Bluefish. I had convinced myself that I could prepare it without using the oven. We hadn’t enjoyed it as an entrée in almost a year, which certainly eliminated the boredom factor (always a concern when you’re cooking fish several times a week, and it’s almost always local).

It was the first time I had used the recipe, and I don’t know where I found it, but I had printed it some time ago, with the caption, “‘Provincetown Bluefish’ (spicy)”. I was surely attracted to the reference to the Cape paradise whose culture was still very Portuguese when I first played there 50 years ago.

The single fillet I brought home on Saturday weighed about 18 ounces, far more than I would normally want for the two of us, but it was the smallest one in the stall on Saturday, it was, as always, inexpensive, and this superb pelagic fish sport fish is a very healthy choice, and currently a sustainable one.

Bluefish needs some kind of distraction to perform on the plate at its best. Usually that means some form of acid, and tomatoes are the most common. This time the distraction was provided by a lot of spice (although not the fiery kind), and some sweet peppers rendered a little more pungent with a little anchovy, and a little more sweet with a drizzle of balsamic vinegar.

• one 18-ounce skinned bluefish fillet from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, rinsed, halved, dried, coated on the flesh side with a mix of 1/2 tablespoon of Spanish Dolce Pimentón, 1/2 tablespoon of freshly-ground black pepper, 1/2 teaspoon of Jamaica cayenne, and 1/2 teaspoon of dried thyme (from a bottle just opened), sautéed in a large, heavy, tin-lined oval copper pan for 4 or 5 minutes on each side, on the coated side first, removed and placed on or adjacent to an accompaniment of sautéed peppers which had already been prepared
• eight small multi-colored bell peppers from Stokes Farm, washed, seeded, and julienned, sautéed inside a large seasoned cast iron pan with a little olive oil, stirring until they had become soft, 2 large salted anchovies (rinsed) added and cooked until they were dissolved, the pan removed from the heat and 2 teaspoons of balsamic vinegar added and stirred in [note: the amounts of all the ingredients could be doubled if there is no other vegetable]
• three large red ‘new potatoes’ from Norwich Meadows Farm boiled in well-salted water, drained, dried in the still-warm glass pot, quartered, rolled in a little olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, sprinkled with chopped parsley from Phillips Farm and chopped summer savory from Stokes Farm
• the wine was an Italian (Sicily) white, Catarratto ‘Vigna del Masso’, Feudo Montoni 2015
• the music was Henry Desmarest’s 1697 opera, ‘Venus & Adonis’, Christophe Rousset directing Les Talens Lyriques and the National Opera of Lorraine Chorus

I was about to pick out a couple of gorgeous pink mako shark steaks at the Pura Vida Fisheries greenmarket stand when I noticed some beautiful triggerfish fillets in a bucket nearby.  Paul and his wife also seemed more excited by the latter, visitors found in local waters far more rarely than the shark. That fact, together with my memory of our having really enjoyed triggerfish on the one occasion I had prepared it, won the day – and last night’s meal. Triggerfish it would be.

By the way, triggerfish is subtly sweet (they dine on crustaceans) and the texture of the fillets alone would put it in a class by itself: unlike that of any other fish I can think of right now, the flesh is both quite firm and beautifully flaky when cooked properly. The picture above suggests as much, but out of sight is the ease with which I was able to run the fillets over, and then remove them to the plates.

The sweet potato greens however were entirely new to me. I had tasted them raw at some time in the week before, and I thought they were pretty wonderful, but that moment I had already bagged all the vegetables I needed.

On Friday, as soon as I spotted these beauties I knew what I would serve with the triggerfish. They’re probably delicious in almost any state of cooking, from raw to par-boiled and sautéed, and I’m going to try to find out for sure whether that’s the case, with what I expect will be repeat purchases. My only concern would be dealing with the stems, since they don’t soften as quickly as the leaves. On the other hand, a certain amount of chewiness isn’t really a problem for me.

