Paris al Fresco

October 19, 2021October 27, 2021 / wendyulfers / 12 Comments

Sitting every night at the dining table with my wife, sharing our meal and a bottle of wine, discussing the events of the day…This daily ritual has been ingrained so profoundly within us that we could not live without it and that is how food memories are made. –Jacques Pepin

If you watch people eat, you can find out so much about them. Eating is learned behavior; one of the ways cultures define themselves is by teaching children what to eat…But as we get older, we begin to make our own food choices and they are equally telling. If I tell you I like very spicy food, I’m not just talking about food…I’m telling you I like adventure. –Ruth Reichl

Yesterday was the first rain/sleet/snowstorm in our part of the Colorado mountains. I spent the afternoon on the sofa with a fire blazing, a book in my lap, and candles on the coffee table as the light faded. The season for sitting outside with a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, or a meal is behind us now.

fireside afternoon, new snow on Long’s Peak

Europeans have well-established dining rituals built into their cultures for centuries. Having lived in Germany and France, memories filter in on this quiet day. When we lived in France dining outside, “al fresco”, occured throughout the year, weather permitting, whether sipping “un café” or “un verre de vin” or enjoying a meal. It is as acceptable to do this alone as it is with friends or family.

cappuccino and wine in Paris, pizza in the courtyard in Germany

My friend, Michelle, is American/French, married to a Frenchman, Jean Louis. They both own their own businesses. Michelle and her partner are in relocation services with their company, A Good Start in France. Jean Louis took over his mother’s bookstore which started out specializing in rare books on mountain climbing in the 1930’s. Since then, Librairie des Alpes has expanded into books on mountain imagery, guidebooks, rare, vintage, and new books of photos, art, lithographs, and even postcards. It continues to reflect the spirit of the mountains on rue de Seine in Paris’ 6^th Arrondissement.

Michelle and Jean Louis live in a charming glass fronted two story house that looks like an atelier [artist’s studio] with so much natural light flooding in. It has a private courtyard outside the kitchen and living room.

Almost every Sunday morning Michelle and Jean Louis walk to the Porte de Vanves Flea Market which is in their neighborhood in the 14^th Arrondissement.

After browsing and schmoozing with vendors they have long known, they head home stopping at a local market for lunch ingredients. Theirs is a mixed ethnic section of Paris which offers a rich variety of flavors in food choices in their market. Seasonal fruits and vegetables come straight from the farm, their favorite fish vendor is from Martinique and specializes in spicy, white fish dumplings called “acras de morue”, from the butcher they buy Lyon sausage, the boulanger provides fresh baguette and pastries.

What do I miss about living in Paris? It’s right here–in every local market in every neighborhood throughout the city. Choosing what to eat from the best and freshest ingredients all year long. I miss daily shopping on my market street.

Sometimes I ran into Michelle and Jean Louis on Flea Market weekends. One Sunday, shortly before we left France, I was invited to meet them at 10 AM for a walkabout/browse/pick up a trinket followed by lunch in their home courtyard. In the warm months, lunch takes on the informality of tapas, an assortment of small dishes. Always wine and a basket of sliced baguette.

The generosity of the French table is akin to honoring the spirit of the guests invited for a sit-down meal. Any meal, simple or formal, pays tribute equally to the guest and to the hosts who prepare it. It is a time to gather, enjoy good food, exchange information, share conversation (often politics), and memorable time with others. The art of the debate is encouraged and freely employed. No subject is off limits. This is a centuries-honored ritual of dining à la français.

For our lunch fare, the table was laid with spicy “acras” or codfish dumplings, slices of farm tomatoes with basil snipped from the courtyard garden, shrimp and avocado, cucumber salad with dill and a dash of piment d’espelette, a cheese assortment of buffalo mozzarella, goat, and camembert, smoked salmon, asparagus, roasted red peppers and tuna salad which Michelle spices with lots of chopped shallots and Dijon mustard. [She says French people think tuna salad is exotic because of its inherent American-ness]. A glass of wine, bien sûr.

What I remember is conversation that was lively and fluid, a Willy Ronin black and white photo [which I admired and was given as a gift], delicious food to dip bread into, and a host and hostess most charming. This “meal as a ritual of exchange and sharing”, in Michelle’s words, is a perfect reverie on a snowy indoor day. In France, every single sit-down meal is like this, whether sitting with one other person or a tableful of guests. Ah, France.

I believe we replicate this in America, perhaps not daily, but better on our national holidays of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter where traditions and patterns around food are more universal in many families. Religious traditions also claim meal rituals and memories particularly around their holidays.

There are other stories of living in France, many written while we lived there. But today, this one of friends and food and time spent around a table in a cozy Parisian courtyard comes just at the right moment. It is vivid and warms me to the core while I gaze at blowing snow and autumn slides into winter.

Michelle often makes a seasonal soup for Sunday lunch. Fresh spinach soup is one of her staples. Spinach is out of season here now, but this is her recipe in simple format to try on your own.

Michelle’s Homemade Spinach Soup

Thoroughly wash and stem 2 lb of fresh spinach leaves.

Heat olive oil in a large stockpot, add lots of chopped shallots and sauté until wilted.

Peel and chop 1-2 large potatoes.

Add spinach, potatoes, and water or chicken or vegetable stock to the pot. [You can use a pressure cooker if you have one.]

Simmer until spinach cooks down and potatoes are soft.

Using an immersion blender, blend ingredients together in the pot.

Season to taste with salt and pepper and some piment d’espelette. [Espelette pepper]

Serve in a bowl with a little design made with cream or half and half on top.

Links to more stories about living in France that you will enjoy:

My Market Street, Ode to My Paris Kitchen, Leaving Paris and Hemingway, Cow Seduction, “Not a Station, but a Place”–Gare de Lyon and Le Train Bleu, Paris, “Not a Station, but a Place”–Paris to Avignon, Living Both Sides of the French Coin, Treize–A Baker’s Dozen, Paris, Looking Back To the Present, Champagne: “Tasting the Stars”, La Bonne Rentrée in Paris, The Baba au Rhum Affair, Kindle Some Candlelight, You Say Jam, Nico Says Confiture, The Unexpected in Normandy, The Lowly Leek from Boring to Sublime

Carolina On My Mind

July 14, 2021September 28, 2022 / wendyulfers / 15 Comments

There is something evanescent, temporary and fragile about food. You make it. It goes, and what remains are memories. But these memories of food are very powerful. –Jacques Pépin

It takes a long time to grow an old friend. –John Leonard

These quotes remind me of the last time I visited my friend Gail in the mountains of North Carolina. Gail is my longest “go to” friend. We met at age 16 when my family moved to a small town in Iowa along the Mississippi River. She balances my analytic nature with kindness and consideration toward everyone. She is intuitive and listens like a compassionate counselor. She knows my eccentricities and loves me anyway. When I was undergoing medical treatments and the rest of my family was overseas, she jumped in to help by coming to Colorado and being with me. We laugh easily and know each other’s stories. Even when too much time has passed, there is immediate ease when re-engaging in each other’s lives. Although we don’t share the same blood, she is my sister too.

We didn’t know it at the time we became friends as teenagers but that is when we began living the concept of “growing an old friend”. We were unwavering through the high school years, the university years, summer jobs in the Wisconsin north woods, a western road trip at 21, marriages one week apart, children, and now grandchildren. We haven’t lived near each other for a long time, but we talk on the phone or visit back and forth in our respective states of Colorado and North Carolina as often as we can.

When we were 20, Gail and I worked one summer at a camp for girls on a lake in northern Wisconsin. It was the same year that she introduced me to the man I would marry three years later. She loyally returned from her honeymoon to stand next to me in our wedding one week after I had been a bridesmaid in hers. With husbands, our friendship grew as couples.

The last time I was in North Carolina we spent the entire visit in the Blue Ridge Mountain community of Leatherwood rather than in the city. It was early August and humidly warm in the mountains. Low bluish clouds formed a canopy over and around the green mountains across the valley. It’s a mystical and captivating way to greet each morning. And such contrast to Colorado’s high rocky peaks, golden aspens, and dry mountain air.

The food recollections from that visit are so clear. Gail made a pre-dinner apéro by muddling very ripe peaches in the bottom of a glass then poured Vino Verde [a light Portuguese sparkling white wine] over the top. Along with the wine were appetizers of pickled okra [very southern] and small slices of Manchego cheese. Manchego is a firm sheep’s milk cheese with buttery texture and mild taste. It was a perfect combination. The company, the light food, the ambience.

There was one quirky but memorable cocktail hour involving neighbors who invited us to their home. Burdette, a retired architect, 90 years-old, wanted to prepare his own version of “The World’s Best Martini”. Gail’s husband is a bourbon man and politely declined. But the three women–Gail, her sister, and I agreed to try. There was much ceremony involved in the preparation of glasses, the assembly of ingredients, the shaking of equal parts of vodka, gin, AND vermouth. Only one olive allowed per glass. We sipped. It was okay, but what I appreciated most was their living room Rumford fireplace–a tall, shallow, masonry fireplace of European design. They had added a swinging black pot apparatus to cook soup or stew over the open fire. It seemed romantically retro, but I could see myself sitting by a fire that way.

When in Carolina do as the locals do. Or drink as the locals drink. In many southern states, this means bourbon. Craig, Gail’s husband, is a quintessential bourbon guy. He has his own version of an Old Fashioned. The only time I drink bourbon whiskey is when he makes this for me. A slice of orange, some Bada Bing cherries, two shots of good bourbon, fill with club soda and ice. His daily bourbon is Maker’s Mark. For splurging, he reaches for Jefferson’s Ocean or Woodford’s Reserve to sip over ice.

pickled okra appetizer, Gail’s glass of white, Craig’s bourbon special

The best meal was something new to me. Shredded beef brisket with a smoky homemade sauce. Cooked long and slow in the oven and served as a main course with side dishes of cornbread, beans, and salad–the epitome of southern cuisine. Perfect for guests and great leftovers.

Each day was full–with morning walks before the heat rose to a crescendo, a side trip to Blowing Rock’s boutique shops, outdoor showers with wide-angle valley views, picnic lunch in a park, and noisy Jenga games ending with blocks crashing to the floor amid cries of “Oh no!” and laughter.

champagne picnic–Craig and Gail, Wendy & Tam

Craig’s handmade jenga set and studying the physics of play

The Carolina mountains have been on my mind recently for a particular reason. Several seasons have passed and now it feels like time to return. To a different climate and different scenery. To those lower, greener hills, and humid misty clouds. To friends who make a difference in my life when we are together and even when we are not.

Jacques Pepin is right about the fleeting nature of food. You make it. It goes. What remains, what is truly powerful, is when we nourish our lives with memories of food in a spectacular setting, in a meal around a table, and taking time to grow the very best of friends.

GAIL’S BEEF BRISKET

Brisket is a tough cut of beef that must be tenderized by long, slow cooking. I adjusted the recipe for high altitude as most food takes longer to cook at 8300 feet where we live. My edits are in parentheses. The secret to this recipe is the sauce. Shredding the cooked brisket rather than slicing it eliminates the fat layer, leaving only the lean.

INGREDIENTS:

5-6 lb brisket [I have used smaller]
Salt and Pepper
Liquid Smoke

Place brisket in baking dish with fat side up. Rub salt and pepper and liquid smoke onto both sides of meat. Cover with foil and seal edges of pan. Marinate 12 hours or overnight in the refrigerator.

pouring liquid smoke over and rubbing with salt & pepper

NEXT DAY:

Preheat oven to 275 degrees F.
Place sealed baking dish in oven for 5 hours.
[Better than timing is to test with a meat thermometer as it will take 2 or more hours longer at higher altitudes. Internal temperature should reach 200 degrees F.]
When meat is tender and done, take two forks and shred onto a serving platter.
Discard the fat layer.
Pour sauce over or serve in a pitcher, on the side.
Serve brisket on buns or as a main course with side dishes.
Leftovers are easily reheated and just as delish.

shred brisket with two forks, discard fat, serve with side dishes, pour sauce over the top or serve on the side

FOR THE SAUCE:

2 C. catsup
½ C. water
3 T. Liquid Smoke
4 T. Worcestershire sauce
8 T. butter
3 T. brown sugar
3 t. dry mustard
2 t. celery seed
¼ to ½ t. cayenne pepper

In a saucepan, slowly heat all ingredients together while stirring.

