Home Salad with Radishes

A salad seemed in order one night a few weeks back. Arugula, two types of radishes, spring onions, tomatoes, avocado and a poached egg all went into it with a olive oil/basil/feta/lemon/pepper dressing.

I ate it while reading Ender's Game or one of its later related books.

Dinner With Old Friends c/o Vedge

A few weeks back I called EF just to say hello. It had been a while since we had last communicated verbally, but I knew through Mr. Ass that she and her husband B. were officially moving from Michigan back to the east coast and Philadelphia in particular. During our phone call it was established that they'd actually be in town the following week to figure out some of the details of their move...like where they might live. So I actually ended up spending part of a Saturday with E. walking around my greater neighborhood looking at houses with for sale signs and, in one instance, taking a tour by the owner of one such house (it was a cute house and I would buy it if I had the resources). We also had plans to have dinner one night later in the week. Initially the plan was that EF and B. and Mr. Ass would come by my place and I would make them dinner, which we would eat on the deck. But the weather for the night in question insisted that it was going to be rainy, and that wouldn't really do for an al fresco dining experience. As a plan B we all met at Vedge. EF and B. are vegetarians, so Vedge seemed like a pretty good choice, given its entirely vegetarian and vegan menu. EF and B. arrived first and said that they were given a bit of guff and attitude about getting a table without a reservation, but a table they did secure. The meal started with olive oil with fennel seeds and fresh bread.

I was drawn to the fancy radishes, roasted, raw & pickled, smoked tamari, avocado, shishito dish. I wish I could have taken a better photo to truly demonstrate the presentation and range of radish preparations, but alas the light was low and I was trying to take pictures quickly. So this is the best I could do. I'll say this. I love radishes pretty much however you give them to me. Straight up. Pickled. Sauteed. With salt. With butter. With nothing. So this more careful and involved presentation just upped the ante and made something I already love even more pleasant.

We all shared an order of potato wedges with a creamy worcestshire sauce, which I don't know exactly how they made given the lack of dairy in all their fare. The potatoes were lovely and creamy in their own right.

I also tried their funky kimchee stew with charred broccoli, pickled tofu, and togarashi. Our server warned me that it was spicy, but after the tofu stews that I've been making lately, this wasn't anything to worry about. Its broth was rich the kim chi funky. The pickled tofu was probably the weirdest part, as it had an almost mango/fruit taste to it. The others had a nice range of dishes as well, but I did not photograph them because the lighting was low and it would just take too much time. Pretty much everything was full-stop delicious. While I love me my cheese and red meat, Vedge is a reminder that with care and creativity one doesn't need either to have a meal that feels like it truly is complete while also being special.

Afterwards we wandered around the narrower streets in the neighborhood. I insisted on a photograph or two.

It will be exciting to have EF and B. in the city.

Country Scenes and Beans

Weekend before last (I think) I went out to Bucks County to enjoy a little more prettiness in my life. Here are a few photographs from that weekend. This is an entirely untouched but accurate photo of the sky one night. 

I was a little lazy/it was hot, so I just bought a rotisserie chicken at the grocery store and then made myself a bean and radish salad.

Another beautiful sky.

Yup.

A nice quiet weekend in the country. I read a fair amount and sat a fair amount. And walked a bit to boot. Fell in love with an old farmhouse and its 7.9 acres of land, meadow, woods and pond...but really need to get a grip and accept that there must be something wrong with it and that I don't actually have the money to buy or fix up a $245K property. Being a grown up is rough that way.

Farmer's Market, Juice and Nails

After the ramen we went to the Union Square Farmer's Market. I picked up two bunches of radishes...delightfully spicy, it turns out.
Appreciated the look of these onions.
And stocked up on tomatoes, among other things.
Then we returned to Brooklyn and got our nails did. This included my first ever pedicure, but there's not proof of that really. I think the reason that many women in my life are so in love with pedicures is that their feet are a tougher sort than mine, far more in need of pampering and smoothing. My feet, however, are rather dainty creatures...I don't stuff them into high heels often enough that I have any real system of callouses, and my feet blister more than anything else no matter what. My point being that while I liked my pedicure, I didn't exactly understand what the big deal was. Afterwards I had a carrot beet juice at BeQu.
I've been rocking the golden nails for some and decided to give silver a shot. L. went with a green. I like the silver well enough, but gold is nicer - at least for my fingers. Though I would consider silver toes and a burgundy set of fingernails. Blah, blah blah.

Another One

Lunch on the fourth. The valderon, the goat brie, and a raw sheep's milk cheese - the name of which escapes me at the moment - along with more radishes, juicy tomato, cucumbers and jalepeno pickles I bought at a farm stand. Plates like this really are happy-inducing for me. I keep missing the farmer's market in Philly because I'm always somewhere else, or about to be somewhere else, so it seems wrong to buy produce I won't have time to eat. But I'm missing the best eating of the year, and that's beginning to wear on me.

Hazy Shade of Summer, Plus Radishes and Tomatoes

On Sunday I went to the Hellertown Farmer's Market. I didn't take any photographs because it wasn't quite as extensive as I had been hoping it might be. And the main produce presence was Trauger's ... which I had visited the day before at their actual farm. It was a strange day in terms of weather. Hazy but warm. Threatening to rain but not actually raining. Or at least not for the majority of the day.
For lunch I made myself another lovely plate. This time with radishes, cucumbers, tomato, olives and goat brie. All was right with the world.