A Trip to San Juan Capistrano

I drove up to San Juan Capistrano a couple of weeks ago to do some photography. I hadn't been there in years and years. My memory of it was that it was a quaint town, and that there was a mission where the swallows returned year after year.
What I had forgotten - or maybe I wasn't there at the right time of the year - was how beautiful the town can be when the trees are in bloom...
This time around, I saw it with different eyes. I began to piece together a part of California's history as I exited the Starbucks and walked across the street to the mission. The mission was built in 1776 by Spanish Catholic Franciscans, and is part of the chain of missions stretching through California.












The history of this mission is similar to many such missions in the southwest: The building of a mission, the subsequent conversion of the indigenous people, the destruction of the mission and then the subsequent rebuilding. This history repeats itself over and over. I have seen it in New Mexico and it is here in California as well. What usually happens is that the mission eventually falls into disrepair and is left as ruins which become a tourist attraction. In the case of this mission, there is actually a chapel which is still in use.
But the small entrance fee is worth it just to stroll through the grounds and duck into the restored rooms.






































And of course, there's the wonderful fountain in the central courtyard, with it's resident fish, and exquisite leaves floating peacefully....






















I was grateful to spend a day with the sole purpose of seeing. I needed that respite from the hectic days that speed into each other, blurred by necessities and phone calls. There in the gardens of the mission, a golden fish glides by with nothing more than the next morsel to think about. It is his inheritance, just as the freeways are mine.

Next week I will have a recipe to share. This week without my lens was given to finishing up all the "gotta-dos" on my list!

My Secret Obsession Revisited

My camera lens is off being repaired. This leaves me feeling completely out of sorts. I mean, I don't know what to do with myself! It also means that I cannot photograph anything that I've cooked recently. So while I was sipping my morning chai, I decided that maybe it was time to revisit this old post that I did back in March of 2007. I don't have a clue how I did such a good job of formatting the original post - this one's been fighting me for hours!! Hopefully, my lens will be back in time for next Sunday's post - I'm in no mood to spend my Sundays in battle.

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When I was growing up, every time any of us felt sick, my mother always made us tea and toast. Lipton, of course. It was supposed to make me feel better, and I suppose the simplicity of it made sense, but the effect was always the opposite her goal. One lump or two made no difference - I would sip the tea and immediately feel nauseated. I guess it had a Pavlovian effect on me in later years, when the smell of tea would make my stomach queasy. I loved watching English actresses pouring tea into china cups and passing around lumps of sugar. It was all so civilized and lovely. I would have loved to have lived that civilized and lovely life, I thought, wearing those dresses, pouring that.....tea? Oh dear. I needed a substitute.I really cannot remember when it happened. Honestly, I don't recall if I was still living in New Mexico, or if I had moved to California, but at some point in the distant past, I was with some acupuncturist friends who offered me a cup of bancha tea. "Um....I'm not really a tea drinker...." And before I could explain my Pavlovian response, they insisted that this was not like black tea, and I should try it. "Well.....OK...." It was not in my nature to argue with my hosts, after all.
I said a silent prayer and took my first sip. This is tea? Really? For those of you unfamiliar with it, bancha is a traditional , daily use, Japanese green tea variety that is made from mature leaves, plucked in the summer or autumn. Bancha's like a mature samurai - the extra time it's had to mellow in the sun makes it a bit toastier in color, with a sweet, earthy taste. It has nothing in common with the black tea favored by Europeans. It's ability to strengthen the metabolism and aid in digestion, makes it a favorite among those following a macrobiotic diet. All I knew was that it was delicious. Bancha led to sencha and matcha - all from the same tea plant, but picked earlier in the year. These familiar green teas are slightly more arrogant - they have an edge to them, and an astringent quality. As long as they're not steeped too long, they are delicious. Leave the bag in the water for too long and you're probably not going to like the bitterness. Of course, it's easier to put up with the attitude when you know their antioxidant and anti-carcinogenic properties.

From there, I branched out into Earl Grey. The Earl was a huge step for me, as the basis here is black tea. But it is flavored with bergamot oil, which lends a distinct citrus flavor and aroma. With citrus as it's leading edge, I managed to sail past that black tea flavor without my stomach noticing it. I was making progress. The Earl and I are friends now, but we don't see each other too often.

