Just a short update for all of you who regularly read my blog. My husband (my DH, dear husband) came home from the hospital yesterday (Tuesday) after his double heart bypass surgery. It boggles my mind that he had open heart surgery on Friday afternoon and on Tuesday he came home! I won’t say it’s been exactly easy taking care of him – he’s not able to do much yet – but he’s recovering well. Sleeping a LOT (good thing) and in a moderate amount of pain (managed with meds). Getting up and down from a regular height chair is probably the most difficult and painful thing he has to do. As a double amputee he must use his arms more than able-bodied people and with the incision and sternum cracking they had to do, everything is tight and painful in or near his chest. He IS grateful to be alive right now (and so am I, obviously), but I won’t give you a photo at the moment – he’s not exactly a happy camper yet and there aren’t any smiles suitable for broadcasting! Maybe in a few days.
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Here are the tastingspoons players. I’m in the middle (Carolyn). Daughter Sara on the right, and daughter-in-law Karen on the left. I started the blog in 2007, as a way to share recipes with my family. I’m still doing 99% of the blogging and holding out hope that these two lovely and excellent cooks will participate. They both lead very busy lives, so we’ll see.
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BOOK READING (from Carolyn):
Music of Bees, Eileen Garvin. Absolutely charming book about a woman in midlife, lonely, who raises bees, also makes unlikely friends. Heart-warming and very interesting about beekeeping.
A Postcard from Paris, Alex Brown. Really cute story. Dual time line, 1940s and present day about renovating an old apartment in Paris, things discovered.
Time of the Child, Niall Williams. Oh such a good book. Very small village in Ireland, 1960s. A baby is left on the doorstep. The town all whispers and helps. I listened to an interview of the author, which made me like him and his books even more.
Sipsworth, Simon Van Booy. If you like animals you’ll swoon. An old woman who really wants to die finds a tiny mouse in her house and befriends it and finds a reason to live. Utterly charming book.
The Forger’s Spell, Edward Dolnick. True story. For seven years a no-account painter named Han van Meegeren managed to pass off his paintings as those of Johannes Vermeer.
If You Lived Here, You’d be Home by Now, Christopher Ingraham. Could hardly put it down – about a journalist who takes on a challenge to move to small town in Minnesota and write about it. He expects to hate it and the people and place, but he doesn’t. Absolutely wonderful true story.
The River We Remember, William Kent Kreuger. 1950s, Minnesota. A murder and the aftermath. Could hardly put it down. Kreuger has such a vivid imagination and writing style.
How the Lights Gets In, Joyce Maynard. An older woman returns to New Hampshire to help care for her brain-injured son. Siblings and family, lots of angst and resentments.
The Filling Station, Vanessa Miller. Every American should read this book. A novelized retelling of the Tulsa massacre in 1921. Absolutely riveting.
The Story She Left Behind, Patti Callahan Henry. Love this author. Based on a true story. A famous author simply vanishes, leaving her husband and daughter behind. She had invented a mystical language no one could translate. Present day, someone thinks he’s solved the riddle, contacts the family. Really interesting read.
The Girl from Berlin, Ronald Balson. Love anything about Tuscany. An elderly woman is being evicted from a villa there, with odd deed provenance. Two young folks go there to help unravel the mystery. Loved it.
The Island of the Colorblind, Oliver Sacks, M.D. Nonfiction. The dr is intrigued by a remote Pacific island where most of the inhabitants are colorblind. He also unravels a mystery on Guam of people born with a strange neurological problem. Medical mysteries unveiled. Very interesting.
The Bookbinder, Pip Williams. Post 1914 London. Two sisters work at a bookbindery. They’re told to not read the books. One does and one doesn’t. One has visions beyond her narrow world; the other does not. Eventually the one gets into Oxford. Lovely story.
The Paris Express, Emma Donoghue. 1895 on a train to Paris, a disaster happens. You’ll delve into the lives of many people who survived and died in the crash.
