Last Day of School

Lucky kids - they're now on summer vacation!

My daughter is officially done with her Sophomore year and can now be considered a Junior. Woo-hoo! To celebrate, we headed out to Misty Moonlight Diner in Pittsfield. We also happened to celebrate her 8th grade graduation here, so I'm sensing a trend.

Misty is one of those sock hop style diners with the checkerboard floors, formica tables, naugahyde chairs with metal legs, and oldies playing in the background.

They especially rock because they SERVE BREAKFAST ALL DAY! This is tops in my book. They also serve dinner all day. The menu is meant to have something for just about anyone. They even have blue plate specials - meatloaf, roast beef, roast turkey, pot roast - served with mashed potatoes and gravy, a roll and a salad.

You can also choose from a variety of appetizers and small plates, like quesadilla, potato skins, buffalo wings, hummus and veggies, etc. Then, of course, a selection of burgers, wraps, hot sandwiches, salads, etc. Really...you can get just about any American style entree you might be hankerin' for here.

We finally settled on...

• Daughter: HOT buffalo wings with bleu cheese dressing and veggie sticks; they ended up being a little hotter than expected, but she still loved them.
• Friend: Fried shrimp plate with french fries and coleslaw; it came with both cocktail and tartar sauces. The coleslaw recipe was good - seemed like the sauce had mayo, vingar, sugar, and salt...didn't detect any horseradish, and very thinly shredded and very fresh cabbage.
• Me: Hot roast beef sandwich with plenty of gravy and fries; I don't buy white bread in stores, but this sandwich MUST be served on soft and gooey white bread. I could have used a little more gravy, because I'm nuts about it. I dunked my fries in my daughter's bleu cheese dressing - mighty tasty.

So, I go off to work tomorrow at 7 am and my daughter stays home to sleep until noon, and then rest afterward. Ah...the life!

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Photo Expedition - Route 22

On Mother's Day, my daughter lets me choose the locale, and we head out on a photo expedition. This means taking a camera along, with plenty of charged batteries, and seeking out beautiful photo opportunities and taking hundreds of shots. It's fun, creative, and helps us look at things a little more closely and with an eye toward framing a great shot.

This year, we decided to head south down scenic Route 22 just over the border in New York. Here's what we found as we meandered along

(NOTE: I can't figure out how to slow down this slide show. If it's running too fast, just hover over it until the control buttons appear, then click Pause. You'll be able to continue playing it when you're ready, or use the arrows to view one photo at a time.):



We had a lovely meal (late lunch, early dinner) at the quaint and cozy Hillsdale Crossroads Diner. It was pleasant inside, with friendly servers, interesting old farm implements hanging from the ceiling, and the requisite aluminum diner backsplash. They serve breakfast all day (hallelujah!), so I had my favorite corned beef hash and poached eggs. My daughter had the special - popcorn shrimp and fries.



After that, we turned around and headed home again...still finding many great shots along the way. And, we still made it home with plenty of time to spare for uploading photos and creating slideshows!

PS - If you head out on one of these rural road trips, be sure to gas up the car ahead of time, pack water bottles and snacks, and bring cash! It can often be quite some time before you can get these items. We ended up needing cash to pay for our meal, as the restaurant didn't take cards, so went to the nearby gas station ATM. It only could dispense ONE $20 bill!
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Sanguine Sangria

We have a new favorite thank-God-it's-Friday-it's-been-one-helluva-week place...it's a Mexican restaurant called Xicohtencatl and is pronounced she-ko-ten-cat.

It's in Gt. Barrington, which is a bit of a drive for us, but a pleasant one, especially in spring when everything is fresh and green and the tourists have not yet descended.

The decor is bright and excitingly ethnic with lots of color everywhere, and the Mexican music in the background adds to the light and festive mood. The outside seating is delightful - either on the the porch or down on the stone patio. We sat inside when it was still chilly in March, but were thrilled to be able to sit out on the porch this time, watching the setting sun. The porch ceiling above our heads was painted fuschia and orange, while the walls and porch posts are bright yellow.

