52.51... Our Lady of the Pie Plates
When I was in grad school my friend Alan Sugar, who is a poet as well as a puppeteer, wrote a poem called "Our Lady of the Pie Plates"... or maybe it was "Madonna of the Pie Plates". It came to me handwritten as a gift with a framed copy of the photograph that had inspired it... a lovely and genteel "scarecrow" made from a delicate lace tablecloth and a straw hat. She held a bouquet of orange daylilies in one hand, and dangling from both extended arms were aluminum pie plates, assumedly to ward off any birds or other creatures with a mind to raid the garden she watched o'er.
If I recall correctly he'd written the poem as a birthday present, and I remember thinking that he was one of the few people at the time who really understood how much "pie plates & such" are at the core of my being.
I know the saying is "you are what you eat" but I've always thought in my case it's more "you are what you cook". Matt observed recently that whenever I walk into his house I head straight for the kitchen. I was about to protest, but quickly realized he's right. When I arrive there for the weekend, or in the middle of the week, I'm invariably carrying a bag full of groceries, or containers of soup, or something else that needs to be put away in the fridge or the pantry. And fairly often I've also stashed in my satchel some necessary utensil or ingredient; a rolling pin, a whisk, some smoked salt, a citrus zester, once my extra hand-held blender. I cook more and more at his house, so ever-so-slowly my arsenal of kitchen gadgets has been migrating from Somerville to Watertown. Not to worry that my kitchen at home is depleted... I have enough "implements de cuisine" to keep several cooks busy. If I ever decide to open a restaurant I'm all set.
As older family members- or the family of friends- die I'm usually the one who ends up claiming items from their kitchens. That's how I've gotten some of my best rolling pins (I have eight of them), potato mashers and ricers, strainers, piecrust crimpers, and wooden spoons. It's also how I come to have the original colored pyrex nesting mixing bowls, a clamp-on-the-table meat grinder (essential for making cranberry relish), and my heavy candy-apple red juice-o-matic.... all things that others are spending a fortune for reproductions of at emporiums like William Sonoma and Sur La Table. I believe I'm the only one in my circle of friends with nine cookie sheets. It's true I don't have a fancy Cuisinart or KitchenAide Mixer- though Matt got me a shiny new food processor for Christmas!!!- but I have my grandmother's Ipana hand mixer, my great grandmother's battered tin turkey roaster, a slew of butter molds, and the biggest buncha antique cookie cutters you've ever seen in the home of someone who uses them rather than collects 'em..
That's not to say I've never bought a gadget myself. When I saw a "soup tasting spoon" like my friend Alice's-there's a channel in the handle where you rock some soup back and forth until it's cool enough to test it for seasoning- I bought it quick. And I'm a sucker for small canape knives so I finally got myself a set. But more often than not they're gifts from friends who know me well. Last year my cooking buddy Dave got me a set of oblong tart pans that he knew I was lusting after, and for Christmas this year my housemate John brought tears to my eyes when he presented me with a beautiful and expensive wooden-handled long bent-metal spatula to replace my grandmother's which I'd been using for 30 years, and which had succumbed to metal fatigue. I'd been in mourning for months without it. The new one looks to be a perfect replacement.
I suppose most folks think it's silly, but that Mexican Hot Chocolate Stir is an old friend of mine. I have a hard time making mashed potatoes with anything but the half-moon masher I used when my grandfather taught me to mash 'em. And I'm still trying to figure out whose house I left that stainless steel slotted spoon at because nothing else feels right in my hand when I make three bean salad. You get the idea.
Oh, and even after years of leaving them half full at other people's houses, I still have 12 tins for making pies each fall. "Our Lady of the Pie Plates" indeed.
Highest I know of on Explore!... #59 on 1.8.08
52.51... Our Lady of the Pie Plates
When I was in grad school my friend Alan Sugar, who is a poet as well as a puppeteer, wrote a poem called "Our Lady of the Pie Plates"... or maybe it was "Madonna of the Pie Plates". It came to me handwritten as a gift with a framed copy of the photograph that had inspired it... a lovely and genteel "scarecrow" made from a delicate lace tablecloth and a straw hat. She held a bouquet of orange daylilies in one hand, and dangling from both extended arms were aluminum pie plates, assumedly to ward off any birds or other creatures with a mind to raid the garden she watched o'er.
If I recall correctly he'd written the poem as a birthday present, and I remember thinking that he was one of the few people at the time who really understood how much "pie plates & such" are at the core of my being.
I know the saying is "you are what you eat" but I've always thought in my case it's more "you are what you cook". Matt observed recently that whenever I walk into his house I head straight for the kitchen. I was about to protest, but quickly realized he's right. When I arrive there for the weekend, or in the middle of the week, I'm invariably carrying a bag full of groceries, or containers of soup, or something else that needs to be put away in the fridge or the pantry. And fairly often I've also stashed in my satchel some necessary utensil or ingredient; a rolling pin, a whisk, some smoked salt, a citrus zester, once my extra hand-held blender. I cook more and more at his house, so ever-so-slowly my arsenal of kitchen gadgets has been migrating from Somerville to Watertown. Not to worry that my kitchen at home is depleted... I have enough "implements de cuisine" to keep several cooks busy. If I ever decide to open a restaurant I'm all set.
As older family members- or the family of friends- die I'm usually the one who ends up claiming items from their kitchens. That's how I've gotten some of my best rolling pins (I have eight of them), potato mashers and ricers, strainers, piecrust crimpers, and wooden spoons. It's also how I come to have the original colored pyrex nesting mixing bowls, a clamp-on-the-table meat grinder (essential for making cranberry relish), and my heavy candy-apple red juice-o-matic.... all things that others are spending a fortune for reproductions of at emporiums like William Sonoma and Sur La Table. I believe I'm the only one in my circle of friends with nine cookie sheets. It's true I don't have a fancy Cuisinart or KitchenAide Mixer- though Matt got me a shiny new food processor for Christmas!!!- but I have my grandmother's Ipana hand mixer, my great grandmother's battered tin turkey roaster, a slew of butter molds, and the biggest buncha antique cookie cutters you've ever seen in the home of someone who uses them rather than collects 'em..
That's not to say I've never bought a gadget myself. When I saw a "soup tasting spoon" like my friend Alice's-there's a channel in the handle where you rock some soup back and forth until it's cool enough to test it for seasoning- I bought it quick. And I'm a sucker for small canape knives so I finally got myself a set. But more often than not they're gifts from friends who know me well. Last year my cooking buddy Dave got me a set of oblong tart pans that he knew I was lusting after, and for Christmas this year my housemate John brought tears to my eyes when he presented me with a beautiful and expensive wooden-handled long bent-metal spatula to replace my grandmother's which I'd been using for 30 years, and which had succumbed to metal fatigue. I'd been in mourning for months without it. The new one looks to be a perfect replacement.
I suppose most folks think it's silly, but that Mexican Hot Chocolate Stir is an old friend of mine. I have a hard time making mashed potatoes with anything but the half-moon masher I used when my grandfather taught me to mash 'em. And I'm still trying to figure out whose house I left that stainless steel slotted spoon at because nothing else feels right in my hand when I make three bean salad. You get the idea.
Oh, and even after years of leaving them half full at other people's houses, I still have 12 tins for making pies each fall. "Our Lady of the Pie Plates" indeed.
Highest I know of on Explore!... #59 on 1.8.08