Sorry. I just can't help myself. I'm going to wax poetic about the magic of Craigslist and its ability to turn junk into wondrous stuff - such as a brand new, still in the box, birdbath and Chocolates!

Got rid of my backyard chaise, because I have absolutely no plans to relax this summer. I plan on working in the garden - constantly.

Good. That's one less pile of crap in my shed!

The lady who came to collect the chairs owns a chocolate shop. See? The magic is starting!

When I arrived home and reached into my mailbox to retrieve the money for the chairs, I also found a box of four yummy truffles from Copper Kettle Chocolate Company, which is located out in gorgeous Prince Edward County.

Since they're in wine country, they do these great little shots - mine was a snappy, dark chocolate cup filled with Sandbanks Winery Baco Noir. Awesome! PS, wine snobs can stuff it. I happen to enjoy baco noir.

And there was a dark chocolate sea salt caramel - my fave! The PB & J was a very grown up PB cup and the dark chocolate blackberry was tres sophisticated.

Check these folks out the next time you're in the County or better still just add them to your list of reasons to make the trip. 


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I moved to Toronto from Montreal in the late 80s. One of the first summer weekends in my new home, some friends took my then husband and I up to Lake Simcoe for a picnic. We were all spread out on a blanket, enjoying our lunch a few feet away from a big, friendly, Italian family. Their food smelled so good on the little portable 'Q - we had dopy, little sandwiches - and they seemed happier than my family had ever managed to be, ever. 

Then, along came a couple of over-heated OPP officers. They honed right in on the family and made a bee line for their bottles of homemade red wine. Before anyone could say a word, the cops were pulling corks and pouring wine onto the sandy ground. I was agog. Remember, as a Montrealer, I was totally confused about what was going on. Public boozing, there, is OK - encouraged, actually. Well, actually, I'm not sure if it's truly legal or not, but everybody does it and no one ever says a word about it.

I thought I had made a horrible mistake coming here. Still, I didn't go back to Montreal. I stayed. But I still don't understand the law. I have however, learned to work around it every now and then.

I've filled ginger ale bottles with Asti for Shakespeare in the Park. Vodka and cranberry in fruit juice bottles for a hot summer night walk home after a brutal shift in the kitchen.

I don't drink coolers or ready mixed drinks - usually - but then I tried this one: Canadian Club Mixed & Ready Ginger Ale. I was painting a fence in the sun a couple of days ago, and it was perfectly decent, all chilled. I did have to ask myself though, just how lazy have we become, that we can't even mix a little CC with ginger ale? Seriously.

And then, it occurred to me: I might just be able to get away with a can or two of these at the beach. And, of course, if you are having a party poolside and glass is dangerous, these are perfect. I didn't at all care for the Cola and CC version.

Yes, yes, yes, I know...I really shouldn't be saying this out loud. I'm not saying you should do this, of course! I'm just sayin' is all.
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I'm not a big sweet person. Give me salt and fat over sugar any day. Although...sugar and fat...as in butter cream, now that's another story. What I'm saying is I rarely, if ever, crave candy. Chocolate? Yes! Candy, just about never.

I'm that disgusting person who can take a bite of a candy bar, then wrap it up again and save it for another day. Do you hate me now? Put a bag of chips in front of me and I'm done for.

Anyhoo, I'm a tough critic when it comes to sweets. There has to be something really special about it to get me excited.

Full disclosure: the folks who make this ought-to-be-illegal stuff sent me two packs to try: dark and milk chocolate.

I tried them both, preferred the dark, just because I don't eat milk chocolate...actually, I loved the dark chocolate, but then I read the ingredients and was not pleased. I told them so.

Listed was palm oil. And though it's not 'modified', it's still a crop that displaces wildlife and natural habitat, so it's problematic. According to the Rainforest Action Network, about 50% of all products in the grocery store contain palm oil and palm oil production means rain forest destruction. So, when I read the ingredients panel of a product I'm considering, if I see palm oil, I'll most often put it back on the shelf. So, we are trading orangutans and the earth's lungs for cheap oil. Sigh.

Christ! Even a bag of candy can make me sad! So, back to the OMGs...

I'm a bit of a bitch, I suppose..and I seem to lack the internal editor most have, so I also told them that I hated the packaging, that it looked amateurish and the clusters got too broken up leaving a whole lot of crumbs. Delicious, hard to pick up, crumbs.

And one more curmudgeonly comment: if I see "love" listed as an ingredient one more time I'm going to scream. Seriously!

Let your sweet tooth and conscience and be your guide on this one.

Here's a little background on the makers from their publicity people: "In 1996 Chris Emery and Larry Finnson developed Clodhoppers; a multi-million dollar candy business which they sold in 2006. In 2012 Chris and Larry formed start up corporation OMG's Candy to launch OMG’s, a brand new gourmet confection, to the world. OMG's Candy is committed to using the best ingredients and practices to produce a product that makes people happy because happy people make the world a better place to live."
 
