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It is I, tvindy. Now it’s my turn to participate in this group effort to drive Bakerina’s blog into the ground.

For my first post I am reproducing a review I posted on Amazon a couple years ago of a cookbook entitled The Horn of the Moon Cookbook by Ginny Callan.

I first discovered this cookbook some years back when I was part of a group doing volunteer work in rural Brazil. Most of us were vegetarians, so we took this book along with us for recipe ideas. We were very limited on available ingredients and were forced to omit or substitute about half of everything that was required. Nevertheless, we produced really great dishes from that book. As soon as I got back to the US, I ordered a copy for myself and started cooking some truly amazing meals!

The Horn of the Moon Cookbook has a lot going for it. First, unlike most other vegetarian cookbooks, it does not concern itself with fat content. (A lot of the dishes are extremely high in fat.) There are plenty of resources out there for people looking to reduce fat or cut calories, and most vegetarians, even those who are highly health conscious, are willing to splurge now and then for something really good. (Just like people who eat meat.)

Also, I was amazed by the number and variety of recipes. When I first got the book, I didn’t know where to begin. Salads, sandwiches, soups, pastas, pizzas, desserts, breakfast foods—it all looked so good, and the results almost never disappointed. (The only notable exception was the cashew french toast.) This book will keep you busy for weeks!

In addition, the recipes will appeal to everyone, not just vegetarians. If you have a friend or relative that you want to introduce to a vegetarian lifestyle, just cook them a few meals using these recipes. Or if you are a non-vegetarian and need to plan a meal for a group of people containing some vegetarians, use this book. The vegetarians will appreciate it, and the non-vegetarians will enjoy it and probably not even notice the lack of meat.

My favorite recipe is the one for Pizza Alfredo. I guarantee you’ve never had pizza like this before! Every time I make it, I’m always amazed when I take the first bite at how good it is. I also enjoy the Black Bean Soup a lot. I usually quintuple the recipe (I have a very large pot.) and freeze most of it to make it last, so I can have a bowl every day for a month, or longer. Also, every halloween, I buy an extra pumpkin (in addition to the one for the jack o’lantern) to make the Pumpkin Pie recipe. That’s now part of my halloween tradition.

If you are a vegan, you probably won’t get as much out of this book as people who are willing to eat dairy products and eggs. There is a lot of dairy in this book! But there are some vegan recipes, and of course you can adjust some of the other recipes to your needs. The same goes for people who are really watching their fat intake.

I can’t recommend this book highly enough. Different recipes will appeal to different people, and it would be hard to imagine someone who couldn’t find at least a handful of recipes in it that would delight them. This is definitely my favorite cookbook; I’ve never found one that even comes close!

Greetings, oh readers of Bakerina’s blog!  Tis I, Snowball.  I have word of Bakerina.  Read and be amazed.

It seems that Herself landed safely in a Dramamine-induced haze.  The plane ride wasn’t overly bumpy.  The bus driver enshuttled her and whisked her away to the Writer’s Colony.  She said he was a sweet, dad-like sorta guy.  Magnolia boomed in her honor, and all was very well.  At first. 

Unfortunately, she discovered that her computer appears to have suffered a bit of motion sickness and currently has a virus.  If you’re receiving virus-laden email, it’s probably from her.  Seriously.  I got some. 

Her computer woes are to our benefit, however, because the rules of cloisterdom state that she must truly retreat.  If she’s incommunicado, we can wreak all kinds of havoc here. 

Oh, wait.  We’re supposed to be talking about food, aren’t we? 

Stephen Lanzalotta appears to be a multi-talented man who has degrees in biologoy and biochemistry, as well as a whole boatload of baking experience.  He feels that Atkins and the low-carbites have it all wrong.  Mr. Lanzalotta has developed what is being called The DaVinci Diet.  This regimen consist of eating mostly Mediterranean foods, such as fish, cheese, vegetables, meat, nuts, wine, and of course, bread.  This sounds like a much more appealing way to lose weight, doesn’t it?  It would also prove to be a much more lucrative food trend for our favorite artisan baker sans bakery.  I can personally vouch for Bakerina’s walnut and scallion bread, and it’s well worth going off any diet that doesn’t include it. 

