Yule Report

While you were spending Christmas in your comfy pants, eating peanut brittle and turkey legs while watching your favorite holiday movie with your family in your warm home, I was being tricked into doing a 12-mile hike. And it was fantastic!

I didn't go home this year, which marked my second ever Christmas away from my family in Minnesota. I've got a pretty big trip coming up in February (so epic that it involves anti-malaria precautions!) and have no vacation time to spare, as well as zero patience or money for peak holiday travel, aaaand my parents were just here two weeks ago, so quit judging me already, OK? Instead Beard and I had brunch with our friends Matt and Jenny, and then we all headed to Forest Park to take a stroll with their vizsla and visiting border collie mix.

As you can see from the photo, Portland suffered an identity crisis, and it was a gorgeous day. Sunglasses were worn. One thing led to another, and the next thing we knew we'd hiked up to Pittock Mansion, where the photo was snapped, then on to the rose gardens at Washington Park before looping back to the car, three adventure-hike hours later.

Then I promptly went home, put on my pajamas, and stuffed my face with pizza and Jubelale and watched Home Alone with some buddies. You really can have it both ways.

Hope you all had a lovely holiday, wherever or however you chose to celebrate it.

Stewing

You know that Dinty Moore beef stew, that comes in a can, with the mushy vegetables and the suspect-looking meat mounds? Most people have never considered actually eating it. But you know what? I love that shit. Loooooove it. So, with this in mind, imagine how much I adore its homemade, non-sketchy counterpart.

Free license to eat stew without scrutiny might be my favorite thing about winter. Apparently I'm pretty vocal about this, because a couple months ago at work, publishers started sending me a disproportionate amount of books about one pot meals - one of them being Slow Cooker: The Best Cookbook Ever. Seriously, that's the real subtitle. And I'm going to let it slide, because the book is amazing.

I didn't have to spend much time deciding what to make first - I wanted the stew from the cover, and I wanted it NOWS. Minus the corn. (I feel strongly that corn does not belong in soup. One of my coworkers also believes corn has no place on the cover of a book. So this was a double corn whammy. What a polarizing vegetable!) Anyway, the prep for this recipe was extremely easy, and I'm not sure the wonder of a crock pot will ever wear off for me. You put food in it, turn it on, and leave. And then it's a meal, ready when you walk into your house, which has incidentally been filled with amazing aromas. I can only hope that the Nobel Prize commission will someday recognize what this contraption has done for humanity.

So. Old-Fashioned Beef Stew. (Based on the version from the previously mentioned best cookbook ever.)

Ingredients:
4 yellow potatoes, quartered
2 medium onions, quartered
2 carrots, 1 inch pieces
1 1/2 lb beef chuck, cut into 1 inch pieces
1 cup beef broth
2 T olive oil
3/4 c flour
1 t dried thyme
1 c frozen peas

Throw your potatoes, carrots, onions, 1 t salt and 1/2 t pepper in your crock pot. Put 1 t salt, 1 t pepper and flour in a bag, then the meat. Shake. Heat oil in skillet, add meat, and cook until brown on all sides, but don't cook through. Deglaze skillet with the broth, scrape any browned bits, and put it all in the crock pot. Add the thyme, cover, and cook on low for 8 hours. Add peas, and cook for another hour. Voila.

I took photos of my stew, and then accidentally deleted them from my camera. But honestly, it looked just like the photo. Minus the corn.

I'm baaaaaack!

With the exception of 36 hours or so, I've felt like a crazy, deranged lady for the last three months. There aren't really good reasons for this. There haven't been any life-altering catastrophes, just a rotating roster of life stuff - and most of it has been enjoyable. Like trips and weddings, and positive changes. One being that I moved about a month ago, into a fantastic place, with a regularly sized kitchen! Look at it! Look at my kitchen! Well, look at half of it.
And while you're at it, look at my reading nook. Poang chair + bay window = win. The footstool doesn't hurt, either. But anyway, I moved. I've also been planning an epic trip. I'll be spending about a month in Southeast Asia, starting in February. More on that later. I've also been sewing! Sewing complicated things! Things that I am giving as gifts. So you'll have to wait until they've been given before I spill the beans.

