use real butter

Recipe: carnitas

We are three weeks away from the Food and Light Workshop! Todd, Diane, Helen, and I have been working like mad to put this event together. We have a fantastic group of attendees converging on Boulder at the end of June including some of my favorite food bloggers. It’s not too late to snag a spot! There are a handful of spaces left and if you’re flying into Denver, Southwest Airlines has a Rapid Rewards double credit program for any flights into or out of Denver. (I know this because I just booked two flights out of Denver).

pussy willows

the thaw is well under way

Productive weekend? Fun weekend? Hot? Busy? All of the above (or rather, everything to the left) for me. Jeremy and I managed to get quite a bit taken care of for work and around the house. We even took Kaweah for a swim. Each year it gets harder and harder for her to make it to the high alpine lakes, so we try to ease her into the hiking season. She still loves it and she’s still a complete nut.

in search of the stick

scooby snack

throw the stick!

It’s been uncommonly humid in our neck of the woods this weekend and that makes for interesting weather. As we walked Kaweah back from the lake, we saw some striking mammata in the sky as the sun dropped closer to the horizon. The hot air from the day gave way to the flow of cool air coming off the melting banks of snow in the forest. The mountains are invigorating. Jeremy and I sometimes get bogged down in the work we have to do and forget how much good it does to just step outside and breath the clean mountain air and drink in the gorgeous surroundings. I climbed an embankment to get a shot of the clouds and then called down to Jeremy, “We live in AWESOME!” We really do.

mammata just before sunset

Okay, but Awesome became awesomer after I learned to make carnitas. Can you tell I’m on a taco kick? It’s because of our trip to California and that lovely Mexican food in the Central Valley. It’s been on my “want to make” list forever and I referenced my go-to book for all things wonderful and New Mexican – The Border Cookbook.

cumin seed, chiles de árbol, mexican oregano, garlic

blend with salt and pepper

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: pickled chinese cabbage

My good friends know that I have a rule about worrying – I try not to fret about things I have no control over. This comes in handy because I get several medical scans and tests and I generally do not waste an ounce of energy on worrying myself before I get the results. Life comes with her own stresses as it is, there is no reason for me to be heaping more on. The further I move away from my cancer treatments, the more they become a faded memory. With the exception of a few permanent issues that I’ll carry for the rest of my life, I am doing very well and I feel good! I feel normal.

kaweah loves her summer walks

I get one mammogram and one MRI every year to scan for new or recurring cancer. I don’t expect anything from the mammogram because it never detected my original cancer whereas the MRI did. So I had an MRI a few weeks ago… and I never heard from radiology about the results. I have been so busy I had essentially forgotten about it. It was on the drive to my oncology appointment that Jeremy admitted to me he was concerned about my MRI, because we hadn’t heard anything. At first I felt horrible that my dear man – the fellow who was my only caregiver during my entire ordeal – was quietly worrying himself sick over me. Then the thoughts crept into that dark part of my brain. Perhaps radiology only calls you with results when everything is fine, but wants to give you the bad news in person? Well no – my surgeon gave me the bad news over the phone. What gives? And so went my internal conversation.

heart-leaf arnica dot the forest understory

It’s hard to describe what I felt. I powered through chemo as best I could, but I found myself dreading that last infusion because each one did more damage than the previous. It’s not just the treatments, but feeling as if your body is not your own as your condition deteriorates under the chemicals. I look at my friend, Barbara, and think what a lion she is for enduring chemo not once, but THREE times and yet she is so grounded and strong.

i always welcome the arrival of the brilliant green aspen leaves

But my appointment was a happy occasion because my oncologist was back. He had been on leave for cancer treatment – a horrible treatment far worse than mine, and yet here he was looking great and joking and smiling and being his awesome self. My onc is one of the finest human beings I have ever had the privilege to know. Truly. We adore him. I asked about my MRI results and he pulled them up on the computer (electronic records ROCK) and read them out to me. Negative. No cancer detected. He sent a copy to the printer for me to have. He smiled at me and I smiled at Jeremy who squeezed my hand.

last light over the local peaks

By my estimates, we’ve experienced about 7 days of spring between the last snow storm and the onslaught of hot weather. 80°F on my deck is hot and not in the good way. Even Kaweah is sprawled out in the cool office instead of roasting her brains in the great room right now. Despite the heat, our house is in a particularly good mood this weekend – more so than usual. Part of that could be the MRI results and part of that could be this pickled Chinese cabbage I’m noshing.

start with a head of napa cabbage

wash, shake off, and blot dry the leaves

It happens more often than you might think. I’ll describe a dish to my parents and ask if they know how to make it, but when they describe the recipe I’ll say, “That doesn’t sound like what I’m talking about.” I can imagine their frustration because if I were them I’d be all “Okay, whatever, I can’t help you.” But they insist their recipe is correct or Mom will call Grandma for her recipe (which is invariably different from Mom’s or Dad’s recipe) and I’m just confused. I went with intuition and a little help from each of their recipes to come up with this salty, sweet, vinegary, spicy, fragrant, cold pickled cabbage.

slice up the leaves

mix and boil the pickling liquid

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: cherry-almond clafoutis

[Thanks to 5280 Magazine for the shout out! I’m honored, even if you called my tone irreverent – which it is. When I first moved to Colorado, I thought 5280 was a truncated zipcode and it really puzzled the hell out of me. Congratulations to fellow blogger Rebecca Caro for making the list too.]

Strawberry who? I’m just joshin’ around. This house is still loving the strawberries, but now those shiny, luscious cherries are making their appearance in the markets. Consider me enamored. I associate summer with small fruits that stain your hands deep reds and purples. Messy and sweet. Summer equals berries. But wait – cherries are drupes.

a bowl of cherries sounds better than a bowl of drupes

We buy a lot of fruit on a regular basis – a rainbow of fruits. From our groceries, you’d think we are healthy eaters. That’s only a half-truth. Half of the fruit is for Jeremy because he’s fruitist. He discriminates against drupes… doesn’t like drupes. I married a guy who won’t eat plums, peaches, nectarines, mangoes (seriously?!), or cherries. I know I’m not the only food blogger who married a picky-picky. What is up with that? Okay, this was going somewhere… We don’t own a cherry pitter because I’m the only one who eats cherries. I recently made a Fine Cooking recipe that called for pitted cherries. In the back of the issue, they had some nice tips on how to pit them without a pitter, including one method which uses a straw.

i happen to have a nice metal straw

pierce the bottom with the straw, then push from the top

**Jump for more butter**