Guest Ready Sweetness

October 13, 2020July 17, 2022 / wendyulfers / 10 Comments

smoky mountain views in RMNP [drone photo by Jeremiah Green]

To say it has been an atypical summer in the mountains is an understatement. Forest fires burning around us since July, ash and haze obscuring mountain outlines, no rain in three months, statewide fire ban, surging global pandemic, and a lack of visitors except for children and grandchildren.

playing with sticks around the unused fire ring, bro/sis time before bed

I’m more than ready for next season’s return to normalcy if it works out that way. By ready, I mean that I have three exceptional recipes to satisfy the sweet tooth of any person or group that drops by, sits around a campfire, or stays overnight.

idle campfire ring [drone photo by Jeremiah Green]

Maddy’s Caramel Bars, Patricia’s Double Chocolate Brownies with Sea Salt, and Jean’s S’mores Bars are unbeatable for chewable bites of sweetness cut out of a 9×13 inch-baking pan.

As all great passed-on recipes should be, these come from stories about friends.

Last summer’s road trip in 2019 was to Maddy and Cabby’s cabin on the Methow River [A Guest Room Under the Porch] in eastern Washington State. Maddy is a great cook and hostess. Their log home, with overflow teepees and tents, is a revolving door of family and friends. She offered us her always-on-the-counter pan of caramel bars and said, “Try these. People love them! They are my go-to for company all summer long.” We sampled and agreed. Caramel bars with chocolate chips and pecans were prepared over and over for our own guests, with rave reviews.

cool in the pan before cutting — cool completely before cutting

caramel bars — cool completely before cutting

Patricia, whom I have written about in several adventures, Cocoa Cake With My Curry, Please, Sunshine on the Back of Your Knees] vacationed in Colorado in August. She rented a cabin bordering on the National Park just down the road from us. The double chocolate brownies she brought to our front porch originated from a friend in Wisconsin. Richly chewy, with texture from chocolate chips inside, these brownies are for every chocoholic. I switched out the garnish of powdered sugar for flaky sea salt sprinkled over the top. Et maintenant ç’est plus délicieux. Chocolate and salt can’t be beat. Except by caramel and salt. Or almost anything with salt.

double chocolate brownies with flakes of sea salt — double chocolate brownies with sea salt

The last recipe came onto the scene this summer because of the harsh no burn season. We invited neighbors for a socially-distanced outdoor cookout around the fire ring. S’mores were requested for dessert. Except a campfire couldn’t be lit. Our friend, Jean, came bearing S’mores Bars baked in the oven and cut into bite-sized squares. These are even better than real s’mores, which often feature charred marshmallows blackened over red-hot coals.

With baked s’mores you can revisit the original in one chewy, not overly sweet, bite of marshmallow and chocolate chip cookie dough over a graham cracker crust. There is melted chocolate on top so licking fingers is required. I substituted dark chocolate for traditional milk chocolate. [S’more better.]

I’m anticipating the return of a next summer’s season of sequential guests. This winter while I drink coffee next to the picture window with the wide angle view of Long’s Peak, I will muse about the return of daily summer afternoon rainstorms followed by rainbows, campfires by sunrise, sunset, or moonrise, and baking pans full of dessert bars to sweeten everything that happens in between.

CARAMEL BARS [Maddy Hewitt]

First Layer:

1 C melted butter
1 C flour
1 C oats
1 C brown sugar
1 ¼ tsp baking soda

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. Pour melted butter over and mix in. Reserve ¼ of the mixture for topping. Pat the rest into bottom of a 9 x 13 inch baking pan. Bake 15 min. at 350 F. Cool 5-10 min.

line up of ingredients, first layer pressed into bottom of pan

Second Layer:

1 bag Kraft Caramels, wrappers removed
3 ½ Tbs butter
3 Tbs cream [or Half & Half]

Melt all together, SLOWLY, in cast iron skillet over low heat. Stir constantly. When melted, pour over cooled crust.

Third Layer:

1 C semi sweet chocolate chips [or dark chocolate chips]
¼ to ½ C pecan pieces

Mix together and sprinkle over caramel layer

reserved crust mixture for 4th layer is sprinkled over top of chips and pecan layer

Fourth Layer:

Using reserved crust mixture, sprinkle over the top of chips and pecans

Bake 10 min. more at 350 F. Allow to cool completely before cutting. Store in tins. Freezes well.

DOUBLE CHOCOLATE BROWNIES WITH SEA SALT FLAKES [Patricia Green-Sotos]

4 oz. unsweetened chocolate
1 C butter
2 C granulated sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 C flour
12 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 ½ C miniature marshmallows
Flaky sea salt crystals

Melt chocolate and butter slowly in a saucepan over low heat. When melted, add sugar and set aside to cool slightly. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Stir in vanilla and flour. Mix well. Fold in chips and marshmallows.

melting chocolate and butter over low heat

beat in eggs, add chips and marshmallows

spread into parchment paper lined pan, sprinkle with sea salt after baking

Bake in a parchment paper lined 9 x 13 baking pan [or grease the pan] for 30-35 minutes at 350 F. Top may be bubbly. Don’t overcook. Sprinkle with sea salt flakes and cool completely before cutting. Store in tins or plastic ware. Freezes great.

S’MORES BARS [Jean Adam]

Crust:

1 ½ sleeves graham crackers, crushed with rolling pin in zip-loc bag
2/3 C melted butter
1/3 C granulated sugar

Mix together and press into bottom of 9×13” pan lined with parchment paper. Bake 7 min at 350 F. Cool slightly.

Cookie Top:

1 C butter softened to room temperature
¾ C brown sugar
¾ C white sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Cream together. Add:

2 eggs

Stir in:

2 ¼ C flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda

Mix in:

1 C semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
2 ½ C mini marshmallows

drop clumps of cookie dough layer over crust, then gently press to sides of pan

Drop by large spoonfuls of dough carefully over crust and press into graham crackers without disturbing the layer underneath. Bake 15 min at 350 F or until golden brown on top. Quickly remove from oven and cover the top with broken pieces of Hershey’s dark chocolate bars. [2 large ones or 3 small]

Return to oven until chocolate melts ~ 3-5 min. Don’t overcook or let the top get too brown.

place broken chocolate bars over baked cookie dough layer

Cool completely before lifting parchment out of pan and cutting into small squares.

Refrigerate to slightly harden. Freezes well.

Summer’s End…

“It was now one of those moments when nothing remains but an opening in the sky and a story–and maybe something of a poem.”
–Norman Maclean, “USFS 1919-The Ranger, the Cook, and a Hole in the Sky” from
A River Runs Through It

We All Need the Eggs

April 6, 2020March 25, 2021 / wendyulfers / 7 Comments

This is a story about friendship. And eggs.

Many of the most rewarding relationships in my life are friendships formed when we lived in Asia, the Mediterranean, and Europe. Our family friendship with the people in this story, Nancy, Maddy, and Cabby, began in Taiwan in the 1990s. We forged relationships in the midst of howling typhoons and bed-shaking earthquakes, during Thanksgiving pig roasts, in delivery rooms birthing babies, on hillside picnics with roaming water buffalo [transcendent-picnics], at uncountable dinner parties in each other’s homes, and on apartment rooftops.

In 2018, we decided to have a reunion in Greece. Shortly before Easter, Nancy flew from New York to Paris where I was living. Together we traveled to Athens where Maddy and Cabby are now living.

In Greece, we shed our Asian history and jumped right into a mix of antiquity and contemporary adventures. As we climbed to the rooftop of their home, the Acropolis and Parthenon appeared stage center before our eyes. Hellooooooo Athina.

Mornings began with breakfast carried to the roof–an image imprinted forever in my mind. Strong French-pressed coffee, a bowl of Greek yogurt with sour cherries spooned on top, a basket of buttered toast, hardboiled eggs. And that view…

Family and holiday traditions are often a shared experience with friends overseas. During the Taiwan years, when our children were young, Maddy and Cabby hosted an annual family-centered party at Easter time. Eggs, dyed and decorated, were hung from dried branches standing upright in a tall vase to form a colorful egg tree. Multiple families were invited. There was food and a ceremony involving candles and a song. Then the eggs were selected from the tree, one to each person, and taken home in carefully packed containers.

Twenty-five years later, Cabby was in the final phase of decorating 60 eggs hanging over the second floor balcony. I don’t mean simple-dipped-in-one-pastel-color-dyed eggs. I mean Eggs As Art.

In the 1990s, decorating small bare tree branches as “Easter Egg Trees” became popular in the United States. In the Tennis/Hewitt family, the first egg tree was produced in Cambridge, Massachusetts when their first-born, Liza, was a toddler. It consisted of a single branch decorated with a few colored eggs taken to a party of graduate school friends.

Following graduate degrees and the birth of a second child, Maddy and Cabby moved to Taiwan. In succeeding years, their egg tree tradition was shared with international school families from Taipei, to Cairo, to Johannesburg, to Saudi Arabia.

Watching the tradition unfold in Athens, I realized that an important annual event, merged with artistry, had created outreach and a ripple effect in international relationships. Families from different countries and cultures invited to the Egg Tree celebration often carried it forward. They began new traditions that passed on beyond the Tennis/Hewitt family.

Maddy inspires action. Cabby implements details. It’s one of the ways they complement each other. Together they prioritize the importance of nurturing the family they created with lasting traditions.

Cab also has a knack for research and prototyping. Since crafting the first egg tree, he experimented and fine-tuned the “how to” process of taking a raw white egg and turning it into something spectacular. The steps from A to Z are not for the impatient or the faint of heart. But, the results are dazzling.

In the beginning, there was trial and error. He blew out the egg interiors as a first step only to realize that empty eggs don’t sink. There was year-by-year evolution, advancing the dyeing/waxing techniques used today. For example, randomly splattered candle wax creates only one type of pattern underneath–spots. So Cabby made small tools from toothpicks and wooden skewers that allow painting stripes, swirls, and even plaid patterns onto the shell with hot melted wax. Complexity and depth magically emerge after rounds of dyeing/waxing/dyeing/waxing on a single egg. Each egg reveals a surprise ending.

The bleaching process arose from a mistake of leaving an egg too long in one dye. Because it turned an ugly dark color, he wondered why not lighten it with bleach. A new step was added when he discovered bleaching enhanced the depth and range of dye colors.

Growing up overseas, the three Tennis children spent time around the table with their parents learning the egg dyeing craft. One Christmas, when they were older, each of them received a complete supply kit with containers, dye packets and tools to build their own egg tree and carry on the tradition after leaving home.

Oldest son, Whiting, took on the challenge first as a university student. Now married and teaching in an international school overseas, he produces spectacularly decorated eggs and invites faculty families to participate in the Egg Tree Party.

After Athens, I thought about the generosity of sharing this family-centered tradition all over the world and how comfortably it links people together in international communities. Cabby and Maddy exemplify a natural ability to build and create inclusiveness in every relationship.

The Tennis Family Egg Tree Tradition is one way this family has fostered love and respect in their global and personal relationships. It begins at home with a circle of people gathered around a bare branched tree covered with kaleidoscope colored eggs.

I’m reminded of the ending to the movie Annie Hall. The main character muses about the nuances of relationships, suggesting they are sometimes irrational, usually complex, and often absurd. He tries to sum up his feelings with a joke:

…A guy walks into a psychiatrist’s office and says, hey doc, my brother’s crazy! He thinks he’s a chicken. The doc says why don’t you turn him in? The guy says, I would but I need the eggs.

And, he’s right. We strive to hold onto each other in love, support and caring, because, actually, all of us…need the eggs.

