Godard on Godard

Jean-Luc Godard's 80th birthday has been commemorated with a new typeface.
Inspired by the graphics of his title credits,
it's free, pretty fantastic, and you can find it here.

Swing Time...

'I get so sentimental when I see how perfect perfection can be.'
Fred Astaire in Top Hat

A Day at the Races

This morning I made my way over to Cambridge and the banks of the river to settle in and watch a few of the Head of the Charles races. I brought coffee and scones and met up with a few friends to watch the alumni teams glide by. It was an absolutely gorgeous day for it... quintessentially fall in Cambridge.

Most years, my aunt & uncle come into town to compete and we get together to catch up over lunch... a lovely annual tradition. This year we also made a visit to the new Community Rowing Boathouse for a quick architectural tour and to take a break from the hub-bub down river. But not for too long, and pretty soon it was back to the festival-like atmosphere that is Harvard Square this weekend. The races and festivities continue tomorrow... plenty of time to head on over to watch a race and reunite with a few friends on the riverbanks.

At the alumni Reunion Village tents on the banks of the Charles

The Larz Anderson Bridge, Harvard's Weld Boathouse, and an endless row of food tents along the shore...

Get Out

Murray as a pup, holding still just long enough to take a picture!

After a gray and rainy few days, it's time to get outside and enjoy autumn in New England... perfect, easy-t0-love weather is predicted for the weekend here in Massachusetts.
Murray has been pretty cooped up this week so I plan to take him out for a few all day adventures: maybe a meet-up at the dog park, an outdoor market stroll, or a day trip to the beach now that it's the off-season and dogs can romp freely on sandy shores.

However you spend the long weekend, get outside for a bit...
before it's time to hunker down and hibernate!

happy columbus day

Keeping Afloat

It's been a tough few weeks for many of those near and dear. We've been fighting battles on many fronts, some together and some on our own. Remembering this flag, and other old battle cries, feels surprisingly inspiring to me at times like these... I guess that's what all of those old mottos are there for.

Easy Being Green

Toasted Nut & Parsley Pesto

2 cups loosely packed fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 cup walnuts or a combination of walnuts, almonds & pecans
3/4 cup freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano
3-5 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil or walnut oil
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
kosher salt
pepper

1. With the peel on, lightly toast the garlic cloves, let cool and peel.
2. Toast the nuts until fragrant.
3. Combine parsley, nuts, garlic, cheese and 1 tsp salt in a food processor.
4. Turn on the processor and slowly add oil through the feed tube. Process mixture into a thick paste, but don't over process!
5. Add lemon juice, pasta water (about 1/4 cup). Season with salt and pepper to taste and pulse food processor a couple of times.

This pesto is delicious on pasta (I especially like it on spinach noodles), but is also tasty on crostini, as a seasoning for grilled shrimp, or combined with 1 cup of unsalted butter in a food processor to make a herb-nut compound butter.

Inge Morath

Arthur Miller & Inge Morath at their home in Connecticut, 1962

Inge Morath is one of those artists that I just keep coming back to and she never fails to inspire. Not just for her photography, which is fascinating to me, but by her ability to be a life-long-learner, consistently adapting to and embedding herself in the many countries and cultures that she inhabited in her life.

Inge, incognito

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller on the set of The Misfits, photographed by Morath. Miller wrote the part for one-time-wife Monroe in his screenplay. He and Morath met on the set, where she and other photographers (including Henri Cartier-Bresson) were documenting the production.

'Photography is a strange phenomenon...
You trust your eye and cannot help but bare your soul.'
Inge Morath

Read more about Morath here

upandoverit into the weekend

So long, sweet summer!

Reading a few of the really lovely summer send-offs that friends and favorite bloggers have posted lately, I was inspired to do a little of my own remembering of things {in the not so distant} past. This summer flew by faster than many in recent history, but only because it was so full, filled to the brim with wonderful people, places... and food! It was truly a time to savor the little big things in life.


Just a few of the summer moments that I'd like to remember to remember...

Took my first trip to Lake Winnipesaukee and stayed in a cottage perched on the lake shore and built by a friend's grandparents in the 1930s when lake cottages were just what they should be... charming retreats for friends and family to gather & really spend time together... which we did, over good meals and good news.

Traveled with a very creative and talented friend to Nantucket to visit other creative and talented {and industrious!} friends who spend each summer out there running a picture perfect market by the shore. Ate more than my fair share of lobster, learned how to shuck an oyster, sang along during after dinner sing-alongs, and swam in the Atlantic under a nearly full moon.

Went to the first concert that I've been to in ages and was reminded of that feeling of instant communitas that can happen when a whole crowd of people are together, so absorbed and in the moment, dancing and singing their hearts out.