Anyway, I'm excited to share some projects. Expect to hear about (and see evidence of) sewing milestones and a notable crock pot conquest very soon. In the meantime, I'm going to spend the weekend on the Oregon coast, with my visiting parents, hopefully doing a lot of this:

No More Excuses

Prepare to soon be dazzled by this sophisticated little point-and-shoot. I watched the CNET video about six times before finally pulling the trigger, so here's hoping the ISO sensitivity and 5x zoom live up to the hype. Either way, it sure is purdy.

Excuses, excuses.

Oh hi! How are you? What's that? You're wondering where the hell I've been? And why I don't seem to give a rat's arse about my blog anymore? Well... here's the deal:

My digital camera died. The photos accompanying my last few posts were captured on my phone. MY PHONE. This is not ideal. And you know what else? I just moved, and don't have the internets yet. It's a long, sad story that involves a disappointed Comcast technician, and a gigantic drill. I had to sneak into a coffee shop and pretend I wanted a hot chocolate just to share this message with you right now. I am sacrificing for you, by drinking this hot chocolate. I am selfless.

Anyway, I'll be back soon, I promise! I've got my eyes on a fancy new point and click, and my new place has a craft room! And a stove with more than one working burner, and an oven with more than one cubic foot of space. That doesn't run 75 degrees hot. It's luxurious.

So basically, you're in for it, once I get my bearings. Watch out.

In the meantime, here's yet another thing I'm obsessed with on Etsy. Sasquatch holiday! The best kind.

Regretsy

Don't get me wrong, I love Etsy. I am still swooning over the bag I got a couple of weeks ago, not to mention the earrings that warranted their own blog post. But Regretsy.com, this blog that showcases some of the more... interesting (I'm being very kind) items available, is some of the funniest shit I've seen in a long time.

This chicken poncho/wrist cuff is just the beginning. Other highlights include the "Party Sweater" (Don't even think about buying the hat. OFF LIMITS), the "Large Mounted Bearded White Tiger Head with Swarovski Crystal Encrusted Features,"and my personal favorite, the "Just Married Wedding T." I almost peed myself reading the comments. Which means that my heart is likely tiny, dark and empty. But it's funny enough that I'm OK with it.

Something borrowed, something blue, something cornhole.

My friends Carle and Charlie got married last weekend, in cute New England fashion. Opting for small and simple, about 35 guests descended on the White Mountains of New Hampshire, and the ceremony was followed by a happy hour at a cabin-type home called "The Schoolhouse" that belongs to Charlie's family.

These two definitely had their priorities in order, and decided early on that there would be cornhole at their wedding. The game, which I'm fairly certain is referred to simply as "bean bags" everywhere but the Pacific Northwest, is all about throwing said bean bags at holes cut into a board. And it's awesome.

In my most important sewing project to date, I made the super special wedding cornhole bags. (Which technically should be called "bean hole" in this case.) Carle picked out fabric to match the fancy boards that Charlie's brother made, and I followed directions found here. I was pleasantly surprised by how easy they were, and how well they turned out. Thinking about opening up a cornhole store on Etsy. I'll do some market research and keep you posted.

Congratulations again, to the C&C Wedding Factory.

New Hampshire Nuptials

West coast, you've got some competition in the fall department.

Large Apple

I'm sort of embarrassed by this, but up until a few days ago, I'd never been to New York. I've been to Fiji, spent a few hours in Iceland and lived abroad in Australia, but had never set food in this country's iconic big city. And to be honest, I expected to hate it. I am a big fan of space, and doing things at my own pace, and affordable rent. But against all logic, I adored this place.