This is the definitive “How-To” for dyeing and decorating eggs in the Tennis/Hewitt tradition. Instructions are by Cabby Tennis. There is minor editing on my part for clarity.

THE TENNIS FAMILY EGG TREE

WHY GO TO ALL THIS TROUBLE FOR A FEW COLORED EGGS?

It brings family and friends around the table working creatively together.
There is hands-on learning––coordination, art, safety, chemistry, physics, perseverance, patience and the final “wow” factor with each finished egg.
There is grace and humility in overcoming a “Humpty Dumpty” moment of loss on the kitchen floor.
It can become an annual family tradition.
Eggs are beautiful.

GETTING STARTED

Source dyes in craft shop or order online. Powdered dyes offer greater color variety. Suggested websites: Ukrainiangiftshop.com, BestPysanky.com, Ukrainianeggcessories.com
Cover surface of worktable with taped together garbage bags, a vinyl tablecloth, or shower curtain liner. Layer of newspaper on top absorbs spills. Do not work over carpeting! Outside picnic table is ideal.
Set up table with plastic gloves, liquid dye containers, plastic spoons, eggs, paper towels [pre-torn into a stack of single sheets], empty egg cartons, waxing tools [explained below], 3 bowls for bleach and rinse water, candles for waxing, small saucepan for hot melted wax, scissors, pen, scotch tape.

EGGS – Unstamped white eggs are best. Large [not XL] range free eggs tend to have stronger shells. Rinse under water–no soap. Eggs are dyed raw because they are heavier and will sink. Blowing them out comes later.

CONTAINERS FOR LIQUID DYES – Any glass jar [preferably with lid] such as jam jars, canning jars, etc. One plastic spoon per jar to prevent color mixing as eggs move between dyes. Leftover dye can be kept year to year, so save the jar tops. If not enough jars, use water glasses.

*one spoon per jar, label* *with dye color, keep the lids*

DYE MIXING – 1 packet powdered dye diluted with ¾-1 cup boiling water. Add 1 T. white vinegar. Apple or grape vinegar is ok. (Exception: No vinegar for orange dyes because they will curdle.] Follow package directions for diluting liquid concentrate dyes. Cut off color name from dye packet and tape on jar for reference.

WAXING METHODS

Partially used taper candles set into aluminum tea candle base for dripping or sprinkling wax over eggs.
A small saucepan with hot melted wax to use with tools [see below] or for complete immersion of egg into wax. Leftover candle remnants can be melted over low heat in saucepan on stovetop, camp stove, or hotplate. If no candles at home, purchase 2-3 thrift store pillar candles [any color] as melting base.

*old candles to melt down, saucepan with solidified wax ready to heat*

WAYS OF APPLYING WAX – Time to get creative. Holding a lit candle above egg, drip or shake/splatter wax onto shell. You can also use tools made from several toothpicks or split bamboo skewers bound with rubber bands to paint on wax. Repeatedly dip wooden tool into melted wax in saucepan, then touch or tap the egg with the tool. Egg color underneath the wax will be preserved and not take on next dye color. This is how you create different color patterns by waxing stripes, dots, or splatters on the dry egg. The number of colors on the egg depends how many times it goes through the cycle of 1. Wax 2. Dye 3. Dry.

*candle set up for waxing, wooden tools made from toothpicks and skewers*

DUNK DYEING – Place waxed egg into any dye jar, then remove and gently dry with paper towel before waxing on a new layer of stripes or splatters. Repeat sequence as many times as you wish. Each wax application retains the color underneath it. Dyeing sequence is from light colors to dark. Begin with yellow [or any light color] moving toward darker colors each time you 1. Wax 2. Dye 3. Dry. Creativity and patience are keys to this technique.

BLEACHING as part of the dunk dyeing process – An optional but effective way to reverse the usual light to dark dyeing sequence. Bleach lets you cut through any final dye color [even black] that is un-waxed on the egg. Once the dark color is bleached, a lighter color can be dyed over it. This takes deft handling. Three bowls recommended. One with 1 part bleach to 2 parts water, and two [or 3] rinsing bowls with plain water. Dip the egg into bleach solution. Then move it through the rinse cycles, swirling thoroughly through each bowl. Egg continues to bleach with each step. Dry with paper towel. Note: The bleach will creep under some of the wax edges so be quick with the steps. You can do several rounds of 1. Bleach 2. Rinse 3. Dye 4. Wax 5. Dye and then repeat.

POWDER DYEING – This is a simple and efficient one step method to achieve beautiful eggs with the look of Monet water lilies or a ‘60s tie-dye experience. Eggs must be moist after soaking in plain water or liquid dye. Use leftover powder remnants [from envelopes used to make liquid dye] or open new ones specifically for this technique. With previously opened packets, write the color name on the outside to identify the powder inside.

METHOD FOR POWDER DYEING – Wearing clean, dry gloves lift a wet egg from bowl and hold each end between thumb and fingers. Tap the powder dye envelope against the egg to sprinkle grains onto the moist surface. Upon contact they will explode into fireworks shapes. Turn the egg and keep applying powder until it has the look you want. Use different colors, but be careful of combinations. Red, green and blue used together will turn brown. When desired color is achieved, quickly pat dry and immerse in saucepan of hot melted wax to seal. Or splatter with candle wax.

DE-WAXING EGGS – Wear gloves. Place used candle stubs or pillar candles into small saucepan over low to medium-low heat on stovetop. You need enough wax to completely immerse an egg. Have a stack of prepared paper towels nearby. With a slotted spoon, lower egg into the pan and stir gently, watching for wax coating to loosen and shed. [Stirring speeds up wax removal.] When the coating is clearly melted, add a second egg to the pan and lift first egg out. Rub loosened wax off first egg with paper towel. It should feel smooth with no rough spots and have a shiny patina. When wax in the pan starts to film over, time to re-heat on low temperature.

Safety note: Heat wax only until it liquefies. If it starts to smoke, it’s too hot and should be removed from heat.

Economy note: Place the saucepan of wax in the refrigerator overnight. The solidified wax will pop out the next morning. Store for re-use the next year.

BLOWING OUT THE EGGS – Use a bellows type egg blower. Good source: Best Pysanky Egg Blower. With the awl that comes in the kit, make a hole in the exact bottom of egg the size of a wooden kitchen matchstick. The bellows pumps air in and forces white and yolk out the bottom hole. Be gentle. Take your time. Too much pressure and egg can explode. Use a paper clip or thin wire to break yolk or un-jam clogs as needed. Do this in rounds, about 10 eggs in a round, letting each egg sit upright between rounds so gravity can help the insides move to the bottom. Next, do a “gravity shake”. Holding egg upright in fingers, firmly and repeatedly whack your wrist against the tabletop onto a paper towel. When drips emerge from bottom of egg, blow it out again. Repeat until nothing comes out of egg and it feels light and empty. Finally, carefully use the awl to make a hole the size of a thick paperclip in the top center of egg. This is where knotted string will be attached later.

Best Pysanky *egg blower, extracting yolky interior, gravity shake to move the last bits down*

BAKING THE HOLLOW EGGS – This removes the final film of wax and bakes inside of eggs to prevent spoiling. In a preheated metal pan, place 6 eggs at a time on their sides. Make sure both ends of egg are open and unplugged or egg can explode in the oven. Bake at 350 F for 4 minutes. Watch carefully so they don’t burn. Remove from oven and cover pan with foil or kitchen towel to retain heat. Place next pan of eggs in to bake. Quickly rub each baked egg with paper towel to remove any wax residue before it cools.

*the ever-ready stack of paper towels, a baking disaster*

STRINGING THE EGGS – Use thin string such as dental floss or embroidery thread. Tie a knot and create a loop where the size of the knot barely fits inside top hole of egg. Hold the knot against the hole, and gently push it inside the egg with a paper clip. Expand hole with the awl if necessary. Line up strung eggs for gluing. One by one squirt a tiny dab of super glue into the hole. This affixes knot inside the egg. Let eggs rest on their sides [string parallel to table top] while glue dries. Avoid getting too much glue on the string above the egg as it will dry stiffly and can snap like a twig over time.

*loop, knot, squirt of glue, dry in side lying pose*

HANGING AND FINAL CLEANING OF EGGS – String a rope where eggs can be suspended at least 6 inches apart. Use large paper clips or loops of wire to attach eggs to rope. If inside the house, place drop cloths below to catch drips. Wear gloves and use a soft cloth to gently wipe each egg all over with paint thinner [white spirits in Europe]. Dry with another soft cloth to remove any residual wax. Let stand for 30 minutes. This step speeds up drying time of the lacquer.

LACQUERING THE EGGS – Use clear polyurethane [Varathane] or Spar Varnish to seal eggs and enhance colors with a durable finish coat. Varnish can be satin or gloss finish. [Cabby prefers gloss.] Dip fingers into the urethane and rub each egg, coating from top to bottom. Dab off accumulated drips with paper towel. Lacquer can take 1-3 days to dry. Eggs kept year to year can be re-lacquered annually. The Tennis family has one egg, “Jungle Book”, with over 15 coats and a deep hard shine.

NAMING [Optional, but great fun] – Give each egg a creative name–something it reminds you of. Examples from the 2020 collection: The Duke of Earl, Violet Sultana, Jigsaw Cyan, Fly Like an Eagle, Calypso, Sgt. Pepper, Tetherball, Clouds of Mercury, Purple Reign, Gilly Spring

BEST EGG TREES – Made with dry sticks or branches with many limbs. Bougainvillea branches are excellent. Bind branches with string or zip ties and place in a large vase or container, preferably metal. Fill with rocks/pebbles to keep branches secured and centered. Hang eggs in a pleasing arrangement.

THE EGG GIFTING TRADITION – Invite families with young children to your home. Have an Easter reading about the historic symbolism of eggs, the season of spring and renewal, or related meaningful traditions. Light hand held candles one by one around the circle, and sing, “This Little Light of Mine”. Pass a bowl of folded bits of paper with numbers on them. Eggs are chosen from the tree in numerical order. [Parents sometimes trade numbers so children can pick earlier.] Number 1 leaves the room after pre-selecting an egg in their mind. The group tries to guess which egg will be chosen. #1 returns, removes their egg and the sequence continues. The key is to keep the pace going without dampening the enthusiasm of conjecture.

Egg cartons are filled with selected eggs for each family to take home.

A new egg tree tradition begins.

Cabby has additional details such as video clips of different stages of the process and a movie of the complete 2020 egg line up with names included. For more information, contact: windowtoalifeoverseas@gmail.com

Wait Twenty Minutes Then Add Salt

May 19, 2019January 27, 2022 / wendyulfers / 21 Comments

Naples, Italy is the birthplace of pizza. When tomato was added to flat bread in the late 18^th century, pizza, as we know it today, was born. If you go to Naples, you will certainly enjoy eating pizza on a cobblestoned street after touring the Amalfi coast and the dusty excavations in Pompeii. Then fly out the next day. Naples is not an easy city.

Pizza ranks high as a favorite food all over the world. You can order in, carry out, or enjoy at your neighborhood spot. However, I don’t eat restaurant pizza anymore, except in Italy, because my husband learned to make perfect pizza dough at home. His finesse began with a friendship of mine.

My husband enjoys creative time in the kitchen. Not everyday. But when people come to our home he will go to finicky recipe extremes. I call it performance cooking. Guests love it. Each course is beautifully plated and presented with a detailed description of what goes into whatever is being served.

His foray into kitchen time began when we lived in Taiwan. Home dinner parties were an almost every weekend event. This, in contrast to meeting up with friends in fluorescent lit, Formica tabled, disposable chopstick, plastic plate restaurants circa 1990s.

We did that often, as well, because the food in Taiwan is fresh and delicious. However, it wasn’t a place for long, conversation filled evenings with good wine and food, heavy china, linen napkins, and candles flickering down the middle of the table.

