Month: July 2013

July 30, 2013

Here’s a piece about Phyllis Feder of Clinton Vineyards that I wrote for the current issue of Edible Hudson Valley. I just sent off another piece about local wine that should be in the fall issue, so stay tuned for that.

July 17, 2013

It has been hot as balls around here, which will not be news to you if you live on the East Coast. While outside, though hot, there has been a breeze and thus in the shade it is not too too bad, inside without air conditioning is a wretched sauna of hatred, trickling sweat, and fetid stench. Also, the other night a skunk got spooked right outside the front door and sprayed all over a corner of the house, so with no rain in sight for weeks the air is seductively perfumed with a sulfurous reek redolent of nothing so much as a smoldering corpse wrapped in plastic that you forgot about in the trunk of your ’79 Chevy in the Nevada desert while you attended Burning Man. Good times.

July 12, 2013

Today—after what felt like at least a month of fetid, slug-covered, swelteringly humid torpor, interrupted by days of rain that only augmented the ambient moisture—dawned dry, clear, and breezy. I wasted no time, rushing out to attend to the neglected garden, mustering hours of energy despite a shitty, insomnia-dented night of inadequate sleep. There’s a lot going on, not least of which is the full arrival of what I like to call the “round food.” No longer are leaves the bulk of each day’s harvest; they’re shrinking into the minority as the roots and fruits gain girth by the day. Yesterday saw the first new potatoes of the year, roasted along with a spatchcocked chicken, taking advantage of a cooler evening to use the oven (and bake some much-needed bread). Today, thanks to a basket piled high with the various thinnings, cullings, and eager grabbings that attended my earnest horticultural ministrations, dinner comprised a perfect, seamless conclusion to the most pleasant summer day of the year so far.

July 2, 2013
July 1, 2013

For the July Chronogram, I visited Hudson Valley Bee Supply in Kingston. It was a lovely day, and the photography gods were kind to me. Check out the slideshow they put up; it’s a big glossy magazine and for those of you outside of the distribution area it offers a handsome way to look at big pictures. Sadly, they did not use this picture, but that just gives me an excuse to show it here.