Fresh tomato sauce

As summer wanes, I picked the last and first of my San Marzano tomatoes. the upside-down tomato planter that looked so promising has proved to be a dud. I think part of the problem is that when you water tomato plants upside down a lot of water drips down on the plant, which promotes fungus. So I ended up with just a small basket-full of tomatoes. Exactly enough for one batch of tomato sauce.

I've been working hard to eat my garden bounty as it ripens. I've been eating tons of cucumber/tomato/basil salads and the squash I grew was delicious prepared simply. Sliced and fried in olive oil along with thickly sliced onions. This tomato sauce came wonderfully. All of the ingredients were either grown by me or bought at the farmers market.

The Farmer & the Cook booth at the Ojai farmers market had some wonderful looking cipolline onions. I still have some garlic left that I grew, along with basil and oregano from my garden.

>Fresh tomato sauce

About 20 San Marzano tomatoes
2-3 tablespoons olive oil1 cipolline onion diced
3 to 4 cloves of garlic finely minced
1/4 cup fresh oregano coarsely chopped
1/4 cup fresh basil coarsely chopped
1 teaspoon salt
pepper to taste
1 cup red wine
1-2 cups water

Peel the tomatoes by cutting and x in the end and plunging into a pot of boiling water for 1 minute. Remove from boiling water and plunge into cold water. The skins will come right off. Squeeze each tomato by hand to squeeze out excess seeds and liquids. You don't have to be too rigorous in this, some seeds are fine. Heat olive oil in Dutch oven over medium high heat. Add onions and cook until translucent. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add tomatoes and cook, breaking up the tomatoes with a wooden spoon. Add herbs, salt pepper and wine. Cook over low heat for at least two hours, keeping a close eye on the sauce, stirring and adding water as the sauce reduces and thickens.
I added my lo-carb meatballs (See March 15 post) and cooked the sauce an additional half hour. I served it with spaghetti and Parmesan cheese.

Farewell fair

This is what fireworks look like through fog
Bird's eye view on a foggy night from the ferris wheel
Having fun at the fair

It's been a few days since the fair ended and I'm going through the same kind of letdown I go through after all events I eagerly anticipate, like Christmas. The fair grows each year in its important to me and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because it's the only county fair in California that's actually on the beach, although this year that wasn't a plus because the fog seemed relentless.

I was able to write eight fair stories, which meant that I went there for all of those and then I went back one more night on my own to take pictures. I couldn't enter the baked goods contest this year because the oven is down, but being able to talk to all the ladies at Home Arts who judge and run the contests was a great next best thing.

There were also some really fun stories, like the watermelon cracker eating/whistle blowing and the Eagle Scout who built the interactive exhibit. And the Penny family with their lovely, outgoing self-assured kids were a delight.

I realized this year that I was doing exactly what I want to be doing, which is going to these events and writing about them. On top of that, we were able to bring Kaia to the fair and had a great time w/her, although I had to leave early to cover the naming of the grand champion and reserve grand champion at the fair.

This is also the last week for the peaches. I've made peach preserves, brandied peach, no-sugar-added peach chutney.

So with the fair over, the peaches picked and pickled and my first first day of school, I suppose summer is unofficially over.

Enough about you, let's talk about me

Some of you may be noticing that I seem to be doing a lot more posting these days and that you're learning more than you ever wanted to know about the minutiae of my life and then, again maybe not. But just so you know this is all a part of a concerted effort on my part to create a brand, as such concepts are called in corporatese.

I am a journalist and, as has been widely disseminated, newspapers are imploding. The fact that they aren't the cash cows the moguls had come to expect, as they cleaned up in advertising revenue and posted massive profit margins, has caused considerable angst and upheaval in the industry. Ultimately, I believe this is for the best. Newspapers will get smaller and, with any luck, rededicate themselves to the actual gathering and disbursing of information. And the Sam Zells of the world will be vomited out to take their retched brand of capitalism to some other industry.

Most newspapers have forgotten that the whole point of the enterprise is to be the watchdog of our society. We try to tell the stories that provide insight and understanding of the increasingly baffling world. Most journalists I know are truly dedicated to free speech and the fourth estate. The whole "media bias" and "media conspiracy" things are just laughable for most day-to-day journalists.

While I'm not so naive to believe that deals are brokered behind closed doors -- I remember the very first job I had at a newspaper when a reporter had some water treatment leads that would expose some questionable practices, he was explicitly told to back off because the water district superintendent was a friend of the publisher -- overall journalists live for the stories they tell, trying to be as fair and honest in that telling as they can possibly be. As with all endeavors, there are those who do a better job than others. There are those who have more scruples than others.

But in this new wild and woolly age, one thing seems clear, each of us is in it for ourselves and that means that in addition to gathering facts and chasing down leads, we need to be promoting ourselves and our work. Up to now, I've never been very good at self-promotion, but now I'm giving it a whirl.

My goal is to try to create a reputation for being able to write good, well-written, fair and accurate stories. I'm not terribly picky about the focus of the stories, just as long as they're good and compelling. If I can write about my favorite topics, one of which is food, or do some good by bringing attention to an issue that needs support, such as the stand-down for homeless veterans, which I recently wrote about, then so much the better.

To build this reputation, I feel it's important to do what I love to do, which is write, and to take advantage of the new world of social media, which is heavily dependent on the written word.

So when you see my big blueberry face, yet again, in your news stream prattling on about some meal or some cute thing the dogs did, try not to roll your eyes, and resist the temptation to hide me from your feed. And if you have any ideas for good stories, I'd love to hear them.

So now do you get the photo I used with this entry, throw me a bone? Get it? Cause I want people to give me writing jobs? Get it?)

The bounty of summer

Our tomatoes are coming in, slowly but surely from our upside-down planter and so far -- knock on wood -- there is no sign of the tomato caterpillars that have destroyed my crops in previous years. We have had a lot of problems with blossom drop and I've been adding egg shells and more potting soil, which seems to have helped.