One of our family rituals while the children were growing up was to have a formal Sunday night dinner. Husband was in charge of menu planning, shopping and meal prep. I laid the table with the “fancier” china and flatware. Son and daughter were on cleanup and some form of “presentation” as entertainment. Those responsibilities worked some of the time.

My friend, Linda, is a Midwestern ex-pat who moved to Taipei with her family several years after our arrival. We became fast friends with husbands and children joining in. Linda’s Sunday night family ritual was making homemade pizza. Her youngest daughter liked to participate by carefully rolling out the dough, just so. Her two teenagers showed up for the eating part.

When she made pizza for guests, I discovered my favorite Linda-topping-recipe. It was always this: the thinnest crust, basil pesto sauce, toasted pine nuts, sliced garlic and fresh chili peppers with grated Parmesan cheese over the top.

Along the way, a quirky tweak was added to her recipe because of an Italian chef named Max, who found himself temporarily employed in a Taipei restaurant. He left Barbados for one year while the hotel where he worked was being renovated. What he loved about the Caribbean was the warm, turquoise colored water and beautiful beaches. Max found Taiwan on a map and saw it was an island, too. He thought he could happily cook and still be near sand and water. That didn’t exactly work out. Not much white sand and blue water in Taipei.

Max enjoyed chatting up lingering late night restaurant customers after the kitchen closed. When Linda mentioned she often made pizza from scratch at home, he told her the secret for the “best pizza dough”. It was a tip from his Italian mama.

Don’t add salt right away. Wait at least 20 minutes to let the yeast, sugar and warm water begin their bubbly reaction. Yeast reacts better without salt added until later. It creates more pliable and elastic dough. From a mother in an Italian village, to a beach loving chef in Taiwan, to an American home cook, here was insider pizza chemistry.

Before Linda left Taiwan, I wrote down her dough recipe with Max’s tweak. I’m the basic kind of cook rather than the finicky kind, so it was filed away and several years went by. Children left home. A new job with new geography moved us out of Asia.

With only two at the table, formal Sunday dinners faded away. We ate out more often because it was Europe! Germany! Restaurant atmosphere was charming. And the food didn’t disappoint.

Sundays in Germany are quiet. Everything closes from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. Pulling out Linda’s recipe, I waved it in front of my husband and suggested, “We need a new Sunday eating ritual. I love Linda’s pizza. Why don’t you learn to make it?”

And so, my man began kneading and punching and creating homemade dough with puffs of flour in the air and a rolling pin in hand. Sunday night became Pizza Night. It worked when there was just the two of us. It worked as a night for entertaining guests. It worked as a Christmas Eve meal for a crowd.

From rustic Naples centuries ago, to an ex-pat friendship in Taiwan, to a displaced Italian chef and his mother, to a man who found contentment in mixing flour, water, yeast and salt into elastic dough, a new family tradition was formed. Linda’s pizza became ours.

We have made it for family, and for people from cultures around the world. In whatever geography we find ourselves, and in the midst of complexity and the rush of life, we always wait twenty minutes. And then add salt.

MARK’S PIZZA CRUST

Yield: 4, 15-inch or 6, 12-inch pizzas

the basics–flour, water, yeast, sugar [not pictured], and salt

Ingredients:

2 packages active dry yeast
1 t. sugar
2 C. semolina flour–mix in first [optional, but a good Italian touch]
3 C. all purpose flour, plus more for kneading
2 t. salt
Olive oil for coating bowl as dough rises and for pizza pans

Preparation:

Place 2 C. warm water [110-115 degrees F.] in small mixing bowl.
Stir in 1 t. sugar. Then sprinkle in yeast. Stir to combine.
Set aside for at least 20 minutes, letting it expand and bubble.
After 20 minutes, combine flours, salt and yeast mixture in a large bowl. If using semolina flour, stir in first, then add the rest.
When dough becomes difficult to stir with a wooden spoon, turn out of bowl onto a lightly floured smooth surface.
Begin kneading by hand. Add small amounts of flour, as needed, so dough is not sticking to hands and surface.
Knead at least 10 minutes, squeezing and folding dough over on itself, pushing with heels of both hands. I like to pick the dough up and throw it down hard onto kneading surface several times. Husband likes punching it.
When dough becomes smooth and elastic, form into a ball.
Lightly wipe a large bowl with olive oil. Place dough in bowl. Turn once to coat both sides in oil. Cover with a clean kitchen towel.
Set aside to rise 45 min. to an hour or until doubled in bulk.
Punch down, reshape dough, and cover. Let it rise once or twice more as you wish. It’s not necessary to do multiple risings, but time gives more structure and flavor to the dough.
Preheat oven to 465 degrees F.
Wipe or spray pizza pans lightly with olive oil. Optional to sprinkle pans with semolina flour.
Roll out sections of dough as thinly as possible to fit prepared pans.
Arrange toppings on dough. Less is more with homemade pizza. This keeps crust from becoming soggy and heavy.
Bake in preheated oven to desired doneness. Start checking at 10-12 min. Watch the edges so they don’t get too brown.
Remove from pans and cut into slices. Kitchen scissors work great.

Toppings:

Unlimited variety
Individual preferences rule
Allow guests to create their own pizza topping combination

Toppings and Sauce suggestions: light brushing of red pesto, basil pesto, tomato sauce or olive oil over unbaked dough

Thinly sliced [or diced] garlic cloves–always
Red pepper flakes or sliced fresh chili peppers–optional
Meat–chicken, prosciutto, pepperoni, sausage
Or no meat
Roasted vegetables such as eggplant, broccoli or cauliflower
Raw veggies like sweet peppers, mushrooms, black olives, onions or shallots
Toasted pine nuts
Anything else

Cheese:

I like freshly grated Parmesan, only, over top of ingredients.
Husband mixes a little fresh buffalo mozzarella, or goat cheese, or mixed grated cheeses with a topping of Parmesan.

Final Flourish:

Fresh arugula or baby spinach strewn over cooked pizza adds a bite of salad and green. Add before serving or let people help themselves table side.
Champagne is our pizza beverage of choice. There is some kind of chemistry going on there too. In your home, family choice rules.

champagne sipping for assembling and eating

Final Note:

Practice makes perfect. Play with proportions until you are comfortable with the sequence of steps. You won’t need a recipe if you make it regularly.
This makes a LOT of dough, which is efficient for later use.
It freezes well in zip lock bags and thaws easily. Place in refrigerator overnight or on the countertop until soft.
Roll out on lightly floured surface and proceed with toppings.
Make friends and family happy! Pizza night!

stir to mix flour, salt and yeast mixture

turn lump of dough out onto floured surface — stir to mix flour, salt and yeast mixture

pushing, pulling, flattening — begin kneading by hand

after 10 or more minutes of kneading, form into ball

place dough in lightly oiled bowl, turn once to coat top and bottom

let rise and double in bulk — place dough in lightly oiled bowl, turn once to coat top and bottom

let rise again — punch dough down and reform into ball

take sections of dough and begin to roll into a circle

flat and thin — take sections of dough and begin to roll into a circle

dinner for guests — kitchen scissors for cutting slices

People Who Pull the Magic Out of You

March 17, 2019January 29, 2022 / wendyulfers / 33 Comments

I knew when I met you an adventure was going to happen. –Winnie-the-Pooh

The important relationships in my life are best explained by this: Stick with people who pull the magic out of you and not the madness. These are the people who fill in my gaps with their strengths. They have characteristics I love and want to absorb when we are together. They are the ones with whom I am always comfortable.

I have written about my overseas friend, Janmarie in an earlier story, Hellenic Halloumi. We saw each other almost every day for the three years we overlapped while living in Nicosia, Cyprus. She came to my kitchen table on weekday mornings for coffee and conversation after dropping off her children at the International School.

In 1993, our family moved from Cyprus to Taiwan and the daily connection was left behind. It was before email and international phone calls were common so we lost touch with the changes in each other’s lives. In 2018, our last year living overseas, Janmarie was in Beirut, Lebanon while I was in Paris. She urged me to visit her before leaving Europe. I didn’t hesitate to say “yes”.

Friends are the family you choose. –Jess C. Scott

In an overseas lifestyle, friendships tend to be intense and become surrogate family on holidays, vacations, and for celebrations.

My mother visited us the first Christmas we lived in Taiwan. We had just arrived a few months earlier. She was surprised by the closeness and quality of friendships we had already established. She said that we were at a depth of relationship and caring about people we had known for only months that could take years to develop at home.

Having lived in Singapore and Cyprus before, we knew that filling in the details of our home away from home started with the people who came into our lives by chance…and shared geography.

Janmarie met me at the airport in Beirut. We slipped into easy conversation on the way to her apartment as if it had been 25 minutes instead of 25 years. She told me how important it was to her that I made the effort to come to her home, how much it honored her, and our friendship.

A true friend is one you can go extended periods without seeing or talking to, yet the moment you are back in touch it’s like no time has passed at all.–Ellie Wade

Janmarie’s plan was to immerse me in the beauty and culture of Lebanon. Generosity and freshly prepared food are hallmarks of Lebanese hospitality. After we arrived at her apartment, the dining room table was laid with an array of dishes made in preparation of my visit.

Because I had watched Janmarie feed her family in Cyprus, I knew the importance and love that goes into making nourishing and delicious food followed by sitting à la table en famille in Lebanese/American households. An abundant table with my friend’s vivacious spirit was the perfect beginning.

Janmarie introduced me to Marti, an American of Lebanese heritage who grew up in Kansas and now lives upstairs. She is a scholar and an intellectual, studying the Quran with a private teacher, working her way through reading and reciting all of the holy prayers in Arabic. Marti became a new friend because of an old friend. We connected right away.

The three of us took a day trip outside Beirut to the beautiful Shouf Mountains and the picturesque village of Deir el-Qamar [Monastery of the Moon], which is a UNESCO World Heritage site. Along the way we stopped for coffee and a typical pastry snack, ka’ak [Arabic for cake]. It was savory rather than sweet–a ring shaped bread “purse” filled with cheese and covered in sesame seeds. At lunchtime we dined al fresco, under trees overhanging a restaurant patio, with freshly prepared traditional dishes to share.

My favorite cultural experience was the “Hubbly Bubbly” ritual. This is a tall water pipe that sits on the floor and is used for vaporizing flavored tobacco. It is available in every bar, restaurant or café. Janmarie chose a mint/lemon flavor for me. Not a smoker by habit, but there was enjoyment in relaxing with friends and making big puffs of smoke from an aromatic hookah in the midst of others doing the same. When in Lebanon, do as…

We spoke about the Cyprus years when our children were young and life had a different framework. But we shifted seamlessly to exchanging stories of experiences, perspectives and beliefs that define who we are today. It’s an important quality for ongoing friendships–each person capable of keeping the relationship moving forward, while savoring shared times from the past.

The day before I left, I asked Janmarie to cook one of my favorite Lebanese dishes, Mujadarah. She taught me to make it years ago when my cooking specialized in one-dish meals for the family. Mujadarah is a lentil/rice casserole smothered in fried onions. I probably served it alone because it is flavorful and filling. The version she made for me was finished with a lemon-y dressed cabbage salad over the top. I finally learned to make a complete one dish meal, salad included!

There are reasons, perhaps subconscious, as to why we want to return to certain friendships. And why others remain at a distance. There are people in our lives where any amount of time spent with them is just right, and exactly what we need. We swoop into their orbit because they pull out our better selves, even our best selves. And when a friend knows the joy in your company that you feel in theirs…then the magic is complete.

…And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit. –Kahlil Gibran, “On Friendship”

MUJADARAH WITH CABBAGE SALAD-Serves 4

1 C. dry lentils
¾ C. dry rice
Cook the lentils and rice separately. [Leftover rice works great.] Mix cooked ingredients together in a decorative bowl. Season to taste with salt and olive oil.
Cut two onions into thin slices. Deep fry onions in oil until crispy and brown. [You can also use less oil and sauté onions very slowly until caramelized.]
Smother the top of the lentil/rice combo with cooked onions.