After a couple days of learning the ropes from one of my favorite gals, gallivanting around different neighborhoods and eating fantastic food at tiny restaurants that seem like well-guarded secrets, I was enamored. I can't wait to go back and get lost in it all again soon.

In the meantime, I'm spending the next couple of days at Beard's folks' place, in central Pennsylvania, which is on the other side of the spectrum. It's quiet and relaxing and lovely. And there is an Amish buggy museum. 'Nuff said.

Redemption via earrings.

Today, after working 10 hours, I came home to find these earrings that I ordered from Etsy in my mailbox - the ones from the seller in Italy that I was starting to think weren't going to show up before I get on a plane to the East Coast tomorrow morning.

Well, they're here! And they're even more lovely than I anticipated. I can't wait to wear them while I watch my dear friends get married, on a mountain, in New Hampshire. (And maybe also while I'm drinking overpriced martinis in Manhattan.)

Here's to small victories, like earrings that seem like tiny miracles after a long week.

Like sands through the hourglass...

Trying my best to appreciate what will soon be replaced by pointy, sideways rain. Sigh.

Photo via my iphone. Not bad, considering I was on a bridge, on a bike, facing backwards, imagining all sorts of scenarios where my body and precious gadget would plummet into the river below. Notice none of those visions stopped me from taking the photo.

Sunday Sewin' Milestones

Ladies and gentlemen, your attention, please. I made that skirt. The one answering the door. It started out as a square of fabric but it's been transformed into a fully wearable, not hideous garment. With a zipper. A ZIPPER. As if that isn't exciting enough, I also sewed my first set of darts. Besides a couple patches of crooked stitching, I'm feeling pretty good about skirt #1. Compared to my expectations, it's the Paul Bunyan of skirts. (That's a good thing.)

Or at least it was, until I realized that I had whipped together a piece of clothing that's too small for me. As you can see, it clearly doesn't fit my purple doppelganger. (I thought we'd all feel better about putting Paula the dressform through this kind of public humiliation rather than forcing you all to look my ass unsuccessfully crammed into it. You're welcome.)
So anyway, I'm aiming to give it to someone who can squeeze their buns into it. It's a heavy-ish twill, guessing around a size six, and has some great darts. Some of the best darts I've ever seen. The Swiss Family Robinson of darts. Someone take the skirt. Please.

Skirt pattern from this handy little book.

I pickled!

I realize that based on how often I talk about it, you'd think I put up a few pints every weekend. Not true. I'm a giant poser. Or I was. I recently delved into not only my first pickling project, but I canned those buggers too.

And it was... pretty easy. Yes, there were steps that had to be done in a specific order. No half-assing allowed in preservation town. But all in all, fairly straightforward. I've already single-handedly taken down a pint of pickled green beans. And I'm still alive. Proof of my aptitude. Or resilience to botulism. We shall see.

Many thanks, once again, to this fantastic book.

This is going to be fun. Unless I fail.

Vintage pattern from Serendipity Vintage. Fabric from Bolt. Not sure where the completely unrealistic assessment of my skill level came from. Wish me luck.

Mad men, lazy women. Err... woman.

I realize this blog has taken a weird turn. Instead of sharing little anecdotes about my attempts to conquer all domestic realms, I've been recycling content featured elsewhere. This is because most of my projects have been put on hold, due to general summer mayhem involving visitors, weddings, trips, and other assorted whiny excuses that I basically use to cover up the fact I can't stop watching Mad Men. But there are some good things in the works, I promise. Things I can't wait to tell you about. After I get through Season 2 and find out why Don Draper is so f-ed up.

So, please be distracted by this little opinion piece about city cycling that I wrote for Volume One, a really great alternative biweekly that I used to work for in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. About six years ago, when it was just a wee little b&w zine that a couple of guys produced on the side, in a tiny office the size of a closet, where we had to move the ethernet cord from one computer to the next because there was only one cord -- I was the outfit's first "intern." Now it's a full fledged, sharp-looking tabloid with an editorial and sales staff with a kickass downtown headquarters. I feel lucky to have been on the ground floor of this publication that has done remarkable things for the creative scene and sense of community in that city.