The tomatoes that are doing the best are the small red, tomatoes and the San Marzano tomatoes, which are thriving. They have just started to ripen, so I took the first San Marzano (the little tomatoes I just eat straight up with ground sea salt) tomato and decided to make it into a grilled pizza.

We went to the best Von's in Ventura (at the corner of Victoria and Telegraph) to do our weekly shopping. Off to the side, we found something called Flatout Flatbread, light original. What makes this especially appealing are the 6 effective carbs per piece, which is made from whole grains. There is a picture on the label that promises that it "Makes Great Pizza!" And I thought -- really?

Our oven isn't working these days, so I knew I'd have to make whatever creation I came up with on the grill. I had the idea of incorporating the delicious tomatoes and basil from my garden with some buffalo mozzarella and grated cheese. The tomato/basil combination is one of the reason I love summer so much and I try to make as many versions as I can each season.

Rob was psyched, but wanted a more traditional pizza with sauce and cheese. I grilled my pizza directly on the grill and Rob had the idea of using aluminum foil. I thought his idea was brilliant until he cooked his and it became a soupy, gloopy mess. The direct grilling made the pizza crisp, but watch it, it will burn quickly.

Grilled caprese pizza

1 Flatout flatbread light original
olive oil
1 San Marzano or roma tomato, thinly sliced
5-6 whole basil leaves, ripped by hand into small pieces, or cut into a chiffonade
2 small balls of buffalo mozzarella broken into small pieces
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Brush the flat bread on both sides with olive oil. Top the flatbread with sliced tomatoes, basil and mozzarella. Put pizza directly on the grill over medium heat, watching carefully, for about 2-3 minutes. Remove and sprinkle with Parmesan. Slice and serve.

Stuck in the middle

I've always been a firm believer in civility between divorced parents. My parents divorced when I was very young and they had an angry relationship, which scarred me, as I tried to avoid taking sides, while still retaining my parents love. It didn't work. Both parents have founds ways through the years to let me know how disappointed they were in me and the fact that I didn't throw myself one way or the other. It sucks.

I decided my kids wouldn't have to go through the same thing and my ex and I maintained a civil relationship for years after our divorce. I would call him to talk about the girls. Even after I married Rob, I could stil talk to my ex perfectly pleasantly any time I so desired.

As far as Rob's relationship with the girls, he made it clear from Day 1 that he was their step-father. They have a father and he was never, ever, going to intrude on that relationship. He believes that there is enough room in the girls' lives to allow both relationships between father and daughter and between step-parent and child to flourish.

I completely support him in this. My mother tried to have us call my stepfather daddy and even though I was a child, I was incensed. I HAVE a father, I said. My father, to his great credit, never allowed my mothers antipathy to chase him away from his children, the way so many dads do. He was always an important and vital part of my life, despite all efforts to exclude him.

The girls, their dad, Rob and I all continued along in a fairly civilized and peaceful manner unit She came along. My ex-husband decided to remarry and his new bride immediately began claiming the girls as her own. The tension began as soon as she swapped rings and inserted herself in our ives.

She was soon dubbed the "stephorse" by the girls' friends, a name that seemed fitting, mean but fitting, especially in light of her behavior, which was controlling to say the least. She would call and leave angry messages on our answering machine, screaming and berating the girls for some imagined slight. She would call, scream and hang up on them, leaving my 12-year-old daughter in tears. One summer visit was marred when she slapped my oldest across the face when my daughter yelled "You're not my mother!"

She started demanding that I be excluded from family events. My relationship with my ex has always been complicated by the fact that we are first cousins, so the family remains in common even after the ill-conceived marriage ended. She wouldn't go to my cousin's wedding if I would be there She wouldn't allow the girls to speak my name in her presence. She started referring to the girls as "her" children.

As the years wore on, her behavior became even more egregious. She wouldn't go to any family event when my oldest daughter was graduating from college. She tried to hold a brunch where I was specifically excluded after my daughter's college graduation. The brunch was to be held at my father's house, which she and my ex traditionally (remember my ex is my dad's nephew -- the whole first cousin thing) visited when they came to town. She refused to go the the party my daughter had organized rather than have one or the other parent take charge, taking her son to a museum instead.

When my youngest was graduating from high school, the stephorse made sure that she and the ex steered clear of any events where I would be present. From time to time, the girls would stand up to her -- at great price. The ex is known for screeching diatribes and chilly silences when her wishes have been thwarted. She is one of those people who enters a room and demands that everyone there adjust their behavior to her wishes. If it's too hot for her tastes, she will demand the temperature be lowered; if the food is too spicy it has to be re-made. If people are too loud, they need to be quiet.

My oldest daughter finally decided that enough was enough. She now has children of her own and doesn't have the time or energy to continue the ridiculousness. I don't care. While I can't say I enjoy the company of the stephorse, she doesn't really have much of an effect on me. Like most people who take themselves way too seriously and demand the world follow suit, she is easy to ridicule, but I do that behind her back, of course.

The only thing the stephorse says in her defense is that I once yelled in my own home at our dog to be quiet, and somehow, some way this offended her so deeply, she decided that she could never be around me again. In the meantime, she continues to make every effort to create discord and strife. She won't allow her son to be around me, although I've never been anything but welcoming to the poor kid. It's not his fault he was adopted by a lunatic.

I don't care about this woman and her claims to my daughters. They're adults and they can handle their own lives. What I resent, however is the fact that they claim to be stuck in the middle. I don't care about this woman. I'm not playing. There is no Middle.

No. Seriously. I. Don't. Care. I can be in the same room. I will be civil. I will smile and share food and my family. I know how to behave. I was raised with a modicum of manners. This is not my fight. Both Rob and I have always wondered why we provoke such irrational anger on the part of various ex's and steps. But we're not the ones fighting. We prefer to spend our days sitting around playing with our dogs. The drama ends here.