Cabbage salad:

2 C. finely sliced cabbage
2 cloves garlic, minced [or probably more]
¼ C. olive oil
¼ C. freshly squeezed lemon juice [or more]. Can use vinegar, but lemon is so right for this
½ t. salt
Pomegranate seeds [not optional as they add color and zing.]
Optional: 2 T fresh or 1 T. dried mint, also green onions

The Dressing:

Pound garlic and salt in mortar and pestle.
Add lemon juice [or vinegar] and olive oil.
Whisk together and pour over cabbage.
Toss. Refrigerate 1 hour or so to blend flavors.
Adjust seasonings.

To Serve:

Place Mujadarah on a plate. Top with cabbage salad. Salad must be crunchy because the cabbage rules!–Janmarie

Home Is Where You Are, Even Overseas

September 20, 2018September 30, 2022 / wendyulfers / 24 Comments

A new experience can be extremely pleasurable, or extremely irritating, or somewhere in between, and you never know until you try it out. ―Lemony Snicket, The Blank Book

There are myriad ways to experiment with life. Moving away from the known or familiar is one way to keep things interesting. Finding enriching friendships is another.

In the late 1980’s, a new job opportunity nudged our family geographically away from the comfort zone in middle America. Our two children were young and adaptable. As the decision-making adults we took a chance–letting go of two jobs, two cars, a house in the ‘burbs of Denver, Colorado. Just for a couple of years. We moved to Southeast Asia.

From the beginning, everything we saw, smelled, ate, drank, or experienced in those first years in Singapore laid the foundation for what followed over the next three decades. We moved to four other countries. Singapore was the catalyst to keep the experiment going.

My husband remembers pacing the aisles of the airplane as we flew there for the first time, children sleeping peacefully, worrying about what he had wrought on our family. How would we adapt a very American lifestyle to this small, tropical, island-state with three predominant cultures–Chinese, Malaysian, and Indian?

Actually, it was easier than we imagined. Because of the people we met, the friends we made–living a little off balance, in the unknown, became our new norm. The first important overseas experience happened when I met my friend, Jan.

Jan was an operating room nurse–we had that in common–who left her job to follow a husband who worked in Germany and then Singapore. We both missed the camaraderie of our co-workers and the hospital environment. Here we were, in a foreign country, unable to work professionally. It was time to find something else to do.

still a lot of bicycles in 1987, singapore

There was a refugee camp located in a former British barracks on Hawkins Road in the Sembawang area of Singapore. It was established after the fall of Saigon in 1975 for Vietnamese “Boat People”. Because Singapore did not accept refugees, this camp was a transit stop before deportation to countries accepting them. Volunteer nurses were needed. Jan signed us up.

We took long bus rides to the north of the island to work in the clinic. Giving immunizations, tending injuries, dressing wounds, treating minor illnesses in men, women and children who usually spoke no English, but knew how to smile in gratitude. A steady influx of refugees created long lines of those needing help. I jumped feet first into learning the risks that other people take, too.

risking all for a new life

singapore refugee camp, 1975-1996

Another friendship, with Sandy, provided something different. She was also an American nurse who moved to Singapore with a husband and three children several years before we did. It didn’t take long for her to start a business by filling suitcases with wholesale women’s clothing made in Hong Kong and selling them out of her home. Clothing in Singapore in the ‘80s was available only in small Asian sizes and styles. Non-Asian women were an eager and ready market for her niche.

updated façades, little india, 2017

singapore little india shops, 2017

merlion park and a modern city backdrop, 2017

Sandy’s home was a cozy, eclectic mix of styles and textures that I loved. When I asked where she found certain pieces of furniture or funky artifacts, she said, “We should go Kampong shopping.”

The word “Kampong” is from the Malay language, meaning village. Throughout Singapore’s early history, and well into the 20^thcentury, kampongs were settlements of houses and small shops where the indigenous population lived. Initially, huts were built with palm-thatched roofs designed to let the air pass through and temper the heat of tropical sun. Later, wood and zinc replaced thatch because it leaked like a sieve in monsoon rains and housed centipedes and other creepy crawlies that dropped down from overhead.

The kampong communities were close-knit, doors left open, children of Chinese, Malay, Indian, and Eurasian culture played together seamlessly. Rainwater was collected. Cats, dogs and chickens roamed in co-existence. Later, generators that sometimes worked brought electricity.

Screen Shot 2018-09-16 at 13.21.35 — map of known singapore kampong locations

Colonial British government began addressing overcrowding and poor hygienic conditions within the kampongs in the early 1900s. Public housing began in earnest after WWII as the Singaporean population rapidly increased.

In 1960, (prior to independence in 1965) the Housing Development Board [HDB] was established to further urban renewal. Mass demolition of shop houses and kampongs began to build affordable, low cost, high-rise, housing estates for all Singaporeans. HDB flats led to the creation of “new towns” throughout the island.

Transition from kampong living to government sanctioned housing flats allowed people to easily enjoy clean water, electricity and gas. However, life changed dramatically in the sense of decreased community spirit, less neighbor interaction, and a population of children who grew up playing on concrete, not in nature.

By the time we moved to Singapore many kampongs had been partially bulldozed or completely razed as residents moved on to modern living. Tropical heat, humidity, and prolific vegetation growth from daily rains rapidly invaded and took over abandoned sites.

remains of kampong house

steps leading to nowhere

the jungle takes over in time

Sandy knew locations of deserted kampongs where, if you dared to venture into the overgrowth of tenacious weeds and jungle vines, dodge snakes and crawling things, repel dengue-fever-bearing mosquitoes, you could unearth left behind possessions with potential for renewal and use.

It was the Singapore equivalent of an archeological dig, with a recycling component. Here we witnessed the life of a community after the community had moved on.

Kampong shopping was always a dirty, sweaty proposition of hunting, excavation and fun. Rewards were in the discovery. We found crocks used for storing water, oil or food, incense burners, altar tables, tea pots, baskets, dragon pots, glass jars, marble lamp bases, teak tables, a wooden kitchen cabinet with rusted screens. We hauled our “treasures” home and spent hours cleaning or refinishing them. They functioned as decorative or usable artifacts, with a back-story.

kampong teapot

dragon pot

unearthed jar

altar table, refinished

ceramic pots for storing water or food

baskets refurbished

Initiation into the exciting world of Singaporean cuisine came from my friend, Mary, who was Singaporean Chinese, married to a German man. She was a tiny woman who loved food–as culturally important to her as her matrilineal family hierarchy. Mary would call me on the phone and say, “I’m picking you up to go eat. Right now!” The food in Singapore was, and is, phenomenal. This is the country where my taste buds learned to crave spices, with Mary as my guide.

We ventured to her favorite “Hawker Centres”–informal, open-air food stalls specializing in Chinese, Malaysian, Indonesian, or Indian food. Cooked to order on site, eaten with chopsticks while sitting on plastic stools at plastic tables on the sidewalk.

I tasted Nonya Laksa [Laksa Lemak] for the first time at Peranakan Place on Orchard Road–a spicy hot noodle soup in curried coconut broth with prawns and a quail egg. Carrot cake [Chai tow kway] is not cake and not carrots, but a favorite hawker dish of mine. Steamed white radish and rice flour cut into cubes and fried with garlic, eggs, preserved radish and other spices. Whatever Mary ordered I ate, sweated through, and loved.

nonya laksa

fried carrot cake

Peranakan Place pre-urban renewal, 1979

one rendition after renovation

current look in june 2017

Singapore was the beginning of making friends who lived as we did, away from the usual, outside the familiar. People who said “yes” to living outside of the box.

I thrived in our international moves because of every friend I made. Sometimes it was hard to leave one place to rebuild relationships in the next. And sometimes friendships were lost with the geographical changes. But shared experiences with every friend remain in my most important memories.

Creating relationships and life lessons is really what overseas living is about. In such a nomadic lifestyle, the key is making a home where you embrace friends as family.

Anywhere in the world.

A REASON, A SEASON OR A LIFETIME

When someone is in your life for a REASON, it is usually to meet a need you have expressed. They have come to assist you through a difficulty, to provide you with guidance and support, to aid you physically, emotionally, or spiritually. They are there for the reason you need them to be. Then, without any wrongdoing on your part, this person will say or do something to bring the relationship to an end. Sometimes, they die. Sometimes, they walk away. What we must realize is that our need has been met, our desire fulfilled; their work is done. The prayer you sent has been answered. Now it is time to move on.

Then people come into your life for a SEASON, because it is your turn to share, grow, or learn. These people bring you peace or make you laugh. They may teach you something you have never done. They give you an unbelievable amount of joy. It is real, but only for a passing season.

LIFETIME relationships teach you lifetime lessons, things you must build upon in order to have a solid emotional foundation. Your job is to accept the lesson, love the person, and put what you have learned to use in all other relationships and areas of your life.

–author unknown

Leaving Paris and Hemingway

August 13, 2018April 11, 2022 / wendyulfers / 29 Comments

It has been several months between writing stories while we packed up our life after 31 years overseas and repatriated home. Now there are new jobs to learn and new geographies to explore on the east coast of the U.S. And while there are other overseas adventures to share, this is my farewell to eight years in Paris.

boxes exit out the window

empty living room

window view

If ever a city were designed to distract us from our troubles, it would be Paris.–Thomas Jefferson

If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris…then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast. –Ernest Hemingway

When I read Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea as a student, I found it dry as dust. Decades later, after devouring A Moveable Feast, his memoir to first wife Hadley set in 1920s Paris, our lives intersected more personally. Because I was living there.

My “earnest” infatuation with all things Hemingway began in 2010. It was more than literary interest. I walked up and down streets of the 5^thand 6^thArrondissements (neighborhoods) seeking addresses transcribed into my pocket-sized black moleskin notebook. I found the location of every apartment, restaurant, bar, and café where Hemingway was known to have lived, eaten, slept, talked, consumed alcohol, or written. More than 90 years later, in cafés where he nursed a single café crème for hours to keep his table and construct that “one perfect sentence”, I sat and read his books.

The first apartment where he and Hadley lived until the birth of their son, Jack, is marked with a plaque outside the entry door on rue du Cardinal Lemoine. The studio apartment he used for writing was around the corner from Place de la Contrascarpe on rue Descartes. He carried bundles of sticks up six flights of stairs to burn in the fireplace for winter heat.

plaque identifying 74 rue de cardinal lemoine

entry to apartment

rue descartes studio entry

top floor studio was where he wrote

Hemingway crossed through the Luxembourg Gardens, often passing by La Fontaine de Médicis, on his way to meet Gertrude Stein at her apartment on rue de Fleurus for conversation and counsel before the unfortunate rupture of their friendship.

la fontaine de médicis, jardin du luxembourg, paris

He borrowed books and talked with other struggling writers at the Shakespeare and Company bookstore owned by Sylvia Beach on 12, rue de l’Odeon. Sylvia lent him money when he was hungry, along with the books. Today, the original Shakespeare is a clothing boutique.

After WWII, Shakespeare and Co. re-opened across the river from Notre Dame. The owner, George Whitman, eventually passed it on to his daughter, Sylvia, named after Sylvia Beach. Under Sylvia Whitman, Shakespeare now encompasses two storefronts plus a café.

shakespeare and company, 37 rue de la bûcherie, 75005 paris

george whitman passed the torch to daughter sylvia in 2004

When Hemingway began an affair with Hadley’s girlfriend, Pauline Pfeiffer, the marriage ended on a sad note. After marrying Pauline, they lived on rue Férou near Saint Sulpice church. In this apartment he wrote A Farewell to Arms.

I read stories of the bar at the Ritz Hotel where Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald and others convened for hours on end. Since Hemingway was a regular there for 30 years, and the bar was eventually named after him, it was on my list to know first hand.

Actual discovery did not begin until our last year in Paris due to an extensive four-year renovation of the entire Ritz infrastructure. Toward the end, a roof fire created even more delays before the reopening.

