I spent a few days in Montreal and Quebec City last week to attend a professional conference (and give my first talk!) I hadn't been to Montreal since I was 17, so it was great to have a chance to explore a bit. It had definitely already turned to fall--the leaves were changing, and the weather was very gray and rainy the whole time. I loved it though--it reminded me of home! Certainly a far cry from the 100+ degree temperatures I had left behind in the Southwest. Among the highlights of my trip were visiting the Algerian bakeries in the Petit Maghreb neighborhood (almonds and orange blossom water in so many delicious combinations). I didn't take any pictures, but I'm making plans to try to create something similar at home. My previous attempts at Moroccan sweets were ok, but seeing as these are among my favorite flavors, it's really about time that I perfect the recipes.
I also went to the most fun concert I had been to in a while (and I go to a lot of concerts!) The group is Bajofondo. They are a group of 8 people from Argentina and Uruguay. They mix tango with rock, Euro dance club, and some hip hop. The audience was really into it, and we all danced the whole time. If they ever come to your town, definitely check them out.
In continuation of the theme of my week, when I arrived home I injected some Autumn and French influence into my kitchen my making Apple and Almond Clafoutis, based on the recipe recently posted by La Tartine Gourmand. I love clafoutis as an alternative to pies or tarts. They are very simple to make, and have such delicious flavors.
I've been working in Israel for a week now, and everything has been fantastic. We're staying in a lovely guest house with gorgeous gardens and a beautiful view of the valley below:
Miriam Avitan, who runs the guest house with her husband, makes us 3 fantastic meals a day. Last week for lunch we had homemade falafel:
I do my conservation work in a covered shed at the guest house, while most of the team works at the dig site in the mornings. I was able to visit it for the first time last week to see how things were going. They have a gorgeous view from up there of vineyards, and you can even see the Lebanese border on nearby hills.
This summer I will be repairing a whole lot of pottery. Although I do something very similar in the museum setting, here I have added challenges. For example, even though the ceramic fragments are sorted into groups before they come to me, there are usually a few sherds that don't belong. The two pots below were found in the same bag. I also don't have any idea of what the pot will look like when it's completed--or if I have all the pieces. It's like doing a difficult jig saw puzzle without the box, and with a handful of pieces missing.
The cool part about it is that I am the very first person to work on these objects, and the first to see them complete! The pot below was really challenging to put together--if you look closely you'll see that it was actually thrown in two pieces and put together so that the wheel marks run in a different direction than you'd normally expect. It took me a little while to figure out what was going on!
I hope everyone is enjoying a great summer. Although my internet connection is super slow, I'll try to add some pictures to the blog on occasion.
Early Monday morning I'll be leaving the States and heading to Israel for 8 weeks. I was offered a chance to work as a conservator on an archaeological excavation, and jumped at the opportunity. This will be my first time working on a dig, my first visit to Israel--and I'm very much looking forward to it. As a conservator on a dig, I will be stabilizing and putting together artifacts that are excavated by the team. It will be an intense work environment, where we will work from early in the morning until the evening 6 days a week. I will be knitting as much as possible, but do expect this blog to remain pretty quiet in the upcoming months. I'll try to post interesting pictures and stories if I can. In the meantime, I will also be guest blogging about my professional work as a conservator over at the Kelsey Museum website:
I spent the day exploring some nearby areas with a couple good friends. In the process I was able to experience some things uniquely Southwestern. We stopped by a Southwestern food heritage festival, which was small but nice. There was a woman demonstrating tortilla making using a very cool convex wood burning stove. She stretched the dough until they were paper thin--quite impressive!
We also stopped by the San Xavier del Bac Mission. The 'white dove of the desert' was very interesting--from historical, stylistic, and preservation standpoints. The imposing white building can be seen for miles around, and is really striking against the clear blue Arizona sky.
I love these religious candles--there's something very cool about them. The mission only allows candles purchased on site to be lit--I think they use special candles with low smoke/volatility so the newly restored wall murals don't get sooty.
Hey there, strangers! Thanks for all of your lovely comments in recent weeks. I think of you often, but have been too busy in my real life to find time to work on my virtual life. I have done a bit of knitting and pattern tinkering recently--nothing I can share yet. But I can show you some of my pictures from exploring the Southwest and cooking.