Spent many afternoons on boat trips and ferry rides from Maine to Martha's Vineyard and was invigorated by the restorative powers of salty sea air and the New England seashore. Boating out to explore little island summer communities in mid-coast Maine reminded me that there is a slower, more summer-y way of summertime living.

Celebrated my birthday by throwing a mid-week pizza cook-off party attended by thoughtful and caring friends... an outpouring of friendship and love that made me actually feel pretty wonderful about turning a year older!

Ate many beautiful and delicious meals al fresco, including this gorgeous salad niçoise. Eating outdoors, especially in a region of real seasons, is such a simple summer pleasure that it seems to make the food taste that much better.


Spent some real quality time with my mom during her visit from the west coast and was reminded by the too-soon-passing of a family friend of just how precious that kind of time together, just being, is and of how important it is to treasure those moments.

Celebrated the marriage of beautiful, wonderful friends in the mountains of Virginia where we feasted {oh, how we feasted!} and swam and danced into the wee hours to send the lovely couple off into a happy and full life together.


With such an optimistic note to end the summer on, how could one not look forward to the fall? It only gets us nearer to next summer!

Pistachio-Saffron-Rosewater Ice Cream

One of my favorite cookbooks is SPICE from Ana Sortun {the chef at Oleana and Sofra in Cambridge, Massachusetts}. Looking for an ice cream recipe with flavors that would compliment her recipes, I found a few variations on pistachio that I thought might be perfectly delicious. I've combined and adapted a few of them for what I think is a good balance of flavors with just enough of the flowery rosewater essence to bring to mind a more exotic place and time. A great finish to a spicy Mediterranean meal!

Ingredients:
1 cup cream
1 cup half and half
1 heaping teaspoon saffron threads
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
6 egg yolks
1 cup superfine sugar
1/3 cup rosewater
1 cup pistachios, crushed or chopped to small pieces


1. Heat cream, half and half, saffron, 1/2 cup chopped pistachios and vanilla to just boiling, being careful not to overcook. While the cream mixture is coming to the boil, whisk yolks with sugar in a metal bowl.
2. Pour about 1/2 cup of the hot cream mixture into yolks in a slow, steady stream, whisking all the while. Don't stop whisking. Let it cool a bit by whisking for another 3 to 4 minutes.
3. Pour the egg mixture into the remaining cream mixture and cook over low-medium heat until the custard thickens and coats the back of a wooden spoon, stirring constantly.
4. Strain the custard, removing the steeped pistachios, and cool in the refrigerator (overnight is best but 4-6 hours will do). When you are ready to make the ice cream, stir in the remaining 1/2 cup of chopped pistachios and pour all of the custard into an ice cream maker; freeze according to manufacturer's directions and let set for at least 6 hours.

Garnish with finely chopped pistachios

Brimfield

The Brimfield flea market wrapped up for the season this weekend and I (along with a few friends and Murray the dog) headed west for the final day. Not necessarily a novice, I went for the first time last year, and yet still the sheer amount of objects and things and never-before-seen-collections (hundreds of ornate walking canes!) can be a bit overwhelming. This typically results in my not wanting to actually buy anything, but to just look. And to think of an empty house or beach cottage to fill with eclectic finds.

I did purchase a few small things: like last year, I found the bead dealers and bought several strands to use in new jewelry creations. At a booth filled with all sorts of amazing laboratory glass, I bought two small pyrex bottles with glass stoppers. These are just the thing I've been looking for to contain a mix of perfume oils that I bought in Abu Dhabi last year.

The booths of architectural salvage materials and pieces were my favorite... full of fantastic steel tables, repurposed industrial lamps, and large wooden cabinets, like the one pictured below with multi-colored numbered drawers. Next year I'll bring a truck!

Hey there, Cupcake

I know, I know, this whole cupcake trend has been around for ages... but there is still something so valid, so perfectly proportioned & autonomous about the cupcake. And, I shouldn't neglect to mention, these years of cupcake craze have certainly raised the bar. No more dry and bland cake topped with overly sweet and slightly crumbly frosting for us.... we've become a pretty picky bunch.

After getting briefly caught up in Magnolia Bakery fandom (and, I admit, I still love strolling through the West Village on a summer evening to grab an after dinner dessert when in NYC) my current favorite cupcake recipes are by my dear friend and former classmate Ming Thompson of mingmakescupcakes fame. The flavor combinations are well-balanced and innovative... never too sweet... and are easier than they look to recreate at home. Ming is surely destined for stardom, both culinary and design-wise, so take a peek at her latest confections and say you knew her when.

ming makes cupcakes

Simply messing about in boats...