Bar Hemingway, a very small space in the Ritz footprint, has it’s own unique history. In the early 1920s, it began as a ladies bar or “steam room”, followed by a poets’ bar, and then a writers’ bar called Bertin’s. Bertin was a friend of Hemingway’s who gave him gambling tips. And more than a few free drinks. Ernest was a man who often counted on the generosity of others.

In 1979, Mohamed Al-Fayed (owner of Harrods, London) bought the Paris Ritz. That same year, Hemingway’s family officially named the “Hemingway Bar”. Three years later it closed for the next twelve years, 1982-1994. Two years after reopening, in 1996, the name was copyrighted as “Bar Hemingway Ritz Paris.”

the first menu of the newly reopened bar in 2016

Located on the backside of the hotel, it is most easily accessed from a small side street. But I like to enter via Place Vendôme, through the front door of the Ritz, where there are uniformed doormen. Walking down expansive high ceilinged hallways past splendidly decorated rooms where tea or drinks or food is served, I peek into display windows of the high-end shopping gallery. Turn another two corners, go down several steps and walk in the door of a cozy, wood-paneled room.

two small rooms

and a bar

Minimal changes were made here during the renovation. Woodwork was stripped and refinished and new lamps were added over the bar. The Hemingway paraphernalia is all there–books, magazine portraits, photographs with wives, friends, and dead animals, a black Corona typewriter like the one he used, a long barreled hunting rifle behind the copper bar, fishing rods, a boat propeller, and a bronze bust of his head.

Sometimes I would go with a girlfriend or two when it opened at 6 PM, other times with my husband on a weekend. But if I wanted to ask questions and learn more, I went by myself to claim an empty barstool and talk with head barman, Colin Field.

What is it that draws crowds of people every day to this little piece of real estate tucked into the backend of a high-class hotel? Is it romanticized lore of Hemingway’s life in Paris–from marriages to Hadley and Pauline in the 1920s, to working as a WWII correspondent in the ‘40s, a short-lived third marriage, spiced with competitive friendships and raucous fights with other painters and writers of the time? Or is it because of the drinks, many of which are original and creative but, at the same time, over-the-top expensive?

the signature martini

served with a frozen olive ice cube

and salty snacks

I believe Bar Hemingway’s current popularity continues to be about ambience and lore and cocktails, with the added garnish of Colin Field’s 24 year history there. His amiable personality, professional bartending and management skills, and vast anecdotal knowledge of famous past patrons have kept it high on the list of iconic places to visit.

In 1994, Colin was hired to reopen the Hemingway Bar [before the name change and after the twelve-year closure]. In the beginning, as the sole employee, he did everything single-handedly. But, he added a twist–keeping the bar open until 4:00AM when all others in Paris closed at 2:00AM. During times when it was too busy to manage alone, he recruited regulars to help–answering the phone, greeting and seating customers, taking orders. In exchange, their drinks were free.

Opening night, August 25, 1994, happened to be the 50^thAnniversary of the liberation of Paris in WWII. Jack Hemingway [son by Hadley, father of Margaux and Mariel] was invited and came for the party. It turned into a bash. People dressed in GI and MP costumes. A full line-up of army Jeeps was staged along the street outside. Chaos reigned inside. Hemingway would have loved it.

These days, there are five or six employees who serve a regular flow of clientele seven days a week from 6:00PM until 2:00AM. Colin continues to hold court behind the bar, chatting up customers and blending new drinks.

Shortly before our departure from Paris, I met friends at Bar Hemingway on a clear summer evening. They invited me for a final good-bye drink.

“new age caipirinha”, a lime smoothie plus

Conversation flowed as we reminisced about shared experiences and future plans. We mused about hiking together in Portugal and Spain on the Santiago de Compostela trail a couple years before. And then, it was time to part ways. Walking back through the corridors of the Ritz, we stopped outside to say good-bye on Place Vendôme.

There is never any ending to Paris and the memory of each person differs from that of any other. We always returned to it no matter who we were or how it was changed or with what difficulties or what ease could be reached. It was always worth it and we received a return for whatever we brought to it. –E. Hemingway

Like Hemingway, Paris doesn’t end for me because I no longer live there. When I return, it will be with the happiness of years of wide-eyed discoveries, friendships for life, and the realization that…I will always be coming home.

Garlic and Girlfriends

February 17, 2018March 11, 2021 / wendyulfers / 14 Comments

How can I cook dinner tonight–we’re out of garlic! –Aunt Josephine, from the Gilroy Garlic Cookbook

It’s not an exaggeration to say that an absence of garlic in the house could be, as far as dinner goes, a showstopper. Garlic simply makes things taste better. And, as Josephine makes the case, without it, why bother?

There is more lore about garlic than any other food. As one of the oldest cultivated plants, it was thought to be a cure-all, to have mystical powers, and even to protect from evil spirits. It was used in Egyptian burials and placed on windowsills when babies were born.

Garlic is a member of the lily order of plants and the onion family that includes chives, shallots, scallions and leeks. But the most important thing about garlic is the magic it performs when blended into other foods, creating delicious, taste-enhancing flavors.

I love garlic like I love my friends. Friends, carefully cultivated with time and circumstance, blended into my life, enhancing everything. Friends going back to childhood, at home in the U.S., and while living all over the world.

Our early years in Taiwan, in the 1990s, were the beginning of a ritual of rotating Friday afternoons among a group of women I grew to know and love. We took turns gathering in each other’s living rooms. Friends came and moved on as is normal in ex-pat circles. Yet, through the revolving door of overseas life, those Friday afternoons of “wine and unwinding” were highly anticipated.

a sampling of TGIF friends, Taiwan, late 1990s

Food served invariably included a healthy dose of garlic. In certain seasons in Taiwan you could find big heads of garlic that were perfect for roasting whole. We squeezed warm, nutty, oil-soaked roasted cloves onto fresh bread or directly into our mouths. Open bottles of wine stood at attention, ready to replenish glasses.

We let our hair down and put our feet up. The formula within the formula was that all ideas, problems, or dreams were fair topics. Laughter kept everything in check. We appreciated each other’s insights, intelligence and strengths. We learned to love the idiosyncrasies. And couldn’t wait to return to garlic and friendship a week later.

What garlic is to food, insanity is to art. –Augustus St. Gaudens

10,000 years ago garlic was first discovered. It has evolved since then, having survived winters in the caves of our ancestors. Garlic is a natural antibiotic, fights bacteria and viruses, thins the blood, detoxifies the liver, decreases inflammation and lowers bad cholesterol. It is also low in calories–one or two per clove.

There are five elements: earth, air, water, fire and garlic…without garlic I simply would not care to live. –Louis Diat

my garlic tin

filled with rose garlic

Store garlic in a cool, dry place with ventilation. Not above or next to the stove, sink, or in a window with sun exposure. Never in the refrigerator! Strands of garlic can be braided attractively into plaits, ready to pull off a head as needed.

braided garlic lasts a long time

and looks beautiful too

There is no such thing as a little garlic. –Arthur Baer

To eliminate garlic on the breath: chew fresh parsley or, my favorite, allow a piece of good, dark chocolate to melt slowly on your tongue and slide down your throat.

The best way to rid garlic odor on the hands is to wash with soap and water then rub fingers and hands back and forth on the chrome of the kitchen faucet. This works!

Avoid at all costs that vile spew you see rotting in oil in screw top jars. Too lazy to peel fresh? You don’t deserve to eat garlic! –Anthony Bourdain

For easy peeling of cloves, separate them from the head. Smash each individually with the broad blade of a chef’s knife. Slip skin off. Or, from Dietitian Daughter, place cloves in a plastic container with lid and shake like crazy. The skin will loosen and separate, ready to be easily peeled away. For either method it helps to first cut off the stem ends.

One little known use for garlic was as glue in the middle ages. It was used to affix gold and silver leaf to furniture, mend glass and porcelain. This seems like a natural idea when literally everything sticks to garlicky fingers after peeling and chopping.

Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make it French. Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek. Soy sauce makes it Chinese. Garlic makes it good. –Alice May Brock

As good as the garlic was in Taiwan, it is even better in France. I’m partial to the big bulbs of rose garlic on my market street. [My Market Street] It has a pink purplish tinge to the skin unlike white garlic. Once peeled, all cloves look the same. Rose garlic cloves are uniform in size and have a less pungent smell and taste.

Remove garlic root or not?

I remove it unless garlic is very young

We went to a party in Paris one Christmas season. The dining table was laden with an impressive array of food, but I made a beeline toward a casserole of hot artichoke dip. It was perfuming the room with a warm, garlicky aroma that I could not resist. After the first taste, I spooned it directly into my mouth foregoing bread or crackers. I learned that a lot of garlic was the secret.

That recipe for garlic artichoke dip played center stage at the French version of “wine and unwind”, chez moi in Paris. Not all of the women knew each other well, but conversation and laughter flowed as effortlessly as it does among long time friends. Garlic seemed to be the tie that binds. And, well…a few bottles of memorable white and red Bordeaux [Les Hauts de Smith Blanc et Rouge] from my husband’s wine closet worked a bit of magic, too.

It is not really an exaggeration to say that peace and happiness begin, geographically, where garlic is used in cooking. –Marcel Boulestin

I don’t cook everyday now, but I always have a bulb or two of garlic in the kitchen. I’m afraid of being caught in a pinch, like Aunt Josephine, unable to put a meal together because the garlic tin is empty. And, if some girlfriends are getting together, I’m ready with my go-to ingredient to enliven the party…and create a memory of food and friendship.

ROASTED HEADS OF GARLIC

Cut ¼ to ½ inch off the top of head of garlic.
Cut off just enough so all clove ends are exposed.
Drizzle with olive oil. Salt and pepper as desired.
Rub oil in with finger or use a brush to evenly coat.
If roasting 1 or 2 heads, wrap each in foil and seal.
If roasting many heads, place them in baking pan with cut sides up. Cover the whole pan with foil.
Roast 45 minutes at 400 F. [205 C.]
Cool a bit.

Squeeze roasted cloves out of skins onto fresh bread, crackers or mix into potatoes or any pasta dish. Or place in oil and refrigerate to use later.

GARLIC ARTICHOKE DIP

2-15 oz. [400gm] cans artichoke hearts in water. Drain water.
1 whole fresh jalapeno pepper
3 large or 6 small green onions
6 large cloves garlic, chopped, then smashed in mortar and pestle
1 C. [250gm] grated mozzarella cheese
½ to ¾ C. freshly grated Parmesan cheese
2-3 drops Tabasco, Siracha or chili sauce
Salt and pepper
½ C. [or less] good quality mayonnaise. Not Hellman’s. [just enough to bind ingredients]
Sprinkle of cayenne over top

Bake 350 F. [175 C.] for 30-40 minutes until bubbly and brown. Serve with bread, crackers, or vegetable crudités.

dip ready to bake

ready to serve

SPAGHETTI JOSEPHINE from Gilroy Garlic Cookbook

[This dish was prepared regularly for the family when we lived in Taiwan. You can add in other ingredients as desired. But I like it best Josephine’s way. Serve with a big salad.]

1 medium head cauliflower, separated into tiny flowerets.
1 lb. [500 gm] spaghetti
6 cloves garlic, minced
2 T. olive oil
¼ C. minced parsley [cut with scissors in tall glass]
½ C. butter
½ C. or more freshly grated Parmesan
Freshly ground pepper

Cook cauliflower in boiling salted water until almost tender [~5 min.]
Cook spaghetti al dente.
Sauté garlic in olive oil ~1 min, then add butter and parsley.
Cook on very low heat until hot and bubbly.
Add garlic butter to spaghetti and cauliflower.
Toss together. Add Parmesan and toss again.
Serve immediately with additional grated cheese and the pepper grinder.