Rob's birthday and other milestones

I'm not sure when the summertime became so filled with birthdays and other anniversaries. I suppose it really started right after I met Rob just days before Courtney's birthday. One of our first events together was celebrating his birthday. I made him a Black Forest cake, but the cherries and all the chocolate kept sliding off, so it looked terrible. It was tasty, though.

Now June with Alex's and Courtney's birthday, and Rob's and my anniversary is busy and July is busy with Rob's birthday and my AA birthday (four years :-). Rob's brother Jon also has a birthday in July as does Jon's wife Suzette.

It's a busy time, which is odd because summertime should be all about long, languorous days and this year it's all about running around and covering events in Ventura County. I'm so delighted that my freelance career is taking off. I've always loved writing but my biggest hurdle has always been getting people to read what I write. I remember one editor at the Dayton Daily news giving me all kinds of advice about my writing and seeking other opinions so I could improve. "So you've read my work?" I asked. "Well no," she said, and then she went on with her "tips." It was odd. I would give my clips to my bosses and they would just ignore them. Whenever people would read my stuff, however, they tended to really like it.

I finally gave up and decided to go ahead and pursue a job on the copy desk, something I resisted in Dayton, but decided to do in California. Biggest. Mistake. Of. My. Life. Looking back I can see it was an experiment destined to failure. Frankly I don't give a rat's ass if groundwater is one or two words. I don't care if the blues is plural or not. I tried to make myself care. I tried to fit in. But creativity and copy editing tend to be mutually exclusive terms and the truly creative people get kicked off early.

Now I'm back to writing and I've never been happier. I get to go all around Ventura County -- my favorite place on earth -- and talk to people, share in their lives and tell their stories. There was a time -- back in my "drinking days" -- when I knew I was in real trouble with alcohol because I couldn't be happy without it. I realized that was probably the most dangerous thing that could happen to me, and I was right. Nonetheless, it was true.

But just recently I've been walking through the hills in Ojai working on a story about a Boy scout Camporee or trudging on the beach at Ventura Harbor to do a story on outrigger canoes, and I realize I am truly happy, happier than with alcohol. There are those who say that such a statement invites the evil eye, but on the other hand are you being ungrateful if you don't express thanks for good fortune and appreciate it as such?

This summer, I've been able to work and to have fun. For Rob's birthday, we drove to Malibu -- one of my favorite drives -- to Hows Market to pick up some prime t-bone steaks. One of the first things we noticed about California is the death of good beef. I'm not sure why. There are lots of cows around, but the beef is crap. We found some steaks at the high-end markets Bristol Farms and Lazy Acres, but they were obscenely expensive. Then we discovered Hows, which has a store by Trancas Canyon in Malibu.

For Rob's birthday, I bought a bunch of the steaks to grill. If I may say so myself they were perfection. I rubbed them with crushed garlic cloves and olive oil and salted them. Four minutes a side over a hot flame, and they were perfection.

I made some fresh corn using my patented microwave method, (wrap shucked corn that's been rinsed in water. Wrap loosely with plastic wrap. Place in the microwave for a minute and then turn the corn and cook for 50 seconds. Remove the hot corn from the oven and let sit for five minutes.) Rob, Lindsay and Ryan had baked potatoes and the meal was perfection.

Finally, I had some "dragon beans, we've been buying at the Ojai farmers market. Rob was the first to discover them and he had to have them because they look so weird. I cooked them up, you just put them in salted boiling water for about 3 to 4 minutes and rinse them with cold water to stop the cooking. But they are also delicious raw. The unfortunate part of cooking them is that they lose the purple markings in the hot water. But they are our latest discovery and they are delicious.

Shushers and tourons

So when do people -- especially women, for some reason -- make the decision to take it upon themselves to be the arbiters of all volume at public events? You know them: They're the ones who, when the person in front of the room is trying to get the attention of the crowd, officiously hold their index fingers to their pursed lips and excrete a loud hissing SHHHHHHHHHHHH, their eyes glaring with indignation.

I'm not a shusher. I tend to shut up when asked to or when concerts and other events begin. So I really don't need Ms. Manners wagging that bony digit in my direction. Most of the time shushers are women. Middle-aged women, especially, love to, in fact live to tell the world what to do. It's understandable, I suppose. Middle age brings home to women how truly powerless they are in this society. As soon as they lose that dewy attractiveness that seems to captivate the world, they find no one really is interested in them at all.

Go to a crowded counter where there is no numbering system. No matter who is waiting on the group, the men will get attention first. Then the attractive people. Then the seniors. Then the rest, kids, teens and middle-aged women. I've stood in many a crowd watching wave after wave get waited on while I'm ignored. It's infuriating. But it hasn't led to shushing, at least not yet.

I suppose complaining becomes such a siren call to older people because it's a way of dissecting the world as one has less and less impact on it. Of course, there are many who just love to complain for the sake of complaining. Perhaps they feel superior because only they have standards that can never be met.

So now I've complained about the complainers and shushed the shushers. I suppose I will just sit there quietly, letting the shushers enjoy their vital function in the worldwide order. After all without their sibilant shushes civil society would degenerate into cacophonous chaos.



We call them tourons affectionately as the invade our sleepy seaside town year after year. They are the hands that feed us, they bring tons of much-needed money here and add some excitement, but if you've ever been late for an appointment or for work and you're behind someone who has no idea of where he/she is and where he/she is going, you'd understand the Venturan frustration at the bumbling, impatient, rude and annoying influx we invite here to spend money.

Tourons don't know the roads like we locals do, so they do things like stay in the left lane on Hwy 33 as it passes Stanley going south, despite the numerous signs saying that traffic merges from the left. They don't know that the intersection of Harbor Boulevard and California Street is not a three-way stop and that traffic from California going onto Harbor has right of way and doesn't stop. They don't know all the quirky nonsensical things about this town so they seem to be in the way a lot.

The place where the tourons put the moron in tourist is always at the beach. Despite the fact that it's a crime in California to in any way disturb or harass wildlife, you'll always see tourons swinging starfish by their legs, poking anemones or running at the seagulls flapping their arms to make them fly, as the guy in this picture was just doing before I took this picture.