Then I discovered Spiced Chai, or Spiced Chai Tea, as Trader Joe's calls it. Funny name, that. Since chai is another name for tea, it means that this tea's name is Spiced Tea Tea. Be that as it may, I used to take a teabag and pour boiling water over it, letting it steep for a while until it reached the right color. Then I'd add milk.
But back in 2000, a friend of mine who is a photojournalist went to India to photograph the first Kumba Mela of the new millenium. The Mela is an enormous Hindu festival, and that year it was held in Alahabad. There were about 75,000,000 people from all over the world who converged on Alahabad for the celebration, and my friend was swept up by the colors and sounds and smells of it all. He told me about drinking tea from a street vendor, who would have a pot of water with milk boiling over a fire. When someone ordered some tea, he'd throw a handful of tea and sugar into the pot, then ladel some into a small, low-fired ceramic cup. The cup was "disposable", meaning people would throw them away when they were done.

I was intrigued by the idea of boiling the milk in with the water, and wondered if it would make a difference. I don't eat much sugar, but I figured a teaspoon of it wouldn't make all that much difference.

With my first sip, I became a convert.

Ever since then, this has become my standard morning drink. Yes, I will still have a cup of coffee from time to time, but my morning chai has become my morning comfort. Different brands of chai will have different spices in them, but ginger and cardamom are fairly standard additions. In Chinese medicine, both of those spices are used to benefit the digestive system, and there is a whole school of thinking in Chinese medicine which says that all chronic diseases stem from a poor digestive system. As a student of mine once pointed out to me as I sipped my chai in an herbology class, declaring that my digestion was actually quite good, "Yes, but you self-medicate every day!"

She was right. I do. And intend to continue to do so, enjoying every sip!

I now have an entire pantry shelf devoted to teas. I don't know how that happened. Do they breed in there? And I've discovered something about me. I'm fickle. I'll fall in love, it will last for a while, and then I move on. So while bancha was my first love, my relationship with Earl Grey was more of an affair. Spiced chai is my steady partner in life. But I confess to having a few flings from time to time. There's genmai cha, a green tea with roasted brown rice in it. Genmai has a kind of popcorn flavor, which is appealing from time to time, but not as a steady romance. His first cousin houji cha, a handsome brew made from roasted bancha leaves. With a chestnut color and light, almost sweet taste, I flirt with him in the summer. (He's the most decafinated of the green teas.) And then there's a very special, decafinated rooibos (Afrikaans for "red bush") tea, which a local pastry maker calls Marco Polo Rouge. Marco is from the legume family, and he's oh so sweet and slightly nutty. Someday, I hope we travel together to his homeland. So far, he's been silent on the subject.

Leftover Curry

What was it that I made that used coconut milk? Did I post it here, or eat it before I had the chance to photograph it? My memory isn't what it used to be!

But there's this small jar in the fridge of coconut milk, so whatever it was, it didn't take the entire can. It's been sitting there staring me in the face every time I open the fridge. I knew I was going to do something with it before it went bad, but I didn't want to get locked into an idea and then go shopping for the ingredients. I wanted to let the dish evolve out of what I had in my refrigerator and my pantry. Most of my best meals happen that way.

I want to digress a bit here. There's a story which goes with this post, and I don't think I've told it before. When I was married and living in New Mexico, Bob did most of the cooking. I thought I was a pretty good cook when I met him, but I was a complete amateur. He had a pantry that could have supplied a batallion for at least 2 weeks. At first I found the whole thing overwhelming. Why did we need to keep all those weird ingredients in the pantry when we never used them? Lotus root? Odd pastes from Indonesia? Or Thailand? Why did we need 10 cans of green chili? How come our freezer was packed with everything under the sun?

Well, not only was he an amazing cook who taught me how to be creative in the kitchen, but he was also a magnet for all kinds of people from all over the world. I have no idea how we collected these people. They just showed up, like flies on the screen door before a summer rain. I remember one day a Chinese man showed up and he saw our kitchen with a selection of woks and 3 or 4 different soy sauces as well as shrimp paste and all the other necessities of a well stocked kitchen, and he offered to cook us a meal. We were delighted. "But do you have any ____?" (I've forgotten right now what it might have been.) "Sure!" "And what about lotus root?" "Oh yes, we have that." With each ingredient requested, his eyes got bigger and bigger when our answers kept coming back "Yes, we have that." So he set to work in the kitchen and produced a phenomenal meal for us.

