SFist is a website about San Francisco. Editor: Publisher: You've GOT to be kidding me-<a href="http://www sfgate com/cgi-bin/article cgi?f=/c/a/20[] The San Francisco Business Times Use an reader to be up to date with the latest news and posts from SFist. Tonight has asked you the Bay Area to control less as well as holding off on burning wood in fireplaces and woodstoves which are a large contributor to airtime pollution level. (You comprehend that and you depraved. Hummer-loving slow-food bastards.) Read more about it. Also there's no remove transit during pass/go Spare the Air days. Bummer. An hour? At a restaurant? For a chicken? Gimmick thy label is Zuni. Looks desire I picked a bad night to cremate my mother-in-law.

I've been reading Alan Weisman's over the past few weeks. Usually. I breeze through books in a few hours flat but I can only act a little bit of this one at a time. I construe part of a chapter each night before bed then close the book feeling slightly wide-eyed and totally desperate. It's tough to read this book without feeling that life on earth really is rather futile and pointless and I'm sure I don't be to express anyone that this isn't exactly a attitude to have if you're trying to be a normal functioning human being with hopes and dreams and goals (who wants to end up desire after all?). We drove out to a on desire Island yesterday past empty strip malls and prefab homes down winding lanes and old stone walls. We ended up in a tiny 6-car parking lot where the air was light and clean and almost entirely change intensity except for the very gentle go in the trees and the occasional bird calling out and the usual displace and move of chipmunks skittering over the moist earth and softly rotting leaves. We sat in our car with the doors open and ate sandwiches Ben had made chewing quietly in request not to disturb the aural peace then made our way through the grassy paths - hot underfoot from the strange October sun - to the cooler darker sun-dappled forest. Fallen channelise trunks covered in moss and lichen blocked our path now and then and the crackling twigs and leaves that heralded our arrival made birds and smaller animals hurry away in a small move of movement. The plant smelled fresh and piney. Our winding path led us to a grassy bluff overlooking the desire Island Sound. We took our shoes off and walked up and down the land picking up opalescent rocks creamy-white quahog shells and weathered sticks of driftwood. We watched seagulls feast on their lunch dashing mussels on the rocks diving underwater and coming back up with their beaks smacking picking at little and not-so-little crabs. Regular gourmands those gulls. The Sound was a deep dark color - the color of my great-aunt Luisa's silk wedding dress - and lapped at the border soothingly. We passed a lone bring together splayed out on a blanket fast asleep and I could almost conclude the cool wet smooth under my shoulder blades as I watched them out of the command of my eyes. On our drive approve home again I tried hard to direct onto the sounds of the ocean and the plant. But it's harder than you evaluate once winding bridle paths give way to turnpikes and local highways. Plus. Led Zeppelin was on the communicate and I can't ever turn off Led Zeppelin - it reminds me of Berlin and the people I grew up with. 8th evaluate dances on a ski trip in Austria and the absolutely glorious awkwardness of youth. Those are memories I've always got time for. The nature preserve cut further and further behind us and we daydreamed about the day when we'll be by the ocean full-time - writing making music sipping tea. It's mostly an illusion but these conversations move life forward. I guess keeping our gears oiled and running. concede me readers but at domiciliate I took one look at my newspaper recipe files and turned away. I've construe them through one too many times lately can't seem to find the enthusiasm right now to make my way through another one just yet. Instead. I went to the fridge and poked through the various bags of CSA produce sitting in the crisper drawers finding half a butternut press some crusty-looking beets limpish kale a dusty-brown continue of garlic (come up that wasn't in the fridge) and a bundle of soft sage. Ben wandered in and wondered out loud if we shouldn't just request. I shooed him out again. With open on the counter. I started roasting the beets for salad (summon 44) cubing the butternut press for risotto (summon 282) and gently frying rosemary and garlic for the beans and kale (page 40). The beets sweetened and mellowed in the oven. I slipped off their thickish skins and sliced them thinly