds, Reptiles & Amphibians, Fish, Invertebrates, Habitats & Plants, Wetlands, Marine Mammals and Terrestrial Mammals, including but not limited to pelicans, sea otters, tortoises,  seals, shrimp, oysters, plankton, sea gulls, plovers, algae, turtles,  dolphins, egrets, insects, crabs, herons, fish, manatees, sea lions, whales, jellyfish, porpoises. This is an outrage and a tragedy: one that could have and should have been avoided. And yet further evidence that this country must turn away from fossil fuel consumption and toward a future of alternative energy sources.





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Creature Feature: Swamp Things

5.24.10


This weekend was full of interesting animal friends. Pulling off the road to get a closer look at some baby geese, we wound up near a swampy pond where we saw a big osprey nest poised on top of a tall, limbless dead tree. With the binoculars, we could just make out the top of somebody’s head and then, sure enough, mama (or daddy?) came swooping in with a big fish dangling from its talons! And just then, lumbering across the field and heading straight for the water was this big dame—a snapping turtle with a long tail like an alligator’s, big beady eyes and plenty of attitude. She must have weighed about 20+ pounds, but they can get up to 45!


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The Sky Is Falling

5.9.10
all photos by george billard

That’s sure what it sounded like some time after midnight last night, when this tree came crashing down onto our little barn. We were just drifting off to sleep when we heard a few strange squeaks that we thought might be some new sort of nocturnal visitor. (In retrospect, I think it was the straining of the wood before it split.) It was windy last night, powerful gusts blowing in the rogue snow showers predicted for early this morning. Suddenly there was a loud wrenching thud, the sound of damage. G went racing out with the night-vision goggles and reported back that a major tree was down. In the morning we were greeted with this grim aftermath…


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The Night Visitor (Bear 2.0)

5.7.10


You won’t believe this, but there was ANOTHER bear in the yard and this one was ENORMOUS. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get a picture because it was night. (This one is an approximation I pulled off the web.) We came home late and I was puttering in the kitchen when I heard some loudish crashing noises outside. Thinking it was G, I called out to him but he was in the bedroom, on the other side of the house! He immediately ran over with the night-vision goggles (the best birthday present I ever got him) and spied a huge bear UP IN THE TREE behind our house. It was trying to pry open our metal bird-feeder to get at the black sunflower seeds we’ve since learned are a bear favorite. (The feeder is now dismantled. Sorry, Tweety.) Then I looked through the goggles and was TERRIFIED! The bear was looking right at me and, because of the night vision, his eyes were like big green saucers. My heart was pounding and it didn’t help that the sister-in-law was giving me a blow-by-blow over the phone of how a bear broke into David Letterman’s house and ripped the door off his fridge. WTF? Our house started to feel like a cardboard shack. G said the bear was over 7 feet tall!!! But eventually it scrambled down and lumbered away, and later I fell so sound asleep I didn’t even hear it come back in the middle of the night. Good thing G stays on the alert…

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Sow What?

5.5.10
photos by george billard

I’ve got so much to share with you! This is a very exciting time of year, as all sorts of things start to happen out in the garden. On Saturday—a sweltering, faux-summer day—we visited our local organic nursery, Silver Heights Farm, where they specialize in wonderful heirlooms and rare varieties. (They have a great website, and a booth at the farmers’ market in NYC’s Union Square.) We haven’t gotten it together yet to start things from seed, and we are so spoiled by their incredible greenhouses fairly bursting with baby plants. G and I are like kids in a candy store, and we tend to overbuy. He took some beautiful pictures of the initial planting, mostly lettuces, a few peas, onions, shallots, cauliflower, broccoli, lots of kale and chicories, and fennel. Cucumbers, tomatoes, Japanese eggplant, tomatillos and summer squash will go in later. I’m also posting an in-progress shot of one end of the garden. You can see one of the places we are in the process of installing flagstone paths, as well as the area marked off for a new raised bed.


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Creature Feature: Exotics

5.3.10
photos by george billard

Is this not the cutest thing you have ever seen? A baby hedgehog! I was beside myself. Could not resist posting a couple of photos from nephew Stan’s 4th birthday party. Aside from baby hedgehog and the enormous (20+ lbs) python below, there was an angora rabbit, a skink (very cool), a tortoise, a chinchilla, some guinea pigs, giant cockroaches (gag) and various other lizards. A good time was had by all, big and small.


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