A Race to the Bottom of Crazy, Richard Grant. This is about Arizona. Author, wife and child move back to Arizona where they once lived. Part memoir, research, and reporting in a quest to understand what makes Arizona such a confounding and irresistible place.
The Scarlet Thread, Francine Rivers. A woman’s life turned upside down when she discovers the handcrafted quilt and journal of her ancestor Mary Kathryn McMurray, a young woman who was uprooted from her home only to endure harsh frontier conditions on the Oregon Trail.
A Place to Hide, Ronald Balson. 1939 Amsterdam, an ambassador has the ability to save the lives of many Jewish children. Heartwarming.
Homeseeking, Karissa Chen. Two young Chinese teens are deeply in love, but in China. Then their families are separated. Jump to current day and the two meet again in Los Angeles.
North River, Pete Hammill. He always writes such a good story. A doctor works diligently healing people from all walks of life. His wife and daughter left him years before. One day his 3-yr old grandson arrives on his doorstep.
A Very Typical Family, Sierra Godfrey. A very messed-up family. Three adult children are given a home in Santa Cruz, Calif, but only if the siblings meet up and live in the house together. A very untypical scenario but makes for lots of messes.
Three Days in June, Anne Tyler. The usual Anne Tyler grit. Family angst. This wasn’t one of my favorites, but it was entertaining and very short.
Saved, Benjamin Hall. Author is a veteran war reporter. Ukraine, 2022, he nearly loses his life to a Russian strike. Riveting story – he survives, barely.
Grey Wolf, Louise Penny. Another Inspector Gamache mystery in Quebec. She is such an incredible mystery writer.
All the Colors of the Dark, Chris Whitaker. A missing person mystery, a serial killer thriller, a love story, a unique twist on each. Could hardly put it down.
Orbital, Samantha Harvey. Winner of 2024 Booker Prize. I don’t usually like those, but I heard the author interviewed and she hooked me. This is not a normal book with a beginning, a story and an end. It’s several chapters of the day in the life of various astronauts at the ISS (Int’l Space Station). All fictional. She’s been praised by several real astronauts for “getting it” about space station everyday life.
The Blue Hour, Paula Hawkins. An island off Scotland. Inaccessible except when the tide is out. Weird goings on. An artist. A present day mystery too.
Iron Lake, William Kent Krueger. A judge is murdered and a boy is missing. Riveting mystery.
Tell the Wolves I’m Home, Carol Ricks Brunt. 1980s. A 14-yr old girl loses her beloved uncle. Yet a new friendship arises, someone she never knew about.
Four Treasures of the Sky, Jenny Zhang. 1880s, a young girl is kidnapped in China and brought to the United States. She survives with many hurdles in the path.
The Boy Who Fell out of the Sky, Ken Dornstein. Memoir, 1988. The author’s brother died in the PanAm flight that went down in Lockerbie, Scotland. A decade later he tries to solve “the riddle of his older brother’s life.”
Worse Care Scenario, T.J. Newman. Oh my. Interesting analysis of what could/might happen if a jet crashed into a nuclear plant. Un-put-downable.
Song of the Lark, Willa Cather. Complicated weave of a story about a young woman in about 1900, who has a gifted voice (singing) and about her journey to success, not without its ups and downs.
Crow Talk, Eileen Garvin. Charming story which takes place at a remote lake in Washington State, about a few people who inhabit it, the friendships made, but also revolving around the rescue of a baby crow.
The Story Collector, Evie Woods. Sweet story about some dark secrets from an area in Ireland, a bit magical, faerie life, but solving a mystery too.
A Sea of Unspoken Things, Adrienne Young. A woman investigates her twin brother’s mysterious death. She goes to a small town in California to figure it out, to figure HIM out.
The King’s Messenger, Susanna Kearsley. 1600s England, King James. About one of his trusted “messengers,” and his relationship with a young woman also of “the court.” Lots of intrigue.