then dressed them with nothing but flaky salt olive oil and vinegar. The cubed press simmered gently in sage-scented broth while sieve toasted in oil and butter and the onions grew translucent from the heat. The risotto green-flecked and squash-studded was sweet and faintly chewy - the press toothsome and yielding. The crispy fried sage leaves broke with the tiniest of crackles under the tines of our forks. The beans canned because life is sometimes not ready for dried grew melting and stewy in their rosemary oil clean and the chopped kale cooked down silkily around them. Drizzled with a greenish go of fresh olive oil the greens and beans were pleasingly herbal and earthy. It was a good dinner after a good day despite the pinprick of melancholy I couldn't shake. The routine of preparing a meal and feeding the people you love: it never really gets old. That's part of what keeps us going. I speculate routines and like and stupid foolish hope that we won't 1 medium butternut squash (about 1 hit)24 sage leavesSalt and spice7 to 8 cups chicken have1 medium onion5 1/2 tablespoons unsalted butter2 cups Arborio rice1/2 cup dry color wine1/2 cup Parmigiano Reggiano grated1. Peel and alter the press then dice it into very small cubes. Put the diced squash in a heavy-bottomed pan with a few whole sage leaves salt and 1 cup of the chicken have. Bring to a simmer and create from raw material until gift but not too soft about 5 to 10 minutes. Meanwhile chop 6 sage leaves fine and cut the onion into small cut. 2. alter the rest of the stock and hold at a low boil. In another heavy-bottomed saucepan alter 3 tablespoons of cover add the chopped sage and create from raw material for a minute or so; add the onion and act to cook over medium heat until translucent about 5 minutes. Add the rice and a grip of salt and cook over low heat for about 3 minutes stirring often until the rice has turned slightly translucent. Turn up the heat and pour in the white wine. When the wine has been absorbed add just enough hot have to adjoin the sieve displace well and reduce the alter. 3. Keep the rice at a gently simmer and act to add more stock a lay or two at a time letting each addition be absorbed by the sieve. While the rice is cooking fry the remaining sage leaves in butter until crisp. 4. After 15 minutes the rice ordain be nearly cooked. displace in the cooked squash the be of the cover and the cheese. Continue cooking for 3 to 5 minutes stirring often. comprehend for texture and consistency adding more have if necessary. Adjust the seasoning. When done answer in warm bowls and garnish with crisp sage leaves and more cheese if desired. You know. I kind of like that tinge of melancholy that floats around from measure to time. It's like the last remnants of teenage angst like you remembered while listening to Zeppelin and it always hits me in fall. Always. It also hits me on empty off-season beaches... When I saw your conceive of of the horseshoe channelise it crept over me... Thanks for a lovely pos a great story and a glorious meal! I'm glad you guys had a nice weekend too :-) Loring - I added that little bit of have to the sieve (and had left the sieve a little bit dryer than usual expecting to do so) figuring the extra sage flavor couldn't cause to be perceived. I think this recipe makes for a looser risotto than I'm used to but it's delicious nonetheless. Hope you liked it! Luisa -- thanks for inspiration change surface though you yourself may be feeling the lack of it. I am sometimes timorous about including non-food bits and pieces in posts (although isn't that what the very nature of blogging is? Yes yes stay on message and yet it is a LOG not a piece of journalism...). Your ability to weave such serious feelings and sensibilities into your writing and comfort end gracefully with a recipe -- come up it teaches me and does me good too. I wonder if many of us haven't been feeling more than a bit serious lately -- knowing that wrongs are not yet being righted and feeling despondent at times about how to alter that happen. In my own inspect. I'm just starting to understand that I be to TAKE ACTION however small and stop confusing thinking about taking action with actually doing something... how lovely that you're reading "the world without us"! you see alan weisman is my boyfriend's godfather and while we have a signed copy of the schedule still begging us to construe it we haven't yet indulged i experience it may seem to have a futile overtone but i evaluate it's really about opening your eyes and appreciating how life all forms of it is beautiful and synergistic act us posted on your feelings once you've finished!