Aaaaand now it's time for more Mad Men. At the rate I'm burning through these DVDs I'll be back here trying to fill an immense void before you know it. Or getting cable to continue my addiction. See you... soon. Soon-ish.

Business + Pleasure

Sometimes work = fun.

A couple of weeks ago I got to interview Karen Solomon, who wrote Jam It, Pickle It, Cure It - a collection of crafty DIY kitchen projects that I've been evangelizing on behalf of for months.

She's a hoot. You can read the exchange here.

This completely makes up for that summer I spent at a cheese factory, watching a robotic arm put bags of shredded cheddar into boxes. (Although even that position had its perks: reject cheese.)

Burnt Out

I went camping this past weekend, at a nice little spot between Hood River and the north side of Mount Hood in the Cascades. I had my heart set on doing the Cooper Spur hike, a solid trek at 8000 foot elevation, but the road to the trailhead was closed -- and this is why. Forest fires wrecked havoc on the area last fall. So instead we did a 7 mile trip up to Tilly Jane shelter, and I hate to say it, but the destruction was stunning. The trail was covered in inches of ash, like walking in sand, and there were gnarled, scorched trees as far as you could see. But, if you looked close enough, you'd see signs of the green returning. I'd love to do it again next year and gauge the regeneration.

Reasons why the Pacific NW is pretty much amazing - Exhibit Q: Swimmin' Hole.

I don't know why it took me so long to go to this place, but on Saturday I threw myself in this mystical spot called Dougan Falls in the Washougal River in near Camas, Washington.

About half an hour's drive from Portland, a 30 mile stretch of road follows the water, allowing frolickers to pull off just about anywhere and jump in, with varying depths and currents. Some spots are perfect for a lazy tube ride, others, like the one we went to, are prime for amateur cliff jumping. Here the water was crystal clear and cold, but not go-into-shock cold, and deep enough in spots that you couldn't touch the bottom.

And the best part? I got myself some water socks. Amphibian feet technology has come a long way since 1992. I was shimmying up those wet boulders like it was nobody's business.

Welcome to the world, tiny potato babies. (I might have heat stroke. Help me.)

It's still really hot here, and it's making me a bit batty. Battier. Which might be why I decided at 10 p.m. last night that I should probably go outside and dump out my potato container. And look what I found! Those sure as hell weren't in there when I filled the pot with dirt. In all honesty, I think that only one of my three plants actually produced any spuds - and if you plopped these little beauties onto a scale, it's likely that the three "seed potatoes" that I planted actually held more starchy mass than what I dug up. But does that matter? No. Because these potatoes are new and different, and I made them. And it will be me who single-handedly ends them with a knob of butter and some chives. I'm pretty much a potato God.

It's the heat. Really.

Update: It's leveled off to a cool 94 degrees. Hallelujah.

The Real Zinger Acres + Heat. Unbearable Heat.

I just got back to Portland after spending a few days in Minnesota on my family's dairy farm. I have all sorts of stories for you, but there's one problem. It's 106 degrees. In the Pacific Northwest. Which translates to 170 degrees in what would be reality-based temperature land. This means that it's at least 95 degrees in my apartment with the gigantic but un-openable windows, so I've been hopping from one air-conditioned space to the next. Please enjoy this video of some of my favorite gals back home, and I'll see you again once this meteorological absurdity passes, which I'll determine when I can sit on my couch without my legs becoming fused to it.

The apron, revisited.

I bet you thought I'd moved on. Well, not quite. I stitched up this topless, shamrock wonder for one of my best pals, who recently transplanted herself from Madison, WI to the middle of NYC. Trust me, her photo styling and clever wardrobe choices make this little smock look far more darling than it does on its own.

