life in portland

late night hijinks

Idea for using those giant zucchinis your neighbor sneaks onto your porch in August:

the fruits of labor day

It's September, and that means it's the beginning of the end of summer. The markets are bursting with fresh fruits and veggies, and it makes a person just want to go all out to enjoy the fresh bounty while we can.
Here's one idea for using up those luscious, juicy nectarines I can't seem to get enough of:

Galettes are kind of like a free-form tart: just plop down a bunch of thinly sliced stuff on a round of pie dough, turn up the edges, and cook it 'till it's golden brown.

 Easy as pie, (or possibly even easier).

Anyhow, here's how to do a Nectarine Galette:

Slice up a couple of juicy nectarines (leave the skin on..galettes are all about being rustic)

and drizzle with some lovely local honey and a few drops of fresh lemon juice.

Place a round of the pie dough of your choice  (This one's made by Pillsbury, who did NOT pay me to say it...I'm just really bad at making my own) on a parchment-lined cookie sheet. 

 Finely grind or chop about a half cup of almonds and sprinkle them over the dough,

then arrange the slices of fruit overlapping each other, leaving about an inch or two of crust around the outside.

It looks really pretty this way, but you could just heap them in a pile in the center of the crust, and it would be absolutely fine, too...it's supposed to be rustic, remember?

Fold the edges of the dough over the fruit, making little pleats.

Sprinkle the top with cinnamon sugar (equal parts cinnamon and sugar mixed up) 

and bake at 400º until it's golden brown and crusty.

I don't want summer to end just yet...I'm not ready!

more summer

Even though yesterday's damp skies weren't the brilliant blue that defines a perfect Oregon summer day, the rain that fell was warm, and the hope remains that there will be more sunny days ahead.  (We Oregonians are an optimistic bunch...if we weren't, I'm pretty sure the suicide rate would be sky high)
Anyway, despite the weather, there are certain signs that summer is here. One of my favorite hallmarks of summer is  a juicy caprese salad: sliced, ripe tomatoes, fresh, pillowy mozzarella and fragrant basil leaves snipped right off the plant. All this goodness is layered and drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, then sprinkled with coarse salt and ground pepper, for a taste of true summer.

{click on the photos to get up close and personal}

Mmmm. I think I can still smell the basil.

Over at the blog Written, Inc. Carmi  hosts Thematic Photographic and invites everyone to join in. This week's theme ( No. 201) is called "Welcome Summer."

welcome summer

Every week, Carmi over at the blog Written Inc., hosts an exercise called Thematic Photographic and invites everyone to join in. This week's theme ( No. 201) is called "Welcome Summer."

A couple of days ago Dave and I and a visiting friend loaded the pups in the car and took a drive out to the coast. The weather was warm, the sky was deep blue and cloudless, and the ocean sparkled like there were diamonds in the surf.

Later, we had lunch on the patio of a brewpub, and our outgoing friend shared an oyster shooter birthday toast with another patron.

It was a great way to welcome summer!

Now I suggest you hop on over to Written, Inc. to view Carmi's photos, and don't forget to check the comments for links to other photographic submissions.

a little light summer reading, anyone?

It's always easy to spot an Oregonian on vacation outside of the Northwest. They're the ones sitting in the shade with the ethereal complexions, wearing sunglasses and wide brimmed hats, nose deep in a book. 

 Portland is a town full of readers, and I'm not sure, but I think it might possibly have something to do with our rainy climate. 

There is never a time when Powell's City of Books isn't packed, and our library has a ridiculously high circulation rate. This makes for some stiff competition when a new or interesting book is reviewed on NPR or in the NY Times or the Oregonian. Fortunately, the Multnomah County Library has a great website which enables you to search for and place holds on books online. Unfortunately, Portland is also a very web-savvy town, and when a book is mentioned on NPR, within a few seconds there are 350 holds placed on two copies, and you really have to have good reflexes to be one of the first in line to get it. This is exactly what happened when I read this review of "The Instructions" in the Oregonian early one morning in the beginning of January. I jumped up immediately, walked the thirty-six inches to my computer and placed a hold on the book at the library. I was something like number 245. I promptly forgot about it until last Friday, when I got an email from the library stating the book was waiting for me. 

When I went to the holds shelf, I thought I must have ordered an audio book. It looked like a big box sitting on the shelf. Then I remembered that the title of the review was "The best 1,000 page novel you'll ever read", and I realized what I was in for. 

(Wine cork added to show scale)

I just hope three weeks is long enough to finish it. 

another recipe, or you could just sneak some zucchini onto your neighbor's porch...

We are now officially over Zucchini Madness Week at Camp Cactus. The crop has finally slowed way down, now producing only about one zuke the size of a 7 year old's tibia every few days.

A more sane and manageable number, even for a zucchini lover like myself. In all seriousness, there is just so much squash a person can take! So, here's one more recipe, in case you still have a squash surplus.

Zucchini Cake

1 cup white sugar

1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed

2 cups unbleached flour

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

4 large eggs, beaten

1-1/2 cups safflower or vegetable oil (not olive oil)

3 cups grated zucchini

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 - 12 oz pkg chocolate chips

1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350ºF

Coarsely grate zucchini.