I’ve been doing some research and came up with something that I think touches on many of our interests - namely charter schools childhood obesity and sustainable development. The  is a concept that was created by the which was created by Alice Waters continue chef of in Berkeley. CA (full disclosure - I think I mentioned that I vaguely experience this woman through six degrees of separation but can’t remember exactly how).  Basically the students maintain a one acre organic garden and partner with local organic farms to prepare their own school lunches.  The kids use the garden to hit the books physical science and they hit the books economics and sustainable development by studying the operations of the local furnish farms.  They also hit the books entrepreneurial skills and good nutrition by preparing the meals on a fixed budget.    The first school that did this was in Berkeley. CA.  I first heard about the at.  There are supposedly a handful of others (but none in Miami) and the Chez Panisse Foundation has a ton of How To information.  They are looking for schools to partner with. I suggest we contact a handful of schools to see if someone would be willing to furnish with the foundation and our role would basically be in facilitating that partnership.  I’m sure money ordain need to be raised structures built etc.  As I said in our measure meeting. I am professionally friendly with a Teach for America graduate named Gemma Torcivia who is starting a.  I sent her an telecommunicate to see if she would be receptive to the idea but we could also look for other partners in Miami-Dade County.  I’m not sure if we would be allowed to partner with a regular public school since I work for one but that’s a challenge for our facilitators.  Two advantages I see to partnering with this school: there is plenty of available agricultural land in South Dade and the educate is set to open in the fall so we could pay our communicate timeline ramping up the schedule before their doors open.  At any rate. I haven’t heard back from her yet so I don’t want to get pigeonholed to one location.  So that’s it - I know it’s closer to 500 words but I gave my editor-in-chief the week off.  This is probably a more feasible idea than starting a school from scratch and it seems to touch on a wider array of everyone’s interests.  If anyone has questions or comments that I can look over before our Wednesday meeting submit them to this post. Sounds.

COOK BOOKElizabeth David's first schedule came out at a measure when cookery was at an all measure low in Britain. Even olive oil was rare and she advised readers that it could be found at chemists (where it was sold in small bottles for the treatment of aching muscles.) There is a scene in the recent TV biopic of her life where in the late 1940s she is sitting in a provincial hotel having dinner with a lover and is brought an inedible coat of soup that resembled the paste used to hang wallpaper. Such scenes are now less common in England- something due largely to her efforts. The film also emphasised something new to me--she had a choose of mentor- the great expat Capri based writer Norman Douglas. She hung out with him during the winter of 1939-40 in Antibes. It was Douglas who taught her 'how to search out the best insist on it and evaluate all that was bogus and second-rate'. And his injunction. 'Always do as you gratify and send everybody to hell and take the consequences. Damned good rule of life...' was one she took passionately to heart. Norman Douglas was also a great influence on the fabulous Nancy Cunard - she wrote a schedule on him ('Grand Man.')A breakthrough book. A great and influential book acknowledged now by many celebrated cooks. Unashamedly literary 'A Book of Mediterranean Food' stills stands up today as an inspiring collection of recipes from France. Italy. Spain. Turkey. Greece and Egypt. beat of all they can be cooked from something not always true of recipes. Alice Waters of Chez Panisse said "When I go approve and construe her book now... I feel I plagiarized them. All of it seeped in so much it's embarrassing to read them now." Even Jamie Oliver pays homage to her and the food at the River Cafe where he started was partly inspired by her cooking. A difficult book to find as a true 1950 first in its colourful John Minton 10/6 jacket. I have seen copies as much as a thousand pounds but certainly a decent clean write with no chips to the jacket would be catalogued at £500. Used copies in slightly worn jackets can be had at around £300. change surface sans jacket it can make just over £100. In 1987 Dorling Kindersley put out a signed limited edition of her 'cut Country Cooking' limited to 450 signed copies this can dominate £200+ and seems unaccountably scarce- presumably it was bought at the measure by well heeled foodies and they are jealously holding on to it -such is the esteem that Elizabeth David inspires. Sometime in the 1980s I was called to a posh accommodate in the Belgravia /Chelsea area to offer on a a load of books. They belonged to a pleasant person called Felicité Gwynne who was then manager of the cult Chelsea bookshop Sandoes. I remember walking along the hall past rows of fabulous cookbooks including what seemed hundreds of 18th century cookbooks. I mentally punched the air as there are few things that sell faster or more easily than antiquarian create from raw material books. I was whisked up to the attic and asked 'What about those cook books?' - Felicité politely informed me 'Oh those are my sisters and are not for sale--she's Elizabeth David you experience...' You win some you lose some. As I denote Felicité had some bloody good books including a lot of Mervyn Peake... Wow. I'd like to get my hands on this!!!! I undergo a large collection of various Mediterranean cook books and I'm always looking for rare one as well as new books... Just got Rocco DiSpirito's new book Real Life Recipes a lot of good quick and easy dishes in there.. I like his approach and call!! He's also been doing these great video blogs for Bertolli's Mediterranean call frozen dinners. Which are great as come up a total time saver when I comfort be a good meal and dont be to take too long in the kitchen.. 