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...but if I were, this lady - Karen Le Billon - would be my hero, my mentor, my guide. You see, I'm old enough to remember when mothers were not short order cooks. You got what you got and you said thank you. You ate it or you didn't. But if you didn't eat what was 'for supper' then you didn't eat at all...unless you sneaked down to the kitchen for a secret snack.

Kids are not genetically programmed to like chicken nuggets. Parents program their kids' tastes. I know grown children with sad, stunted palates and I know babies who will eat everything from steamed broccoli to veggie curry - with gusto and glee.

If you are a mom, get this book. Read this book. Then screw up the courage to stop pandering to your children. (Oh dear, I'm in trouble now!)

Another woman cut from the same French cloth is Lulu Cohen-Farnell, founder of Real Food for Real Kids. I'll never forget something she said to me on one of our first meetings. "What is this 'kiddies menu'? In France, kids eat the same food as adults, we just smash it with a fork!" Hallelujah!

Can we stem the tide of what I see as the dumbing down of the North American child's palate? Because what we are ending up with is a generation of folks who don't know how to eat good or real, unprocessed food, who don't know how to cook, and who are filled with sugar and trans-fats.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

I interviewed a Registered Dietitian a while back about this very issue. His words chilled. He believes we are going to see today's kids developing very early onset dementia - in their 40s! - from all the trans-fats they consume, displacing the omega fats, our brains are made of.

We are going to be a society of obese, diabetic, demented adults. His concern was where we are going to house all these folks who will need long-term care. Now there's a scary thought.

Who's for a kale smoothie? Anyone? I'm buying!


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The Such-ness of Chickens. I'm no Buddhist. Don't know the first thing about it really, though I suspect I should. It would probably suit me right down to the ground.

Take a second or two to read this - not the journal part - and then, if you can spend some time with a few hens. She's totally on the money. Oh, 'she' is the author, Clea Danaan, and the book is The Way of the Hen - Zen and the Art of Raising Chickens, and I'm loving it!

Now I always knew there was something so real, so connecting...so engaging about hens, I just never really had the words for it. They enthrall me. I can sit with them or just lose myself watching them. There is something so wise about them, something so honest. If one of my girls trips or falls, there is no shame, but when she lays an egg, she calls out - loudly! Is it some sort of henny pride? Does she want me to come and collect it or admire it. I know this, she will stop her bellowing when I take the egg from the nest box. I show it to her, she looks at it curiously, wordlessly and watches me take it into the house. She doesn't seem to mind. And I always say 'thank you' and tell her she's done a wonderful job.

Or could it be that all hen keepers are just a tad nuts? Are we looking to see something that isn't there, simply because we love our birds so much? I hope not, because if that's the case, then I'm certifiable!


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I got my copy from Amazon.ca for about $14.
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Beer is not my poison. Dessert island? No source of potable water? OK, OK, a case of Corona it is. But any other time, wine is my tipple of choice.

But it was a hot, sunny day. And my handyman and I had been working in the yard building a fence to keep the ladies out of my soon to be fruitful veg patch. We were hot. We were thirsty. It was Good Friday - a holiday, after all. A cold coke wasn't going to do. This was beer time...and I happen to have one, great big bottle of something very special to share.

Unibrou 17 from Quebec. Now I don't know what the professional beer swillers would say about it, but here's what I thought...me...a non-beer drinker.

I LOVED it!!!

There was some sweetness - not too much - just enough for it to be really interesting - like burned sugar or molasses. A tiny bit of hoppy bitterness for balance and a huge, chewy mouthfeel. OK, perhaps not the perfect suds for the beach, but man, it went down like sody pop. Boozy, chocolate dipped cherry sody pop.

Look for it. Buy it. Chill it. Sip it. LOVE it!

And yes, it's suppose to be murky.

And yes, if you are sensitive to yeast, this beer will make you explode.

And yes, it's strong. The rest of my afternoon was hilarious.

And now, the bad news: the LCBO has discontinued this product, BUT, there are still some bottles out there to be rooted out and snatched up. Let your fingers do the the walking - it's worth the hunt.


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Cookbooks come to my door like magic: it's one of the best perks of my job. If I like the book, I write about it. If I don't, I don't. The cheesy celebrity books usually end up being re-gifted - seriously, yet another cookbook by an anorexic Hollywood bimbo? Anyway, we all read the article, didn't we? Confessions of a Celebrity Chef Ghostwriter or whatever it was titled.

If I love or even reasonably like a book it goes into my ever swelling collection to be ogled and admired from time to time. Rarely do I cook from a recipe. Baking, sure. You pretty well have to use measurements, but cooking is something I do from the hip. And cookbooks are for me, a source of inspiration, and they make me lustful - for certain seasons or ingredients.

Some cookbooks are more pornographic than others and get pawed over again and again, while some more demure editions languish on a shelf, never to be pulled out again. They are just there to add to my wall of wonder.

