A blog, mostly about my work making Jewish ritual objects, but with detours into garment making, living in New York City, cooking, and other aspects of domestic life.
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Friday is here once again
it sort of snuck up on me this week.
Dinner tonight is just the two of us at the table.
This is what is on our chicken. I was planning to make my take on the take out rotisserie chicken that my late mother in law used to buy all the time at Mauzone in Queens ( smoked, sweet and hot paprika) but as I was putting the spice mix together I sort of took a left turn and added allspice and cayenne pepper and a bit of Ethiopian Berbere seasoning to my little lavender bowl. My husband kept mentioning how great the chicken smelled the entire time it was cooking so I have high hopes for this experiment.
This particular batch of chicken bottoms from Costco must have been the football players or the body builders in the chicken yard. They are HUGE.
I cooked tonight's vegetables in the air fryer.
Last night we celebrated the 20th anniversary of Tanta Marcia and her husband Fred at Taam Tov in the Diamond District. The meal was wonderful. There is something so glorious about the love of a couple that met later in life.
I put together this bouquet as a centerpiece for the celebration.
Cathie, one pf my sewing buddies, will often purchase excellent sewing and textile related books at her local thrift store (which seems to have an extraordinary selection of sewing books) whenever she is feeling a bit blue. I thought of her today when my local thrift was having a sale on books.
I purchased this book.
It is filled with excellent easy to follow diagrams.
I agree with catie that a good sewing or other textile craft book can do a good job of chasing the blues away.
I have the feeling that some of these techniques will be put to use in the near future.
This is a love song written to the land of Israel in 1947.
Hoping that this will be a Shabbat of rest and joy and hopefully peace.
Hi Sarah, always so interesting! Love how you mentioned me so thoughtfully! I have been more distressed, due to a drowning of a friend. So I am sewing, and reading sewing-related in bed. Sewing-related books take me to that zen space, in 2 seconds flat! Stay safe! Cathie!
I also bought a couple of issues of a 1930s home and craft magazine. One arrived and the other should arrive this week. A new sewing book or magazine always lifts the spirits. Thank you for reminding me of that. The magazines are better for me than chocolate.
וְנֶאֱמָן אַתָּה לְהַחֲיוֹת מֵתִים: בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְהֹוָה מְחַיֵּה הַמֵּתִים You are faithful to restore the dead to life. Blessed are You, Adonoy, Resurrector of the dead. That particular line is recited at every single prayer service every day three times a day, unless you use a Reform or Reconstructionist prayer book . In those liturgies instead of praising God for resurrecting the dead God is praised for giving life to all. I am enough of a modern woman, a modern thinker, to not actually believe in the actual resurrection of the dead. I don't actually expect all of the residents of the Workmen's Circle section of Mount Hebron cemetery in Queens to get up and get back to work at their sewing machines. I don't expect the young children buried here or the babies buried here to one day get up and frolic. Yet, every single time I get up to lead services I say those words about the reanimating of the dead with every fiber of my being. Yesterday, I e...
A few months ago I had a craving for my father’s chicken fricassee. If my father were still alive I would have called him up and he would have talked me through the process of making it. My father is no longer alive so I turned to my cookbooks and the recipes I found for chicken fricassee were nothing at all like the stew of chicken necks, gizzards and wings in a watery sweet and sour tomato sauce that I enjoyed as a kid. I assumed that the dish was an invention of my father’s. I then attempted to replicate the dish from my memory of it and failed. A couple of weeks ago I saw an article on the internet, and I can’t remember where, that talked about Jewish fricassee and it sounded an awful lot like the dish I was hankering after. This afternoon I went to the butcher and picked up all of the chicken elements of the dish, a couple of packages each of wings, necks and gizzards. My father never cooked directly from a cook book. He used to re...
I had begun speaking to Sarah about making her a tallit in the middle of August. It took a few weeks to nail down the design. For Sarah it would have been ideal if the tallit were completed in time for her to wear it on Rosh HaShanah., the beginning of her year as senior rabbi of her congregation. For me, in an ideal world, given the realities of preparing for the High Holidays I would have finished this tallit in the weeks after Sukkot. So we compromised and I shipped off the tallit last night. I would have prefered to have more time but I got the job done in time. This tallit was made to mark Sarah's rise to the position of senior rabbi but it was also a reaction to this year of darkness. She chose a selection of verses about light to be part of her tallit. 1) אֵל נוֹרָא עֲלִילָה God of awesome deeds ( from a yom kippur Liturgical poem) 2) אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר May You shine a new light on Zion ( from the liturgy) 3) יָאֵר יְהֹ...
Hi Sarah, always so interesting! Love how you mentioned me so thoughtfully! I have been more distressed, due to a drowning of a friend. So I am sewing, and reading sewing-related in bed. Sewing-related books take me to that zen space, in 2 seconds flat! Stay safe! Cathie!
ReplyDeleteOy! Oy! Oy! such terrible news about your friend.
ReplyDeleteI also bought a couple of issues of a 1930s home and craft magazine. One arrived and the other should arrive this week. A new sewing book or magazine always lifts the spirits. Thank you for reminding me of that. The magazines are better for me than chocolate.