September 17, 2019--Garlic

For dinner we planned to make an apple and chicken sausage frittata and, among other things, needed garlic.

"Let's get an organic one," Rona said. "Frittatas are best with fresh tasting ingredients."

"Then Rising Tide it is." Our local organic food shop.

It's the height of the harvest season here and the store is a veritable cornucopia of root vegetables, many varieties of squash, greens of all sorts, and a bushel basket of locally-grown garlic.

"How does this one feel to you?" Rona asked tossing it to me.

"Perfect. Voluptuous bulbs and hard as a rock. Just what one looks for."

"And smell it," Rona said, doing so herself.

"Right out of the ground," I said. "Let's get one. It will be wonderful as part of the frittata."

"Can you believe it?" Rona said. "It's $15 a pound. And this one weighs about a quarter of a pound"--she had placed it in the scale--"and could cost four dollars. A little much, don't you think, for a simple garlic?"

"Maybe it's not so simple," I said. "The good news is that we only need a few cloves."

"I know they charge a fortune for anything organic but about this I don't know. How much less flavorable will your basic supermarket garlic taste?"

"Let's find out."

"So, we went to Hannafords and checked out their garlics. They looked pretty much the same as Rising Tide's. And cost only $5.25 a pound.

"That's more like it," I said. "It appears that they're from California. And though it costs a lot more to get here than the ones locally grown, it's still much cheaper."

"This has piqued my interest," Rona said. "Let's see what they cost in Reilly's." Our local family owned and run market. So we drove to New Harbor. Their garlic was also from California and cost about the same as the supermarket's.

"One more stop," I said. "The other food market back in town that's also family run.

With time on our hands and our interest aroused, we drove back to Damariscotta to check out the garlic at a small family-run market. It was a great surprise to see theirs cost $12.50 a pound. More than two and a half times what our supermarket and local market charge.

"I wonder why," Rona asked. "Maybe they're organic. And let's see where they come from. Perhaps France?"

"No way," I said, this is not a fancy store and their carrying imported or organic garlic is unlikely.

On the box that held the garlic was a shipping label.

"Can you believe it," Rona said, "It is imported. From China."

"iPhones and T-shirts I get, but garlic from the other side of the planet? Literally, we live in a world turned upside down. And I'm sure there's nothing so special about Chinese garlic. I suspect most of it winds up in modest pizzerias all over Brooklyn."

"You have to admit," Rona said, "That they make a lot of good pizza in Brooklyn. But here's one other possibility."

"What's that?"

"They cost $12.50 a pound because Trump's put a tariff on garlic."

"If true, and he's crazy enough to have done that, forget soybeans but do worry about the fate of Italian food."

April 18, 2019--A Lot Of Nice

There's a very good pizza-by-the-slice joint we like on Sixth Avenue and 8th Street.

It's a hole-in-the-wall kind of place that used to be common in New York City until rents soared and small spaces were absorbed by big places to become drug stores and banks.

But this pizzeria hangs on because the rent is still manageable and somehow they are able to survive by charging just a dollar a slice. And so it's packed. Especially midday when mainly blue collar workers show up, leaving their vans double and triple parked, to run in to grab a couple of slices and a can of Coke, also one dollar.

But mainly people crowd in because the pizzas come right out of the oven and they are not just hot but delicious.

We were in there the other day and it wasn't packed, which is unusual. So I was able to squeeze into a place at the counter by the cash register. Rona slipped me a couple of slices and a can of Coke. She waved off a chance to have a spot of her own at the counter, preferring as a true New Yorker, to eat while standing. I no longer have the balance to do that without winding up with mozzarella dripping on my shirt. 

The can of Coke was not opened and I struggled to pop the tab. My PD at times makes this a challenge.

Pressed next to me was a tiny women whose head barely cleared the counter top. 

Without a word, she reached for my soda, which confirmed my suspicion that there was something strange about her. She snatched the Coke from the counter and I decided not to try to get it back and start what I was sure would turn into an argument. Just eat my slices and leave, I thought. I really didn't need the soda. So I turned to concentrate on my slices.

At the same moment I felt her poking my back. When I turned to look at her, really to glare at her for interfering with my eating, she pointed to the can of Coke.