And then there are special books, like this one: Lidia's Italy in America. Now, I'm not a big fan, but yes, it's a gorgeous book with lovely images of the foods and folks that make up the amazing culinary history of Italian food in the US. Just opening the pages induces an immediate and impossible to ignore craving for pasta - done right.

But I'm giving this book away to someone I've never met, because this someone, a lovely lady named Myrna is giving me - someone she's never met - a fantastic gift...a wood chipper.

I can not tell you all how excited I am to start chipping wood. I hope Myrna is just as excited to start cooking Lidia's recipes! And in case you're about to accuse me of being cheap, I'm going to throw in a few more books and of course some of my girls' fresh eggs.

And now, I'm going to make some spaghetti and daydream of growing artichokes in my garden this summer! 
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$38.00 from Random House
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Oh, Yoko! 03/29/2012
 
Fashion means less than nothing to me. In fact, I hate the business of it. I think it's bad for us and as far as I can tell, it's pursuit is sad and empty. Women - and the odd man - starve themselves for it and many go into debt mindlessly following it. Label hounds spend thousands to be walking billboards for zillionaire fashion houses and to bolster their own self-esteem. I think a few hours spent volunteering or planting a community garden would do these folks way more good than owning the latest pair of boots, someone told them they have to own or else be social pariahs.

Long story short: I don't read fashion mags, but I do get this one in the mail. Why? Because it comes along with my subscription to Toronto Life. Usually I toss it into the blue bin without so much as cracking the spine, but today, two words - "Yoko Ono" - emblazoned in red on the cover, bought this mag a short reprieve. Just long enough to tear a bit out.

I don't care about her style or fashion sense. All I care to say is, "Holy shit, people, she's almost freakin' 80!'. Wow.

When I was a teen, I loved her because she was John Lennon's other half. I loved her music because it was so fucking off the wall. And, it's true, I loved her look: flowing black locks, huge shades, great big, floppy hats. But mostly I just loved her for so steadfastly being her own weird self. She was hated and publicly ridiculed and not once did she ever apologize for being authentic, and that's a lesson girls today could stand to learn.

Yo, dumb dumbs, she didn't break up the Beatles. They were done. She's no femme fatale, she's just a woman, an artist, an independent thinker and doer...and in this world...that's as much a crime as, well, anything, really.

And now, at 79 going on 80, she's still rocking on and making art, making a stir and making the scene. I still stand by my 'fuck fashion' attitude...and behind me are the ghosts of legions of those hurt by it's creation and slavish pursuit, from starved models to skinned fur-bearing animals and yes, even the planet.

We talk about oil. We talk about industrial food...and how these things negatively impact the earth. We rarely if ever talk about fashion. About the millions of pounds of crap fashion clogging up landfills. About the millions of gallons of pesticides poured over cotton and linen crops. About the horror of fur farms and trapping. About how the fashionesta's changing whims impact the subsistence shepherd, raising sheep for pashmina or cashmere, when suddenly the rage is over and these wools are passe. Think! all you pretty people!

Still, Yoko, you look maaaaaaravlous!

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http://www.tourmaline.ca
Lots of pretty pictures make the bruises and arm pain worth it.
I'm still in the throws of studying for my Wine Specialist Certificate from George Brown College and this is my text. You can't tell it from here, but it weighs, oh, about 10 million pounds! Seriously, it's the kind of book that bruises your thighs if you try propping it up to read it. If you try just holding it, your arms hurt. Well, mine do, anyway. What I'm saying is two things: one, it's no fun to have to sit at a table to read a book and two, finally I can see a book just made for one of those e-readers, faux-books that I won't touch.

Why won't I touch them? Two reasons: one, I'm an old fart and two, this old fart likes the feeling of a book and the look of a book on her shelf. I guess that's three reasons.

But for this freakin' doorstop, I'd make an exception!

Still, if you love wine and you want to know more about it, this is a fantastic book/doorstop/flower press/booster seat. Filled with tons of information delivered in that delightfully snotty way that only the British can get away with. "Carbonic masturbation" anyone?

I'm almost done this course, then there is one more and then I'm taking a bit of a break from studies. But after I've recovered, I have my sights set on the fromager set, also at George Brown. I hear the homework is delicious!
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A while back I was sent this adorable, hand written book. The author, Minnie Rose Lovgreen - born in 1888 - might not have given hen lovers this guide, had she been more patient. Born in the UK and itching to set sail for America, she got fed up waiting for her ship to sail, so she quit waiting for the Titanic and hitched a ride on a luckier boat. Phew.


Minnie made it across the pond, married a farmer, and raised kids and chickens until she died in 1975. This is her sweet gift. And she sums up in one sentence, what anyone who has lived with chickens knows; "The main thing is to keep them happy." Simple. True.  
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Illustrations by: Elizabeth Hutchison Zwick. $13.00 NW Trillium Press www.nwtrilliumpress.com
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