I want to go up to them and read them the riot act. "What the hell are you doing? Leave the poor animals alone." But then I would be akin to the shushers. And that's just not me. Yet. So I grit my teeth, take their picture and watch them write on the wet sand -- something every touron does. At least they didn't ignore the vast expanse of beach to come and sit 10 feet from us.

Red, white and yummy

Since we've been without an oven, I haven't been able to bake, which is probably a good thing because I'm not tempted to break my diet. But a recipe from epicurious.com caught my eye and I just had to try it. OF course, I did change it up a bit. The original recipe is for no-bake raspberry cream pie, but I made it with strawberries.

Here in Ventura County, Calif., we grow some of the best strawberries in the world. While we ship out the big, wax-covered sturdy, but relatively tasteless varieties, the sweeter, much more perishable varieties are reserved for sale locally at area farmers markets. But you have to be careful and taste them because they range from the spongy, fairly bitter berries to the really sweet berries, like the ones I bought at the Simi Valley farmers market.

One of my favorite smells in the world is driving around Ventura County through lemon orchards and strawberry fields. Sometimes you can smell both at once and the smell is deliciously intoxicating. This pie tastes like that smell combines with a nice, rich chocolate-y crust. I added some cookies and butter, along with a teaspoon of vanilla, which adds dept to the flavor. I would recommend spraying the pie pan with a baking oil because it does stick to the sides because it's impossible to press the crumbs up the side of the pie dish without pressing them down

According to the recipe, the lemon juice combines with the sweetened condensed milk and creme fraiche, available at Trader Joes, to make a kind of custard. I put the cut berries on top of the pie and let it set overnight, which was a mistake. Reserve the second half of the berries until right before serving. I considered doubling the filling because it doesn't make that much, but this is very rich and it doesn't need more filling, although a dollop of whipped cream would be good.

No-bake Strawberry Cream Pie (adapted from Bon Appetit magazine recipe)

8 ounces chocolate wafer cookies (about 35), coarsely broken
1/2 cup bittersweet chocolate chips
7 tablespoons (3/4 stick) butter, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1/4 cup crème fraîche*
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon peel
2 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, hulled and cut into quarters lengthwise

Place broken cookies in processor. Using on/off turns, process until finely ground. Place chocolate chips, butter, and sugar in microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on high at 15-second intervals until melted, stirring occasionally. Add vanilla. Add chocolate mixture to processor and blend until combined. Press crumb mixture onto bottom and up sides of 9-inch glass pie dish that has been sprayed with a non-stick baking oil(do not pack firmly). Chill crust while preparing filling.

Whisk condensed milk, crème fraîche, lemon juice, and lemon peel in large bowl to blend. Add half of strawberries. Stir, pressing gently on some strawberries, until strawberries begin to break apart and filling turns pink. Transfer filling to crust. Chill until filling is set, about 2 hours or overnight for a good set.

Scatter remaining strawberries over pie. Cut into wedges and serve with sweetened whipped cream.

*Sold at Trader Joes.

Kitchen science: The filling firms as it chills, creating nice clean slices of pie—but it doesn't contain any thickeners. The secret? Lemon juice. When it reacts with the other ingredients, it helps thicken the filling.

I brought this pie with me when we went to Gen and Sean's to celebrate the 4th of July. Earlier in the day I covered celebrations in Oxnard and Ventura. The annual Ventura 4th of July street festival has grown to amazing proportions. It took me 40 minutes to park. It reminded me of the Waynesville Sauerkraut Festival, which I used to cover each year when I lived in Ohio, although there were no sauerkraut brownies and doughnuts, like there were in Waynesville. The Waynesville celebration usually topped 250,000 people and I swear the crowds were about as big in Ventura.

I also covered the Summerfest Dog show and will be going back there tomorrow for the best in Show award. I've been having so much fun with these assignments, especially considering that last week I was having a terrible time getting people to talk to me. I had not one, but two people just blow me off. I hate when this happens because I only get paid when I get a story. Plus I just hate to be blown off.

I did manage to write one of my favorite ledes on one of the dog show series when I went to pet the head of an Old English Sheepdog the owner had just spent a hours grooming and smushed the dog's hair down. I never realized how much I missed reporting, and now, looking back I can see what a big mistake it was to ever leave it. I just love the role of observer and chronicler.

I believe that there is a greater demand for real journalists, especially reporters, than ever before as people's appetite for information becomes increasingly voracious. It's just the vehicle for those stories has changed and no one seems to know how to make the obscene profits they made in newspapers -- the profits that have proved to be the eventual undoing of the entire industry.

So I'll just keep honing my writing skills and working at keeping to the basic core values of journalism, which, to me, are making the world a bit better by keeping those lines of communication, so necessary for all of us to have type of freedom, open.

Yippie Kai-a!

Kaia came over to visit for three days because Gen and Sean were going up to wine country to spend some vacation time together. We set up the aerobed in our bedroom for her, with a featherbed on top. Rob put a TV in there and she was able to watch movies while she laid in bed. She loved it.

The first day we went to the farmers market in Ojai where Rob bought Kaia a Webkinz at Serendipity Toys, the coolest toy store in the world where I'm always getting things for the little ones in my life. It was on to Art's Corner Cafe where Kaia was very impressed by the caricature of Rob and me they having hanging there, (chicken Rob and Big Anne, we've never been able to decide which of us should be more insulted). Then she ran into a friend from school, so she knew it really is a cool place.

After I had to go to Port Hueneme to cover Seabee Days, which was interesting because I've never been on the Naval base here. Before I moved to Ventura, I'd never heard of the Seabees, the navy construction engineers who run around the world building things lick-ety split. They build roads and bridges for advancing armies. They build facilities for people to work and live in. But they also do a lot of humanitarian aid around the world, digging wells, building schools and other public works projects in developing countries. It makes my little pacifistic heart happy to hear that our military isn't just about war.

