incredibly dumb things you do in the kitchen

Ok, help me out here. Surely all you kitchen-savvy types do really, really stupid things when no one but the cat is watching. Please share!

Why? Because I just exploded a hard-boiled egg all over my kitchen, that's why. Even worse was not realizing what I'd done for at least 20 minutes after said egg had exploded. Yes, I heard the poof-thwump of the egg chunks hitting the floor at high velocity, but I just figured my roommate had come home, put popcorn in the microwave, and had all the corn magically pop at once, boom.

Honestly, such was my thought process, and I should be condemned to a life of takeout pizza and Grape-Nuts just for that. it wasn't until the house began to smell like something burning on the stove that I recalled putting on an egg to simmer, oh, an hour or so ago. And then I remembered how yes, an egg will indeed explode if exposed to dry heat--the kind of heat you get when you let your pot boil dry for a long time. So, no hard-boiled egg for me, and lots of shell on the floor. Small rationalization: many deadlines, and typing madly on multiple projects! But still.

Damn. And you?

kwassa kwassa bling bing

As a young girl
Louis Vuitton
with your mother
on a sandy lawn...

A cupcake--or four!--for the bed-headed boys of Vampire Weekend, just for rhyming "Louis Vuitton", "reggaeton", and "Benetton", in a super-catchy, head-bobbingly happy tune. Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa, your Zipcar driving song for the summer.

As a sophomore
with the reggaeton
And the linens
you're sitting on

Who else gets cakes? Oh, all the lady couples I know, come June 17. The wedding-cake requests are rolling in, since I've promised to bake get-married-in-California cakes for everyone that can finally tie the knot legally in our fine golden state. Cupcakes, three-tiered frilly cakes, blueberry pies: whatever the ladies want, that's what I'm here for.

Is your bed made?
Is your sweater on?
Do you wanta
Like you know I do?

Of course you do! And if you're in NYC, you want to go see Hamlet in Central Park, assistant-directed by Rob Melrose, of Cutting-Ball Theatre fame in SF. And you want to drop by the Leslie/Lohman (rhymes with Lindsey Lohan!) Gallery, to see photos by former SF-er Phyllis Christopher, as part of a big pride-month show of queer women's art called Pink & Bent. And while you're there, you should go by the Rick's Picks pickle stand at the Union Square and Grand Army Plaza Greenmarkets, and bug Rick for some of his ON-RAMPS, pickled ramps with hibiscus and pink peppercorns. (Ramps, for all you non-easterners, are wild leeks, slim, pungent, and super-tasty for those who like that sort of thing.)

Does this feel so unnatural
for Peter Gabriel too
But this feels so unnatural
Peter Gabriel too

In SF, cool and foggy, you should be rolling around in sweet, sweet strawberries and anticipating the arrival of Bing cherries and Blenheim apricots. Don't be paying no $7/lb for those useless Brooks cherries! Honestly, they're wet and shaped like a cherry, that's all we can say for them. Surely you want more from your cherry than that, don't you? Save your tongue for the Bings. And get down to the Santa Cruz west side Sat. market to get them from Van Dyke Ranch, too. I'll be there this weekend, making strawberry jam at the farm for my fellow Cookie Fairy's 27th b-day, to be celebrated by a tea party in the Chadwick garden on Sunday afternoon.

Can you stay up
to see the dawn
In the colors
of Benetton?

(And what's kwassa kwassa, you ask? An African dance rhythm from Congo, one of the many co-opted/mainstreamed by Peter Gabriel, Paul Simon et al during those world-music 80s.)

south wind

Well, isn't it a balmy day. Almost muggy, which isn't like San Fran at all...which means it's blissful, because everyone knows it won't last. (Unlike, say, NYC, when the first muggy day is merely a harbinger of four months of nonstop mugginess to come.) So the tank-top-and-sandal brigades were out in full force in the Marina, drinking sangria and eating salads outside all along Union Street.

But enough weather chat...the fun news today was getting a mention in the New York Times! For my kids' cookbook, Williams-Sonoma Kids in the Kitchen: Fun Food. The lead story was all about the future for cookbooks for kids, and was accompanied by a list of their fave kiddie cookbooks. Check out the whole piece, here. Or, cut to the chase and see just the PQ mention.