In the Shadow of the Greenbrier, Emily Matchar. Interesting mystery in/around the area of the famous resort in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.
Isola, Allegra Goodman. Hard to describe, survival story on an island in the 1600s.
Save the Date, Allison Raskin. Rom-com, witty, LOL funny. Clever.
The Sirens, Emilia Hart. Numerous time-lines, Australia. Mysteries abound, nightmares, abandoned baby, weird allergies.
Red Clay, Charles Fancher. LOVED this book. Mostly post-Civil War story about the lives of slaves in Alabama during Reconstruction.
Stars in an Italian Sky, Jill Santopolo. Dual time line, 1946 and recent time. Love stories and a mystery.
Battle Mountain, C.J. Box. Another one of Box’s riveting mysteries. Love his descriptions of the land.
Something Beautiful Happened, Yvette Corporon. A memoir of sorts in Greece, tiny island of Erikousa, where the locals hid Jews during WWII. All elusive stories told by the author’s grandmother.
The Jackal’s Mistress, Chris Bohjalian. 1860s Virginia, about a woman who saves the life of a Union soldier. Really good story.
Song of the Magpie, Louise Mayberry. Really interesting story about Australia back in the days when it was mostly a penal colony. Gritty strength of a woman trying to thrive with her farm.
The Boomerang, Robert Bailey. A thriller that will have you gripping the book. About a lot of secrets surrounding the president (fictional novel, remember) and his chief of staff and about cancer. A cure. Such a good story.
Care and Feeding, Laurie Woolever. Really interesting memoir of a woman driven to succeed in the restaurant business. She worked for Mario Batali and then Anthony Bourdain. Gritty stories.
Everything is Tuberculosis, John Green. Maybe not a book for everyone. A real deep dive into the deadly tuberculosis infection, its history. I heard the author interviewed and found the book very interesting.
The Book Lovers Library, Madeline Martin. Fascinating read about Boots’ drug stores’ lending library. And the people who worked in them.
The Arrivals, Meg Mitchell Moore. LOL funny, about a middle-aged couple whose children (and their various family members) return to the family home and the chaos that ensues.
My Life as a Silent Movie, Jesse Lee Kercheval. About grief. A big move to Paris, finding herself a new life with a new set of real blood family.
Escape, Carolyn Jessop. Another memoir about a woman really in bondage in Utah, Mormon plural marriage.
Tasting Spoons
My blog's namesake - small, old and some very dented engraved silver plated tea spoons that belonged to my mother-in-law, and I use them to taste my food as I'm cooking.
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Posted in Uncategorized, on November 20th, 2010.
Allow me to set the stage. We flew home from New Zealand last Tuesday (4 days ago), arriving via dateline change on Tuesday morning at LAX. A friend picked us up and we drove to our home about an hour away. I carried in the carry-on bags and Dave unloaded the big suitcases we took on this trip. I mean, 28 days away from home, you need more clothes! Each suitcase was 50 pounds including Dave’s 2nd set of prosthetic legs and 2 bottles of wine in each bag (they made it fine).
Dave felt some chest pain and just thought he was overexerting himself. (He didn’t tell me that it lasted for an HOUR for criminy sakes.) I threw all my dirty clothes on the laundry room floor, took a shower and Dave said he wanted to go grocery shopping. I asked him how he was feeling. All right, I think he said. He went, then unloaded his suitcase. I fixed us some lunch eventually and I even got far enough to post a blog piece. Then Dave called his cardiologist’s office (my DH had a heart attack in 1997 and has 2 stents) but they told him to go to the E.R. So we did. They weren’t sure. Dave had had one little, short bout of chest pain when we were in Australia, but it went away immediately. He gave it little thought.