And this type of scenario happened more than once, with people from various countries around the world and various states in the U.S. So whether or not it was a local from New Mexico wanting to prepare his favorite version of chili rellenos with home made flour tortillas and some beans and chicos, or someone from Indonesia wanting to make some Gado Gado for us, we always had the ingredients on hand. The only thing which might have necessitated a trip to the store would have been the fresh ingredients - we might have been out of mushrooms, say, because we had used the last of them. (I can't remember ever running out of onions or garlic, though.)

With a steady stream of interesting meals comes a steady stream of leftovers. Bob was a master of leftovers. I've met people who never ever eat leftovers, and I wonder if they are the same species as I am. I don't know how I would survive without them! On the days I see patients, I work until 7pm. I absolutely do not want to come home and start cooking at that time, so if I don't have anything in the fridge, I eat popcorn for dinner. Leftovers rule.

So now back to the coconut milk.... When I looked at that jar, I knew it was going to be a curry. It was either going to be that or that wonderful Thai soup made with coconut milk and galangal. But my favorite Asian grocery store is closed for remodeling, so I am left without a store close by to score some galangal. Curry it was.

When Bob made curries, he was quite creative about the process. He didn't feel constrained by tradition, and so his curries contained ingredients which people from Asia would probably look upon with some skepticism. But since they always tasted great, I adopted the Bob method of curry. The recipe I have here is my own, the amounts are an estimate and should never be considered written in stone. And by all means, if you've got something leftover in the fridge, unless it's a chocolate bar, try throwing it in - just for grins! Mine started with leftover coconut milk and a leftover, store-bought roast chicken....legs, thighs and some breast meat eaten for lunches. Bones reserved for stock...

1 3/4 C leftover chicken meat, diced
1 onion, sliced
2 tsp garlic, diced
1 1/2 TBS canola oil
1/2 C chicken stock
3/4 C coconut milk
6 asparagus spears, cut into 2" pieces
1 apple, cut into cubes
1/2 to 1 TBS Thai Green Curry paste
1 TBS brown sugar

In a saucepan, combine the chicken stock and the curry paste and simmer, stirring, until the paste is melted into the stock. Add brown sugar, stir until it dissolves and set aside.

Heat the canola oil in a pan, add onions and garlic. Saute until the onions are translucent - about 2-3 minutes. Add chicken and stir until chicken is coated with the oil and has absorbed enough of it to flavor.

Add the stock and the coconut milk and stir. Reduce heat and simmer until the sauce has reduced somewhat.
Add the asparagus. If your asparagus was previously steamed, you will want to add it at the end. If it's fresh, it will need an extra minute or two to cook lightly.

Kitchen Notes

You can add some fresh basil if you've got it. It's always a lovely addition to Thai curries.
The sugar in the recipe offsets the spicy of the curry paste. It's the same principal as serving sopapillas with honey in a New Mexican restaurant - the honey will cut the spicy of the chili. You can drink water all day long and it won't put out the fire on your tongue if you've overdosed on chili. But something sweet will help douse the flames!

The Thai Curry Paste was a small jar I bought from Trader Joe's. I didn't photograph the jar because, quite frankly, I forgot to do so. And now my camera lens is having seizures and I must send it to be repaired. But you can find these kinds of pastes these days in many stores. The brand is not as important as the taste, and you'll have to experiment to decide which one you like best.

The apple was thrown in at the end because I had bought 3 apples, and none of them were great. The middles had begun to turn brown, so I used this last one in the curry, cutting out the brown parts.

Vegetable Curry

Sometimes a good idea doesn't translate well.

I love Sundays. I get to wake up late. And then doze off again. I think the cat gets that it's Sunday. She doesn't try to wake me by kneading on the pillow next to my head, or gently brushing her whiskers against my cheek. She was content to doze with me. That part went well.

Today a friend came and picked me up and we went to brunch at a local restaurant. I've eaten there many times before, but today, for some reason, everything was just....off. We sat at the counter, and the waiter gave us the menu. He was quick to ask if we wanted coffee or juice, but after that, he basically didn't have time for us. His whole attitude was sullen, as if he had just been dumped the night before.
We drank our coffee, figured out what we wanted, and waited. And waited. And waited. Another waiter came by and offered us more coffee. And we waited. Finally, our waiter remembered us and asked us what we wanted. I ordered the Yucatan tostadas - black bean and chorizo mixture on top of corn tortillas with avocado, salsa and eggs, any style. My friend ordered a pulled pork sandwich.