Rowing out to view the Tall Ships in Boston Harbor

`This has been a wonderful day!' said he, as the Rat shoved off and took to the sculls again. `Do you know, I`ve never been in a boat before in all my life.' `What?' cried the Rat, open-mouthed: `Never been in a--you never--well I--what have you been doing, then?' `Is it so nice as all that?' asked the Mole shyly, though he was quite prepared to believe it as he leant back in his seat and surveyed the cushions, the oars, the rowlocks, and all the fascinating fittings, and felt the boat sway lightly under him. `Nice? It's the ONLY thing,' said the Water Rat solemnly, as he leant forward for his stroke. `Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING--absolute nothing--half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. Simply messing,' he went on dreamily: `messing--about--in--boats; messing----' `Look ahead, Rat!' cried the Mole suddenly. It was too late. The boat struck the bank full tilt. The dreamer, the joyous oarsman, lay on his back at the bottom of the boat, his heels in the air.

The Wind in the Willows
Kenneth Grahame

Grandma Jane & Grandpa Bill, sailing on Green Lake

Heading back into the pretty little harbor at Five Islands, Maine


HAPPY LABOR DAY, BOATERS!

Funny Girl

Maybe it's just the fact that I was a child of the early 80's (and that my mom played Streisand & Gibb's 'Guilty' album on a pretty heavy rotation), but I can't help but feel all sorts of nostalgia when I hear Barbra Streisand songs from most any era. Even hearing 'Don't Rain On My Parade' on Glee manages to give me a bit of the goosebumps. Life's candy and the sun's a ball of butter...

Banksy in the Bean

Walking home through Chinatown a few weeks ago, I bumped into this piece by British 'graffiti' artist, Banksy. At the time I hadn't heard that a couple of his works had turned up in the city (on Essex Streets in both Boston and Cambridge) and, not looking for but stumbling upon it, the image became one of those moments of spontaneous wonder that come from walking through a city on a summer afternoon.*

*I don't know who those shoes and bike belong to...

Pomp & Circumstance. And LEGOs.

Graduation took place at Harvard this week and, though I technically graduated in March, going through all of the ceremonies made it feel quite a bit more official... putting on a cap and gown will do that! There are so few rituals and ceremonies in modern life beyond marrying and burying. Taking part in commencement suddenly linked this rite of passage to something bigger, more collective. And the LEGO buildings on mortar boards... that was our own twist on a (relatively recent) graduate school tradition!

Walnut-Orange Cake with Olive Oil

I hosted a little birthday celebration for a friend of mine who is a bit of a health nut. As a health(ier) alternative to a traditional birthday cake, I made this walnut-orange cake for dessert. It uses olive oil instead of butter and the finely chopped walnuts give it a hearty texture. Plenty of orange zest helps the citrus flavor hold up to baking, and lightly sweetened Greek yogurt has a tanginess that compliments that tastes and textures of the cake.

A dessert to enjoy, guilt free. Trust me... it's good for you!

Walnut-Orange Cake
1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder

4 large eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup fresh orange juice
1 tablespoon finely grated orange peel
1/2 cup olive oil

Powdered sugar
Greek yogurt

Preheat oven to 350°F. Prepare a 9-inch-diameter springform pan with olive oil. Place parchment paper round in bottom of pan and oil the paper.

Grind walnuts in processor until finely ground but not powdery or chop finely. Combine ground walnuts, flour, and baking powder in medium bowl; set aside.

Using electric mixer, beat eggs in large bowl until frothy, about 2 minutes. Gradually add sugar, beating until light, thick, and pale yellow, about 4 minutes. Gradually add walnut-flour mixture; then add orange juice, orange peel, and olive oil, beating just until blended. Transfer batter to prepared pan. Place pan on rimmed baking sheet, and bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 1 hour. Cool cake completely in pan on rack.

Release pan sides. Carefully invert cake onto platter and remove parchment paper. Once the cake has cooled well, sprinkle it with powdered sugar.
Combine 2 cups of Greek yogurt with 3 tablespoons of powdered sugar and mix together until smooth. Serve with the cake as an alternative to whipped cream and garnish it with orange zest.
Adapted from Bon Appétit October 2007

In search of lost summers: Barbara at the beach

Grandma Barbara, some long-ago summer

When I was a little girl and living in the Pacific Northwest, my family would make summer excursions to the Oregon coast to spend time with my Mother's sisters and my maternal grandmother, Barbara. My mom is one of four girls and all four sisters' first children were daughters. A few sons came along later, but in my memories, these early trips have a very feminine cast. It was a time where, rather than being the only girl in the all-male tribe of my father's family, I was one in troupe, where the girls flew kites and played whiffleball, occasionally & accidentally hitting each other in the nose with the bat on an aggressive swing.

All of these adventures were overseen by the beautiful Barbara, a woman who would hand-craft matching outfits for all of the grandchildren at Christmastime, who kept a well-stocked candy box 'for good little girls and boys', and who would indulge our cravings for not so appetizing snacks such as pickles with whipped cream. She spoiled all of her grandchildren and forgave us when we skipped the outdoor shower to run, feet covered in sand, through the rented beach cottage to grab a popsicle before heading right back out. As this summer approaches, I can't help but think of happy memories of summers in the past.