We went to Carrow's for dinner where I had the gross-t beef and Rob had a Mile High sandwich. Kaia got a sundae with chocolate sauce and hot fudge on top and declared it the best overnight EVER. We were both so proud. Monday was fun day and we went to the Teva outlet store, Deckers Factory Outlet, in Ventura to get Courtney her birthday present and bought Kaia a pair of Teva sandals for $4.99. Then back to Ojai for more Webkinz (they were $7.99 a piece and include a special code so Kaia can register them online and make the into virtual pets). Lunch was at Ojai Pizza, where the portions were huge, the wings were perfectly prepared (which is not an easy thing) and the sauce was too sweet for my taste and on to Libbey Park where Kaia made a 4-year-old friend who proceeded to eat her leftovers.

The entire time Kaia regaled us with her fantastical stories of friends, her endless enthusiasm and vivid imagination. She is such a joy and we're lucky to have her in our lives.

Now we have Gen and Sean's dog Keba visiting because Gen, Sean and Kaia are all in Ohio visiting Rick and Marilyn. Keba came with Kaia during the wine tasting too. She's one of my favorite dogs. She's a German Shepherd mix and I'm not sure what she was mixed with, but it was enormous. Despite being a huge dog with a basso profundo voice that literally rattles the house, she's a timid baby. The rest of the dogs keep trying to put her in her place, so she needs extra attention, and so do they. the cats were angry at first, but now have decided Keba isn't a real threat.

I was given the go-ahead to enjoy the summer when I found out I wasn't kicked out of the Ventura County Master Chorale. I had auditioned originally to get in back in August 2008 and for some reason the director, Burns Taft, decided he wanted everyone to audition again. I figured the audition would be like the first one where I had been asked to do some rudimentary sight reading and to sing my prepared song. But this audition was much harder. The accompanist played two notes and asked me what interval they were -- a third, a fifth and a diminished sixth (WTF?. Then I had to sing a chromatic scale. A what? Oh. half steps. But I was so rattled I couldn't get my mind around what a half step was, even though I do know that. She played a major chord, then a minor one, but she played weird chords that sound major at first and then got all minor.

I played the cello back in high school and read music then but really haven't much in the intervening years. I know that a lot of people in the choir are music teachers or at least were music majors. Me, I just love to sing, which apparently was the wrong answer, according to the grading brochure they had made up. There was a category under singing experience that referred to someone as "just loves to sing," with the phrase dripping with sarcasm and listed as a 4 on their scale of 1 to 5 with 1 being the best.

The entire experience was humiliating. As Rob pointed out, I was totally blindsided. I had no idea they were going to ask such questions. I wish I had known because I would have been able to work on chromatic scales and intervals, which I pick up really easily because I do have a good ear. I'm not going to quit or anything because I do just love singing and am so happy to have this back in my life. I'll try to see if I can get private voice lessons, which are an actual course at Ventura College. I did that in Ohio, but I wasn't really working on music at the time. Now, I could really use some help with some of my vocal issues.

Anyway, at least now I don't have to burn the hideous black choir dress, which would have probably caused a noxious cloud and brought the EPA down on me.

Huanxontle aka lambs quarters

I've been feeling especially lucky lately because I've really been enjoying my assignments writing for the Ventura County Star
. It's a great arrangement for me because I don't have to be trapped in an office and I can get out and meet people and learn really cool things as I travel all around Ventura County.

Of course my very favorite assignment is writing the farmers market column. I love farmers markets anyway and to be paid to go around and scout out the farmers market scene in one of the most vibrant farmers market enclaves is especially exciting. The farmers market gig is made even more cool by the fact that farmers markets are really "in" right now, so there's always more and more to write about.

And even though I go to a farmers market a week to scope out the scene, I still go to Ojai each Sunday to my favorite home market. One of my favorite people there is B.D. Dautch who is always at the Ojai market at his Earthtrine Farms booth.

B.D. is a local favorite not only because he is a big proponent of the Slow Food movement, which has made huge strides in getting the message of local, old-fashioned food distribution out in this day and age of mass food poisonings. He also loves to grow unique, hard-to-find items that are in great demand by chefs from L.A. to San Francisco.

I love his frisee, which I made into a salad with apples, nuts (I generally use pecans, but lately have been using sunflower seeds, which are delicious) and gorgonzola or blue cheese. I added blackberries from the backyard to my Good Seasons (guilty pleasure) Italian dressing and it is amazing. I also get herbs and peruse the other goods, looking for anything intersting.

Last weekend I came on some odd looking stuff that looked like a weed. The sign said it was lambs quarters or huanxontle. I asked B.D. what the Hell it was and he said some of his guys had gone to Mexico and had found this stuff and brought back some seeds. B.D. said it made a great relleno.

I asked him how one would go about making what looked like a pile of weedy stuff into a relleno. He said to grab a small portion of it, blanch it and then roll it in cheese and an egg batter and serve it up with some red sauce.

It sat in my crisper for a week as I made excuses for not tackling the decidedly odd-looking stuff. It smells kind of flowery/fruity with nutty overtones, so it was intriguing. Finally, I screwed up my courage and made some up into rellenos. They were fantastic. I ate them with some Tapatio sauce and sour cream, along with a steak and the flavors were amazing.

Since you don't exactly stuff these like you would a traditional chile relleno, you should approach cooking them more like you would a potato pancake or fritter, with everything mounded in the skillet while you let the heat do the work of forming it into a cohesive whole.

Huanxontle rellenos

1 large bunch of huanxontle, also known as lambs quarters
1 cup Colby cheddar cheese, shredded
2 eggs
2 tablespoons white whole wheat flour
garlic powder (not salt)
onion powder (not salt)
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons canola oil

Blanch the huanxontle in a pot of boiling water for about 30 seconds,rinse and drain. Break off most of the woody stems and grab a small portion. Roll it in about a quarter cup of cheese. Whisk eggs and flour, along with onion and garlic powders and salt. Pour a quarter of the egg mixture into a separate dish. Roll the huanxontle and cheese in the mixture and mound the whole thing in a heated skillet skillet with canola oil. Repeat the process three more times, to make a total of four rellenos. Cook over medium high heat for about three to four minutes or until egg/cheese mixture is beginning to set and flip over and cook for another three to four minutes, or until golden brown. Serve with red sauce and sour cream.