And we waited. And waited. And waited. Yet another waiter came by and asked us if we had ordered. Yes. What had we ordered? When my friend mentioned pulled pork, he said "Oh. That's why", and left. As if pulled pork was something you started from scratch when the customer came through the door. More coffee. Some water. And finally, the food.

My friend looked at his sandwich and said "This isn't pulled pork." And it wasn't. It was chopped pork, and it was dry. The waiter wanted to know what the problem was, and my friend told him that it wasn't pulled pork. The waiter said that it was how they made their pulled pork, and my friend said that they could also call it a waffle if they wanted to.I don't think the waiter got it.

And my tostadas? They were delicious. Especially if you were a vegetarian. Because I don't think any of the chorizo "fell off the string", as my mom would have said. When I asked about it, he said that it was mixed in with the beans. NOT. But at least it tasted good. I dropped the subject.

From there we went to the farmer's market and loaded up on veggies. I had some left over roasted poblanos from the Mexican style lasagne I had made, and I knew I wanted to make a veggie dish with them. My friend, who is an outstanding cook, suggested a curry with squash. It was a gray day, and curry sounded so very right. The farmer's market, however, didn't have any winter squash. I bought some string beans, tomatoes and some salad greens, but no squash. So we went to a local market and I got my squash.
Back home I roasted the squash and the tomatoes. A little too long. I figured on about 45 minutes for the Carnival squash, but since it was small, 30 minutes would probably have been better. The tomatoes were....well....easy to peel.

So after peeling and chopping, I added them to the onion and garlic I had chopped, and then proceeded to wash and trim the green beans. They were added next, and I stirred the pot and then turned it off while I peeled the squash. It was softer than I wanted it to be. But I was well into this dish, and there was no way I was going to change course. I had eaten enough soups, thank you. I wanted something I had to bite into, not drink.

After adding them to the pot, I turned the heat back on, found the remaining black beans from the Mexican lasagne and added them. I found an open box of carrot ginger soup from Trader Joe's, and remembered that it was what I tried eating in the middle of my flu. So I added about a quarter of a cup. I had a can of Trader Joe's light coconut milk and added about half the can, as well as the chopped, roasted poblanos..... And, of course, a little salt. And some lemon grass.

But of course, stirring the whole thing was enough to break down the squash and turn it into squash mush.
Like I said......sometimes a good idea just doesn't translate. In this case, it didn't translate visually. It DID, however, taste quite good. So if you want to try this at home, I would recommend peeling, cubing and lightly steaming the squash first instead of roasting it. I think it would hold up better, and make for a much better photo. Which is why I'm sharing these other photos with you.......because they're visually more appealing.

And I'd also like to share a poem and another photo with you. I came across this poem in a magazine......

O, to take what we love inside
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it...

There are days we live...
from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

Li-Young Lee from "From Blossoms"

Spinach and Goat Cheese Lasagne - Mexican style

Perhaps I was craving iron. Perhaps it was the color green. I don't know. All I know is that I decided it was time to make a spinach lasagne. I wanted spinach, I wanted it cooked, and I wanted lots of it. Do you ever get that way? You know, craving an ingredient and then building a meal around it? I'm sure you do. We all have, I think.

Now, you have to understand, I'm not Italian. I love lasagne, but I rarely make it. It takes so much work to prepare, and since the cat doesn't eat it, I don't bother. Perhaps there's something about growing up with a woman in the family called "nonna" instead of "grandma" that makes some people more patient when it comes to making lasagne, I don't know. I will make all kinds of meals for myself, which my single friends admire. I know they all think I'm nuts for cooking the way I do. After all, there's always the pre-made stuff from Whole Foods, or the stuff from Trader Joe's. While I've resorted to eating those modern day versions of fast food, I always prefer making a meal from scratch. But lasagne?

But the spinach thing was strong, so I forged ahead. I had a bag of baby spinach from Trader Joe's and Henry's had spinach on sale. I was set. I went to my go-to site for recipes: Epicurious. I used to subscribe to Bon Appetit, and my sister used to subscribe to Gourmet. These days, I prefer to keep the paper consumption to a minimum, my carbon footprint to a minimum, and the trees to a maximum. So epicurious has become my main source, with additions from the various cookbooks I own, and the recipes from the magazines that are sent to my clinic for some unknown reason.

