SEASONAL

(post, nicole gliddon)

primary-image, l

last night, just as dusk was approaching, and my bread-in-waiting rising, I stepped outside to plant a row of potatoes. the chickens watched as I worked, and I tossed earth worms to them as I uncovered them. a couple of days ago, we carried them over to the pear tree, and underneath its shade, we clipped each of their twenty flight wings - a precaution we decided to take to ensure their safety in our neighborhood, and to allow them to free-range.

on thursday, we lunched at a favorite sandwich shop. it'd been awhile since we'd visited, and in that time, they added a new british head chef who did up the menu a little. they've introduced delicious new bits to the appetizer menu such as goat cheese crostini: haystack chevre on crispy baguette with mixed greens and fresh tomato. their sandwich list has grown as well, including the argyle: smoked salmon, cream cheese with chive and lemon, cucumber and spinach
and the niven: roast beef, caramelized red onion and tomato marmalade and gruyere. they've also added a couple additional vegetarian alternatives, and several new quiche recipes. when I wasn't a vegetarian, my favorite sandwich was the josephine: smoked turkey, gorgonzola and toasted walnuts with a honey-thyme mayo. after our meal, we ordered dessert coffees and chocolate gelato with walnuts.

the first day of our local, open-air market started early this morning. it's still too early in the season for fresh edibles, but there were artisan-crafted baskets, prairie flowers, soap, and jams. it also coincided with the annual treefest. after perusing the market, we attended small seminars on pruning, composting, woodworking, and rain collecting. tomorrow we have plans to pick up a plastic barrel to transform into a rain collector, so it was nice to receive additional instruction. I had been storing some of last week's snow in a makeshift collector and all this week watering the garden and feeding the chickens for free. my husband, ben, enjoyed conversing with the woodworkers, as it's a craft he'd like to become familiar with. in a month we'll be attending a larger seminar devoted strictly to carving.

enjoy the remaining weekend!