Makes four rellenos. Multiply as needed for more rellenos. the egg batter proportions are 1 tablespoon white whole wheat flour to 1 egg.

Upside-down tomatoes

You've seen those commercials for those Topsy Turvy tomato dealies, which are basically glorified plastic bags that you have to find a hanger for, so you can grow tomatoes. Rob and I really like the concept, but seriously? A plastic bag with a hole in it for $9.95 and no way to hang the damn thing. That just seemed stupid.

But then, right before Mother's Day, we were on our monthly Sam's Club paper products run when we saw this black plastic container thing that you use to grow tomatoes and the top part could double as a planter. We decided it would be my Mother's Day present. Rob and I always select something we've coveted for Mother's Day. A couple of years ago, it was our gas grill, many years ago it was the beach bike I got hit on. This year it was the upside-down tomato planter.

We then headed up to the Ojai farmers market to get tomato plants from my favorite tomato plant grower Caryn Molinelli and we selected four plants, including brandywine and San Marzano, but these are all heirloom varieties. I assembled the plastic contraption while Rob poured sand from the beach in the bottom along with some water, to anchor it. The plants went through the holes easily. We added the soil and I transplanted some seedlings.

Usually when I plant my tomatoes they go through a couple of week of shock before they decide to dig in a grow. The plants in the tomato planter have taken off from Day 1. The black plastic keeps the soil nice and warm, which is important here because Ventura, being right next to the ocean, never gets really hot in the summer. Tomatoes actually like good, warm soil and the planter seems to be fooling the tomatoes into thinking they a lot warmer than they are.

Last year our tomatoes were devastated by tomato-eating caterpillars and I'm hoping our new arrangement will serve as a deterrent, while not freaking out the bees. But we did put the thing where our pool used to be, in the middle of our blackberry patch, and there are lots of bees there. We'll see.

Speaking of blackberries, I haven't been writing a lot about food lately because I've been on a strict low-carb diet. With all of the problems with my legs, it's more important than ever to lose weight. I had a lot to lose because I gained weight during my surgeries, despite trying really hard to watch what I ate.

The oven also broke and we haven't been able to fix it yet, so there hasn't been a lot of cooking. The other night, however, I did make a wonderful discovery. Last year, Rob cut back our blackberry bush in a futile attempt to get the thing under control.

We were given a small bush by a friend of Rob's when we first moved here. I asked him if it would run and he said, "Oh no. It's not the running kind." Ha! Like there is such a thing as non-running blackberries. Rob occasionally gets frustrated by the intrusive bugger and last year he really hacked it back. Of course, this meant it put out a bunch of new growth and we have some wonderful blackberries this year. After they bloom, I'm going to make him cut it back again.

Right now we have some amazing blackberries. They're huge and really sweet. The other night I was preparing to grill some chicken when I got inspired and added some blackberries and mashed them into the teryaki marinade I was using. The flavors went together amazingly well.

Blackberry teryaki grilled chicken

1 whole chicken, cut up
1 cup Veri Veri Teryaki or Trader Joe's Teryaki sauce
4 scallions sliced into 1/4 inch pieces (I used a bigger spring onion from the farmer's market and it was fabulous)
1 cup ripe blackberries
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder (fresh minced garlic, if you're not lazy)

Mix all the ingredients, except the chicken. Mash the blackberries into the teryaki mixture with a fork. Add the chicken and coat and marinade it in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes on each side. Heat a grill and grill the chicken over low heat for about 15 or 16 minutes a side. Make sure to spread the mashed blackberry and onion mixture on the chicken before it cooks. A lot will fall off, but a bunch will still stick.

Oh and BTW, I've lost more than 20 pounds so far, which is making my legs feel a lot better

Daddy's girl

Originally uploaded by daqvidbellbrook

Jesse and Jessica

Those are some cute kids

Originally uploaded by daqvidbellbrook

I'm not sure why Cody is squinting like Popeye, but those are some good-looking kids, the proud grandmom says.

That about sums it up

Originally uploaded by daqvidbellbrook

Cody and Jessica played together, I'm told, while Alex just took off in his own direction.

Jessica and Cody

Originally uploaded by daqvidbellbrook

Three grandkids

Originally uploaded by daqvidbellbrook

Rocking and rolling

I don't believe in prayer. Not that I don't pray, every human prays. Oh please, please, please let ME be the winner. Oh dear God, please don't kill me now! I just don't believe those prayers are much more than wishful thinking articulated. There does seen to be some kind of order to the universe, but beyond that I have no idea.

Sometimes that order even seems to come about in your own life. Just a few weeks ago, I found out my stepfather had died. Now I come face-to-face via photo with my step-granddaughter Jessica.

Apparently Courtney was out with her friend and they ran into my stepson, Jesse, with whom Rob has been in touch sporadically, and infrequently through the years. Courtney and Jesse decided to meet up on Mother's Day in a park near where they live just a few miles apart in Bellbrook, Ohio. Jesse brought his daughter Jessica, who turned 7 on May 9 and Courtney brought Cody and Alex.

Jesse had mentioned a daughter before, but seeing pictures of her -- a really cute, dark-haired beauty -- really brought it home. Courtney said that she and Jesse were both a bit awkward around each other, but it's been many years since they spoke and, she said, it's time to put the past and its grudges behind.

I think Courtney gave both Rob and me one of the best Mother's day presents ever with those photos of all three grandchildren playing together in a park in Bellbrook. But sometimes it is odd how tings work out, with such a scripted perfection. Cool.