Anyway, to cut to the chase (this story could take 3 more paragraphs if I let myself) on Wednesday they did an angiogram and in the recovery room he had a heart attack. A fairly major one. They’d found 2 blockages and some calcification. Yesterday Dave got a double bypass, and he came through it with flying colors, I must say. As I write this on Saturday night at 7:30, it’s a few more than 24 hours since he HAD the bypass surgery and he walked a couple hundred feet down the hallway and back. He’s having typical symptoms of cardiac post-op they say (weakness, dizziness). He got one unit of blood today because he’s anemic. And he was beginning to kid and joke with the nurses, so I know he’s on the right road to recovery. So, that’s why I haven’t blogged. That’s why I haven’t even looked at a single one of our trip pictures except the one at top taken in Queenstown, New Zealand with Dave wearing his Aussie leather hat. That’s why I haven’t cooked a single meal. (I’ve eaten cold cereal each morning – that’s it.) That’s why I haven’t even gone through our 28 days of held mail. Now it’s about 32 days of mail. That’s why I hardly know what day it is. It’s why we still have piles of laundry here and there. It’s why I haven’t even turned on the heat here in the house yet (why bother? I’m at the hospital nearly all day). It’s why my suitcase is still resting on the guest room bed. Not unpacked yet. All of our kids have been here – supporting their dad and propping me up. Amazingly, jet lag hasn’t bothered me too much. Am sure natural adrenaline has something to do with that.
I’ll be back to posting just as soon as I have time. Our plans for Thanksgiving have been changed. You think? He may still be in the hospital. Don’t know at this point. He might be coming home that day too. In every thing I do, though, I know God had a hand in this. Otherwise Dave wouldn’t have had this heart attack 2 hours after we got home.
Posted in Appetizers, on November 18th, 2010.
This recipe was written up just before we left on our long trip, so I’ll ease you back into some easy Mexican cooking . . . although the ingredients here are similar to a Mexican layered dip (you know, the refried beans, sour cream, salsa, etc.) – and I suppose those are the origins here, there’s nothing in this that’s spicy hot. No chile powder, or chili flakes. It’s just wholesome good stuff – beans, cilantro, a bit of feta, roasted red bell peppers. The only higher fat stuff is the sour cream and yogurt. Because it’s what I had on hand, I used full-fat sour cream and low-fat yogurt. It might be fine with fat-free too.
Posted in Travel, on November 17th, 2010.
We’re home from our long trip. Since I have hours of work to do on photos before I begin uploading some stories from out month-long odyssey, I thought I’d just give you this one. I learned something from an article I read about packing – I wrote up about it before we left – Advice for Travel Packing. One of the suggestions was to put all of your things needed at your seat during a flight in a plastic bag so they don’t get lost in the pocket in front of you. That’s what I did. It made it SO helpful to have everything at hand. The only thing missing from the photo was the shawl/wrap I kept over me through the entire return flight – the plane was SO cold.
Posted in Travel, on November 14th, 2010.
There will be a whole bunch of posts I’ll need to make once we get home and I have time to cull through all the photos and write up some stories about our adventures in the last 4-5 days.
As I write this, it’s our last day in New Zealand and we’re headed home. Currently we’re in Queenstown – on the south island, fairly down south on it – we’re actually at the 45th parallel (mid way between the equator and the South Pole). It’s crisper weather here, almost cold, although it is expected to get up to 18 C (that’s about 66 F) today, and maybe with some rain showers. We have been SO fortunate with weather on our entire trip – we had just a few showers when we were in Tasmania and that’s about it.
People who visit the Millford Sound experience 2 out of every 3 days in rain. We were there in perfect sunshine as you can see from the photo at top. I took over 100 photos yesterday, although relatively few of them ON the Sound. Technically the Sound is not a sound – it’s a fiord (here they spell the word with an i versus the Norwegians who spell it with a j as in fjord) but somebody long ago named it and it just stuck despite the technicalities.
