odds and ends

“Summertime,
And the livin’ is easy
Fish are jumpin’
And the cotton is high..”  by DuBose Heyward.

So I gathered bits and pieces from here and there that I felt I needed to tell the world.

• Starting with food. Here’s a real quick and tasty recipe of Pattypan summer squashes. I just got them at our local farmers market. They’re not only cute and add color to your dinner table, but also, ahammm, healthy (here). Most of all- they’re yummy !

Pattypan squashes fresh from the market

All there’s to do: Cut them into halves wide-wise. Also cut a thin flat slice at each end, so the half squashes could rest steadily in the baking dish (wide side facing up). Turn oven to 400 F or 200 C. Drizzle olive oil, bit of salt, crushed or chopped garlic and coarsely chopped rosemary on the yellow shining faces of the squashes.

pattypans go into the oven

That’s all folks. Cover with aluminum foil, put in oven for 30 minutes. Take off foil and let them pattypans get some oven tan till they’re golden(ish). Out of the oven and into your plate they go. With some nice green salad on the side. Ahh ha. Oh yeah- don’t over roast them, they don’t like to dry out.

• more food: Yesterday, on our way to one of the last shows of HAIR in Broadway, a small window on 9th Ave. caught our eyes.  A pile of some fine-looking Bourekas just called us in. The owner, Gazala Halabi, was placing paper-thin rounds of dough on the taboon, which will later become Druze pitas.

Gazala makes pitas on the taboon

We had wonderful bourekas: one filled with sun dry tomatoes and goat cheese, and the other was with spinach and feta cheese. The kids had a Druze pita wrap (“laffa”) with salad and falafel. The plate was wiped clean off the lamb kabab that was there merely 20 minutes before.

We’ll be there again.  Gazala’s Place

Druze cuisine @ Gazala Place

• Staying in the city: restaurants will now need to display the cleanliness rating of their facility according to new letter-grading rules. Now, when deciding upon your next dinner in the City, look on the restaurant’s window. Does it have an “A”, “B” or “C”? Under the new plan, a restaurant receiving an A grade will post it at the end of the inspection. If the grade is lower than an A, the restaurant will not have to post a grade until it has a chance to improve its sanitary conditions. The Health Department will return within a month to conduct a second inspection. The ultimate goal is to improve sanitary conditions and reduce the risk of food-borne illness.

• Going west: San Francisco is requiring stores to post cellphone radiation levels.  Those rates are the levels at which radio frequencies penetrate body tissue. whether or not there is a connection between cellphones (and their radiation) to cancer, it sure brings the question to the table again, to deserve a serious awareness.

Any thoughts to share?

Fun and healthy summer to us all   🙂

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orange soup for Fall

It’s Fall. Not everything is orange yet, as we had a funny Summer. Here and there red leafs are showing for a moment or two before they take off and hit the ground. There is chill in the mornings. I want to feel like Fall.

orangey ingredients for fall soup

So I decided to make an orange soup that my daughter loves, to get into the Autumn atmosphere. And daughter: when you grow and have your own family and you’ll wanna feel like a little girl again, with your childhood kitchen smells, you have the recipe to do just that.  EZ.

you’ll need:

• 5 tbsp. olive oil
• 2 onions coarsely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, sliced
• 1 butternut squash, peeled, cut into coarse cubes
• 9-10 carrots, peeled, cubed
• 1 orange, rind grated
• 8 cups of vegetable broth
• salt and pepper

prepare:

• heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. add onions and garlic, cook while stirring frequently till soften.
• add the rest of the vegetables and cook for another 3 minutes.
• add broth, salt and pepper and bring to a boil. reduce heat, cover, and simmer 25-30 minutes, until vegetables are soft (but not too soft…).
• allow soup to cool, then puree with a hand blender.

variations: add some sour cream to the soup; substitute the vegetable broth with chicken broth; add sweet potato instead of 5 carrots; add saffron. play around and have fun finding your special aroma.

yummy orange soup

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