On both of our visits, I've ordered the red sangria. Let me tell you how it tastes. For anyone who's seen the movie "The Big Night," you'll recall that Italian restaurant owners Primo and Secondo decided to hold a final dinner party with their dearest friends, and made one of their mother's very special recipes. The guests sat around the table, quietly savoring the delectable food...the best they'd ever tasted. Finally, one of the guests, Pascal (a jealous competitor), solemnly arose, walked slowly around the table toward chef Primo, took Primo's face in his hands and said in a husky voice, "God damn it, I should kill you! This is so f***ing good I should kill you!"

Yeah, the sangria tastes like that.


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Sugar Shack Time

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All the local sugar shacks are busy creating maple syrup - days are warm and nights are cold and the sap is flowing. Sugaring time is the best time to go for breakfast, eat and buy fresh syrup, and tour the sugar house to watch the interesting process that, with the exception of a few modern adjustments, hasn't changed much over the years.

I happened to read about a new place to visit on one of the Blogs I Learn From...What I Made Yesterday. One of the posts mentioned a place called Ioka Valley Farm, which is about 25 minutes away (we later learned that Ioka is an Indian word for "beautiful"). We'd heard of the farm but had somehow never been to visit. So, off we went for Sunday brunch. We also thought it might be a great opportunity for one of our beloved "photo expeditions."

When we drove in, the farm parking lot was full of cars from MA, CT, and NY. We strolled past the cows being gawked at by the "city kids" on our way to the Calf-A, where we put our name on the waiting list for breakfast - about an hour's wait. Then we headed over to the sugar house, which was also pretty packed.

Inside, the sugarmakers were busy keeping a watchful eye on the syrup and answering questions about what they were doing. It was cozy warm, the air was full of the damp and slightly sweet scent of the bubbling syrup, and enormous clouds of steam were rising up to the vent in the roof.

A large old tree ornamented the interior, it's many branches reaching up to the roof. The floor was gravel. And, there was a really cool bench featuring small stumps of different types of trees. Our task, should we choose to accept it, was to put a tree stump on its corresponding name. We only got three right - cherry, birch and maple.

We then observed the sugaring process:

1. Plastic lines are now strung on the trees to collect the sap, and left there year-round, and the taps are also plastic. In olden times, the taps were wood, and the sap was collected in individual buckets which had to be repeatedly emptied. One of the old sugarmakers showed me the wooden tap he keeps close in his coat pocket - he made it when he was young from a piece of punky wood. A heated coathanger was pushed through the center and out the other end to make the hole for the sap. It has the polished patina of much use and much love.
2. Part of a sugarmaker's year-round job is maintaining the lines, which animals and nature tend to upset. They keep logs of when lines were put up, and have a routine maintenance schedule to keep them new. We were shown a length of pipe with some fairly impressive bear teeth marks. Hands also leave sweat on the piping, which turns to salt, which attracts smaller critters, so sugarmakers now wear gloves when handling the piping.
3. The sap from the lines feeds into the holding tank and a reverse osmosis (?) process is used to remove much of the water before the sap is boiled.
4. Then, the sap is poured into the large vat over the "Maple Pro Erable" woodstove. It roils and boils ferociously - when wood is added to the stove, it makes the syrup bubble even more and a de-foamer is added to maintain control over it. The sugarmakers prefer to do their work at night when the barometric pressure stays more constant - this affects how long it takes the sap to turn into syrup.
5. A large thermometer on the side of the tank tells how hot the syrup is. When it looks like it's at the right temp, a cylinder of fluid is drawn off. If it's ready, a long portable thermometer (think very large candy thermometer) will float at the right level between 2 red marks.
6. It's now time to remove any accumulated minerals, strain it, and determine the grade. The grade is determined by a combination of color and flavor, and is still a human-based decision-making process. Paler grades of sugar used to be in high demand, as maple sugar and syrup were used as the main sweetener in homes and a strong maple flavor wasn't desirable. Now, however, a maple flavor in the sugar is considered a good thing, so the darker grades are more popular. Only mother nature controls what grade the syrup will be; it's kind of like having a baby - you just wait to find out what you're going to get.
7. When ready, the syrup is poured into large barrels, and from there into correct containers.