One of the first recipes I came across was Mexican Poblano, Spinach, and Black Bean "Lasagne" with Goat Cheese. I knew I was on the right track. It just leapt off the page, and I could taste it as I was reading the recipe. You know that feeling - how you can just look at some ingredients and just know that they will balance each other out. I often use my nose to tell me this when deciding upon which herbs and spices to use. But in this case it was words on the computer screen, and with each ingredient, my palate began to build a taste picture.

So here, from the screen of epicurious.com, is their version of this lasagne:

Ingredients:

For chiles

• 12 medium to large fresh poblano chiles (2 1/4 lb)

For tomato sauce

• 1 (14- to 16-oz) can whole tomatoes including juice
• 3 large garlic cloves, chopped
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
• 1/4 teaspoon sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

For goat cheese sauce

• 1 cup heavy cream
• 2 teaspoons dried epazote* (optional)
• 8 oz soft mild goat cheese
• 1/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste

For spinach filling

• 4 (3/4-lb) bunches spinach, coarse stems discarded
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup raisins
• 1/4 teaspoon salt, or to taste

To assemble dish

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 6 (6-inch) corn tortillas, halved
• 1 cup cooked black beans, rinsed and drained if canned

• Special equipment: a 2- to 2 1/2-quart shallow flameproof casserole dish (about 2 inches deep; not glass)

Preparation:

Prepare chiles:
Lay 4 chiles on their sides on racks of gas burners and turn flames on high. Roast chiles, turning with tongs, until skins are blackened and chiles are tender, 4 to 6 minutes. (Or broil all 12 chiles on rack of a broiler pan about 2 inches from heat, turning, until skins are blackened, 8 to 10 minutes.) Transfer immediately to a large bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Roast remaining 8 chiles in same manner, then let stand 20 minutes.

When cool enough to handle, peel chiles, then open flat and discard seeds and stems, wiping with paper towels or dunking in a bowl of water briefly, if necessary, to remove seeds. If chiles taste very spicy, cut out ribs with scissors to make them milder.

Make tomato sauce:
Purée tomatoes with juice, garlic, cilantro, sugar, and salt in a blender. Heat oil in a 10-inch nonstick skillet over moderate heat until hot but not smoking, then add sauce (be careful of splattering) and simmer, stirring, until thickened and reduced to about 1 cup, about 6 minutes.

Make goat cheese sauce:
Gently simmer cream, with epazote if using, in a small heavy saucepan, covered, 10 minutes. If using epazote, pour cream through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, pressing on and discarding epazote. Return cream to pan. Whisk in goat cheese and salt and heat over low heat, whisking until smooth.

Make spinach filling:
Blanch spinach in batches in a large pot of boiling salted water for 1 minute, transferring with a slotted spoon to a large bowl of cold water to cool. Drain in a colander, pressing on spinach with back of a spoon to remove excess water, then coarsely chop.

Heat oil in cleaned nonstick skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then sauté spinach and raisins, stirring, 2 minutes. Stir in salt and transfer filling to a plate.

Fry tortillas and assemble dish:
Preheat oven to 350°F.

Heat oil in cleaned nonstick skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then fry tortillas 2 halves at a time, turning over once, until just crisp, about 1 minute total. Transfer tortillas to paper towels to drain.

Spread 1/4 cup tomato sauce over bottom of casserole dish. Arrange half of tortillas on top, then spread another 1/4 cup tomato sauce on top and sprinkle evenly with black beans. Arrange 4 poblanos flat over black beans to cover, then spread half of spinach filling evenly over chiles and drizzle with 1/4 cup goat cheese sauce. Make another layer with 4 chiles, remaining spinach filling, and another 1/4 cup of goat cheese sauce, then cover with remaining 4 chiles.

Cover chiles with remaining tomato sauce, spreading evenly, then top with remaining tortillas. Cover tortillas with remaining goat cheese sauce, spreading evenly.

Bake lasagne, covered with foil, in middle of oven until bubbling and heated through, 25 to 30 minutes.

Preheat broiler. Remove foil and broil about 3 inches from heat until top is bubbling and beginning to brown, about 2 minutes.

Cooks' notes: • Chiles can be roasted and peeled 1 day ahead and chilled, covered.

