1/26/2011

nice wall

makin' bakin'

The winter has brought on our baking instincts (heats up the house!).
Russian Tea Cakes.
Yummy biscotti by my niece, Pearl, who is truly a peach.

No knead bread recipe with carrot juice, raisons, walnuts and cumin seeds.  Good toasted with butter!

1/25/2011

Shrooms





We took a field trip up to Saugerties last week to see how mushrooms are grown.  Here we have shitakes, blue and yellow oysters.

1/19/2011

top ten photos of 2010

an igloo my family and I built in January 2010

contest of who can act more like a cat - my cat or my niece

chestnut trees in vienna

family portrait from the beacon portrait project

love in the hamptons

self portrait

artisanal pencil sharpening with david rees
august

4th of july wedding

or at least a few of my favorites....

1/13/2011

A bit of family history

When my Great Uncle Van (Dr. Charles Van Gorder) returned stateside from being a POW during WWII, he chose rural North Carolina as his new home and location for the medical clinic he would open, the family lore goes, so as to avoid a fuss about the illegitimate child he had helped to produce while overseas.  On the train with him was a Polish refugee from the war named Eric Reichman.  Eric had escaped the Nazis to England and had picked western North Carolina for its excellent farming potential.  The two men started talking on the train, ended up getting off at the same stop, and a lifelong friendship was born.

The Reichman family ended up raising chickens for eggs and whenever my grandmother went to visit her sister, she would arrive gleefully home with a tray of double yolkers.  (I am not sure if these were discarded because they were too big to fit in a carton or if customers thought there was something wrong with an egg that contained two yolks.)  What could be better than an egg with two yolks!

A couple of years ago we decided to keep chickens here and one of our hens doesn't lay often, but when she does, you can depend on a double yolker from her.  My grandma always considered a double yolker good luck.  I am certain she was right about that.