Our breakfast on many Sundays includes bacon, toast, and eggs – with trimmings – but most days we stick with various dry cereals, a few mixed raisin breeds, and a very good milk or a good Amish farm yoghurt (plain, occasionally with maple sugar). This formula doesn’t require planning (or thinking), it’s also fast, not unhealthy, and easy (the last not no trivial consideration when I’m cooking a full dinner every night).

Probably half-consciously revisiting my experiences living in Germany ,and other parts, instead of the American cereal breakfast I’ll sometimes have one or two confitures, with rich butter and some fresh or toasted bread, when there’s a particularly interesting loaf, or part of a loaf, in the ancient tin breadbox on the kitchen counter.

This past Thursday Barry and I both sat down to a tiny late-morning feast on that order; it was inspired by two relatively-recent gifts, wonderful homemade jams from friends.

• ‘fresh-squeezed’ orange juice from Whole Foods
• a jar of spectacularly-delicious wild strawberry jam Barry received as a gift from Lisa Steinhauser-Gleinser, artist, writer, art historian, bicyclist, and a beautiful Potsdam friend we had only known on line until she joined us and other friends to celebrate Barry’s birthday at Prater, in Berlin this spring; and a jar of homemade blackberry jam from Russ Spitkovsky, artist, founder of Carrier Pigeon, master printmaker, and the studio director (and gardner!) at Guttenberg Arts, whom we had only met on our first visit last Sunday
• slices of a fresh loaf of Sullivan Street Bakery’s ‘Commune’, which Barry had run out to get that morning
• there was coffee, espresso for me, iced espresso for Barry