Selections from the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum:
I especially love this last one. It's from an alligator tree--so beautiful!
I found a new Indian grocery store to frequent in my neighborhood and stocked up on some ingredients:
Then proceeded to make two delicious Indian dishes from Tarla Dalal recipes. First, the rather complicated (but well worth the effort) Kofta Biryani. It was a delicious mixture of rice, falafel (with an Indian twist) and palak paneer, minus the paneer. Give it a try when you have a free afternoon and feel adventurous! I added potatoes, since I was in a potatoy mood.
I also made Shahi Aloo with a friend who wants to learn how to cook--I started him off easy with peeling and chopping. He did an excellent job. Shahi Aloo is a great way to prepare potatoes with a nice level of spices, and the sweetness and crunch of raisins and cashews, respectively:
My very good Chilean friend had a birthday last week. I asked her to describe her favorite cake, which involved layers of pancake, chocolate, marzipan and lucuma (a fruit I doubt is available here). I decided to make my own interpretation: a crepe cake with homemade chocolate frosting and marzipan creme.
I used a combination of three recipes, for the crepes, the frosting, and the marzipan. It came out looking a lot sloppier than I had wanted, but it was quite tasty and my Chilean friends got a kick out of it!
I also made a brief stop in Tombstone, Arizona. Not something I'd go out of my way to see, but it was entertaining for about 20 minutes.
Mmm, another delicious Sunday dinner courtesy of Karina. This week I found myself tempted by fall flavors: mashed potatoes with hearty stewed veggies in the form of Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie. I grew up eating a fair amount of Scottish cuisine. Although we never technically ate shepherd's pie, we did have mince & totties (minced meat with mashed potatoes) on a fairly regular basis. I attempted a different version of veggie shepherd's pie a few years ago, but it didn't turn out very well. Karina's recipe is a definite winner. I followed it fairly closely, but with my own improvisations, as always. This will make a great fall and winter staple.
This weekend I attended a fantastic local food and culture festival: Tucson Meet Yourself. Having grown up in a large city, I really wasn't expecting this small festival to be as diverse and interesting as it proved to be. There was food from all over the globe: from Hungary to Laos to Native American fry bread tacos. Not to mention performances from well over twenty countries, and craft demonstrations from around the world. I snapped a few photos today of some of the artists at work. Above is a Turkish man painting underglazes on a ceramic plate.
A mini pig pinata and paper cut-out banners from Mexico.
Navajo rug weaving.
And just to show that there was a little something for everyone--some tricked out cars to demonstrate Tucson street culture.
I think I've had a change of heart on this whole shawl business. I finished my Matilda shawl the other day, and I really like it! I used Filatura di Crosa Centolavaggi yarn held doubled on US 3 needles. It was a very easy pattern to follow, though ripping back to an occasional mistake was no fun at all. Lifeline yarns would be a good idea, but who has time to stop and put one in? I'd rather live fast and dangerously. [Ravelry link]
I'm back in the US after a summer of traveling, and have been settling into my new home in the Southwest. This week has involved a bit of unpacking, and a whole lot of weeding. Apparently the weeds in the desert can grow to 6-foot-tall thorny bushes in a matter of weeks. I've never had a garden before, but have always dreamed of growing vegetables. If I have any energy left after clearing the weeds I'd like to make that dream a reality! Luckily, it seems that it will be hot enough here to grow veggies year-round. I'm hoping to attend a workshop at a local farm next week on planting a winter garden--that should be a good start.
Among the things I unpacked were my fabric finds from Thailand and Australia. I bought a lovely plain-woven cotton and silk fabric (green), some very cheap cotton gingham, a black and white cotton canvas print (I thought this might be nice for some little pouches or something), a vintage fulled wool (perhaps a small purse?) and this great indigo-dyed resist printed hemp fabric from Thailand.