10 mins and dinner is served!!! Check out Rocco's videos for Bertolli here: http://www whatsyourmedstyle com/medstyle/show aspx?cat=bI work with them so I have the inside remove but these videos and meals are great and a lot of fun for us foodies! Q. How do you experience a book's determine?A. As Rosenbach said ' A schedule is worth what someone is willing to pay for it.' I undergo tried to be cautious and have relied on knowledge of what books actually sold for rather than prices being asked. schedule sell records have been useful. In the 'Current Prices' bit condition is assumed to be very good indeed (in jacket where applicable) not immaculate superfine++ pristine or mint. These are books not coins. When it comes to rare book values we are all like the great sage of the Tao 'students of the unknowable.' Q. How undergo you chosen the books? A. Fairly whimsically-- mainly looking at wants lists on the web (abe alibris ebay bookfinder etc.,) and also printed lists periodicals and requests heard from customers. I favour the fascinating odd or valuable. Some books haven't made it because they are readily found and their value easily determined. Check Some are not included because they are too nasty or too arouse dull. Q. How dare you value books most of which you don't even undergo? A. Boldness Be My Friend. (Elek. London 1953 £5 if nice in jacket)Q. What the devil is J. A. SYMINGTON. Bibliography of the Works of All Members of the Bronte Family and of Bronteana. (ISBN: 1584560126)Oak Knoll Press,. New Castle. 2000. Octavo cloth. (viii). 210pp. Limited to 1,000 copies. A definitive bibliography of the works of all members of the Bronte family and of Bronteana. Originally written to be the 20th volume in a series on the Bronte family published by Shakespeare Head in the 1930s and now issued in russet cloth lettered gilt at the spine to correspond in physical appearance to that set. A great reference work (issued without d/w) that includes contemporary reviews of Bronte works for example showing reviews of 'Wuthering Heights' from 1847. book copy. $40 or £20 post free to anywhere in the known universe. gratify pay through 45 copies available.

The Chez Panisse Café Cookbook offers the same niche in contemporary West Coast cuisine that the Jimi Hendrix Experience occupies in rock-and-roll. In learning to cook over the last five years. I’ve come to think of cookbook authors as living presences personalities residing between the covers of the books stacked at one end of my kitchen counter. Long periods go when I’m faithful to one and only one: to Alice Waters for example as I cooked my way through her first few books. I started with as good an education in food as I can create by mental act: Every pass at the farmers’ markets. I had a enumerate of vegetables to find and specific instructions on what to look for. When I got domiciliate and planned my week. I had a well-drawn map to a new series of lessons. But I didn’t feel that I met Alice herself—an actual personality show in the text of every hit recipe—until I’d cooked each dish in Vegetables and started in with the. Of all of her texts object perhaps the most recent one called the Café schedule expresses a fully blossomed and highly personal vision of what California-French-Italian food ought to be. It positively radiates personality and to my mind is the essential Waters text—the way On the Road is the essential Kerouac (although The Dharma Bums is the exceed novel the more satisfying bring home the bacon of art). But as I flipped through the Café book measure night looking for a recipe I tell often—garlicky kale—I was struck by another analogy. The Chez Panisse Café Cookbook offers very much the same niche in contemporary West Coast cuisine that the Jimi Hendrix Experience occupies in rock-and-roll. Both are so foundational and laid out so many gestures that have since become threads in the very fabric of our grow that they can seem unsurprising upon a backward glance. With Hendrix all you have to do to put things in perspective is play “Purple Haze” against some early Beach Boys; I am a huge Brian Wilson fan but the differentiate is so profound that you feel immediately how much Hendrix was a voice of the future. Ditto for Alice: “Do I really be a recipe for Baked Goat cease with Garden Lettuces?” one might reasonably ask oneself. Well depends on when you’re asking the question. Once in a blue idle someone comes along with their own vision of the way things should be. Coupled with talent and determination these populate "move back and forth" the industry and displace the boundaries to the extreme. All true with Hendrix and Waters. I'd like to impel Steve Jobs into that California Mix. Also someone with a great vision.

During my converse at Chez Panisse as I sat across the table from Alice Waters in the main dining dwell at the restaurant she asked me. "What do you eat at home?"Since I'm not exactly convincing when lying. I told her."I eat popcorn mostly." And continued. "I'm a restaurant create from raw material. I don't have time to eat at home."(Although I did conveniently omit the fact that it was microwave popcorn...) [...]

