Ratatouille, a traditional French Provençal stewed vegetable dish
Ilana-Davita has hosted her first Kosher Cooking Carnival, and she named it the “Green Edition” because it is mostly meatless recipes and because it is almost Tu B’Shevat, the holiday of the trees. I thank her for including my matzo ball recipe and my ratatouille.
Looks like Tu B’Shevat will occur this year on Monday, February 9th. Maybe I’ll do a little collage of tree photos in honor of the day. It was always strange to me, growing up in snowy cold New England, that one celebrating the planting of trees in February. But Israel has a much different schedule than here, so I suppose February is a good time there to plant a tree!
Speaking of matzo balls, my middle son (he’s twelve) made the matzo balls on Friday. I dictated the recipe to him by heart, as I was rushing off to take a shower about an hour before Shabbat. When he asked “how much oil,” I yelled, “some.” The matzo balls came out absolutely delicious. When I asked him how he did it, he claimed he “worked the balls a lot.” Which is sort of the opposite of conventional wisdom on how to make a good matzo ball. He also made a “chocolate chip pie” using a muffin recipe cooked in a round pie tin. That got devoured, too. And I had enough time to make my cole slaw with red and green cabbages, brussel sprouts and garlic spread.
“EXPERIMENTAL” (Interesting Photographic Effects, Failed/Strange Photos, Blurry, Overexposed,…)
(any guesses on what this is? I’ll post a “clearer” photo next week.)
I was away with my family since Monday, but I did have time to read over the parsha questions I receive in email each week. Maybe you can guess some answers for these two:
Why the Nile? Why was the first plague on the Nile?
Why mention Elisheva’s brother? (and who is Elisheva…)
If you know any of the answers, feel free to comment. If you don’t, take a guess! I’ll post Rashi’s answers early next week.
Sky Watch Friday is a photo meme with photos of sunrises, sunsets, blue skies, gray skies, pink skies, dark skies and any other kind of sky posted by bloggers all over the planet.
I took these photos of the American Sycamore trees on my block at sunset one day.
I consulted with my local tree expert, and she thinks these trees outside my office window are American Sycamores. There seem to be quite a few in Highland Park.
I was attracted to them because of the round seed balls.
The above is a photo of the seed ball, before we got white snow now gracing Highland Park.
The trunks have this distinct peeling bark. This particular tree is on Abbott Street.
I took a photo of this flower in September, and I would love to grow it in my garden. It looks a lot like gaillardia, but those don’t seem to have stripes like this flower. I believe it’s a gazania (thank you, Sara!) in the asteraceae family.
Today’s Flowers is hosted by Luiz Santilli Jr. Thank you, Luiz, for this lovely and fun meme.
Sky Watch Friday is a photo meme with photos of sunrises, sunsets, blue skies, gray skies, pink skies, dark skies and any other kind of sky posted by bloggers all over the planet.
Last week I noted two wonderful Sky Watch posts: Guy in Regina and Carletta in West Virginia. Guy wrote: “I’m sure glad I had my camera while I was driving down Lakeshore Drive…” and Carletta said: “As I look through the branches of the big old oak tree often I catch a glimpse of the sky and know a sunset I wouldn’t want to miss is about to happen. Traces of pink in this image were enough to make me grab my camera last Thursday as I was looking at Sky Watch posts and head outside.”
I wanted to share with you a bit of how I get photos. Two of my three kids take art classes across town with Jill, so I’m often driving from the North side of Highland Park (where I live) to the South side (where Jill lives). It seems that this driving is often around sunset (at least in winter). So on the particular day that I took these photos, I had a few minutes before I needed to pick up my daughter, and I headed over to the high school to see the cupola (see above) and its sky. On my way, I captured the moon (see top photo).
I enjoyed the pinks and blues on top of the high school, but I realized that I had to rush to get my daughter on time.
On my way in my car to get my daughter I need to cross Raritan Avenue. I photographed the above while waiting for the light to change. You can see by the upper right of the photo that I’m taking this through my windshield.
Once my daughter was in the car with me, we re-crossed Raritan Avenue. A quick glance down Raritan toward the river and New Brunswick displayed a powerful, colorful sunset. But I decided to head over to the back of the high school with my daughter. This is what I caught in the back.
Here’s my six-year-old daughter’s contribution to this post (she took this picture).
In contrast here’s how the high school and cupola looked this morning during a brief snowfall.