"Drink, drink," she said, smiling, extending the Coke toward me, "Open, open," she said.

I realized, seeing me struggle with it, she had opened it for me. How I missed what she was doing. I felt ashamed not to understand.

Later that day we found ourselves on the number 6 subway. The car was crowded, not a seat available, but without  even looking directly at me a young man jumped from his seat and gestured that I should take it. I waved him off but he insisted. And so I sat.

Next to me was a woman who got up from her seat so Rona could sit next to me. Reluctantly, Rona took it.

Still later we needed to take the Broadway bus from 23rd Street. Again, all seats were taken but this time a middle-age women with three bulging shopping bags got up to give me her seat. I took it only after she allowed me to hold the bags on my lap.

The three of off it turned out got off at the same stop and when I said I'd take her bags for her she insisted she'd prefer to carry them. 

She got off first with Rona following and me trailing.

Standing on the street, encumbered again by her bags, she held the door for me and offered me a hand as I gingerly approached the steps. I took her hand.

Walking to out apartment, I asked Rona what was going on. "New York is a gruff place, not known for acts of kindness."

"Maybe as you're getting older you're looking a bit fragile," Rona said, smiling. "Or it could be at this less than compassionate time people are pushing back by being especially nice."

"Could be," I said, "But maybe it's more because I am getting visibly older."

"Could be," Rona said. 

She put her arm around me as we walked slowly up the street.

April 2, 2015--Religious Freedom Restoration Act

All of a sudden in Indiana they're not talking so much about the Final Four who will square off there this weekend to determine which team will win the NCAA basketball title. This in spite of the fact that institutional prestige is at stake (though why this sort of renown should be for "institutions of higher learning" is beyond me) as are big bucks--win, lose, or draw, all four teams stand to earn up to $10 million dollars each for having clawed their way to Indianapolis. (The unpaid players, by the way, come away with at most a free pair of sneakers.)

What is really at stake Down Home In Indiana is a fight for the soul of the state--whether or not they want to remain a part of the 21st century or begin to impose a theocracy just slightly more tolerant than the Religious Police in Iran would allow.

Of course I am exaggerating. The law recently passed by the state legislature, signed by potential GOP clown car Governor Mike Pence, and almost immediately condemned by various rights organizations and just as quickly endorsed by Ted Cruz, Mark Rubio, and Scott Walker (no surprises there) as well as by Jeb Bush (I guess, sadly, no surprise) would reaffirm that Indiana supports freedom of religion while at the same time wants that freedom to permit Hoosiers by the law to be able to cite religious belief as sufficient reason not to serve, among others, gay people.

Just as one pizzeria did yesterday when it announced that if you're gay there will be no pepperoni pizza for you. Because, as they proudly proclaimed, "We're a Christian establishment."

So in spite of the hemming and hawing that this law in Indiana as well as dozens of others around the country is just a simple assertion of religious liberty, it is more a measure to allow and justify overt forms of discrimination.

Do not most all states' constitutions affirm freedom of religion? Not that they or we really need that--after all, we have a Constitution that in its very First Amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting the establishment of religion or impeding the exercise of religion.

What is interesting is that the establishment of religion was an intense issue during the early years of our Republic because a number of colonies did have state-sanctioned and supported religions--official religions, if you will (as in England), and the Framers wanted to end that practice. Freedom of religious practice, which we focus on today, was in a sense a secondary matter.

Though increasingly politicians pandering to the religious right are not reluctant to assert that, "We are a Christian nation," as if we have an established religion. To me as a Jew/non-beliver this sounds like the beginning of a theocracy or, at the very least, unconstitutional.

Just as we thought the racial and cultural wars were abating (Barack Obama's election and reelection are still the best evidence for that as has been the momentum in support for same-sex marriages), here they are raging again.

In virtually all the states that have been enacting religious freedom restoration acts there has been other legislation to suppress the voting rights of low-income citizens. An unabashed strategy to make it more difficult for people of color to vote. I should say, vote for Democrats.

And just as states such as Indiana have been required by the federal courts to permit same-sex marriages, we have this spate of legislation that allows businesses to refuse service to gays and others Christian pizzerias will refuse to serve. Not that anyone who knows anything about pizza would order one in Indiana.

