it's all about pie

one thing about portland is they have great fruit and it's not expensive. the butter is even $1 a pound cheaper than los angeles. i've made 3 pies since i've moved to portland. the first week i was here i was too depressed to make pie or really anything. we ate out for almost every meal. i missed my o'keef and merrit stove in los angeles. i miss my kitchen view of the japaneese maple and ginko trees in my back yard. i miss the distant smell of the wet salty ocean sneaking through the front door. back to our temporary home here. a 3 story brick condo in a neighborhood of strangers i am forcing myself to get to know. they asian family next door that lines their shoes against the inside of their garage wall, all 30 pairs. the bum who sneaks a smoke in front of our front door, i can smell him sometimes when i leave the condo to take molly (our rescue dog) for a walk. i'm not scared, i'm just numb with fear of never coming back home and walking in my kitchen.

my first pie was key lime pie, an easy recipe that i found on the internet. even a non pie person guy friend of mine liked it so much his wife called me for the recipe the next day. my contribution to a dinner last week that friends invited us to. they moved from los angeles 3 years ago. also to raise their happens here i say to myself this would never happen in la. as if to fill up my portland cup withmore. just the other day i saw some people carrying a hand full of fresh lavender and i thought there must be a farmers market up ahead. all of a sudden aman from nowhere had a huge bundle of lavender and handed me a hand full for free with a smile. that would not happen in la.

my second pie was an apple pie made the same night as the boeuf à la bourguignonne night.
that was a good one too. everyone took a big piece and there were no leftovers for the next day. so when i saw that fresh peaches were $1.69 a pound this past saturday, less that a week after the apple pie, i made a fresh peach pie just for the 3 of us. i usually don't bake unless it's for a potluck or birthday. it's tuesday and we still have a half a pie left. by accident i used 2 sticks of butter instead of 1 and a half and it is so yummy and flaky. i've altered my sister, the chef's recipe not sure if i should tell her! i'm usually not into baking as much as this but i'm not sure what else to do with my self. at this rate 1 pie a week, i'll get fat and die of a clogged artery.

boeuf bourguignon

this weekend severin and i saw the julia child movie for the second time. we decided to make boeuf bourguinon the next night. we made a list and went to 2 local markets, the first one didn't have a butcher and the plastic wrapped chunks of beef looked very fatty. 4 guests were also coming to dinner so this was going to be a fun test. we did not get home from shopping till 5:30 pm and the guest were arriving 6pm. the recipe said you needed 2-3 hours to cook the boeuf. we were in trouble. everyone chipped in, peeling onions, sauteing, chopping but it still took 3 hours. i cheeted, i turned up the oven to 350 degrees instead of 325 degrees. it was not the intimate mother daughter cooking experience i had expected. it was a harry carry crazy kitchen of 20 steps from drying the meat chunks, piece-by-piece—to sauteing the onions then boiling them in chicken broth for 25 minutes then sauteing 1lb of mushroom caps separately and mixing both ingredients into the boeuf which has been cooking very slowly in the oven. severin wanted mashed potatoes, string beans and an apple pie to accompany this julia dish. it was delicious and everyone except for me and big helpings of seconds and all clean plates at the end with hardly any leftovers. i love leftovers. maybe not this one. when everyone left, severin, nate and myself all unbuttoned our first buttons of out pants. i complained of feeling so bloated and very uncomfortable. severin sat on the toilet for a while and nate said nothing at first, i think not to hurt my feelings. i said it first "man do i have to fart". then nate said the same thing. we all laughed and wondered if our guest experienced the same thing. I called my sister (the chef in our family) the next day and told her about the meal. she said it was probably the 24 pearl onions caused the gas, i think it was the half and half in the mashed potatoes. who knows. in the movie the boeuf dish did not look this hard and i did not hear any fart complaints.