Yes. They ARE all out to get you

This is a mommy Sheltand pony and her 1-week-old baby. They came walking by when we had breakfast Sunday with Lindsay and Ryan at the Farmer and Cook in Meiners Oaks. It was just a happy moment.

It started right after the New Year when our health insurance was inexplicably canceled out of nowhere. We'd been paying the premiums on time, but somehow they thought we owned them even more than the obscene sum we send them each month for CalCOBRA health insurance coverage. In California, workers are guaranteed health coverage even after losing their jobs if they work for a company with 25 or fewer people. COBRA covers people working for companies with more than 25 people.

They figured it out, reinstated us and jacked our bill and then jacked it some more. It costs as much for health insurance as it would to pay rent for a studio apartment. Of course once we got that all straightened out, it got all screwed up again.

If that weren't annoying enough, our health insurance Kaiser Permanente seems to be going through a rough spell, especially when it comes to customer service. They keep billing me for random amounts for procedures that have long been paid for. I did get them to reverse a $500 charge, but they keep coming back like inexorable flesh-eating zombies.

I started thinking maybe it was just us. That maybe we were extremely unlucky. It took all kinds of irate phone conversations to be upgraded to an iPhone because AT&T had screwed up our eligibility. I mean here I am locked and loaded, ready to spend a good sum of money and they won't even let me.

But as we were slogging though yet another day of calling rude customer service agent after rude customer service agent -- right now the insurance billing company needs to send us back our payment, and we can't seem to get them to do so -- I realized our housemate was on the phone having his own irate conversations. In the past couple of weeks he's had a couple of bureaucratic snafus that make our little problems seem trivial.

I started thinking that if what we are experiencing is actually becoming more and more normal, as companies cut back and customer service people, who are paid next to nothing and aren't usually the brightest bulbs in the socket, are overworked and as workloads become overwhelming and people make more mistakes, then we're all going to be spending more and more useless hours undoing the damage the idiots are causing.

Isn't this yet another one of those intangible drags that are threatening to suck us into a vortex of failure? As Cher said in that movies that she inexplicably won an Oscar for, "Snap out of it!" People have to start spending money and remembering basic economic principles of good customer service and good quality products. It's hard for all of us. Everything's been cut back and that sucks, but seriously, people still need to try a little harder.

My very favorite thing about the U.S. is that we're a scrappy country. Compared with the stodgy Europeans and the tradition-bound Asians and Middle Easterners, we tend to roll with the punches with greater agility because we don't tend to be governed by ancient mores. I'm just hoping that we can focus on rebuilding and going forward.

Our new president is right, we can make this a time of tremendous opportunity. But it will take a little hard work and a lot better attitude. Times are tough for everyone and seeing as we're all in it together, let's try to be a little nicer. This especially goes for those "customer service" people, but I'm also sending it out to that guy in the big white pickup truck who rode four inches from my rear bumper and is now swerving around me.

And I want to thank the people who are being nicer, like the bakery lady at Von's who saw me leaving the sorry-looking display of cookies. "Wait. I have some freshly baked ones," she said. I'll take a warm cookie any day.

Zen: In memorium

I found out yesterday that my stepfather died. My sister, Zizzy, with whom I have a tenuous relationship at best, sent me her annual Christmas card. I usually get it in March, but she was later than usual.

In the card she wrote "The big event of 2008 for me was the death of my father. He died of complications of a stroke and Parkinsons. Fortunately he had done some traveling in 2007/2008 and we saw him in Vermont, Ohio and NY." And with that, Zen is dead.

I'm not surprised I wasn't told more. It's not as though Zen liked me and would have wanted me to know (or comment) about what happened to him. But he was my stepfather since I was 10, having met my mom when I was 8. This behavior is normal for that side of my family, in which people stand ready to cut you off for life for so much as a missed thank you note.

I've spent many an hour with various therapists to be told that, basically, my mother and stepfather didn't like me at all. Every time I saw Zen he was furious with me for one reason or another. I would say "So what are you up to these days?" and he'd say "as little as possible" with as much hostility as he could muster, as though somehow it was MY expectations of him that were too high.

The last time I saw Zen was at my brother Lawrence's lavish New York City wedding (reception-at-The-Pierre lavish). My youngest Lindsay had somehow gotten into the tractor beam of some weird guy who kept grabbing her saying "I need to dance with her." Lindsay was about 7 at the time, and I ended up having to physically grab Lindsay and take her to the bathroom to escape this guy. I mentioned it to someone else there, that I was really creeped out by the inappropriate attention being paid to a 7-year-old. Zen found out and went ballistic. He wanted the guy arrested on the spot. For what? I thought, dancing too much with a 7-year-old? The guy hadn't done anything and I was making sure he wouldn't.

Mr. Delcol (sp?) -- the father of the bride -- reassured me that the creepy guy in question "was gay" (as though that would make it OK, which it didn't). I just wanted him away from my kid and wanted no more further embarrassing scenes and told DelCol that. Zen was apoplectic. He wanted the guy taken out in handcuffs and he was furious with me that I didn't share his fury.

That's the last time I saw Zen, but it pretty much defined our relationship. He tended to be furious with me. One year when I went to Colorado to spend Christmas with my dad and asked him to pick me up from the Newark airport, he was so angry at my "thoughtlessness" he drove the entire way from Newark to Princeton at about 95 mph, missing the mailboxes on the side of the road by inches. I've never been so terrified in my life.

So, I suppose that I would find out that he died sometime in 2008 in a belated Christmas card is fitting.

My brothers and I called him Zen after we met him. The first conversation, which became part of family legend, went roughly like this. "This is Mr. Zenowich," mom said.
"You look like Clark Kent," one of us (probably me) said.
"No. I'm more like Mighty Mouse," he said. Hilarity ensued.
We struggled with the name and he said to just call him "Zen." So we did.

Zen had a huge effect on my life and the way I think. He was one of the most intelligent people I ever knew and he shaped me intellectually. He once -- during a moment of honesty -- mentioned that he only liked me intellectually and he would nurture that. I guess what I got from Zen was the gift of original thinking. Zen was an iconoclast, always ready to shatter conventional wisdom.