October 11, 2013--Midcoast: Basic Food Groups

Donuts for us are one of the three basic food groups.

They are, we have convinced ourselves, an excellent source of carbohydrates and so, to get off to a nutritious start Wednesday, we drove nearly 40 miles to Brunswick to have a tray full at Frosty's.

Forsty's is a local institution and so popular that it's essential to get there early in order to find more than a few crumbs remaining. Did I mention that they open at four? Four in the morning. This is not the time they mix the batter and preheat the ovens but when they open for business.

Since they close when they run out of donuts--which can be by as early as 9:30--to have a semblance of a selection, we determined the night before to be on the road no later than 6:30.

It was a magical drive. It had cooled down over night and there was hoar frost crusting the fields and the ponds were steaming with ground fog. Thinking about the land being crusted was yet another inducement to think about donuts and seeing the ponds steaming reminded us that Frosty's also has excellent coffee. All just 50 minutes away.

"This is crazy," Rona said, "You know how I hate to get up so early. I'm still half asleep."

"Close your eyes," I said, "As long as Sirius continues to play Beethoven quartets I'm good to drive."

"But it's so beautiful out. I should train myself to get up and out earlier."

"It makes it special, though, to have to make an effort to get to Frosty's. In many ways it's better to have them so far away. Think about what it would be like if they were in Damariscotta."

"I'd weigh 25 pound more." And with that, Rona nodded off, dreaming, I was sure, about her favorite Boston creams.

When we arrived, though we were sixth in line and I was worried they would sell all our favorites by the time we got to the counter--almost everyone ahead of us was buying at least a dozen (one person bought eight dozen--I assume for a business meeting, though up here where people can really eat, I may have been mistaken), they still had a few left of all those we had been thinking about since earlier in the week--Rona's Boston creams and my favorite glazed twists. And since we had made such an effort to get there and rationalized that we wanted to secure our full quotient of carbs, we also got a chocolate glazed, a toasted coconut, a chocolate maple glazed (with real Maine maple syrup), and, to honor the season, a pumpkin spice donut.

With tea for Rona and French roast coffee for me, the bill totaled $7.00 and we happily slipped into one of Frosty's old-fashioned wooden booths, breathed deeply, and plunged in. Literally.

We didn't speak a word to each other for at least 10 minutes, which is unusual for us. Though being at Frosty's with a tray of melt-in-yor-mouth donuts was also unusual for us--we only do this two or three times a year.

In the adjacent booth there was a couple with a box of "ten mixed," who looked, how else to put this, beatific. When I had sampled all six of ours, I couldn't resist asking which were their favorites. I needed to ask three times as they were so engrossed in their donuts.

Without taking her eyes off her donut, our neighbor, as if in a trance, said, "The glazed twists."

"Mine too," I exclaimed. "What a coincidence."

"What about others?" Rona asked, coming up for air.

"I love them all," she said. "We're from Ohio, Columbus. We've been in the area for five days and we've been to Frosty's every day. We always have a box of ten." She smiled as if in a daze.

"Pants don't fit."

"What?" Her husband had finally roused.

"Pants don't fit," he mumbled.

"Who cares," she chirped.

"I sure don't," he said.

Later that day, after doing a little antiquing at Cabot Mills and visiting the Maurice Prendergast show at the Bowdoin Art gallery, Rona said, "I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm feeling a little hungry."

"Frotsy's is just like proverbial Chinese food--you eat it and are hungry an hour later."

"It's four hours later and I admit I have an appetite."

"I'm game for anything. Do you have something in mind?"

"What about that drive-in along the Bath Road? We've noticed it before and thought to try it. I think it's appropriately called Fat Boys. They supposedly have the best BLT in Maine. I think they make it with Canadian bacon."

Indeed they do. And indeed it is noteworthy.

"Isn't bacon also one of the basic food groups?" Rona smiled, looking up blissfully from her BLT, as if to make us feel better about ourselves.

"With pizza," I noted, "being the last of them."

Later that evening, after devouring two delicious single-serving-sized Rosario's pizzas (made locally), Rona said, "Tomorrow, and for the rest of the week, we eat fish. Right? We have to G-tox."

"As I said, I'm game for anything."