• Tomato sauce, goat cheese sauce, and spinach filling can be made 1 day ahead and chilled separately, covered. Reheat goat cheese sauce before proceeding.

• Lasagne can be assembled (but not baked) 1 hour ahead and kept, covered, at room temperature.Kitchen Notes:

To roast the chilis, I turned my oven on to about 400, put the washed chilis on a baking sheet and popped them in the oven until they were lightly blackened - about 20-30 minutes. This method is a little less labor intensive than the one listed in this recipe. Once they are cool, they're a breeze to skin.

For the tomato sauce, don't bother using fresh tomatoes. Using the good ones from a can yields great results - it's a sauce, after all, not a salad!

I didn't have epazote and didn't miss it. I'm sure it would have been wonderful, but don't go hunting for it unless you're in the mood for the hunt.

The poblanos weren't split in half when I used them - they were in pieces. And I chopped them into smaller pieces. I find it easier that way. Oh, and speaking of poblanos, I was certain that with 12 poblanos, this dish was going to be hotter than Hades. Well, as it turned out, there was no way I was going to fit 12 poblanos into this dish. There just wasn't the room. But even if I had fit them all in, for some reason this dish didn't turn out to be too hot. I was delighted!

And finally -- about those raisins? If they seem a bit weird, don't worry. The sweet plays nicely against the spice. They're an unexpected surprise in this unusual variation of lasagne.

In fact, I just might make this again. It was worth the effort. Am I becoming Italian? If so, can I please wake up tomorrow morning speaking the language?

What have you been craving of late?

The Healing Power of Potato Soup

Back when I was a girl, if I ever felt sick my mom would make me tea and toast. I loved the toast. But the tea didn't cut it for me. I have to say that my mom was a coffee drinker, and didn't really know much about tea. In those days, it was a bag of Lipton steeped in water. I don't recall now if there was lemon served with it or not, but the point is I didn't like it. In fact, for years, the smell of tea would make me nauseated. Kind of a reverse Pavlov's dogs. Or something.

Now that I'm on my own, I have found what works for me - both in terms of tea as well as in terms of what makes me feel better when I'm sick. When it comes to tea, I drink it the way they do in India - boiled with milk, some tea masala and a little sugar. In fact, at this point in my life, I drink that every morning. I don't prepare coffee in the morning anymore. I've turned into a tea drinker.

And when it comes to foods that make me feel better, while I do still love the smell of toast (it's one of those "comfort smells"), I have found that soup is what I want when I'm feeling under the weather. But I can only stand so much chicken soup. After a while, I feel like I'm about to start clucking! When I came down with the flu a couple of weeks ago, I started out by sleeping for a few days. When I woke up, I wasn't really hungry, but my mind told me that it would be a good thing if I ate something. I don't remember what I managed to forage for, but whatever it was, I had a couple of bites and that was it. I knew I had turned a corner when I forced myself to make a chicken soup. (Only had a few bites of that, too, but at least I managed to stand upright long enough to accomplish it!)

How did I gauge when I was really on the mend? When I made a potato soup. Potatoes are another comfort food. I don't care what the carb police say - potatoes are natures way of nurturing you back to health. And this soup is simple enough to be made with stuff you've probably got already in your pantry. The only thing I had to scrounge from a neighbor was a can of evaporated milk. (Fortunately, I have neighbors who like to cook!) This recipe isn't a recipe. It's one of those "Open the fridge and the pantry, look at what you've got in there, pull it out and make soup" kinds of things. So I have no measurements.

I started by sauteeing some onion and garlic in olive oil. While the onions were browning, I peeled potatoes (I used a couple of russets and a couple of Yukon Golds, 'cause that's what I had), halved them, and then sliced them about a half inch thick. Add them to the onions and continue to sautee, stirring regularly. Open a can of tomatoes and quarter them if they're whole. Add the tomatoes along with the juice from the can, along with some chicken broth. (I used the rest of the broth from the chicken I had boiled for the mole.) Add some salt, and water if needed.

While the soup is simmering, put some anaheim and/or poblano chilis in the toaster oven and broil them. I had only one of each. If I had had 2 of each, it would have been better. I have a friend that makes it with 6 Anaheims and it's terrific! You get the idea - these chilis are fairly mild, so you can add until it has enough of a kick for your taste. You're also adding a good source of vitamin C, so don't be shy!