Janmarie demonstrates how to pound garlic in my Cyprus kitchen, circa 1992

Bugling Elk and Sacred Spaces

October 9, 2017June 24, 2020 / wendyulfers / 25 Comments

Every part of the Earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every humming insect is holy in the memory and experience of my people. The perfumed flowers are our sisters; the deer, the horse, and the great eagle; these are our brothers. We are part of the Earth and it is part of us. –Chief Seattle, native American

It’s autumn now in northern Europe where I returned a week ago. The courtyard Virginia creeper vine is reddening more each day. Heavier bed linens are in place so the window can remain open for good sleeping. Scarves donned for outdoor wear. And rain.

Still, for the moment, I’m thinking about a longer than normal summer season in Colorado. Three months at “Camp Estes”–our hillside home with Front Range views and walk-in access to Rocky Mountain National Park.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — camp estes’ long’s peak view

What made it particularly special were the visitors, different from other summers. A toddler grand-daughter’s first time to roam rocky, hilly landscapes, a reunion of women from my high school graduating class, visual apparitions of campfire spirits after two years of “no-burn” ban, s’mores with dark European chocolate, and a herd of rutting elk who wandered in–and stayed.

These events fused with other things I love; wildflowers in profusion, mountain sunrise and sunsets, thunderstorms and rainbows, low hanging clouds clearing to snow on the high peaks, elk bugling in the change of season.

Returning to the mountains is particularly significant to me because of our overseas lifestyle. For twelve summers, during the years we lived in Taipei, Taiwan, I needed to come home and recalibrate. Living and breathing for a few months at a higher altitude under clear blue skies was very different from a big Asian city of concrete, tile, and smoggy air.

The mountains give us our “spiritual geography”, a term coined by Kathleen Norris in her book Dakota. It is the place we inhabit to find our best selves.

Mythologist Joseph Campbell wrote of the importance of finding individual “sacred space”:

“A sacred space is any space that is set apart from the usual context of life. It has no function in the way of earning a living or a reputation…In your sacred space, things are working in terms of your dynamic–and not somebody else’s…You don’t really have a sacred space until you find somewhere to be…where joy comes from inside, not something external that puts joy into you, a place that lets you experience your own will and your own intention and your own wish…”

Your sacred space is where you find yourself again and again. –J. Campbell

My sacred spaces begin in physical forms–a cabin in Colorado mountains, a campfire ring, and a hidden destination called “Rock on the River” where I hike alone to heal or think.

There is a chameleon-like aspect to living an overseas lifestyle, between home in the U.S. and home elsewhere in the world. In the mountains I live in jeans and soft shirts, moccasins or cowgirl boots. I drink coffee on the front porch in sunshine or on a deck overlooking Long’s Peak and Rocky Mountain National Park. I go to bed after sitting around a campfire and awaken to the smell of smoke on my pillow.

Returning home to Paris, there is a seamless slide into the city version of myself. I adapt to the rhythms around me as I sit in cafés watching people instead of coyotes, hawks, deer and elk.

Returning to the mountains is what makes this work. Feeling small and insignificant amid the backdrop of a huge landscape clears my mind. I love the smell of rapidly changing weather, poking campfires with a stick, and wild animals that roam without fences. I think about the good fortune that lies ahead–sharing this with a generation of grandchildren.

Another way to tell the story is with pictures. To those who dropped in or to those who stayed awhile, and to those who will return–a look back at the best of this season’s memories…

“mexican hat” flowers germinated from seeds sowed over many years [without luck]. in 2005, a new cabin was built and they popped out of dormancy

leila 15 months, discovers and wobbles on uneven terrain

jet lag means 5:30AM sunrise with coffee on the deck

avocado margaritas at ed’s cantina. description here: Sipping Avocado Margs in Summer

leila loves fresh lime until it gets to be too much.

horse rides at the shaka shaka [Russian for playground]

early morning reading with auntie “yaya”

fire ring supper with leila, deedee and yaya

high school girlfriends reunite in estes park, photo by betty cleffman hager

hiking in the park, photo by betty cleffman hager

trails with big views, photo by debbie windus

old west photo sepia — marking time with an “old time” photo

2017 Deb Colorado_043 — RMNP natural beauty, photo by debbie windus

2017 Deb Colorado_092 — september light, RMNP, photo by debbie windus

IMG_4073_09-14-2017 — “shining pine needles”, photo by mary beckey kelly

2017 Deb Colorado_082 — mountain lavender, photo by debbie windus

2017 Deb Colorado_079 — pre-dinner snacks for friends, photo by debbie windus

fire ring built in 1991 has mostly remained in the same configuration. I re-arranged it a “few times” until a landscaper called it a “spiritual circle” and I quit messing with it.

s’more ingredients: grahams, marshmellows, European chocolate choices–plain, sea salt or caramel and sea salt. whisky and wine, optional

toast marshmellows over red hot coals, place on chocolate lined graham crackers.

smush together, enjoy with adult beverage of choice

Campfire at Wendy's with Joyce and Dave — smoke in our eyes, photo by barb barton minquet

summer becomes fall with elk rut. 6:30 AM bugling wake ups

CLICK HERE for 30 second video taken from front porch of biggest bull re-claiming the harem after three younger males tried a take over coup

low clouds, yellowing aspen signal change

flame spirit turns into double horse head

And finally, to Leila: I hope the wide and wild natural world will always be part of your adventure, that you will be nurtured by its’ rhythms and beauty, and know that nature exists to support all of her creatures. You are now part of the earth and it is part of you.

Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The wind will blow freshness into you, and cares will drop away like leaves of Autumn. –John Muir

Sex in a Pan

February 12, 2017January 28, 2022 / wendyulfers / 15 Comments

painting by gustave moreau, french symbolist, 1826-1898

Some “firsts” you remember and others you don’t. I can’t remember my first Sex in a Pan.

Many years ago, I was told Sex in a Pan was for women only. Men don’t like it. It is something you never do alone, always with others, preferably in the afternoon.

Hemingway once said, “Never go on trips with anyone you do not love.” I say, never have Sex in a Pan with anyone you don’t like–at least a little bit. Otherwise, why go to all the trouble?

What’s special about Sex in a Pan? It’s not the equipment, which is ordinary. It’s not the getting ready, which is straightforward. It’s not the result, which is pleasurable. It is when everything comes together.

I remember one Sex in a Pan party around my friend Linda’s table when we lived in Taiwan. The other guests were Asian women who had no idea what to expect. But, as with our American Thanksgiving dinners, they wanted to learn and share new customs. So they joined in…and loved it.

Sex in a Pan is like secretly swiping your finger across a thickly frosted cake. It’s what lingers in the memory after taste melts away. But Sex in a Pan is not cake. It is a decadent dessert of many layers–for sharing.

The recipe I have carried around the world is in someone else’s handwriting. That well-worn piece of paper is the key to unlocking where I was and who I was with my first time. It’s lost to memory now.

So, by default, Sex in a Pan is mine to offer anyone who loves smooth and creamy with some crunchy, slightly sour with some salty, chocolate-y, close your eyes, eat-with-a-spoon-kind-of-fun.

At the Taiwan party, inhibitions were safely shed around the table as we talked of taste and texture and guiltless self-indulgence while eating something fun. There was laughter and letting go among friends. And that, in its nutty crust, is what Sex in a Pan is about.

Since we live in France, the ingredient choices are different. Butter from Normandy embedded with crystals of sea salt, Chantilly whipped crème instead of Cool Whip, dark chocolate, shaved into curls, instead of milk chocolate.

We were four women around the table–two Americans, one French and one German. The other three had no forewarning except I needed help to write this story.

It doesn’t really matter who or how many you gather for Sex in a Pan. Once you invite people in, they are mostly curious, ready to dabble in the unconventionally offbeat, perhaps with a touch of “double sens”, [“double entendre”, which is strangely not the expression in France]. The truth about Sex in a Pan is that what’s in the pan is simply a channel for what happens around it.

sex in a pan parisian party, champagne of course

In double-sens-speak, I learned that “sensuously seductive” is said to be “croustillante” in French or “eine heisse Affäre” in German. We romanticized taste by describing the salty [yes to French butter!] and crunchy [those pecans]. Layers of chocolate, sweetened cheese, and fluffy crème mingled. Tiny pellets of chocolate atop hid unexpected softness below. Voilà! Quelle langue!

We sipped Champagne and dipped into the communal dish. Late afternoon gave way to evening. And everyone had different liaisons waiting.

When you host a Sex in a Pan party, try to keep the memory alive by having it again…and, then again.

SEX IN A PAN

Ingredients:

1 C. flour
½ C. butter–best quality salted butter you can find
¾ C. chopped pecans
8 oz. cream cheese at room temperature
1 C. icing sugar
1 large pkg. instant chocolate pudding [6 ½ C. size]
1 large pkg. instant vanilla pudding [6 ½ C. size]
3 C. cold milk
1 large container Cool Whip or any good whipped cream
1 large dark chocolate bar

Preparation:

Mix flour, butter and pecans and press into bottom of 8 1/2 x 11 inch [22 x 28 cm] pan. Bake for 20 minutes, 350 degrees F. [180 C.].
Mix cream cheese and powdered sugar and spread on top of cooled crust.
Spread ½ of Cool Whip or whipped cream over cream cheese layer.
Mix together instant chocolate and vanilla pudding with COLD milk and beat by hand with a whisk until it starts to thicken.
Spread over top of whipped cream.
Spread remaining Cool Whip or whipped cream over pudding.
Shave, grate and chop the chocolate bar. Sprinkle all over the top.
Refrigerate until ready to serve.
Serves 12-15 from one pan, depending on appetites.

Serving:

Pass out spoons, one to a person. Place Sex in a Pan in the middle of the table. In the spirit of communal adventure everyone dips in and eats spoonful by spoonful from the pan. Scoop all the way to the bottom with each bite.

So far, I’ve only known one man who said he enjoyed Sex in a Pan. He was able to rise above the gooey communal aspects others have no taste for. However, let it be known that my brother-in-law, Frank, is very partial to anything chocolate.

Kindle Some Candlelight

December 18, 2014December 21, 2020 / wendyulfers / 26 Comments

Growing up in a family with regular fire-making rituals, I inherited an obsession with flames. When the outside temperature dropped, it was time to place newspaper, kindling, and wood in the fireplace and watch it burn. Now I live in an historic Parisian apartment with seven stone and marble fireplaces. All of them sealed shut. In the dark winter months there is only one thing to do. Between four and five in the afternoon, as the sun is setting, I begin lighting candles.

Recently, I became aware this is not a tradition others follow as consistently as I do. On a dark December afternoon, my friend Lesli invited a group of women to her apartment in Paris for “wine and unwind” time. This is a time of bringing friends into your home, opening a bottle of something, and letting conversation flow.

Lesli’s apartment is furnished with a spectacular crystal chandelier from another century. While admiringly it, I noticed it was outfitted with candles! They had never been lit since Lesli moved in three years before. She needed little encouragement from me. I climbed on a chair, broke off the old wicks and re-lit them. In full glow, this antique beauty became a Versailles-worthy show stopper.

Her apartment also had six or eight candles in heavy glass jars from the oldest candle making store in Paris. Cire Trudon is the most prestigious French wax manufacturer in existence since 1643. The wicks were deeply buried in hardened wax. It took some digging and trimming, but those, too, were put into burning use. Soon the living room was alight with candle glow, “coupes de champagne” in everyone’s hand, and easy banter among friends.

Candlelight warms up any room and the atmosphere immediately turns festive and ambient. Some people believe candles are messy and never use them except on special occasions. As requested by a few friends in France, here is basic candle etiquette to keep your home aglow anytime.

Always trim the wick before relighting a candle. It will break off in your fingers at the perfect starting point. Otherwise, smoke from a too-long wick blackens walls, ceilings and pollutes the room.
Prevent excessive dripping messes by keeping lit candles out of drafts. This seems obvious. Also for safety reasons.
If you light a lot of candles, it’s good to use a candlesnuffer for extinguishing rather than blowing them out. This reduces smoke pollution and prevents spraying wax on walls and surfaces.

When engaging in regular candle usage, there are other interesting tips to know.

