THE BEST LAID PLANS

You can plan all you like, but you can’t plan on the weather. We had set aside yesterday for a picnic in Alameda with friends. The weather had simmered away in the 80’s and 90’s for a number of weeks, keeping us cooking and cooking our heels at home.

Yesterday the smell of petrichlor filled the air and heralded the imminent arrival of the first raindrops, ready to wash the summer dust off the leaves and give sustenance to a thirsty soil.

Brave souls as we are, we decided to wing it and go on our picnic anyway. Stopping at a favorite place for lattes first, we sat inside watching the rain charging down the estuary on pattering feet. Two gentlemen of a certain age sat nearby wearing short-sleeved summer shirts and shorts, obviously visitors on vacation, while I at least, sensibly dressed in wool turtlenect sweater and raingear. The cold sandwiches waiting in our picnic basket didn’t seem too inviting as opposed to a bowl of hot soup at that point.

The estuary is where so many wonderful crew races have taken place through the years, and the Cal boathouse is just across the channel from where we sit watching and hoping that either Cal or the University of Washington win. It is sometimes troubling to be torn between rooting for one or the other. It was not a day for racing.

Alameda is my hometown and though we fight the traffic now when going there, it is lovely to drive down its peaceful tree lined streets, and revisit familiar and much loved old homes and other spots where my life became interesting. The beaches are deserted in the rain, but with the recent warm weather, they were frequently filled with families enjoying the water to cool off.

The rain let up a little and we arrived at our picnic spot near the Bay with all of San Francisco at our feet. Several juvenile egrets joined us, though they are not hungry beggars like the gulls, who are absent when it rains. They came close, but not too close, and pulled a few worms from the grass for their lunch while we chomped our cold sandwiches quickly before the next rain fell. It was, after all, a satisfying day.

SOMETHING TO CHEW ON

I have been asked to share some recipes and/or food tips, so until I run out of ideas, I will try to share something foodwise with you on Mondays. Today, it’s what we ate yesterday during the Superbowl game, and the less said about the game, the better. It was a bitter pill to digest, but we win some and we lose some. This Stuffed Foccacia was much easier to make and to digest.

One thing you must remember is that Superbowl Sunday is inviolate. The game is important of course, but the food and drink take top spot in some families. The amount of chips, dips, and chicken wings consumed on that day could probably tilt a battleship, and the amount of beer and or wine bears no discussion. They threatened to run out of chicken wings two years ago. I didn’t hear any suggestions that it might happen again this year. I guess they are raising more chickens.

The second most important thing about the Superbowl game are the commercials on TV. Budweiser Beer wins hands down always with their Clydesdale horses and puppies every year. This year the puppy ran away and the horses found him and brought him home. Adorable. The third thing is the half time entertainment. I can’t speak for it usually because that’s when I’m out in the kitchen whipping up something to to munch on. This year it was Katy Perry, and I only got a glimpse of her flipping her skirts as she was shouting determinedly into her microphone while riding some sort of robotic animal.

Now for the good part: this is a Stuffed Foccacia, which is so easy your 12 year old could make it.

It’s my version of an Umbrian road food sometimes served at outdoor eateries in Italy. It’s the kind of thing you can pack up in a wicker basket with some good Italian olives and a great bottle of wine. Already that can’t be bad.

FOR THE FOCCACIA:
1 pkg. active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups flour, plus more for working the dough
1 tsp kosher salt

Two cast iron frying pans, or at least really heavy ones that will take the heat. I use my grandma’s. If you didn’t save your grandma’s I’m sorry for you. The others will work.

Dissolve the yeast with 1/4 cup of warm water in a small bowl. Let it sit for a few minutes, until it starts to bubble. Put the flour and salt in the food processor and pulse a few times.
Combine the dissolved yeast with a cup of warm water and pour it all into the processor over the flour while its running. Process until it clumps up and leaves the side of the bowl, about 20 seconds. Process another 20 or a total of 40 seconds.
Turn out onto floured board and knead for a minute then put into oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and let rise for about an hour until doubled.
Heat your oven to 450 preheated for 10 minutes. Deflate dough and divide in two. Flatten each piece of dough and press into cast iron skillet. Dimple all over top with fingers and bake for 15 minutes or until light brown on top.