• four 3-ounce triggerfish fillets from Pura Vida Fisheries, rinsed, dried, seasoned with salt and freshly-ground black pepper, sautéed inside a large, heavy oval, tin-lined cooper pan in olive oil over medium-high heat for only about 90 seconds on each side, removed to 2 plates, drizzled with a little fresh organic lemon juice, immediately sprinkled with chopped fresh dill from Keith’s Farm, with more dill tossed into the pan along with a few drops of olive oil, pushed around with a narrow wooden spatula, those juices then drizzled over the fish
• a third of a pound of sweet potato greens from Alewife Farm, washed, drained, sautéed, then briefly covered until wilted inside an oval enameled, cast iron pot in olive oil in which one chopped garlic and a small amount of slivered cherry bomb/red bomb pepper from Norwich Meadows Farm had first been softened, seasoned with salt and pepper, sprinkled with a little organic lemon juice, and drizzled with olive oil
• 2 tiny new potatoes (probably red Norland) from Central Valley Farm, boiled, drained, dried in the pan, rolled in olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and scattered with chopped lovage from Keith’s Farm
• one yellow heirloom tomato from Eckerton Hill Farm, cut into bite-size pieces, mixed with good Campania olive oil, Maldon salt and freshly-ground pepper, a few drops of white balsamic vinegar, and torn bits of basil leaves from Keith’s Farm, served in oval dishes at the side of the plates
• the wine was a California (Lodi) white, Karen Birmingham Sauvignon Blanc Lodi 2015
• the music was 2 early nineteenth-century works by Nicholas von Krufft, in the album, ‘Sonatas For Bassoon And Fortepiano’, with Wouter Verschuren’s 1810 Cuvillier bassoon, and Kathryn Cok playing a copy of an 1805 Walther and Sohn fortepiano

Peppers aborted, then redeemed.

We like hot peppers, and we can normally take the heat, but earlier this week one variety new to us turned out to be far more fiery than anything we had experienced before.  Neither of us was able to finish a small appetizer plate of this pepper (something like a Padron or Shishito), which I had served as an appetizer for this meal, and then had to abort most of it. But I didn’t want to give up on those remaining on the plate, thinking at the time, if too much of a good thing is not so good, just the right amount of a good thing might be very good. I thought that the peppers should have a second chance, this time subsumed into a frittata with other, far tamer ingredients, making an ordinary dish more complex, and delicious, than it would be without them. I put the remaining peppers, as they were (already-sautéed and salted), into the refrigerator next to a small bowl of some plain, cooked penne remaining from another meal 2 nights before.

Last night it finally all came together.

• one large garlic clove from Keith’s Farm, sliced, sautéed slowly inside a 10″ seasoned cast iron pan in a little olive oil with some sliced red scallions from Rise & Root Farm until both were softening and fragrant, a handful of small hot green peppers from Campo Rosso Farm which had been sautéed in oil a few days before, and some cooked Setaro Penne Rigatoni (the equivalent of 4 ounces of dried pasta), halved in its lengths with a kitchen shears, both stirred in the pan and heated, followed by a mixture of 8 eggs from Millport Dairy Farm which had been whipped with 3 tablespoons of the pasta water, sea salt, freshly-ground pepper, and a mix of chopped herbs (parsley, lovage, tarragon, savory, thyme, and mint), and when that had been settled, torn basil from Keith’s Farm scattered over the egg mixture and 6 slices of one large, ripe heirloom tomato from Eckerton Hill Farm placed on top, the frittata allowed to cook slowly on top of the stove until the outer layer of egg had set, when it was placed in a broiler for barely a couple of minutes, or until the center was no longer runny, removed, scattered with some beautiful micro radish greens from Two Guys from Woodbridge and allowed to cool for a few minutes before serving, supported by an iron trivet on the counter, when it was sprinkled lightly with a very good Campania olive oil
• the wine was a California (Lodi) white, S + A Verdelho Calveras County 2015 [this vintage is now out of stock; the link is to the 2014]
• the music was Antonio Salieri’s 1785 opera, ‘La Grotta Di Trofonio’, in a performance of Christophe Rousset, Les Talens Lyriques, and the Lausanne Theatre Municipal Opera Chorus 

Sicily.

