yellow + gray

I am really loving the color combination of yellow and gray at the moment. I think it appeals to two sides of me. One is the neutral loving side and the other side is the one that craves bright, saturated, sunniness. Here are a few of my favorites, alone or together.
This chair .
This bag, which is also here.
This is on my wish list.
i'm really glad that I came across this flickr.
Enjoy your weekend!

delicious

I promised a recipe from our trip to the market yesterday. It's really one of my favorites. It's quick, easy, comforting, pretty healthy, and easily adaptable to any ingredients you prefer or have around the house. It's based upon the Nigella Lawson recipe for Double Potato Halloumi Bake. I am in love with salty ,squeakiness of halloumi, and there are very few things that it doesn't go wonderfully with. It's getting to be pretty widely available at most larger grocery stores with a specialty cheese section. If you live somewhere with a middle eastern market, it is often much less expensive purchased there- and you can probably pick up some other great stuff for your meal. I love ethnic markets, but that's another post.

Preheat the oven to around 400. Fill a roaster pan with chopped vegetables of your choice. Last night I used red onion, red pepper, yellow pepper, green pepper, and russian and french fingerling potatoes. You could include anything else you'd like : tomatoes, mushrooms, zucchini, broccoli,sweet potatoes, squash, you name it.

Toss to coat with olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic, any other spices you prefer. I really like sumac with this. I'm not sure if this is available most places, but it can be found at any Middle Eastern store. It's dark red like chili powder and has a slightly sour, citrus taste. It's really good spinkled over hummus.


Cover with foil an bake for around 30 minutes, until the potatoes are fairly tender. Then remove the foil and roast uncovered for another 10-15 minutes depending on how brown you like your vegetables.

Now, you can add the cheese if you like. We didn't have halloumi, so I threw some feta on instead. Place under the broiler until cheese begins to brown and melt. That's it. If you have any fresh herbs around, you can sprinkle some on top. I happened to have basil, so I added that. Parsley and even mint would be good here,too.

We had it with an asiago garlic baguette we had saved in the freezer. It would be really good with flatbread or as a sidedish.
The leftovers are really good. I made extra just for this reason. It's good with eggs, on the side, in a frittata or quiche. It would probably even be a good filling for enchiladas. In the past I've added sausage (the fake kind) and peas and topped with mashed potatoes for Shepherd's Pie.

Out & About

We enjoyed yesterday's amazing weather with some ouside time: yard work, carwash, a trip to the beach. We really missed the beach while we were landlocked for a few months.

Today, we made a trip to the West Side Market. It is by far one of my most favorite spots in the city. Because of the number of merchants, competition creates the greatest deals on produce. Inside, there is a huge selection of specialty food stalls with great coffee, gorgeous spices, tempting baked goods, and also a huge meat seafood area if you are into that sort of thing.


Chocolate Cake packages we managed to resist:

Fresh pasta at Ohio City Pasta:

Vegetables!



Afterwards, we headed down the street the SPACES gallery to check out their annual Art Mart.
We managed to make a delicious dinner with our market haul. I'll share the pictures and a recipe tomorrow.

wait for it

There are quite a few signs of Spring around here. It is about time. Spring comes slowly aorund these parts. I finally got around to putting together a modest seed order for my container garden. I'm really excited. We didn't plant anything last year because we were travelling too much. The previous year we did pretty well, although I suspect that the squirrels harvested more of our crop than we did. I'm ordering all heirloom varieties this year,which made the selection process a lot more fun. I'm obsessed not just with the appearance and taste of these varieties,but the names of them are fantastic. One of the tomatoes we ordered is called the "mortgage lifter". Pretty great, I think.


Nate and Hannah came up this weekend. We did some early celebrating of Hannah's birthday with lunch at Melt. Sadly, I forgot to take pictures, but it is a grilled cheese retaurant and every bit as delicious as you can imagine. Maybe even more so.We also enjoyed the weather with a trip to the dog park. Ramona had a great time showing off her guests. We met the biggest fuzziest Newfoundland,which was the icing on the cake.



Now, it's Monday, and the party is over. It's time to contemplate getting some work done before the snow flies again. This is the midwest. It's entirely possible.

This time last year

This time last year we were criss-crossing the country with hopes of a great opportunity and a new beginning. This photo was shot on a trip to Seattle for a job interview. After visiting a host of great places : Seattle, Chicago, Boston, Burlington, Amherst, Brattleboro, to name a few, and even testing the water in one city, we ended up, quite happily, were we began. The fact is that we love our house, (even though no one else wanted to buy it) and our city (even though it has an inferiority complex) and are thrilled to be back. There will be much more to come on a new printmaking cottage industry, as well as life in the midwest-which will hopefully serve as evidence that it is not a cultural wasteland, in fact, it just may be the next big thing.