Never display new taper or column candles in your home with white, unburnt wicks. If you leave wicks un-blackened they look like the store display, not something your actually use for home ambience and decoration. White wicks can be lit briefly and extinguished, unless using the candle right away. Votive candles are an exception. Light them when ready to use.

Don’t burn candles during daylight. Candles are for darkness only, morning or evening. Breakfast or coffee before sun-up with candlelight is a mellow way to start the day. Evening is natural timing. A candle-lit bath is self-care luxury. The long days of summer are for being outside so save candle rituals for the hibernating months.

When a drippy mess occurs, as it will, consider it part of the experience. A plastic spatula gently scrapes wax from hard surfaces. Hot water on a washrag does the rest, melting it away.

One way to prolong the life of column candles is to gently press around the outside rim as it is burning, folding the soft wax in toward the wick. This will help the rim melt into the wax pool and keep it level. If the wax pool becomes too deep, pour the liquid out right after extinguishing. Occasionally trim the hollowed out part of the candle to make it flush with the wick using a cutting board and a large knife. The candle is shorter, but it will burn better.

best of electricity and candlepower, colorado

I can’t explain how fire and candle lore became second nature to me. But I do know our “indoor lives” are enhanced by strategic candlelight. It’s a personal, creative choice for the selection of candle holders, shapes, and colors. Almost any non-flammable container will hold some type of candle. Oil lamp candlelight is a no fuss no muss option, except for needing to occasionally replenish the oil. The rule of thumb is buy good candles, not the least expensive ones. You get better candle power return with the investment.

So on these dark days and long nights of winter, kindle a candle, or two, or three at home on a regular basis. Enjoy some flickering flames with family or friends. After all, ‘tis the season.

Premier candles: www.ciretrudon.com

Cire Trudon USA, Inc. 358 Fifth Ave., Suite 901 NY, NY 10001

In France: 78, rue de Seine 75006 Paris

Hellenic Halloumi

November 16, 2014February 3, 2022 / wendyulfers / 23 Comments

For three years, in the early 1990s, we lived on the island of Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. The capital, Nicosia, was divided in half by the Turkish invasion of 1974. After the conflict, U.N. troops kept peace along a border called The Green Line. This line divided the entire island between the Turkish occupied northern section and the Greek populated land to the south. We lived on the Greek Cypriot side of Nicosia. Although you could still see bullet holes in certain places, the old part of the city was very charming—vine covered walls, stone terraced tavernas, shops of pottery, pewter, and hand made lace, narrow cobbled lanes with flowers spilling out of pots.

We lived on the ground floor of a small apartment building adjacent to the International School of Cyprus [ISC], as it was called in those years. The kitchen and living room had glass doors that opened onto a large terrazzo-tiled terrace bordered by a white iron railing. It was overhung with willow branches from an enormous tree growing out of the garden of the Greek restaurant on the hillside just below.

In warm weather, sounds of clinking glassware and cutlery drifted upward as tables were set for dinner on the patio. We befriended the owner and sometimes he beckoned us to join him for a late night glass of wine. When the last diners departed, we tiptoed down the stone stairs between our terrace and his restaurant to have a drink and conversation under candle lanterns in the willow tree.

I met Janmarie during our first year in Cyprus. Her four children attended ISC. After dropping them off in the morning, she was at my kitchen table for coffee by 8:30AM. Every day. We became good friends over those visits, talking easily about many things.

Sometimes morning coffee conversations merged into lunchtime hunger. When this happened, particularly in the wintertime, Janmarie would say, “Let’s go for some Halloumi.” We headed downtown to the old part of the city.

Halloumi is a cheese that originated in Cyprus centuries ago. Traditionally it came from sheep’s milk, is pure white, shaped in semi-solid blocks and packed in salty brine. Once relieved of it’s packaging and drained, it looks anemic and unappetizing. The subtlety of this cheese is that it transforms into something special by grilling it to a golden color.

sealed in brine

before transformation

On the streets of old-town Nicosia, hot off the grill, layered on Panini bread with tomato and cucumber slices, then grilled again in a sandwich press, halloumi was more than a hand held snack. It was the taste of salt from the sea mixed with creamy chewiness and warmth, in sharp contrast to the cold air in which we sat.

On a wintery day in a Cypriot taverna, that sandwich reminded me of ancient history beneath the cobblestones–9000 years of island invasions and conquerors, Greek mythology, Roman ruins, and archeological digs. In our own time, it was a reminder of spring picnics in fields of red poppies, smooth-stoned beaches, and tile-roofed houses of old stone overlooking the sea. All told, grilled halloumi is the remembrance of a specific time and place, nourishing food, and my friend.

fbf24c61c3c60bb74e8827160c2a4db7 — Kourion Roman Amphitheater used for ISC graduation

stone-circle-500x500 — stones on Pissouri beach

When we lived in Cyprus, halloumi was a local product only, made and consumed on the island. Later, we lived in Taiwan, Germany and France and halloumi was forgotten.

Then one day, in a Greek delicatessen on our Parisian market street, I spied bricks of that briny cheese. The global market had caught up. Taste and memory were about to be rekindled.

There are different ways to prepare and enjoy halloumi. The easiest way is to slice it ¼ inch thick and fry in a little bit of good olive oil. When nicely browned on both sides, it is the start of a great sandwich using pita bread or a tortilla wrap. Layer in tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions, spinach or leafy lettuce.

add spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, red onion

As a snack or hors d’oeuvre, halloumi can be prepared a little differently. Cut into cubes and brown on all sides in a small amount of olive oil. When golden, place in a bowl, drizzle with a bit more oil and sprinkle with red pepper flakes. Pass out the toothpicks and eat it right away. You can make tapas with olives and fresh crudités, or enjoy the salty creaminess on its own.

Although I can eat halloumi cheese anywhere in the world these days, I cherish most these three things–a Mediterranean island steeped in ancient history, the camaraderie of a great friend, and a hot-off-the-grill halloumi sandwich on a cold winter day.

nicosia

cyprus

at the taverna

Two Non-Cooks Saved by the Brazilians

July 29, 2014June 24, 2020 / wendyulfers / 7 Comments

Screen Shot 2014-07-26 at 2.33.50 PM — World Cup 2014: Germany 7, Brazil 1 [soccer-blogger.com]

There has been plenty of press about Brazil lately. Their national depression over losses in the recent World Cup barely registered with me. Reported problems readying venues for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro seem a minor glitch. These things usually work themselves out. Even if, at the deadline, there is little hot water in the hotels, as Sochi 2014. The Games must go on!

My interest in Brazil comes not from sports. It begins with a recipe that solved my first-dinner-party-dilemma when we lived in Singapore. An overseas friend recently reminded me of this. She was there, and it saved her too.

Mary was present in my life in the first three of our five international settings. We met in Singapore as part of a group of friends and families who celebrated Thanksgiving and went on beach holidays together. Then, in Cyprus in the early 1990s we became better friends. She lived in the apartment above us and was our son’s third grade teacher.

When Mary wanted to make a plan with me, an empty coffee can was lowered from her balcony, above our terrace, on a piece of string. When I saw a tin can swaying in the breeze, I knew there would be a folded piece of paper inside with a note: “Meet after school for a brisk walk” or “Come up for a wee dram of scotch”. Often it was both. Later, in Taiwan, we were part of a group of women who bonded in weekly TGIF afternoons in each other’s homes. Our “Wine and Unwind” parties solved most of the world’s problems during those years.

adam and mary, International School Cyprus, 1991

During our first year in Singapore we accepted many invitations to dinners, parties, and holiday events. By the second year, we were past due in repaying friends for their kindness. At the time, I barely cooked and had nothing dinner party worthy in my repertoire. I consulted cookbooks and fretted about what to make.

For the family I stuck to one-dish meals, everything mixed together without the fuss of separate courses. In planning a party, I took M.F.K. Fisher’s advice to heart. She said an in-home dinner party is best when served to no more than six invited guests. Since that required several weekend party paybacks, I needed a menu that was repeatable, too.

Singapore is awash in fresh seafood and world-class cuisine. The spicy mix of Chinese, Indian and Malaysian food cultures always made eating out an adventure. In the late 1980s, we frequently dined at a seaside restaurant on Punggol Point. The specialty was chili crab that made our lips and faces sting. It was served with thick white bread to mop up the sauce. No one stopped eating until the table was a littered mess of shells, claws and sauce. We ate with our hands, wearing a paper bib. When finished, chili sauce covered both hands, went up the arms, and was smeared across cheeks and chin. Hoses were conveniently available.

20140421_203018 — singaporean chili crab, courtesy of serena foxon

Screen Shot 2014-07-23 at 9.13.15 PM — peranakan place, earlier days

The other Singaporean dish I fell for was Nonya Laksa. This is from the Peranakan culture, a combination of Chinese and Malaysian cuisine. It’s a coconut curry-based soup with noodles, vegetables, prawns, and hardboiled quail’s eggs. I lost my taste buds to the heat of spices in this soup and never looked back. A walk from our apartment down Emerald Hill Road to the restaurant at Peranakan Place on Orchard Road is where I learned to eat this national treasure. It’s a double whammy to sweat from the heat and humidity of tropical temperatures while sweating from spicy food in an un-air-conditioned cafe. We adapted. And loved it all.

image (2) — nyonya laksa, courtesy of fiona foxon

It was a different friend who solved the dinner party menu dilemma. Knowing that I needed simple and foolproof, she suggested Brazilian Shrimp Stew–a one-dish wonder. Finding fresh shrimp and produce was easy. Cooking everything all together in a large pan, even easier. A portion of rice for any size appetite with shrimp stew swimming over the top seemed like a hostess’ dream. Easy preparation, plenty of time for socializing with guests and a repeatable result, I couldn’t ask for more.

Mary and her husband were invited to one of the dinners. Like me, she was [and is] uninspired by daily cooking. This easy-to-make stew not only caught her attention with its’ spicy coconut shrimp tastiness, she carried it forward to her own in-house entertaining. Mary reminded me of eating shrimp stew first under our roof, then making it her own success story.

We both thank the Brazilians for saving two non-cooks from dinner party angst many years ago.

Preparing and enjoying Shrimp Stew is for everyone who loves Brazil, her fanatic football fans, and the simplicity of a guest-worthy one-dish meal. Just add dessert.

Bon appétit.

BRAZILIAN SHRIMP STEW

1 kg [2.2 lbs] peeled shrimp
1/4 C. olive oil
1/4 C. chili oil
4-5 large fresh tomatoes, diced, or 1 large can diced tomatoes [do not drain or seed tomatoes]
1 large onion, chopped [or a combination of red and white onion]
1 large green, yellow or orange bell pepper, chopped [or all three]
3 T. parsley [fresh is best, cut with scissors]
6-7 crushed garlic cloves [or more]
fresh red or green hot peppers, chopped and seeded [optional, or to taste]
1 t. salt
¼ t. pepper
½ can unsweetened coconut milk [or the whole can because what else will you do with the rest?]

Heat oils. Add all ingredients except coconut milk. Cook 10-15 minutes. Remove from heat. Add coconut milk. Serve over rice.

Use chopped green onions and fresh lime wedges as garnish. Squeeze fresh lime juice over the stew, table side. Serve with good bread to soak up the sauce.

In Mary’s words: “I have made this recipe many times. Since you don’t specify how many it feeds, I just add more of everything if it doesn’t look like enough.” Spoken like a true non-cook who adapts.

I made this recipe amount recently and it easily serves six people.

A Taste of Mind

window to a life overseas

Girlfriends

Paris al Fresco

Carolina On My Mind

Guest Ready Sweetness

We All Need the Eggs

Wait Twenty Minutes Then Add Salt

People Who Pull the Magic Out of You

Home Is Where You Are, Even Overseas

Leaving Paris and Hemingway

Garlic and Girlfriends

Bugling Elk and Sacred Spaces

Sex in a Pan

Kindle Some Candlelight

Hellenic Halloumi

Two Non-Cooks Saved by the Brazilians

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