Easter eggs

The weather here in Boston feels like it might be springing right into summer, which made Easter Sunday perfect for dining al fresco and inaugurating my friend Sara's yard for another season.

For this Easter brunch I decided to try my hand at deviled eggs... an old standby that I love but have never actually made! Thought that I'd start out with a couple of variations on the traditional, adding bacon to one batch and horseradish to another, giving them both a little something extra.

The eggs were added to a feast of delicious Easter dishes followed by a multiple course dessert of the amazing things that can be made with strawberries. Happy Easter and welcome spring!

Bacon & Eggs

6 eggs
1/4 cup mayonnaise
2 slices of bacon
1/2 tablespoon mustard
dash of paprika

1. Place eggs in a saucepan, and cover with cold water. Bring water to a boil and immediately remove from heat. Cover, and let eggs stand in hot water for 10 to 12 minutes. Remove from hot water, and cool. To cool more quickly, rinse eggs under cold running water.
2. Meanwhile, place bacon in a large, deep skillet. Cook over medium-high heat until evenly brown. Alternatively, wrap bacon in paper towels and cook in the microwave for about 1 minute per slice. Crumble and set aside.
3. Peel the hard-cooked eggs, and cut in half lengthwise. Remove yolks to a small bowl. Mash egg yolks with mayonnaise, crumbled bacon. Stir in mustard. Fill egg white halves with the yolk mixture and garnish with finely crumbled bacon. Refrigerate until serving.

Extra Devilish Deviled Eggs

6 hard-boiled eggs
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1/2 tablespoon chopped fresh dill
1/4 tablespoon mustard
1/8 teaspoon salt
dash of freshly ground pepper
dash of paprika

1. Cook eggs as described above. Cut eggs in half lengthwise. Remove yolks; set whites aside.
   
2. In a bowl, mash the yolks. add mayonnaise, horseradish, dill, mustard, paprika, salt and pepper; mix well.
   
3. Pipe or spoon into egg whites. Garnish with chopped dill. Refrigerate until serving.

Sara's lovely al fresco table

Strawberry-fest: Ming's almond strawberry layer cake (above) & Erin's berry tart with rosemary crust


Thanks to Ming for sharing the beautiful photos!

Comfort me with popsicles

I know that it's not quite summer yet, but these warmer days are getting me thinking about new ice cream recipes for the season. As an easy, pre-summer treat I've been making popsicles. It's amazing how having a popsicle on a warm day (or even a cold, sick-at-home day) can bring back happy childhood memories... it's no coincidence that the popsicle was invented by an 11 year old boy! For a slightly more grown-up take on the frozen treat, I've been combining grapefruit juice and elderflower syrup from Ikea in a make-at-home popsicle tray. The elderflower sweetens up the citrus and combines to create a perfect fruity floral flavor. The ratio of juice to syrup is up to personal preference, but I've found 1 part syrup to 4 parts juice to be a pretty good recipe. If you want to kick it up a bit, St. Germain elderflower liqueur could replace the syrup... definitely grown up!*

*Another 'grown up' summer recipe for elderflower syrup:
Hendrick's gin
elderflower syrup
soda
cucumber garnish

April showers bring...

Now that the sun is shining and the air is feeling fresh and warm enough to keep the windows open, it's so nice to keep a few bunches of fresh flowers around to remind me that spring is really here. One of my favorites are ranunculus... not too precious looking, a little bit country, and definitely feminine; a down-to-earth extravagance!

Ladies who brunch

The ladies that I worked with at a Cambridge architecture firm have instituted a long-standing, monthly potluck get together. The hostess, theme, and location is on a loosely rotating schedule and this week it was brunch at Sydney's lovely home. As is customary with this crew, the food was fantastic and the laughs were plentiful.
My culinary contribution to the feast was two variations on my favorite apricot-sage scones: one batch of pecan-rosemary and one batch of cherry-almond. Delish, if I do say so myself!

Post-brunch clean up... thanks Sydney!

Building School

Immediately after presenting my thesis, and wrapping up with a bow nearly four years at Harvard's Graduate School of Design, I high-tailed it to New York to refresh and restore. And to check out the High Line Park and catch the last day of the MoMA's exhibit on the Bauhaus.
Both turned out to be the most perfect re-inspire-ers that I could have hoped for: the walk along the High Line reminded me why I fell for architecture in the first place and the Bauhaus exhibit conveyed the power of a playful spirit in making the world. Thank you, NYC... you were just what I needed.

The Bauhaus exhibit at the MoMA is over, but its book is worth a look!