I was not feeling very well (car and sea sickness) our day on the Sound. Not only did we take a 5 1/2 hour bus ride to GET there, then we did a 2 1/2 hour boat ride (about half of it on somewhat choppy water), then we got back on the bus and had another 4 hour ride back to Queenstown. I was “this close” to losing it at least half the day. I didn’t, but I certainly was woozy and queasy for about 12 hours. So I didn’t take as many pictures as I wanted to. Somebody else in our group got photos of the Fiordland Crested Penguins, so will need to wait until I have a copy of that to share with you.
So, I’ll be back in a day or so with some new posts – stay tuned.
Posted in Travel, on November 12th, 2010.
Time doesn’t permit me to create the kind of photo journal that I’d like to – there are simply too many to post and I don’t have enough internet time to be able to crop them all, then put them into some kind of attractive collage. So this one picture will just have to tide you over until I have the opportunity to show you more. Probably once we get home. I think the above tree is a Copper Beech.
I won’t be able to post for another day or so because we’re going to stay at a farm for a night, and have dinner with the family. Our tour will resume the following day (although it IS part of the tour).
Posted in Travel, on November 11th, 2010.
Flying into New Zealand was gorgeous. It was a beautiful day with puffy white clouds everywhere, and as land came into view (it’s a 2 1/2 hour flight from Sydney to Christchurch) what could most easily be seen were the snow-capped mountains. And lakes, and a landscape just beginning to green up with springtime.
After checking in at our hotel, we took a lengthy walk all around downtown Christchurch, including several of their beautiful parks. There is still a goodly amount of earthquake damage here (from the big quake that hit in September) so many buildings, homes and other structures were propped up with special equipment and scaffolding surrounds many of the downtown landmarks. Mostly, though, it’s business as usual here.
Our guide pointed out a number of restaurants to us, but I had my palate set on going to a well-known Indian restaurant here called “The Last Train to India.” Cute name, I thought. It had a good write-up at Trip Advisor. I’ll need to compose a separate post just about our dinner. As I write this it’s the end of our first full day here and it’s about 23 degrees C (about 75). Warm and comfortable – much warmer than we’d anticipated.
In lieu of that I’ll show you just one food photo from our last lunch in Sydney. We met a friend of our daughter Sara and her family. He took us to a restaurant called Malaya, right on Darling Harbor (King’s Wharf, actually). He ordered for us – it was absolutely outstanding – kind of Asian-Malaysian fusion, I’d think. I have no idea what all we ate; just that it was delicious from beginning to end.
The above is shrimp on skewers and it was served with a delicious sauce to dip them into. We also had a fish thing wrapped in banana leaves, plus a curry of some kind on rice and a Malay kind of egg roll too. Quaffed down with an Ashbrook Sauvignon Blanc from Australia. After we get home I’ll update this post with links to the restaurant.
Posted in Travel, on November 9th, 2010.
There’s no time to write up anything much, except to say that I’m in love with Sydney. What a gorgeous city, what a beautiful skyline. And the Opera House. Oh my goodness. I’ll need to write up a post JUST about that. So stay tuned. Don’t know when I’ll be able to post next . . .
Posted in Travel, on November 8th, 2010.
As I write this and look at that photo, I can just FEEL the oppressive heat and humidity where I was taking the picture. It was about 80-90 F I guess, and at least the same humidity, as it was in Port Douglas, although in the rainforest it was just a bit cooler.
Really I don’t have time to write up a lengthy post about our two days at Daintree. This trip we’re on is quite active, and we have little or no down time when I’ could be typing away here at my laptop. I’ve purchased another 24 hours of internet (for $22) so will hope to at least get this short post up.
I have lots of photos that I’d like to post, but will likely wait until we get home and I can spend more time working on cropping photos, etc. before I post them. We spent 2 days and nights in Daintree National Park, way up north here in Australia. Where we must be a whole lot closer to the equator since it was hot, sticky, muggy with moisture. We were at a nice, but rustic resort right in the National Park. No phones (the white rats apparently chew all the phone wires as soon as they hook up new ones) and no TV. We walked the rain forest just once – I’ll write up a separate post about that since I have about 30 or so photos and will need to cull them down and write up stories about some of the flora and fauna.