There...some silliness and some actually food related blogging.  We need more porn and chicken!

I teetered back and forth about being the first to step up to the mike here, (couldn’t you have waited till the blog was cold,at least?) but I feel chaos brewing; what with orionoir and ‘mouse threatening to make this all about ‘porn and chicken’.  Sort of a preemptive strike even though I am woefully unprepared for it.  Fortunately, ‘woefully unprepared’ is the story of my life.  But, I’ve been staring at the pink and yellow for a while, trying to get into it.  Be easy with me guys, I’m new here.  Really I am.  The pictures that I took for you are still stuck in the ancient mechanism of roll film.  Suffice it to say that I did make it to the beach today with the kids.  That long and winding road bordered by cypress stumps and pine trees interspersed with megalomaniacal subdivisions doing their best to ‘blend in’ with huge pompous signs announcing completely ambiguous and generic names like ‘Key Vista’.  We did a once around the nature trail, where things looked completely empty except for one large white van with tinted windows.  Not to say I’m getting smarter in my old age, but I’m getting more paranoid.  About a quarter of a mile down the road was the fishing pier, which met my approval with just one group of straggling oldmen in city uniforms lingering about loudly.  At the very end of the winding stretch of grey board BigNick perched himself atop the communal fish cleaning table and decided that he didn’t want to leave.  ‘I wanna fish.  I wanna fish.’ He is undeniable sore at having to spend any more time amongst me and his sister, and tried soliciting help from one skinny fellow in a ball cap that seemed to swallow his head.  I wonder how everyone just automatically knows that his name is ‘Buddy’ in reality. 

I came here specifically, that is, to inform you all that I’m the Forrest Gump of cooking.  I could regale you with tales of nectarine cobbler gone wrong made with a botched batch of peanut butter cookies from the night before.  I could tell you I baked for hours last night while the air conditioner kicked into third gear and the temp outside hoovered around 93.  Suffice it to say, I’ve got the fever.  Lookout innocent foodstuffs. 

But I know a place for sweets, deep in the heart of Tarpon Springs.  Be sure to bang the sand off the bottoms of your sandals before you climb back in the car though.  That stuff’s a bitch to get outta carpet.  Sorry that it’s not Epiphany time, because o- that is a little slice of heaven.  I’ve had dreams about putting that cross on a leather strap around my neck and just letting them bob for me… but that’s neither here nor there, is it?  I feel like a hypocrit, telling orionoir and ‘mouse to hold it down when here i am tempting and teasing you with the plan of a rather pedestrian baklava-orgy…

Love,
Goliard

Here is what I have…

I have a car picking me up at 4:30 tomorrow morning and carrying me to LaGuardia.  I have an e-ticket to get me on the plane.  I have a shuttle picking me up in Fayetteville and carrying me to Eureka Springs.

I have a full complement of clothing:  Everlast t-shirts and shorts for running.  A dress just in case I get invited out to dinner with anyone.  Half a dozen black Calvin Klein undershirts, just in case anyone forgets that I am from New York.  (Piece of Helpful Advice #1:  “Aren’t those the shirts that Lloyd always wears?  Won’t they make you miss him?” Note to self:  Try not to blow your nose into your new t-shirts as you cry into them.) Interesting socks, including a pair with embroidered renderings of sushi and sashimi all over them, which I tried to moblog for your edification, but said moblog has yet to show up.  Grrr.  Enough underclothing to last me for two weeks, and a little bottle of Woolite so that I can wear them for another two weeks.  I do not have the little charmpot of a, er, foundation garment that I found at Bloomies, as close to a perfect piece of lingerie as ever I’ve seen, in my size, actually useful for support purposes, yet lacy and sheer and delicate enough to send a message, the message being “Please rip me off with your teeth.” I checked the tag:  $70.00.  Please do not rip me off with your teeth.  I looked over my head and saw a big sign that said “Natori” – yep, I had accidentally wandered into Designer Lingerie.  Not now, Bakerina, not now.

