A wish, fulfilled

Yesterday, I wanted stuffed tomatoes. I was up just after 5am in a severe swing about of ordinary habits, and sat drinking hot coffee on the hot terrace before the sun was up and thought about them.

Later I walked to Borough Hall with my yellow shopping bags and bought six summer tomatoes, from Jersey. I also bought - pounced on - all the black currants that Wilklow Orchards had to offer. That's another story. I collected basmati rice and dill on the way home.

In the kitchen, in the late afternoon, waiting for visitors, I chopped onion and sauteed it with allspice, and began to slice the tops of the tomatoes. The buzzer rang then, so I stopped. Much later I returned to my chopping board and chopped up dill and mixed it with the waiting rice, and stuffed the tomatoes. On the hot-hot day I turned on the oven.

Forty minutes later they were ready. Exactly what I had wanted. Filling some hole that had developed while I was not looking.

The updated recipe for these delicious things is next door at 66 Square Feet (the Food).

Awake

I am fretting. On the terrace early July looks more like late July. Or August. And the fall - FALL - anemones have buds on tall stems. The Abyssinian gladiolus show signs of blooming. The Iceberg rose, parched above the roaring air conditioner, looks as though it has been inducted into the marines by way of a severe buzz cut. Good grief. Global warming is happening right overhead.

And so I am awake well ahead of schedule after a tossed and turned night. I gave up and had coffee and jam and bread on the terrace ahead of the sunrise. It is already warm. I should go and help the farmers unpack their produce at Borough Hall. I have been craving tomatoes and perhaps the early ones have shown up, from Jersey. I want to eat them baked, stuffed with basmati rice and mint.

Maybe I'll make a cake, too. I know. Too hot. But cake is cake. Raspberry cake.

There's a thought.

Beach plum gin saves the day

So. The Frenchman cannot tear himself from my side to go and look at the Hudson fireworks. Yay! Consequently, a frittata with lots of dill and potatoes will be carried to the roof for a nouveau-American picnic. I'll make a Waldorf salad, too, for New York's sake. 

To reward and celebrate Vince's loyalty I went straight out and bought some 4th of July Champagne and a bottle of the beach plum gin I've been dreaming about ever since reading about it in the New York Times two days ago. Made by Greenhook Ginsmiths, in the style of sloe gin.

Last August's beach plums from local shores

Why the article and the label on the bottle call beach plums (Prunus maritima) fussy and hard-to-grow, I can't tell you. In my experience beach plums are hardy - they tolerate wind and drought very well, and are adapted to dune and seashore lives. So...perhaps they don't like fertilizers and loam?

 Last year I made beach plum jam and beach plum syrup. In this hood they will be ripe, I think, in about 3-4 weeks. And there is a doozy of a crop this year. But for now we'll just drink them, the way that Stephen DeAngelo, the founder of Greenhook Ginsmiths says he does: with Champagne. 

My kinda guy.

Up

Summer marches across the sky. It is fireworks day in the US of A.

We may see some from the roof tonight, if someone in Jersey, across New York Harbor, sees fit to fire into the sky. The big show is in the Hudson and we will not see that. At least...I don't think. I am tempted, because it is spectacular, but it will probably mean a whole lot of standing and as of last weekend and the train that never came, my back has resigned from standing. But I have encouraged the Frenchie and his collection of lenses to visit Jersey to take pictures. I hope he does.

Grump.

The East River has been neglected for years, now, in terms of the major fireworks display. Grump. I suppose Queens and Brooklyn don't count as much as Jersey, That Other State, does. I mean, between these two eastern boroughs of NYC we can only scare up a combined population of just over 4,700,000 people (2010 census). Or is it because Jersey recently came 4th overall in a national beach pollution test by the Natural Resources Defence Council, and was the 4th cleanest?! And New York City beaches came 24th, with one of the lowest scores, and the most sewage (- and how much of that runoff flows down the Hudson, huh, huh?)!

I knew swimming off the Rockaways was a bad idea.

Grump.

Have a raspberry. They are a good match for cold white wine.

And, yes. That is an ice cube in the wine.

Good for Grumps.

Wild summer salad

There has been a little time for a little wild food collecting: common milkweed pods, yucca flowers, sea rocket and lettuce from the roof in our salad yesterday evening. There may have been a lamb burger, too.

The fresh yucca flowers are very crisp, with good structure for eating raw, unlike soft flowers, like nasturtiums. The texture is a little like iceberg lettuce, and they are mildly scented. The sea rocket has a very pungent mustard bite. The milkweed pods were soft and spicy - I'd pan-cooked them first with ground sumac and cumin. A strong dressing with some field garlic from Frank's farm...

Sea rocket - Cakile edentula

And I pickled some yucca flower buds in lemon juice. I think we'll eat them soon. Stay tuned.

Weather

Surely these are early?

They feel so early. Yet the archives say no...These are the Dunyazades, following on the voluptuous and scented heels of the Silk Road lilies, now exiting to a smattering of polite applause. One's public is fickle. The Silk Road has had better years. Haven't we all? Actually...But I digress.

The storms missed us. We heard about the drama to the south, and hoped for a just a little of it up here, sans mortal danger, but the battalions of cumulus marched past just north of the city, swallowing up 787's (the biggest flying machines) on final approach and take off as though they were gnats.

We ate on the terrace last night. The AC turned off to spare us its roar. We talked about Namibia and Nieu Bethesda and Coney Island and US State Parks and fretted about Time. I have not seen enough of this country, and it is my wish to drive it, really drive it. It is very beautiful. I hear.

Anyone have a spare Airstream? And 12 extra weeks?

Cuba libre

It may as well be called Desperate Measures. The jolt of caffeine, the prickle of Coke, the slide of rum and the aromatherapy of the lemon slices.

The hour-long, standing trek on the A train yesterday evening, feeling my mother's genes in my lower back, wondering anew how she lives with back pain every day. It's only standing that does it to me, or very slow walking, or lifting heavy things - all easy to avoid - but we were well and truly rooted to one spot on the train. 

After lying on the floor of the apartment for half an hour with legs up on a chair, as instructed by Shari, my mom's physiotherapist, I went up and watered the parched roof farm, talked to the cat who came to join me, watched the red ball of sun melt into the canopy of the ailanthus tree in the lots behind our block - the sun is moving slowly back south towards Governor's Island after creeping all the way up to Manhattan's southern tip at its height, just over a week ago - sipped the cold drink, felt water pooling and cool around my feet, and then come down to make a late-late salad with thinly sliced summer squash and a Caesar dressing shot through with garlic and an anchovy fillet or two.

Drugs of choice.