Progress

Apple varieties in our house thanks to the Ferry Plaza farmers' market:
1) Pink Pearl (yay!)
2) Melrose
3) Rhode Island Greening
4) Granny Smith
5) Gravenstein
6) Connell Red
7) Cortland
8) Empire
9) Jonathan
10) Philo Gold
11) Arkansas Sweet?
12) Bramley Seedling
13) Ashmead's Kernel...
...and one or two others I can't remember at the moment. Scott made little sticker labels for each apple so we can keep track. I'm tasting and taking notes, trying to create a comprehensive apple comparison chart.

Meanwhile, I did the first round of testing on an apple challah recipe. The loaves came out looking really beautiful, as seen here. But I took them out of the oven too soon. The insides were still soft, which made them collapse, and putting them back in the oven couldn't do anything at that point to restore the shape. But I like this general idea: you roll the bread up like a cinnamon bun, rather than braiding it. I'll try it again with a little less egg and oil, and cook it at a lower temperature. Hopefully that'll solve the problem.

Land of enchantment

We were in New Mexico recently, where I lived for a couple of years in my twenties. It was beautiful, restorative, delicious, and unbelievably green. They've had more rain than usual this summer -- more than the ground can absorb, actually, so there have been problems with flooding. But it was also edenic. Imagine that dramatic landscape in shades of sage and grass and blue. Every time you turn around, your mouth drops.
One of the best moments was returning to Leona's of Chimayo for lunch. If you ever make it to New Mexico, do not miss the opportunity to eat there. Fantastic carne adovada, great tamales, fresh tortillas, and Leona herself, surrounded by grandkids.
Even though Leona's is a destination restaurant with a popular mail-order business on the side, it's still run out of the same little ramshackle stand next to the Sanctuario. You'd still get wet if a hard rain came down at the right angle. Not much seems to change in New Mexico, and that's a nice thing.

Pleasures of the flesh

So here's an apple you probably won't find on the east coast: the Pink Pearl. Isn't it pretty? Like the Gravenstein, it's a summer variety, which means we're now at the tail end of the season. Sigh.

The breed is popular with apple enthusiasts, but because it bruises easily and doesn't keep well in storage, it never made it to the supermarket shelves.

To make matters worse, Pink Pearls are homely on the outside, with dull yellow-brown, faintly blushing skin and an uneven conical shape. I almost skipped over them at the farmers market myself. But they have a secret: inside, they're positively vampy, with shockingly pink, sweet-tart flesh. Even the blooms are bright pink. The fruit is crisp and tastes of raspberries and lemon custard. In fact, I baked some Pink Pearls in a galette with raspberries and they were a natural pairing.

The first Pink Pearl was hybridized in Northern California in 1944 from another red-fleshed variety called "Surprise," which, in turn, probably descended from an ancient breed of red-fleshed Turksh crabapples. "Surprise" apples were beautiful, but sour; a plant breeder named Albert Etter came up with with Pink Pearl as a way to breed more sweetness into them. So I'm giving thanks to him and to the farmers who keep these heirlooms in circulation.

Never a dull moment

We have been living through interesting times this past month. Remember that proverb, "May you live in interesting times"? Apparently Robert Kennedy quoted this "ancient Chinese curse" in a speech in South Africa in 1966. Only it turns out that there is no such curse, or at least, not in China. The only known Chinese proverb related to this sentiment reads, "It's better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period." I'm sure it sounds more graceful in its original tongue.

Anyway, we've weathered some interesting times in recent weeks, most poignantly with the recent and much-too-soon death of Scott's uncle Ron Magram, who had a lot to teach us all about finding meaning in difficult times.

We've emerged in relatively good shape, and last week I got some very exciting news indeed. Remember that book proposal that I mentioned? Well, if all goes according to plan, my first cookbook -- everything you ever wanted to know about apples and more (that's not the title) -- will be published in Fall, 2008 by W.W. Norton. If it goes a little slower than that, it'll be more like Fall, 2009.

My editor (I have an editor!) has encouraged me to not worry too much about the dates at the moment, but I've been diving in these past couple of weeks. Hence this photo. It's an apple Dutch baby pancake I made this morning. Good (and pretty, no?), but too much flour in the batter. I think I'll get it right in the second round. There's also some cinnamon rice pudding with apple compote in the fridge. I need to figure out some sort of food distribution scheme because it's piling up.

From here on out I'm going to use this blog as a journal to record what I'm learning as I work on the book. This project is going to take a while and the incline of the road ahead is daunting from this angle. Especially since I'll be writing this on the side (though not in secret). Bird by bird, as they say. Or, in my case, apple pie by apple pie. This is the good side of "interesting."