Where was I again?...I have a spouse at home, helping me to download my Roadrunner-on-the-road access, so that I might have a prayer of accessing my e-mail.  I will have some form of e-mail access, simply because in a phoneless, cell-less writers’ colony, e-mail is the only way I can communicate with Lloyd on a daily basis.  Until I get there, though, I don’t know what form that e-mail will take.  In other words, if you’re trying to send me an e, don’t take it amiss if you don’t hear from me right away.  I’m probably still standing in the center of my room, clutching a cable, weeping in frustration and bafflement.  Same spouse will also scan all the recipes for the class I’m teaching at the end of the month, recipes I’d really meant to photocopy at the office today, honestly.

I have music to get me through the month, and headphones to listen to the music so that the writers who require absolute quiet don’t kick my ass.  I have Marshall Crenshaw, the Dragsters, Susan Tedeschi, loads o’ Rhino Just Can’t Get Enough cds, Little Creatures by Talking Heads, three volumes of blues sent to me by a good friend, and five discs of David Sedaris doing that voodoo that he do so well.

I have reading material for the plane:  the new book by the aforementioned David Sedaris, the new issue of Fast Company (thanks, Dad) and the new paperback edition of Dancing in my Nuddy-Pants, Louise Rennison’s continuing saga of the exploits of the amazing Georgia Nicolson.  I have moldable silicone earplugs, because I’ve been told that the plane engine will be staggeringly noisy.  For most of last week I have been receiving Pieces of Helpful Advice #2-#whatever from friends, dear sweet friends who are only trying to be helpful when they say things like “that was the most uncomfortable flight I’ve ever been on,” or “No, you won’t get breakfast on that flight.  Frankly, you’re not going to want to eat.” Just when I was about to send my regrets to the Writers Colony and run scarpering off to Vermont instead, I got what I really needed, a soothing, charming and utterly calming e from one of the best guys I know, someone who spends a lot of time in the air and who, were he traveling with me, wouldn’t think twice about letting me grip his hand hard enough to break small bones, and who would feed me truffles every time we hit a little turbulence.  Seriously, in situations like this, you want someone who will remind you of what an adventure you’re embarking on, someone who teases out your inner Wendell Berry as well as your inner Sydney Bristow.  Thank the fates that I’ve got him.

Nevertheless…I have the earplugs, and a stress ball, and a box of Fralinger’s salt water taffy, and a box full o’Dramamine, all for the plane.  If that doesn’t do the trick, then I don’t deserve to travel anywhere.

I have a box of books waiting for me at the Colony, and a desk to put them on, and a window to look through while I let the words travel out my fingers and onto my keyboard, and a deck from which to watch the sun set behind the Ozarks, and a monster-sized Weber grill, just in case I have the urge to invite three dozen people over for a ‘cue.

I have a hummingbird in my chest, a fluttery, manic little bird, careening from rib to rib, stopping at my sternum, where it fuels up on equal portions of nerves, fear, exhilaration and impatience to get down there and get to work.  From time to time, I try to pat the little bird soothingly; there, there, just relax.  The bird is having none of it.

But I have friends, too.  I have friends at LuthorCorp, who are taking care of my workload, who volunteered to take care of my workload, who raised a huge ruckus when it looked like I might not be allowed to go.  I have friends here in the blog world who are taking care of the house while I am gone.  I have friends, online and off, who are good to me even when I fail to write or call, who are a ray of sunshine and a breath of fresh air in springtime, who I adore, even as I act like a neglectful beastie in my adoration.  Dear friends, I adore you, I will miss you, and I can’t wait to share with you all of the beautiful mysteries of life that I will be lucky enough to witness over the next month.

I have 11 hours before I have to get out of bed, 11 ½ hours before my car picks me up, 12 hours before I arrive at the airport, 13 hours before I leave the ground.