the good, the bad, and the ugly

bear with me, i am tittering on slipping into a food comma. it was our friend sandra's birthday the other day, so today after spending a very busy morning at work, part of the memphis gang went out to lunch. where did we go? i will get to that in "the bad" portion of this post. but first "the good."

it seems to be going good in the fall garden and in the kitchen. let's look in on the garden to see how it is progressing.

basil off to a really good start.

bok choy, poc choy, or whatever choy this is growing surprisingly well. remember that these are from the seeds that i harvested myself from my bolted choy earlier this summer.

cute little carrot seedlings.

GROW LETTUCE GROW!!!
one of my new fall lettuce/greens patch.

well thursday was a new adventure in the kitchen. after harvesting some of the swiss chard from the garden i decided to make a swiss chard gratin. i found this recipe on the wednesday chef blog, with the recipe via alice waters who has a really good book the art of simple food. it was a bit time consuming with all the steps for the chard. washing, trimming, blanching, etc. and i was debating adding some cheese into this recipe, which i eventually elected not to. in the end it was a very tasty dish, although i did not have fresh bread crumbs, but these prepackaged ones i found in the back of the pantry, and i also over did it with the nutmeg. i paired the gratin with some fresh tomatoes tossed with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and fresh basil. both dishes were good on their own, but when they got a little mixed together on the plate, now that was TASTY. by the time i finished, i had mixed it all together.

swiss chard fresh from the garden. i planted this from organic seedlings that we got at the hendersonville co-op in NC.

swiss chard gratin and fresh tomatoes. i love using my vintage bowls and casserole dishes to cook in. my fire king pattern that i collect is the primrose. feel free to send me more. that's a new deal i can strike with everyone. bring me a vintage primrose dish and i'll cook you dinner. any takers?

close up of dinner.

alright, now "the bad." like i said earlier, we went out for lunch to celebrate sandra's b-day. we went to rio grill. which i guess is like texas de brazil, or what ever that place is called. basically we had MEAT for lunch. we started off with a bit from the salad bar and then they started bringing us meat. and then they brought us meat, and then some more meat, and then again meat. MEAT... MEAT....MEAT.... it just kept coming and coming. this is some sort of sadistic meat torture. don't get me wrong, it was good. but no one should eat this much meat in one sitting. at one point i thought it might be a good idea to pop an aspirin to help ward off the coming heart attack. then i thought i could hear my arteries clog. not to mention the fact that i just consumed my share of factory farmed animals for the next 6 months. i would have taken pictures, but i'm sure everyone at the table and in the restaurant would have thought i was a complete freak. that's if they could have gotten past the initial shock of my eggplant colored hair.

yes that's right folks, EGGPLANT COLORED HAIR!!!!!!

now to "the ugly" portion of the evening. my eggplant colored hair. dark purple. i have only myself to blame. it all started when i was obviously dropped on my head as a young child, and the fact the my lovely hairdresser, angela at the hair cuttery, has up and left, nowhere to be found. at least not by me. so, i went to this new girl who was recommended by valerie, the new receptionist at work. well, shelia did a real nice job on the hair cut, and for $16 what more could you ask for. then i came home and decided to color my hair. now the dye job in itself is not bad, it's just the color i picked out. i wanted a nice medium brown/reddish color. i opted for chestnut, i just didn't realize that mahagomy chestnut meant deep dark purple. oops. i just keep telling people that i am trying to match my fall garden.

(ok... ray just came in here (from the living room where he has been hibernating since we got back from the meat-a-thon) to see what i was doing. "i'm ready for desert" says ray. i told him he was on crack. he says "ON MY BUTT CRACK!!!!" - i would laugh but i would probably split in two from the extra pressure)

here is some evidence of the hair debacle.

well in the picture the hair does not look that bad. that is more like the color i was going for. but believe me folks, in real life, it is really deep dark eggplant purple. just asked ray or the folks at work. when ray came home and saw my hair this is exactly what he said...."it's... (long pause)..... purple. BUT I LOVE YOU. it's just...... purple."

ok, time to go for now. but if anyone knows of a good meat detox let me know....