Misfits and winter looks

I noticed this,

the winter remains of the Montauk daisies, the other day, and was going to cut it down, but realized it's beautiful. So I left it.

And Misfits came today, bigger than ever because I ordered a cold pack of lovely fish, halibut, hardly ever see it, cod likewise, and salmon, not so rare but a good price and shrimp, which I rarely fit into my budget.  

This was in a new aisle, and as well as the minimum for the regular box, which I always surpass, there's the same minimum on a cold pack. 

Meat, fish, that kind of thing. Special packing. It's in its own insulated pack with freezer blocks, in the main box.

It's not a lot of fish because the price soon gets to the minimum $30. So this week's bill is large. I might skip a week at some point, to catch up with my supplies. But it's high time I had fish not from a can.

Anyway the box was too heavy to lift over the step so I carried it in in installments. Hence the crowd.

The potatoes, listed only as yellow on the website, are in fact Yukon gold, yay. And there will be salad for a couple of days. And they sent basil tomato pesto sauce, instead of the whole tomatoes I'd ordered.  No trouble using it, but not what I'd planned for. They've refunded me. So I accidentally got the pesto sauce, also a jar of ground nutmeg which I didn't order. That might go next door. 

So we're good.

Just as you thought it was over

 

The flowers are fading now, except for the stout hearted Montauk daisies which wait till October to bloom and cheer up the neighbors.

And indoors there's been a Bear Escalation. A local friend has now set up her three bears, one a baby in a bib, beautiful white fancy cloth, for their teddy tea. China cups and saucers all round, small set for the baby.

So word got back and Ruth decided to up the ante at her table with a miniature cup and saucer for Ursula. Whereupon Fred ordered up a seasonal table decoration, a Montauk Daisy.

So, the battle of the  Right to Bear Teas is underway. Winner gets cake.

Anyone may join in. It's not a private fight, old joke.

Dentist, thriftie, flowers writing their own epitaph

High anxiety today, routine check-up at the dentist, great precautions, temp taken, questionnaire to fill out, shoved instantly into exam room, no loitering in the waiting area. Hygienist equipped to do surgery, masked, face shielded, gowned, all to clean my teeth. Dentist arrives in N95 mask. While the cleaning was happening, two alerts sounded on my phone, across the room, too bad.

So no work needed, no deterioration , just keep doing what you've been doing. Empty your wallet, dear, and you can be on your way.

Since I had already ventured across two towns to the dentist, I wasn't far from the thriftie, so I seized the day, found a shortcut to there, and unloaded the Fit of the stuff that's been rattling about behind me for weeks. Nobody was watching, so the hatch opened easily, first time. This never happens when there's an audience. It's a law of nature.

Home again, feeling that I'd acquitted myself well under fire, even simple errands are like this nowadays, and found the phone alerts were about a power outage, one from the power company telling me about it, one from a neighbor asking me about it. Nobody seems to ask the power company. They ask me!  And it was already restored anyway, just had to reset various flashing clocks.

Gardening convo with another neighbor restored my balance, and I noted the Montauk daisies now coming out

 near the Autumn Joy sedum.

 Notice how the ground cover fills in so you don't get that collapsed effect sedum has when it flops out from the center. I can't claim to have completely planned this, more like hoped for it.

Even that daisy head I knocked off is opening in the house, intrepid feller.

Down the street two roses, all  about seizing the day, and time flying.And on that elegiac note, good night!

 After you see a more cheerful sight, a pan of fresh baked cornbread

Life's a banquet, let's enjoy cornbread before our petals fall off.

Crumble, flowers, early fall

The Montauk daisies bloom very late, after you're sure they won't. And there's a lovely mound of them. A couple came in, with some creeping Jenny, posed on a very old rescued crochet doily.

And the farm fruit, last peaches, blackberries and apples, in a crumble for dinner tomorrow with Handsome Son.

Roast chicken, spicy, with sweet potato mashed and buttered, lovely cheese cauliflower head. The farm is serving us well.

Montauk daisies finally

They start to leaf out in spring, bigger and bigger and no sign of buds until you've about given up on them, then in October they suddenly get cracking and put on a show.

Passersby can see them againsyt the Autumn Joy sedum. Coming up the path to the door, and through the kitchen window.

I take all this into account when I plant. Small area, many vantage points. When they finally show up. They're like the last minute passenger hurtling to the departure gate.

There are wild flowers too, less spectacular but dear to me, like this spiderwort lovely blue sparks.

And here shy foliage among some creeper that runs its own life ignoring the gardener, are the closed flowers of scarlet pimpernel, cloudy weather makes them close. At the bottom you see a volunteer Montauk daisy which apparently has plans for next year.

When daisies pied, and violets blue, etc.

Well, this morning the Montauk daisies budded up to almost opening, and there are tiny pies happening, so Shakespeare described my kitchen this morning.  

Labels

Yes, I know his pied daisies meant something different, but I can take poetic license, too, if he can.

Anyway, here's the making of the tiny apple pies.  
 

and at the same time a recipe of bread, wheat and white, rising.

They'll all bake later today, just heat the oven once.  That cloth is in fact clean from the laundry, though it looks a bit weary.  You know how the cookbooks tell you to use a CLEAN cloth, as if you were going to throw the dog's blanket over your bread.

The filling for the pies is: Staycrisp, I think that's the name, apples from the farm, two, sliced up on the slicing side of the grater.  I never used that before, always looked at it wondering what it's for, then realized, oh, cheese, apples, slicing, maybe.  Works fine.

That's macerating with sugar and molasses (equivalent of brown sugar which I don't have in the house) and a big spoonful of cornstarch.  I may add in a bit of cinnamon, fresh ground.

And the wonton wrappers are thawing ready for use.  I've made half moon pies in the past, but this time maybe I'll make round ones, full moons, nice single serve equivalent.  There will be a follow up if this works out.


Speaking of which, last Friday night's dinner with Handsome Son worked out a bit too successfully.  

 I used the ravioli from the freezer, all of them, and a big red sauce with farm tomatoes, homemade pesto and hot Italian sausage. Parmigian to shake over, and hot peppers.  Incidentally, the thawed ravioli tend to stick together, but they separate fine in the boiling water, so you can just put a clump of three or four in at once, and it works.

It entirely filled a great big earthenware serving bowl, the one you see on the left with the cooked ravioli waiting for the sausage and sauce, and I thought I was set up for the week in addition to a generous dinner for Son.  Famous last words.  He enjoyed it to the point where I have eked out two more small dinners for me.  And this is a slim guy.

We had the shortbread for dessert, and he said, after tackling several of them, did you make these? Gosh, they're as good as from the shop.  I choose to believe he means from a high end bakery, rather than the supermarket shelf...