It was a Sicilian meal, well, creatively Sicilian. Calamari are definitely a Sicilian thing, and the wine was Sicilian. Lots of herbs familiar in Sicilian cooking showed up, like oregano (here from the Madonie Mountains, Sicily); basil (the Hudson Highlands, in New York); and there’s no dispute about the importance of anything fennel in Sicily, here fennel flowers (the Catskill Mountains, New York); there was olive oil of course (not from Sicily, but at least from southern Italy, Puglia; there was pepperoncino (the plains of Turri, Sardinia, the next island north of Sicily), and there was garlic (New York again); lemon was important (here the California Central Valley?); and there were also tomatoes (very Sicilian – via Spain – even if these came from the area in New Jersey the Delaware culture called, Tuphanne [cold water], today’s Old Tappan); there was one large zucchini, or at least a relative of the zucchini (this one grown in the Green Mountains of Vermont); finally, the northern Italian radiccchio of which there are some traces in Sicily, at least these days (had that not been the case, this little Sicily conceit would have been a deceit; the radicchio I used came from the our own north, that same farm in those same Green Mountains).

As for the dessert, peaches are Italian, although the 2 we had were from the Marlboro Mountains in New York (the farm is owned by an Italian-American family).

 

*Chicories are grown in Sicilian gardens, even though they appear to have been an invention, or re-invention of the north of Italy.

 

• a large enameled cast iron pan heated until quite hot, its cooking surface brushed with olive oil, and, while the oil was hot, about 13 ounces of rinsed and dried squid from Blue Moon Fish in the Union Square Greenmarket, bodies and tentacles, arranged very quickly in it, immediately sprinkled with some super-pungent dried Sicilian oregano from Buon Italia and part of a crushed dried Sicilian pepperoncino, also from Buon Italia, followed by drizzling a few tablespoons of juice from an organic lemon and some olive oil, the pan placed inside a pre-heated 400º oven and roasted for 4-5 minutes, removed, distributed onto 2 plates, and drizzled with the cooking juices, pieces of lemon served on the side

piccolo squash in the market; trifolati minutes before removed from the heat

 

• a luscious, re-imagined classic summer-squash-and-tomato trifolati made by sautéing chopped pieces of an egg-shape piccolo summer squash (or ‘round green squash’) from Tamarack Hollow Farm with 2 sliced garlic cloves from Alewife Farm inside a large enameled cast iron pan, until the squash began to brown, followed by some of ‘the best cherry tomatoes‘, from Stokes Farm, along with salt and pepper, stirred well and cooked for 5 minutes, during which time pieces cut or torn from the core of a head of radicchio from Tamarack Hollow Farm were gradually added, the thicker parts first, the pan removed from the heat and some basil from Sycamore Farm, torn, added, the vegetables drizzled with olive oil, covered, and allowed to sit for 10 minutes to half of an hour or so [the recipe appears in “Italian Too Easy“], served on the plates sprinkled with fragrant fennel blossoms from Mountain Sweeet Berry Farm
• the wine was an Italian (Sicily) white, Grillo, Ca’ Lustra di Zanovello, from Astor Wines & Spirits
• the music was Antonio Vivaldi’s 1728 opera, ‘L’Atenaide’, in a brilliant performance by Modo Antiquo, directed by Federico Maria Sardelli

The very good Melissa Clark salmon recipe I’ve been using lately really needs a few hours of lead time for its marinade to do its job properly, and last night I didn’t have any lead time at all.  I turned instead to a Mark Bittman recipe, ‘Four-Spice Salmon’, which I have found equally good. I’ve used it several times, although not since the beginning of last year. It too involves a ‘rub’, but it’s one which requires no waiting.