After watching and listening for a while, we headed over to the homey Calf-A. The tablecloths and curtains are in a cow pattern, and the table containers are quaint baskets and painted tin cups. When we got to our seats we ordered mini corn muffins with maple butter, homemade (and delicious) applesauce, and of course pancakes and syrup, plus bacon and sausage. Everything was wonderful and we had such a terrific Berkshire morning. We bought a jug of syrup on our way out - a little pricey but we want to support a local farm. Then, a quick look at the animals, the hay, and the old farm implements, and we headed home. Nice day.
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Inauguration Road Trip

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Evening Post:

Well, we're here and we're all settled in. The trip went really well. Our wintery-est weather and road conditions were right in the Berkshires, where it was pretty slick and slippery (it was snowing and the roads were covered). Once we got into New York state and onto the Thruway, it was smooth sailing.

I had the wiper fluid pump replaced not long ago, but it's still temperamental, and if it's too cold, the fluid won't come out onto the windshield. Well, it was cold this morning (11 degrees when we left), so no fluid. My co-pilot was good enough to step out and give the windshield a "slosh" (see photo at right!). Once it warmed up to about 25 degrees, we had fluid again.

Our mapquest directions were perfect and everything went according to plan. It was really fun to begin seeing cars and buses from all over the U.S. as we stopped at rest stops. Surprisingly, there was no congestion or endless lines (yet!).

We stopped at the Maryland Information Center (which was very nice, but we do have to give props to the state of New York for their very good-looking Adirondack Lodge-style rest stops - very clean and roomy). While there, one of the pleasant gentlemen working at the information desk asked us where we were staying. When he heard we would be on Georgia Ave, he recommended the Crisfield Restaurant to us, as a very good seafood restaurant that was also very close to our hotel.

We got checked in to our hotel, surveyed our room and were pleasantly surprised, then headed out to dinner. The Crisfield Restaurant is totally charming from the outside, and equally as quaint inside. It has old tiled walls and floors, a beautiful collection of vintage china oyster serving plates, and a no-nonsense manner. I had a wonderful plate of sea scallops with the best tartar sauce I have ever had (I'd love that recipe), terrific coleslaw with just a touch of sweet and topped with a bread-and-butter pickle, and applesauce. My daughter had a bowl of oyster stew, with bits of butter swimming on top and oyster crackers on the side. We were both very pleased with our choices and had just the right amount to eat. I would highly recommend this place for both its ambience and its food.

So now it's off to bed, sleeping in a little bit in the am, and then off to learn the Metro and see the sights. Let's hope tomorrow goes as successfully, and as full as laughter, as today.

PS - photos courtesy of my daughter - the ace photographer.

A Day at The Clark

A group of us met up to tour the Clark Art Museum in Williamstown today.

But first - FOOD! We were tempted by both Spice Root (Indian) and the Sushi Thai Garden, both on Spring Street. For anyone not familiar with Williamstown - it's home to Williams College, and Spring Street is a quaint New England street that is the hub of local activity.

We ended up choosing Sushi Thai Garden . I've been many times for lunch and dinner, and always like going there, both for the food and the atmosphere. I love their Pad Thai. Another favorite is just about any of their "Lunch Box" meals - a lovely laquered box with many compartments - each compartment has some delectable goody in it, so you get a nice variety all in one meal. This time, I had Chicken Himmapan, a house special. The hot thai tea is especially enjoyable along with the meal. It's the prettiest pinky-orange color with a very subtle smoky flavor.

PS - This Urban Spoon link says that Sushi Thai Garden is in North Adams, but it's actually in Williamstown. All other contact info is correct.

Then, on to the Clark. My daughter and I have been many times, as they have wonderful summertime festivals on the lawn that are very kid friendly. And, one of my favorite paintings is housed there - "Nymphs and Satyr" by Alphonse Bouguereau. During art school, we were often tasked with choosing paintings in the Clark or other local museums and copying them, to learn composition, color, and other techniques from masters. This is one that I attempted to duplicate (obviously, my copy did not look quite like this, but it was a good exercise anyway).

The Clark doesn't currently have a special exhibit, but will soon feature works by Toulouse-Lautrec. We enjoyed leisurely browsing through lovely galleries, admiring paintings, drawing and scultpures by Renoir, Degas, Rembrandt, Homer, Remington, Sargent, and so many others.

Then, I had to zip home to pick up my daughter and her new boyfriend (!) from the mall movie theatre, and then home to prepare dinner for our guest this evening. Busy day!!

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