Combine sugar, flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Add eggs, oil, zucchini, vanilla and chocolate chips, and stir together with a wooden spoon until the mixture is thoroughly moist. Spray an angel food cake pan (or a 15" x 10" x 2" rectangular pan, or two 9" round pans) with non stick cooking spray and dust with flour.

Dump the whole mess of batter into your cake pan(s) and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. (About 1+ hour for the angel food cake pan, or 45+ minutes for the rectangular pan, or about 30 minutes for the round pans.) Let cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes, then turn out of pans and finish cooling on the rack before frosting. (Recipe below)

Cream Cheese Frosting

1 - 8 oz. pkg. cream cheese

1/4 cup butter

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 - 1/2 cups powdered sugar

With an electric mixer (or a lot of elbow grease), cream together the butter, cream cheese and vanilla. Slowly add the sugar, mixing until creamy after each addition. Taste all along the way, adding more sugar if you like it very sweet, less if you like it more tangy. (I like tangy)

Frost the cake and lick the spatula!

I forgot a few steps in the photography process, so let's just jump to the finished slice, shall we?

pdx to oc, day three

On the road again, after a stop in the Bay Area to visit my sisters and nephews...I stayed up too late and got up too early, but I was eager to get the trip down that desolate stretch of Interstate 5 over with. Not much to look at but gently rolling golden hills and cows. Lot of cows. Down around Coalinga, you can smell the feedlots from miles away. A truly awful way to raise food. I'm not a vegetarian, but why we feel as if it's our right to treat these animals as if they're just inanimate, non-feeling things is a mystery to me.

Further south the rolling hills give way to the enormous San Joaquin Valley, a formerly fertile, now incredibly arid place full of orchards and vineyards and orange groves fed by broad, manmade canals moving water from North to South. Farm is such a quaint word. This is Agribusiness.

It's easy to be critical, but not so easy to reconcile that criticism when I pull into an oasis to fill up my car with gas and have a breakfast of fast food at Burger King.

However, nature is not quite so critical...the wild things see opportunity in the very things I'm criticizing.

Hours later, I make the long, hot climb up and over the final pass

into LA smog and traffic.

It seemed fitting that I was listening to this song at the time:

Welcome to LA...

did I mention it was hot?

pdx to oc, day two

Back on the road after a one night stopover at my cousin's place. By 7:45 am I've already seen two dead deer and a small orange tabby on the side of the road. We humans sure have made this planet a dangerous place for our fellow creatures.

On the bright side, I narrowly avoid hitting a confused squirrel trying to cross the interstate, so I console myself with that for awhile.

By mid morning I've climbed up and over quite a few mountain passes:

The first three were hills, really...

but then they got a bit higher...

Still, nothing like going over the Rockies, but the highest point on I-5 nevertheless.

And then I got to see the last little bit of cool, green Northwest scenery for about a week:

pdx to oc, day one

Driving down I-5 near Roseburg, Oregon listening to Jumping Jack Flash loud on the stereo. I'm doing 75, trying to pass a log truck, when out of nowhere a big maroon Pontiac comes up on my tail. I slip the Honda in front of the truck, and watch the Pontiac blow past me. It's a car full of blue-haired, little old ladies bobbing their heads and laughing animatedly, doing at least 85. I wonder what they're listening to?

the best summer days

The best summer days offer up a combination of delights:

• Berry pie for breakfast on the deck in my pajamas.
• A mid morning walk with the knuckleheads in the sunshine under a cloudless, impossibly blue sky.
• A surprise visit from a dear friend, who always makes my husband smile.

• Afternoon in my studio, drawing while sprawled in a comfy chair found for free on the street last weekend, and the new french doors flung open to the patio built with my own two hands.

A day for which I cast my gratitude to the Universe.

wordless wednesday no. 16

of tourist traps and strip mall sushi

I think we should officially declare 2009 The Year of the Visitor. Long-lost friends, in-laws, nieces and nephews, cousins and children have all trekked up the Oregon Trail to Camp Cactus recently, and we couldn't be happier. It's given us an opportunity to go places and see sights we wouldn't ordinarily take the time to visit.

Matt and I drove up to Seattle on a warm and sunny Saturday with my sister in law Martha and niece Lily. We got there just before lunchtime and drove around looking for a cheap place to park. Cheap is a relative term. Let's just say, if you're used to parking in a small to medium sized city like Portland, when parking in Seattle it is advisable to be accompanied by either a platinum credit card or a briefcase full of money.


Our first stop was the Public Market, where we waded into a raging torrent of tourists and were swept along past stalls selling dazzling flowers, luscious fruits and vegetables and tacky souvenirs of every description.

It's a throwback to another era, and it's packed because public markets like these are few and far between.




I'm not sure what the pigs were doing there, though.

After lunch we strolled past the original Starbucks location.

It was packed with Japanese tourists holding up their cell phones to take pictures, so we skipped our afternoon caffeine fix and walked up the hill to the museum.

It's a good thing, because the caffeine might have sent me over the edge like the drivers of these cars.

On the way home, we stopped for gas and food at an outlet mall in Centralia...were we found a kick ass little Japanese restaurant that served the freshest sushi I've had in ages, as well as a really great Korean dish called bulgogi.

It was so good, I ate it before I remembered to take a picture.