I started with a Simplicity "It's So Easy" pattern (kudos to them for not cashing in on the obvious pun) but soon found that I have zero patience for double fold bias tape. None. In fact, I think it's pretty worthless. So I improvised, which at my beginner level, is bit cocky. For the most part, the project turned out OK. I am pleased with my first stab at pleats, but the straps ended up looking fairly ghetto. If I could go back in time, I'd trust my instincts and make them inside out, like I learned in my sewing class.

Oh well. At least the subpar portion lends itself easily to hiding. I just hope this creation serves the purpose I intended, and makes a new home in a new place a bit more cozy and warm for a dear, dear lady who deserves warmth and comfort. And cute kitchen outfits.

Etsy droolin'

Hi friends. I apologize for the lack of action here lately, summer has swept me away to a land of bike rides and happy hours and impromptu camping trips, and for the most part, I'm OK with this. Just falling a bit behind on general life-tasks; like dish-washing, and toenail-clipping and bike chain-lubricating. You get the idea. Please accept this list of things from Etsy that I'm currently lusting after as a real post, and I'll be back soon with the real thing.

Sparrow Necklace by MDsparks. You should get one, we'll be twinnies.

Logs. Print by GollyBard. I want this bad.

Terra cotta earrings by betsy3. I don't care if they're as heavy as marbles and they make my earlobes droopy.

Cute little day-brightening card by thebeautifulproject. When I'm not ogling this seller's cute paper products I'm trolling around her food blog, also worth a looksie.

Happy summer everyone! Soak it up.

My landlord may have tried to drop a subtle hint.

I came home from work yesterday to find this big-ass Rhododendron planted smack in the middle of Zinger Acres. At least they took the time to move and replace my containers when they were finished, but this definitely throws off the sunshine plan. I have to assume that the potatoes, wherever they are back there, are thoroughly confused.

And yes, my butter crisp lettuce bolted. Big time. Although no longer edible, it looks kind of impressive, and I'm OK with my failure looking impressive.

Berries. More of them.

We've entered phase 2 of Oregon berry splendor, which marks the arrival raspberries and blueberries to the party. In celebration of this, I went berry picking for the first time, and it was sooo much fun. What took me this long, I have no idea. It combines some of my favorite pastimes: standing in fields, touching berries, sunshine, and thrift.

After spending a couple of hours at the Sauvie Island Farms U-Pick, we ended up with over 5 pounds of blueberries and raspberries. (For $10!) I've got big plans for these little fruits.

I froze most of them, laying them out on a cookie sheet in the freezer for a few hours before bagging them up, but set aside some blueberries to use right away to test drive a recipe from a new cookbook that I'm really excited about: The Big Sur Bakery Cookbook. During the epic camping trip I went on earlier this year, I got to experience this place in the flesh, and it blew my mind.

So far, the cookbook has delivered the same results. I followed their scone recipe, and whipped up some of the blueberry variety. They were fantastic, if you like butter. And if you don't, you really don't have any business reading this blog.

Scones via Big Sur Bakery:

1 cup fresh berries
1 cup (2 sticks!) cold, unsalted butter, cubed
3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup granulated sugar
1 Tb. baking powder
2 t baking soda
1 1/2 t kosher salt
2 Tb. vanilla extract
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup turbinado sugar

About 2 hours before making the scones, scatter the berries on a cookie sheet and pop them in the freezer. Put the cubed butter, flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a mixing bowl, and but this in the freezer too, for 30 minutes. Put your baking rack in the middle position and preheat the oven to 375. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Using a pastry cutter, work the chilled ingredients together in the bowl until the butter cubes are the size of peas, and make a little well in the center. Combine the vanilla and buttermilk together in a separate bowl, then pour it into the well. Mix this up with a wooden spoon to form a shaggy mass, then add the frozen berries and gently mix them in, trying not to crush them.