When cool, split in half crosswise and fill with an assortment of your choice. I like to use roasted vegetables, deli turkey or ham, two or three cheeses, a few sauteed greens, and of course a generous drizzle of olive oil. Yesterday I spread a layer of artichoke pesto, then I used some roasted zucchini, and broccolini, and eggplant, havarti cheese, sliced turkey. Put the tops back on and press lightly together. Brush with good olive oil and wrap tightly in a layer of foil and place in a hot oven for about 10-15 minutes.

THE BRILLIANCE OF MOMENTARY DECISIONS

“Presidio Sunset” by Kayti Sweetland Rasmussen

The new Bay Bridge between San Francisco and the East Bay is well under way and we decided to try and get a closer view. A year or so ago when it was first begun, we took a boat and picnicked in the lee of Treasure Island and watched its birth pangs a number of times, but had only seen news pictures of it of late, so we decided on a recent brilliant holiday morning with clear skies and a feel of Spring in the air, to try and see it from our side of the Bay.

Somehow or other, we missed the last turnoff before the bridge approach and with no other choice at hand, we were forced to drive across the bridge, but we got a good look at its progress. A number of years ago, I was on a flight with a young man who was going into the City to present his plans for the bridge. I got a first hand look at his plans, although they were not the ones chosen for the project. Nevertheless I felt exhilarated to think they might have been.

Aside from it being a decidedly Springlike day, there was no traffic! Unheard of in our area. We went on to one of our favorite coffee houses in the entire City—Delancy Street, where they purvey not only coffee and food, but have the absolute best selection of current books and cards. If I lived closer, I would never go to Hallmark again.

I met a lovely woman wearing a stunning hand-woven coat she had bought in West Africa. She was quite tall and thin, handsome rather than beautiful, African-American with magnifient bone structure, large dark eyes and very white teeth. She wore her hair clipped close to her head, and had large dangling earrings. I have always said if I were African-American that is exactly how I would look. Not easy for someone only 5’1/2″ with grey hair, but I can dream. I feel sad that I could not paint her.

San Francisco on a sunny day offers a world of street entertainment. We saw someone, a man or a very tall skinny woman, petitioning cars at a stop sign and wearing a large brown dog’s head, and carrying a hand-printed cardboard sign saying “FEED ME”. I had to admit it was clever advertising.

Down along the Marina Green, where the America’s Cup race will be the drawing the boating crowd next year, there were dozens of small sailboats out testing the wind, looking like tiny white flowers flitting across an extraordinary blue Bay.

We grabbed a sandwich at the nearby Safeway, and settled down to enjoy the other picnicers, runners, bikers, dogs, and kids flying some pretty wild colorful kites. We often replayed this same scene through the years with our daughters, and then with grandchildren with their own kites. On at least one such outing, the pigeons joined us. The late columnist Herb Caen always referred to them as “feathered rats”, but we have at least one grandson who once raised both arms out to the side at shoulder height, and received the “blessing” of an armful of admiring pigeons. Herb may have thought they were no-account birds, but obviously one little boy disagreed with him.

We finished our lovely day at the Presidio, where the sunset was coloring the sky and the ocean with unimaginable and unpaintable beauty. I’m so glad we missed the last turn-off before the bridge.

BARBEQUED RATTLESNAKE?

One of my grandsons is a wildlife biologist.  They say you can tell what sort of job a person is suited for when they are children.  Well, we should have known about this one when he drove off for college with fishing and hunting gear loaded into his small grey truck.  They didn’t have an ocean in the state where he aimed so there was no need for a surfboard.  But life is good anyway.

He hunted often in the hills near his home, so there should have been no surprise when his parents arrived home one afternoon to find the skin of a six foot rattler drying in the bright Southern California sunshine and firmly attached to their fence.  Since this was not part of the normal garden decor, they naturally sought the new designer.  He was found in the person of their ten year old son who was happily starting a fire in the barbeque pit preparing a rattlesnake picnic for friends.  He and a young friend had come upon this squirming monster under a discarded sheet of corrugated metal on the side of the hill, and being of curious nature and “just happening” to have brought along a homemade snare, they had captured their unwilling  prey.  After an agreeable time on the grill, they both agreed that it tasted like chicken.