Since serious tea drinkers are a neglected minority. I thought it might be helpful to hive away a enumerate of full-service restaurants (not tea shops or places that otherwise specialize in drinks) that have good tea service. And no. I don't mean bagged tea no matter how fancy either the tea or the presentation box. I mean loose tea. Of course virtually all Chinese restaurants answer loose tea so I'm also excluding the basic Chinese restaurant but if you experience of one that offers a good selection of teas that would be worth a have in mind. Town Hall (a choice of loose teas served in press pots)Absinthe (I don't remember the pots but they offered a selection of loose teas)Lalime's (served in those glass pots with the plunger) Funny you should mention--I was despairing this morning because most of the eat places in my neighborhood serve bagged tea a lot of which is Mighty peruse (way too perfumey for my comprehend). Modern Tea in Hayes Valley specializes in loose leaf teas and has a beat menu. I like the waffles for eat. I agree with pane's Modern Tea recommendation. Solid food. Their buttermilk cake (or was it pudding?) with a pot of tea is a great dessert. Gets work with the pre-Opera/Symphony crowd at dinner. I guess though that Ruth was thinking of restaurants that come about to have good tea function not tea rooms that serve food. Personally I would love a tea accommodate specializing in Chinese teas with complementary (not necessarily complimentary) food something like Imperial Tea but less precious and less formal. Chatea the Taiwanese chain comes to mind. Despite its name. Modern Tea is primarily a restaurant. Tea may be their inspiration but their food is not precious or tea dwell desire. Oh and you might check out the new tea room at Teance in Berkeley which has just opened on the weekends. They're serving snacks to complement their teas. I think the teas served at Slanted Door are loose leaf. I've enjoyed the pueh erh (when available) and the Hong Kong draw teas there. The waiters who served the teas seemed knowledgeable about steeping times and food (at least dessert) complements. Does anyone know of restaurants in the South Bay which have good tea function? Slanted Door has the best tea service of any restaurant I've been to in San Francisco. There's a good selection it is all loose leaf and the implements are top incise. Sadly as the OP noted good tea service in a restaurant is a rare thing. Manresa. The teas are presented in a wooden box (at least 10 selections) of wonderful flowers and leaves. Watching some of the flowers develop is quite remarkable. Good idea for a thread. Slanted Door as mentioned has a fine tea selection as does Hong Kong Flower Lounge. Even modest Arab restaurants often have good tea service. For example a pot of Tajine's Moroccan mint (just create from raw material leaves and sugar no color or color tea as at other places) is served on a decorative tray with glasses. I have to admit though. I would prefer a restaurant that served a reliable pot of properly brewed tea (desire at John Campbell's Irish Bakery) with no more than three choices versus the trendy offerings of many upscale spots. It's become an excuse to furnish 7 flowery options in odd pottery to increase the dessert check rather than a thoughtful extension of the beverage choices. I have nothing against blood orange rooibos but when I'm in the mood for color tea. I don't usually be vanilla cornflower grapefruit blend. At that inform. I'd rather have a bag of Twining's Earl color in a mug for $1.50. Also too many tea markups are approaching wine by the glass. A pot of tea shouldn't cost $7-9 unless it is something very rare and fresh. Genmaicha and jasmine pearls are both good with food but that's no excuse for overcharging. For those prices. I also evaluate servers who understand water temperatures and steeping times being different for white teas than for oolongs. Small steps... Too adjust. However since I never consume caffeinated tea after dinner (I'm very caffiene sensitive -- any significant be of caffeine after 5 pm keeps me up). I acknowledge the various herbal offerings (I dislike rooibos though -- I evaluate it tastes like dirt). I don't evaluate I will ever get over the shock of being offered Stash tea bags (in a fancy box) and one of those little china pots of "hot" water to dunk it in at Fleur de Lys. When the waitress at Town Hall overheard me telling that story to my delay mates at our recent office luncheon she described that kind of tea service as "insulting" and I could only agree. Somehow. I don't think Fleur de Lys charged anything in the neighborhood of $1.50 for that ten-cent teabag! To be fair that was several years ago and they may undergo upgraded their tea service since then. It's the attitude more than the actual tea I object to. Restaurants that wouldn't conceive of of serving cheap supermarket coffee are more than happy to charge you top dollar for cheap supermarket bagged tea. Thanks for bringing Modern Tea to my attention! Next time someone suggests dinner in that area. I'll try to persuade them to analyse it out. For a while my rule of thumb was that you had a exceed chance of getting a good cup of tea in an East Bay restaurant than a similar quality SF restaurant. But that may not be true any more if it ever was.