To shape the scones, place a 3-inch round cookie or biscuit cutter on one corner of the baking sheet, then take a handful of dough and press it into the cutter, patting it down so the top of the scone is flat. Pull the cutter off the sheet, leaving the scone behind, and repeat, keeping the scones well-spaced; they just about double in size. Sprinkle the tops with the turbinado sugar and bake for 15 - 20 minutes - until they're golden brown along the sides but still tender inside. Transfer them to a cooling rack and wait 10 minutes before gobbling.

Excess Baggage

I can't stop. Say hello to the cowboy bag and the let's-go-on-a-picnic tote. The wild west option has a liner and pocket, one sized specifically to hold you-know-what.

Hello, Pretty.

I finally succumbed to my urges, and brought home my very own iPhone today. She is everything I ever hoped she'd be. I've rationalized this upgrade in a number of different ways.

1. This is the first phone I've ever paid money for. Sooo, I deserve a nice one. Yeah. That's how that works.
   
2. My current (woops, I mean, former) phone, a dinosaur Nokia flip thing, has to be rigged up very carefully with the wind blowing on it in exactly the right way in order for it to charge. At one point it didn't ring, it warbled. Which was especially interesting when my rooster alarm clock went off.
   
3. This is not just a phone. It's a tiny computer! And an iPod, a digital camera, a video camera, GPS, and has applications that tell me where to eat and what constellations are currently overhead. How did I ever live without this?
4. I've already canceled out the additional monthly cost from my budget by threatening to leave my internet provider, which they responded to by cutting my bill in half for a year. Boom. Try it.
   
5. I just want to feel fancy.
   

I just worry about this purchase turning out like the dreaded Guess sunglasses incident of 1997. I was working as a lifeguard at the ole municipal swimming pool and went against all of my better judgment and spent $70, which is a fairly shocking figure when you're a 16-year-old lifeguard, on a pair of sunglasses. To go with my whistle. I lost them within 72 hours, and have been pretty cheap as a rule ever since. Here's hoping that my new precious gadget doesn't find itself underneath a zamboni, or in the belly of a wild beast. Which is where I can only assume my sunglasses are.

I'm a bag lady!

I decided that I've graduated from Aprons 101, and have quickly moved on to Totes: A Cultural Study. And now I can't stop making them. Bag manufacturing has turned out out to be pretty easy, and instantly gratifying. A nice combo.

This is the first one that I made, based on some instructions in Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing. I love this woman's style - and adore every project in this book, however I'm starting to think that they skipped any form of user-testing.

This bag is the first of her projects that I attempted, but I found a good amount of instruction to be missing. Like for instance, Lotta never tells you to cut your fabric in half at one point, which perplexed me for longer than I care to share, and then a couple steps later, she tells you to pin something, then trim it, watching for the seams that she never told you to sew. I know, these are things you can figure out on your own, but for a beginner like me, filled with self-doubt and all sorts of other strange sewing hangups, it was kind of annoying. Take a crack at the instructions yourself, here.

Nonetheless, I've already got my next 15 bags planned out in my head, and got further inspiration from an intense fabric acquisition mission yesterday. I've even started to fine tune the tote a bit - I added a liner to bag #2, and have a pocket planned for #3. What's next!?! Well, probably not much. But I'm toying with the idea of opening up a little Etsy shop once I've cranked out enough and feel the quality is up to snuff. Which translates to: when I can consistently sew in a straight line. I'll keep you posted.

Why June would beat January in a cage fight:

Top sirloin, horseradish mashed Yukon Golds, sauteed zucchini + asparagus. Almost all of it from the farmer's market.

My operation is thriving + the arrival of the "mystery hose"

As you can see, I am not messing around. The hillbilly garden currently contains a lettuce drawer, a jalapeno pepper, the Yukon Gold potato pot, two cherry tomato plants, one large-ish tomato variety, some strawberries and the chive tray up top. I'm guessing I probably crossed the dirt-claiming boundary at my apartment building awhile back, but until I hear otherwise, this earth is mine.