When the chilis have broiled to the point where the skin has separated from the meat of the chili, they are ready to peel. Remove the seeds before cutting them and adding them to the soup. (Remember to wash your hands afterwards, and whatever you do, DON'T touch your eyes!) Add some herbs. I had oregano, but marjoram works well. I think I also added some thyme. Use what you have on hand, and what your nose tells you to add. You can also add a bay leaf.

When the potatoes are almost soft, add a can of evaporated milk, bring the soup back to hot and you are ready to serve. You can put some grated soft cheese in it at this point. Served with a chunk of French bread, you've got a meal fit for company. And if you absolutely must add some meat to satisfy yourself, chorrizo works well. You can slice and fry some on the side, put some slices in the bottom of the bowl and ladel the soup over the top.

How do you gauge when you're on the mend? What foods do you like when you're feeling under the weather?

Back......Almost

OK, OK.... So I know I've been out of touch for a while. I honestly don't understand how the speed of life increases, but it obviously does. Is there a physicist out there who reads food blogs who can explain this phenomenon to the rest of us? In simple English? But the fact of the matter is that between the inauguration, which seemed to have taken up everyone's time in my circle of friends, to my birthday a week later - all that time was a blur. And then I had a birthday reminiscent of the way we used to celebrate in New Mexico. Translation? It lasted for about a week. And then I got sick.

I'm beginning to recover now. Still not eating much, but at least I've started to eat again. Today it was a grilled cheese sandwich, which frankly was the best tasting thing I've eaten in ages!! But I ate it before I photographed it. I guess when you haven't eaten anything in 2 days, a grilled cheese sandwich tastes better than a filet mignon.

Then I found this photo I took of a chicken mole dish I had made before my personal "crash". I was inspired to make this dish after eating dinner at a friend's house. He makes some of the best mole I've ever eaten. Perhaps it's because he's Mexican, but I don't think that's it. All moles are different, and some are better than others. My friend Luis' is spectacular. I asked him for his recipe and he smiled at me and told me that it was simple. Yeah, I thought - get out the mortar and pestle and start grinding seeds.....
But no! He started with a product I was very familiar with - Dona Maria's mole sauce.
The most welcome change in this sauce is it's packaging. It used to come in a jar with a lid you had to pry off. Once you pried it off, there was no way to truly seal it back on. They obviously figured it out, because the packaging now makes sense - just screw the lid back on and store in the fridge.

But Luis' mole didn't just come out of this jar. What he did was to boil some chicken first with a little marjoram. In a separate pan he added about a heaping tablespoon of peanut butter plus a tablespoon of sugar to the mole sauce over low heat. Once those ingredients were combined, he thinned the sauce out with the water from the chicken he had boiled. And the rest of the water from the chicken? Well, he used that to make rice, of course.

If you're looking for something quick but tastes like you've slaved over that hot stove all afternoon, this is your answer. You can make it in the middle of the week when you get home from work, and you'll be sitting down to dinner in less than an hour. Enjoy!

And I seem to be on a path these days to include poetry in my blogs. I found this one recently and thought the title of it fit the occasion:

The Chocolate Infection

by G. E. Murray

Days of the ferret, a sweet fever.

Someone is walking through the sun

With my tongue on a leash.

Say “Ahhh.” Thank goodness,

It’s not diabetes or the Bolivian Rot.

This morning I am a cross

Between lefthandedness

And pointblank rage.

The sun leaks like soft ice.

The infection deepens . . .

My eyes dissolve

In a closet of heat.

I become 4,000

Yellow flowers, chirruping.

O the clich� of a trek into the bowels of China.

O the night that zings like a harpsichord factory!

O gorgeous sun limping in the frozen dusk.

O candy wrappers stacked like bricks!

Snow growls on my roof.

The infection deepens . . .

A day on fire

Placing real rabbits

Where my mouth should be.

I am several kinds of tigers.

I am a confectionary treat.

This fever fills my sleeves

With pearls of honey drops.

Am I too strange to bleed?

I’m behind myself

With a knife and fork,

Revolving on a skewer.

I am wild with grief

As greasy children

Reach deep into my fever

To scoop out their revenge

In double-dips . . .

Come off it, kids.

Next week, I’ll be raining

On the iron road to Malta

And perfect health, melting

Like sugar in the mouth of the Orinoco.