But I will give you this little food tidbit:
On our way into the National Park we stopped at a little concession (obviously it’s a regular pause for all the OAT tours) and had a refreshing cup of local ice cream. What you see there, from 11 o’clock is: wattleseed (the best of the bunch), sapote (also really good, but not quite as tasty as the wattleseed) and blueberry. Down underneath was fresh pineapple. All four were scrumptious, but I liked the wattleseed the best.
I purchased some ground wattleseed when we were in Melbourne (did I tell you it’s pronounced mel-bin?), but I can’t take it with me to New Zealand. NZ has some very strict policies about taking any kind of flora or fauna (alive or dead and ground) into their country and our guide as assured me they’ll confiscate it. I can’t buy wattleseed in NZ, so today my goal is to transfer the contents of my bottle to a plastic bag and visit a local post office to mail it to myself. Our daughter-in-law Karen visited Australia some years back and brought me a package of wattleseed, but the voracious bugs in my pantry go to it before I had a chance to use it.
It’s a bit hard to see the rainforest right outside, but it’s definitely there. We had A/C in our cabins – the rooms were actually very nice. That’s my DH framing himself in the window. We sat out on that deck for a couple of hours one of the days. You can’t just go wandering in the rainforest without a guide, so we relaxed one afternoon and rested up. They have to generate their own power to supply all the rooms and cabins. We were in the middle of nowhere, trust me!
As I write this post we’re down in Sydney, but will need to cull more photos for that and write up more than one story about our visit here. We’re off to New Zealand soon.
Posted in Travel, on November 5th, 2010.
My DH and the rest of the tour group went off to see the Great Barrier Reef today. Unfortunately, I don’t go on such adventures because it was out on the open ocean and I get seasick. I hope Dave is having a good time. The others expected to go snorkeling, to swim to a small island and back and take a little ride in a glass-bottomed boat. Dave planned to stay on the 159-foot catamaran the whole time. He can’t swim with his artificial legs, and he can’t stay upright in the water without his legs. Our guide thought the skipper of the catamaran would welcome Dave’s company at the helm.
Me? I worked on yesterday’s posting you already read about Ayers Rock, then I took the local bus into the town of Port Douglas. If you’re not actually stopping in stores and buying things (I did some of the former but none of the latter) it might take you about 30 minutes to walk up and down the main street of town. Mostly the stores sell tropical resort stuff – saris, bathing suits, hats, beach gear, sunscreen and the usual kind of tourist stuff you’ll find almost everywhere else. Port Douglas reminds me of Naples, Florida or Honolulu. Probably much like any beach resort in the world.
I stopped for lunch – a grilled chicken breast served on top of fries and some brown gravy poured over the top with about two bites of lettuce, one tiny tomato wedge and a smidgen of cucumber. The chicken was tasty and not dry. The fries were good – actually the Aussies make very good fries. I just don’t eat them hardly ever. The Aussies do love their fries and they serve them (if you order them as a separate item) with a side of sour cream and a kind of sweet chili sauce – you dip each fry into the sour cream, then into the sauce. It’s actually quite good. My plate had a few that were crispy, but most of them turned pretty soggy with brown gravy on them.
Once I returned to the hotel/resort where we’re staying I went to the bar and asked for an iced coffee. What I got was this: iced coffee blended up with some vanilla ice cream plus a scoop of vanilla ice cream in it. It wasn’t what I was expecting (it cost me $6.50 plus a $1.00 tip) but it was so refreshing after being really warm and sticky walking around town.
The photo looks a bit dark here. I’m not bothering with going online to tweak it much. Suffice to say it was downright delicious.
I walked all around the resort and watched families playing in the swimming lagoon, and now I’m nice and cool in the room. The clothes I hand washed are draped all over the furniture on our patio. One pair of slacks I washed yesterday evening are still wet. Hopefully they’ll be dry by morning.
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