• a 14-ounce fillet of fresh wild Coho salmon from Whole Foods, seasoned with salt and pepper, rubbed with a mixture of ground coriander seeds, ground cloves, ground cumin, and grated nutmeg, sautéed over medium-high heat for a few minutes on each side in an enameled, cast iron pan [a little squeeze of lemon would normally be appropriate here, and maybe a drizzleof good olive oil, but I neglected to do either last night]
• thin yellow beans (haricots jaune/fagioli gialli) from Norwich Meadows Farm, boiled in a large pot of salted water until barely softened, drained, heated in the same pan to dry, then set aside until warmed up, when the salmon began to cook, in a cast iron pan, with a small amount of  olive oil and some dried ramp blossoms (for a mild, complex, garlic-like effect) from Berried Treasures earlier this year, then seasoned with salt and pepper, and mixed with a handful of ‘Mexican gherkins’, from Norwich Meadows Farm, which had been halved and sautéed in a separate pan until they had barely begun to color on the edges, evrything sprinkled, once on the plates, with fennel flowers from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm
• a small handful of  ‘the best cherry tomatoes’, from Stokes Farm, halved, sautéed very briefly in olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, a mix of chopped herbs (parsley, lovage, tarragon, savory, thyme, and mint) stirred into the small vintage pyrex pan in which they had been heated
• a little wild water cress from Max Creek Hatchery, dressed with a good Campania olive oil, maldon salt and ground tellicherry pepper
• the wine was an Austrian (Kamptal) rosé, Schloss Gobelsburg Schlosskellerei Cistercien Rosé 2015
• the music was Matthew Locke’s 1675 ‘dramatick opera’, “Psyche’, performed by the New London Consort and the New London Consort Chorus, directed by Philip Pickett

Only after I had plated fish and the vegetables did it occur to me that they would have looked so much better had I thought ahead and included some color, like any one or more of the tomatoes in various colors sitting on the window sill across from the table. Still, even unembellished, the entrée was scrumptious; I don’t think it could have been improved.

Porgy is a magnificent fish, as I’ve written here before, and these pale-green long eggplants (I did not get their name from the farmer, but I will ask) were incredibly juicy and sweet.

 

• two 5 1/2-ounce Porgy fillets from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, dried, seasoned with salt and pepper, pan-seared, along with a thinly-sliced red scallions from Rise & Root Farm, over medium heat inside an oval copper pan in a bit of butter and a little olive oil, the fish basted, using a small brush, with the the scallion butter and oil for about 2 minutes, more or less continually, then carefully turned over, the heat reduced to low, a cover (I used aluminum foil) placed on the pan and the filets cooked for about another minute before the cover was removed and 2 or 3 tablespoons of mixed fresh herbs thrown in (I used parsley, lovage, tarragon, savory, thyme, and mint this time), after which the basting continued for about another minute, or until the fish was cooked through, at which time the fillets were arranged on the 2 plates, and a small handful of stemmed oxalis from Alewife Farm was thrown into the pan, stirred for a few seconds, scooped up with the juices and sprinkled on top (the recipe has been slightly modified from one written by Melissa Clark)
• three medium long pale-green eggplants from Campo Rosso Farm, split lengthwise, scored, brushed with a mixture of oil, finely-chopped garlic from Keith’s Farm, and chopped fresh budding oregano from Stokes Farm, seasoned with salt and pepper, pan-grilled for a few minutes, turning once, then sprinkled with fennel flowers from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm [the basic recipe is here]

 

There was fruit, for a simple dessert.

• six small green figs (unfortunately, their origin unknown) from Eataly

 

• the wine throughout the meal was a South African (Paarl) white, J. Joostenberg Estate Die Agteros Chenin Blanc 2015, purchased at Chelsea Wine Vault
• the music included symphonies/sinfonias by Franz Josef Haydn and WIlhelm Friedmann Bach, performed by Giovanni Antonini conducting Il Giardino Armonico

Until the night before cooking this meal I hadn’t thought about the fact that there had been no meat entrée on our table in almost 2 weeks. It was probably my thinking about the purple carrots I had bought a few days earlier that made me think I should prepare something, with a little substance than seafood, a frittata, or a light pasta, something, well,.. ‘meaty’.

Just before the meal I found myself extending the idea of ‘substantial’ to thoughts about a sauce, something I rarely do to the very simple recipe I regularly use.