When I lived at home, he was still struggling to make a career in the publishing world. But he hated it. And he would have fits of temper and quit his jobs, even though he was a really good editor, at least according to those authors he worked with. He had always bragged that he could live "perfectly happily" renting a room, with a bathroom down the hall, in New York, with no job or responsibility. My mom and Zen would have huge, ugly fights, made even uglier the greater the wine intake.

The fights used to freak my little sister Zizzy out. It was just her and me at home because my brothers ran away to my dad's because of the generally abusive nature of the household. (Zen actually broke his had once slamming it on the wooden table because he was angry at my brother.) I assured Zizzy that the marriage was OK. But it wasn't and Zen and my mom lived a kind of twilight marriage, where he would live with her for a while and then sometimes not.

I have no idea how Zen spent his final years. I have been estranged from my mom for a long time, after it became apparent that she planned to take the abusiveness that was her childrearing with me and apply it to my girls. The last time she saw my daughters, she spent most of her time drunkenly yelling at my youngest daughter for being "lazy, just like your mother." The girls made plans to to run away and escape her in the middle of the night. I could only think that I never wanted my daughters to experience what I had had to live with for the first 18 years of my life, so I decided enough was enough.

Zen pretty much was complicit with my mother and all I have left of my childhood are memories of desperately wanting to get away to where I wasn't despised. One time, I was trying to have Zizzy come visit me at college, but Mom and Zen wouldn't allow it until they talked with the psychologist I was seeing. After he spoke with both of them, in separate conversations, the shrink declared them to be the the most "awful" people he'd ever dealt with and his advice to me was to have as little to do with them as I could. Zizzy was never allowed to visit.

So I'm struggling with how, exactly, I deal with such a death. I never really hated Zen that much. But he always made it clear he didn't like me, despite mom's efforts to make us call him "dad." (Um, I already HAVE a dad, I blasphemed.) I can see his contemptuous smirk as I write this "what does this matter to YOU?" he'd say.

I wonder if my sister will let me know that my mom has died via a belated Christmas card.

Hammin' it up

We had a great Easter this year. The entire local family showed up, nephews, daughter, and we had assorted friends. It was a beautiful day and everyone had fun. Sean and Colin managed to fly the remote control bug that I got Rob for Christmas -- and has incidentally turned out to be one of the best presents I ever got him -- over to the lemon orchard. But they got it back. Kaia was delighted with her Easter egg hunt and made Rob find eggs that she hid. She also loved the musical jump rope Lindsay bought her. Kaia's been fixated on jump-ropes, and this one was perfect. even the dogs had a blast.

Our oven was broken, but I was able to use Lindsay's and she lives about 2 miles from here. I would have used Kim's but her oven is also broken. Despite the oven glitch, or maybe because it caused me to be more organized, everything came out on time and was tasty.

Because we're watching money these days, I've switched from the Honeybaked Ham, which I still love, to making my own because I can buy a 10-pound ham for $.77 a pound, and who can pass that up. I used a new method to make the ham and it came out great. I cooked the lamb on the grill. I've had problems with flare-ups and was running to get Dena from work, so I threw a big piece of aluminum foil on top of the grate under the lamb leg (which was on the top grate) and this solved all the flareup issues and the lamb cooked well.

I had made the scalloped potatoes a couple of days ahead and had Lindsay cook them ahead of time. Scalloped potatoes can be very hard to cook because they resist cooking through, especially if you make a big bunch, as I do. In warming them back up, they finished cooking and were at the perfect consistency. I got a bit carried away and bought too much asparagus, (which I served lightly cooked with melted butter and fresh-squeezed lemon) but I am having a great time eating all the leftover spears. I also served baby potatoes with butter, parsley and chopped scallions, which is a perennial favorite.

Gen brought garlic bread, which people devoured, and Kim brought a carrot cake from a local bakery. Lindsay also brought over an orange coffee cake she'd made that was quite delicious. In fact, it was what I broke my diet to eat.

I'm not sure why I had so much fun. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that -- for this moment in time -- we're all OK, we're together and we can enjoy each other's company. And as we've learned in the past few years, that's saying a lot.

Coke-baked ham

I had wanted to make ham with Coke for years because every Southerner swears by it. I bought a Mexican Coke -- made in Mexico and formulated with sugar, not high fructose corn syrup -- and poured that under the ham, which was placed big side down on a roasting rack in a roasting pan. I added about 1/2 cup of water, although looking back this probably wasn't necessary. I trimmed all the skin off the ham and cut the skin into diamonds. I studded the ham with whole cloves, stuck in at the intersections of the diamonds. The entire ham was covered with aluminum foil, which was extended to the pan edges forming a tight seal. I baked it in a 325 degree oven for about 20 minutes a pound or three hours for a 10-pound ham.

After the ham was done I glazed it with a brown sugar, apple cider vinegar, mustard glaze poured all over the ham and cooked uncovered for another hour.

One thing Rob always loved in Ohio was the Dorothy lane market Heavenly Ham(TM) salad. I have yet to see a ham salad in California that holds a candle to the DLM delicacy. So I have had to resort to making my own version. In fact, I've made two version. The first version is designed to taste as much like the DLM original as possible and the second one is designed to be low-carb, so it's made with dill pickle relish, not sweet relish.

Devilishly delicious ham salad

Leftover Coke-baked ham cut into 1/2 inch cubes
Mayonnaise, to taste
Yellow mustard, to taste
Sweet pickle relish

Place all of the ham in a food processors fitted with the big blade and chop fairly fine. Place all of the chopped ham in a bowl and add enough mayonnaise and mustard (I use about 2 tablespoons mustard to about a half cup of mayonnaise)to moisten. Add pickle relish to taste. I add about 3 to 4 tablespoons for two cups of ham salad. For the low-carb version, use dill pickle relish in place of the sweet relish.