So far everything seems to be going pretty well. My lettuce had been choking itself off a bit, and I cut it back and now it appears to be doing pretty well. Still harvesting some outer leaves about once a week, making some delightful little salads. The leaves at the bottom of the potato plant are turning yellow, which my farmer friend Marven says means that the little spuds are developing. He even said that I could start digging some out, but that could go horribly wrong in a number of ways, so I'm going to hold off.

And then there's the mystery hose. I can't be sure that the following two incidents are linked, but I've read enough formulaic popular fiction to secretly hope that they are.

So. A couple of weeks ago the lettuce was looking kind of haggard, and I decided (or Google told me) that it might have been getting too much direct sunlight, so I rigged up a cheap umbrella before I left for work in the morning to give it some shade. I didn't really see a reason anyone would want to steal it, but after a couple days, I returned home from work to find it gone. This was discouraging.

But then yesterday, I came home to find a small length of what appears to be a new hose on my steps. Since I often make about 7 trips out there with my watering can, it would prove to be helpful... if there was an outdoor faucet to attach it to. Which there is not.

This raises some questions.

#1: Did the umbrella thief just trade me for a hose?
#2: Is some creepy person watching me water my plants?
#3: Was this hose even intended for me?
#4: Who put the fricking hose there?!
#5: Where the %&*# is my umbrella!?!?!?

Berries. Berries!

I luuuuurve Oregon's berry season. What we lack in sunshine, we definitely make up for in well-endowed fruit. Some of you might have heard that I have a teensy bit of a sweet tooth. Or a gigantic Paul Bunyan sized bicuspid of one. So when the berry bounty is in full swing, I feel good about satisfying my urges in a more natural fashion. Like more natural than a jumbo box of rainbow nerds, for example. Or a half pound of salt water taffy. You get the idea.

It starts with the rhubarb. Then come the strawberries. Then the raspberries, followed by my favorite: The jumbo Oregon Blackberry varities. I'm pretty sure no other berry will ever compare, and I've come to terms with this.

All summer long I come up with different ways to manipulate all this fruit into desserts, my favorite being the Crisp. They're easy, you can virtually mix any kind of berry together and it will meld OK, and I usually have all of the ingredients on hand. I'm a firm believer that if you take some berries, mix them with a little bit of sugar, then top it with some semblance of oats, sugar, and butter -- it will turn out amazing and stun everyone you feed it to. Of course, you can add little variations - a little cinnamon here, some walnuts here - but seriously, it's pretty hard to screw up a crisp.

Plus, it's the perfect dessert to show up with at a BBQ. Here's the recipe I based my most recent crisp adventure on, from Molly Katzen's Dessert book.

Strawberry-Rhubarb Crisp

2 lb fresh rhubarb, cut in 1-inch chunks
3 cups sliced strawberries
1/3 c sugar
1 1/4 c rolled oats
1 c flour
1/4 c brown sugar
3/4 tsp cinnamon
dash or two of allspice and nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 375. Mix your fruit with the white sugar. Mix together remaining ingredients. Put this on top of the fruit. Bake for 40 minutes. I told you it was easy.

Aces

During the epic road trip, we decided to treat ourselves to a little pampering and spent a night at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs, CA. Keep in mind that at this point we were bathing with Wet-Naps and shaking ticks out of our hair -- so it wouldn't really take much to make us feel fancy. My oh my, the Ace was a treat. We adore the one in Portland and have a buddy on the inside, so we got the room at a discount - but even a room at full price is pretty affordable - 100 bones or so. And we had our own little private patio, free bikes, three pools, and the bartender delivered drinks on a longboard. AND there were Have' a chips waiting for me in the room PLUS they serve Stumptown coffee! If you don't mind embracing your inner hipster, I highly recommend visiting them in New York, Seattle and Portland too. Good stuff.