Some of you may know of and even share my interest in ‘garum‘ (at least from afar). It seems I may have tripped over a vegetable near-equivalent, although one with a taste far less difficult to acquire. Just about a week before this meal I had served a flounder fillet with a ‘tomato butter’. I did not use all of the tomato sauce, so I put what remained in the refrigerator, sealed, later adding to it more seasoned heirloom tomato juices, produced in preparing a later meal (I’m no longer sure which one).

Last night I tasted this still-curing little treasure, and decided it would definitely work with the duck.

 

To introduce the meal, there was the most minimal of appetizers, as an excuse to enjoy the remainder of a bottle of wine we had started the night before.

• terrific rustic Italian breadsticks, Mario Fongo grissini integrali, from Buon Italia
• the wine was a New Mexico (Sierra County) sparkling rosé, Gruet Brut Rosé

 

• one 13-ounce boneless duck breast from Hudson Valley Duck Farm, the fatty side scored in cross hatching with a very sharp knife, the entire breast then sprinkled with a mixture of sea salt, freshly-ground pepper, and a little turbinado sugar (in our kitchen, the bowl of sugar has been infused over time with a vanilla bean), the duck left standing for 45 minutes or so before it was pan-fried, fatty side down first, in a tiny bit of oil over medium heat, usually draining the oil part of the way through (to be strained and used in cooking later, if desired), but I decided not to this time, removed when medium rare and cut into 2 portions to check for doneness (that is, not so done), left to sit for several minutes before finishing it with a drizzle of organic lemon, a coating of ‘tomato butter’ [described above], a sprinkling of oxalis from Alewife Farm, and drops of a very good Campania olive oil (the tenderloin, removed earlier from the breast and also marinated, is always fried very briefly near the end of the time the breast itself is cooking)
• wild watercress from Max Creek Hatchery, dressed with the Campania olive oil, salt, and pepper

 

In the photograph at the top of this post the carrots look charred, in reality, it’s an attribute of their color[s] (that is, purple outside, lighter, almost orange, inside, before they are cooked), a little intentional caramelizing on their edges, and the available light.

 

• purple carrots from Paffenroth Farms, scrubbed, lightly-scraped with a paring knife, cut into small diagonal pieces, and, to avoid a hot oven last night, sautéed until tender on top of the range in a large seasoned cast iron frying pan, some sea salt added while doing so, then sprinkled with freshly-ground pepper and served scattered with fennel flowers from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm
• the wine with the main course was a California (North Coast) red, the gift of a friend, Cartlidge & Browne Merlot 2013

• the music for most of the meal was the album, ‘Miklos Rozsa’s Double Life: Concert Music For Strings’

We eat at home almost every night, but it was an anniversary, so we had made dinner reservations for Saturday night, at a restaurant in Bushwick which we had really liked on a previous visit. A few hours before we were to leave the apartment, knowing we would have to battle some mean heat and humidity before we got there, we decided to continue enjoying our good humor and cancel, vowing to do it another day.

We had done without it all day, but I now turned the AC on in the kitchen and breakfast room area, then checked the refrigerator and the larder to see what I could put together.

I came up with something that, under those circumstances, really had no right to taste as good as it did.

• a caprese salad which repeated the process of the night before, but on a much smaller scale, and this time included a ‘bed’ of leaves from a head of radicchio from Tamrack Hollow Farm
• slices of a loaf of Bien Cuit ‘Campagne’ from Foragers Market

 

• about 8 ounces of Setaro Penne Rigatoni, from Buon Italia, tossed with a sauce which started with 2 chopped garlic cloves from Alewife Farm and a tablespoon or so of dry fennel seed heated in olive oil inside a large cast iron enameled pot until fragrant, adding a little cherry bomb/red bomb pepper from Norwich Meadows Farm, finely slivered, and a couple handfuls of seeded and chopped sweet peppers of various colors and shapes from Campo Rosso Farm, were sautéed until softened, finished with one good-sized, bulbous red scallion from Rise & Root Farm, sliced, again sautéed until soft, the mix emulsified with some of the reserved pasta cooking water, then scooped into bowls, and garnished with micro bronze fennel from Two Guys from Woodbridge

 

• the wine was a New Mexico (Sierra County) sparkling rosé, Gruet Brut Rosé
• the music was Antonio Vivaldi’s very silly, but absolutely beautiful 1731 opera, ‘La Fida Ninfa’

We had a pretty special guest for dinner. The meal had to be special too.