The hemp fabric is very skinny and very very long. It is made by the Hmong women, who would fold it into fine pleats and sew it to the bottom of their skirts:
I bought the green silk/cotton fabric after seeing this Kate Spade ad. I just love that ruffled neckline:
In other exciting news, I just bought cheap tickets to see a bunch of great music in the next two weeks: My Morning Jacket,Okkervil River,Dr. Dog, and Sea Wolf. There are a few others coming through town soon as well. It feels like I'm packing my entire summer into a few short weeks, since I missed most of it while in the Southern Hemisphere!
I'm feeling like a bit of a train wreck at the moment. Although I've moved around quite a lot in the past few years, it never gets any easier to say goodbye or to start over in a new place. I'm leaving Australia today...well, hopefully leaving today. At the moment I'm stuck in the Sydney airport waiting for a typhoon-delayed flight that is 8 hours late. It's a bit of a nightmare, but on the bright side it does give me a good long while to write some things on this blog that I've been thinking about lately.
I had the great pleasure to travel to Northeast Arnhem Land two weeks ago to attend the Garma Festival of Traditional Culture. Arnhem Land is in Australia's Northern Territory, and is the home of the Yolngu--one of Australia's largest groups of Aboriginal people. The festival is run by the Yothu Yindu Foundation and aims to celebrate Yolngu culture and to create a respectful environment for the sharing of knowledge between indigenous and non-indigenous people. It was really a beautiful experience for me.
I participated in the 'cultural tourism' program, which involved quite a lot of hands-on learning experiences, and opportunities to interact with one particular Yolngu family, who acted as our guides and hosts for the week. There were other programs at Garma that were more conference-style, with various presentations and discussions on a variety of subjects relating to Aboriginal culture and land. Next year the key forum subject is art, so I'm already thinking of how I might be able to make it back!
The festival is located in a remote area outside of Yirrkala, where a city of tents is erected once a year for the week. Each day we would split into men's and women's groups in order to learn about some aspect of traditional culture. In the evenings we would reconvene to watch the Bunggul--a ceremony featuring the traditional dance and music of numerous clan groups from around the area. This was truly awe-inspiring. Click here and here to see some great pictures of the dancers (I don't have permission to publish my own images of people from the festival, and will refrain from doing so out of respect.) After the Bunggul, there were concerts every night featuring everything from country music (Jimmy Little) to hip hop to reggae. There were also film screenings and art events. And we saw these guys:
The Chooky Dancers!
Some of the highlights of the cultural tourism program were going with the women to listen to the wind, wade in the mud and collect bush medicine:
Seeing the most beautiful coastline in the world at Bawaka:
And learning some new basket weaving techniques using pandanus leaves:
preparing the fiber.
my basket attempt--to be finished when I get back home.
But by far the best part of the festival was the grace and warmth of the Yolngu people. It always feels a bit awkward for me when I am a tourist in a foreign culture. However, the Yolngu were so welcoming, and made a point to tell us--from their hearts--that we were welcome, that we were a part of their family now, and that they were happy to have the opportunity to share their knowledge with us. On the final night of bunggul, each of the Yolngu dancers--roughly 50 people, came around the audience to shake each of our hands and say goodbye. It was really a touching experience, and something that will stay with me.
I have a new finished object awaiting a photo shoot. All I need is some sunlight and a tank top and I'll be set to show off this lady. I'm pretty pleased, so do check back (perhaps Saturday?)
I'm still in Sydney, and still exploring. I tend to avoid touristy things like the plague in lieu of hanging out with the locals in various neighborhoods. Last weekend I went to the Bankstown Bites food festival. Bankstown is a suburb about 40 minutes from Sydney city that, apparently, no one goes to unless they live there. Let me tell you, Sydney, you are missing out! The food festival was nice, although on the small side. The real gem were all the other shops around the area. There were all kinds of Asian markets, Middle Eastern markets (including a fantastic and cheap spice shop), an Indian market that had food from Mauritius (Mauritius, people! I haven't seen food from Mauritius since I was in Mauritius!) bakeries, cheap fabric stores, great op shops. I was in heaven. If I ever actually live in Sydney, I will be going shopping in Bankstown for all my specialty food needs. The photo above is from the festival--I'm not sure what these balls are actually called, but it was fascinating to watch them being made. They basically seem to pile a whole lot of dough onto these plates, and keep rotating the dough within the depressions until they form perfect spheres. If anyone knows what to call these, bonus points for you!
