The merits of the martini

It is the day after Christmas. There are still ribbons and scraps of paper on the living room floor. There's a plate of cookies on the table across from me looking distinctly picked over. I do not want to eat anything even remotely sweet. My nephew is across the table, cranky and tossing cheerios on the floor, belting out hoarse screeches every couple of seconds. My brother is trying not to listen to it, but getting increasingly irritated. Everyone else is in the basement playing wii. Even Grandpa is perfecting his golf swing on wii golf.

And I'm thinking that now might be a nice time for a martini. In the midst of all the detritis of a holiday party, I'm pretty sure there's a bottle of gin and some dry vermouth. Some olives in the back of the refrigerator? No doubt. It's been raining for two days. The lovely two feet of snow that was dropped on the DC area has all melted into a flat, gray landscape. And I'm thinking that martini might chase away some of the post-holiday blues.

So in the spirit of the season, a cold cocktail recipe for you. A classic. Like It's a Wonderful Life or twinkle lights on a Christmas tree. Just like that. Enjoy.

Classic martini
While the recipe is a classic, the gin is not. This gin has an entirely different taste from something like Tanqueray- it's a bit like cucumber. And I love it. So, see what you think. It isn't cheap, but it's worth it.

2 oz. Hendrick's gin
splash of dry vermouth
three olives

Add gin and vermouth to cocktail shaker along with a handful of ice. Shake vigorously - I figure it's ready when my fingers stick to the shaker. Strain into a martini glass. Garnish with the three olives speared on a toothpick or a slice of cucumber. And to be honest, I don't measure the gin. It's probably a little more than 2 oz. It is the holidays, after all.

Photo by Ralph.

Apple Days II

  Cluster of apples in Champlain Orchards.

 Glaucous bloom.

11 gallons of newly pressed apple cider
8 pounds of raw honey
3 pounds of Thompson raisins
1 peck of pears
1 cup of mulled cider
and a drizzly, dark, damp Saturday afternoon

yields

3 glass carboys of cider sitting on our kitchen floor, ready to ferment
and pear sauce, coming soon.

Cider siphoned out of the carboy for tasting.

 Dissolving honey in warm cider.

The Pleasures of Afternoon Coffee

So I went through a bout this spring of not drinking coffee. I've never been a heavy coffee drinker, one cup in the morning, every morning. That's not terrible, right? Well, not drinking it certainly was terrible. Horrible headaches everyday for a week that hit right in the middle of my usual afternoon slump. On an ordinary day, the two o'clock hour is hard for me. I lose focus, start drifting, and generally have a minor crisis of motivation. Lack of caffeine added what felt like a ten ton hammer knocking on my brain to that ordinary hiccup in my day.

But here I am, back to my wicked caffeinated ways, drinking a cup every morning. And my drive into work is once again enjoyably contemplative as my brain slowly comes to life. But what I want to talk about now is the afternoon cup. The cup that I'll occasionally reach for when those afternoon lulls hit. And how much better it always tastes when it's summertime and hot in my second floor office and the coffee is iced. Like on a Friday afternoon when things are quiet and warm and the fan pushes the air around sluggishly, not cooling off much. Like today, for instance.

I'm not shy about sharing. I'll freely pull colleagues into the lure of the afternoon jolt. And this afternoon's caffeine produced brilliant results in the form of the following brainstorm: coffee ice cubes. Yup, you got it. Is the genius of this idea apparent to you yet? I bet it is if you've had your afternoon caffeine. No waiting for the coffee to cool before pouring it over ice and no watery coffee those times when you can't wait. Brilliant. I'm giddy with anticipation. Or maybe that's just caffeine.

Deer in the Strawberries

This is the first year of eating our own strawberries from the garden and the thrill of finding new bright red berries among the leaves is definitely worth the year-long wait before you get fruit. Yesterday was the first real harvest and we ate half of it before I could take this picture. The plants look lovely, very upright and vibrantly green.

Apparently, the deer think the plants look like dinner. We went out yesterday to find that all the tops of the outermost row of plants had been munched. This has happened often enough in my life as a gardener that I no longer experience the sense of utter despair that first came when I discovered that a groundhog thought my unfenced garden was his pasture of plenty but it still makes me grind my teeth. We knew it was coming and we knew we were tempting fate by not putting a fence up right away. So here we are, contemplating a Saturday of digging post holes and running fence line instead of the bike ride we had planned.

But those strawberries are worth it. We made drinks yesterday afternoon with dark rum and tonic and mashed strawberries and swung in the hammock that Ralph gave me for my birthday while we enjoyed them. The strawberries soaked up the rum and were just about the best part of the day. We might try strawberry mojitos this evening- the mint plant on the deck is growing so fast I almost expect to see it unfurling new leaves as I watch. We'll deserve it after digging all those post holes.