I expected the evening was going to be warm, and at least a little humid, but I wanted us to be able to sit by the open windows next to the roof garden; at least some of the meal plan had to address the subject of kitchen heat.

There would have been a first course in any event, and it would be one which did not require cooking, but since the fish I had purchased were slightly smaller than I would have liked, and because there were suddenly more perfectly-ripe tomatoes sitting on the windowsill than I had expected, it ended up a wee bit larger than I would normally have set out.

I had picked up some black sea bass at the market that morning, because I love the fish, and I was pretty sure our guest would too. It also had the attribute, at least as I have always prepared it, of requiring only about 3 or 4 minutes of direct heat, and that entirely on top of the stove.

I chose the vegetable which would accompany the fish, thin green beans, both for their freshness and beauty and the fact that they could be parboiled well ahead of time, avoiding heating up the kitchen around the time we would be sitting down (they were very briefly reheated over a low flame just before serving)

We hung around in the parlor before the meal, nibbling on some very good whole wheat rustic Italian breadsticks from Buon Italia, and sipping some very good sparkling wine, with an awesome color.

• the wine was a California (Lodi) sparkling, Folk Tree Pétillant California Sparkling Wine 2014

 

• a caprese salad, asembled with various kinds of heirloom tomatoes from from Campo Rosso Farm, very fresh store-made mozzarella from Eataly, basil leaves from Sycamore Farm, Maldon salt, freshly-ground Tellicherry pepper, and a Campania olive oil, D.O.P. Penisola Sorrentina ‘Syrenum’
• a superb bread, a baguette monge, from Maison Kayser
• the wine was an Italian (Sardinia) white, La Cala Vermentino di Sardegna 2014

 

• three 5-ounce sea bass fillets from Pura Vida Fisheries, dredged in seasoned coarse stone-ground flour which had been spread across a plate, then dipped in a mixture of one egg from Millport Dairy Farm which had been whipped with a few tablespoons of chopped parsley from Stokes Farm, sautéed for a couple of minutes in a mixture of butter and olive oil inside a heavy enameled cast iron pan pan, skin side down first, then turned, sautéed for little more than another minute (until the fish was cooked through; the time will vary each time with the size of the fillets and the height of the flame), removed from the pan and placed on 3 plates, the heat below the pan now turned off, and the juices remaining in the pan scattered with some oxalis aka ‘wood sorrel’ from Alewife Farm (the stems first removed) and pushed around with a wooden spatula for a moment, the juices then divided on top of the three fillets, finishing with a squeeze of an organic lemon from Whole Foods, and, finally, the bass dressed with more (fresh) oxalis leaves
• haricots verts from Lucky Dog Organic Farm, left whole, blanched, drained and dried in the pan over heat, shaking, set aside until just before sautéing of the bass was to begin, reheated in oil, finished with salt, pepper, and stemmed fennel flowers from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm
• the wine was a California (Lodi) rosé, Karen Birmingham Rosé Lodi 2015

There was a cheese course; it included a fruit.

• There were 4 great cheeses, all from Consider Bardwell Farm: ‘Manchester’, a goat cheese, ‘Pawlet’, a rich cow milk cheese, and their 2 new-ish blues, ‘Barden Blue’, a cow cheese, and an awesome goat blue which has not yet been named (although I’ve suggested they call it ‘Wellen’)
• ripe green figs from Eataly (the store, remarkably, could not tell me where they had been grown)
• the wine was a California (Central Coast) rosé, Keith Hock Exit 43 California Bollicine in Bianco 2014

 

• the music throughout a long meal was mostly that of Johann Christian Bach; one of the albums was the 6 early Symphonies, published in 1765, performed by Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields

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