lauren bell

Kinfolk, The Times, The Roving Home

Fri, 2 Mar 2012 12:35:31 -0500

I had the good fortune last week to receive an invitation to the Kinfolk Social, a celebration of community, food, and craft, at The Green Building in Brooklyn. I went solo, hoping that like-minded nice people interested in meeting others would allow me entry to their conversations. They did.

The Green Building, a long, lofted barn-like space was lit by three golden chandeliers and enough candles to warm the place. Eucalyptus leaves were strewn from the rafters above, creating a canopy over the long communal table. After enjoying a family-style vegetarian meal, the group welcomed a larger crowd, doubling the size of the Kinfolk fans, the local crafters and artisans, and the writers and photographers who spend their time in the support of these artists.

Kinfolk, possibly the most beautiful quarterly magazine to hit limited shelving in recent years, celebrates this coming together. It inspires a slower pace, an appreciation of tastes, smells, decor, and place. Above all, it wants to create community. And that Sunday night supper in Brooklyn helped do just that. There were Brooklyn-made cheeses, chocolates, specialty beers and cocktails, slate serving platters, ceramic mugs and teapots... a true celebration of the talent our neighborhood possesses.

This was great timing, for the Times had run a quick story in the Sunday magazine the week previous, highlighting the artisans that are moving beyond pickles and knitted caps and becoming specialists in more specific manufacturing. The author, Adam Davidson, argued that this was true capitalism, as Adam Smith wrote it could be, for maximum efficiency there must be specialization. I make the cheese, you the bread, he’ll make the oven. Together, we all have grilled cheeses. If we each make our own parts to the grilled cheese puzzle, the process is slowed. This is ironic, isn’t it? This craft movement occurred in the first place because we wanted to get off the high-speed, high-pressure life style that thrives on quickness, access, and expediency. We focus on slowing sufficiently to focus on one thing, one thing we feel a connection to, and in doing so, we hasten the efficiency of the whole, as long as enough people slow to focus on their specialties too. There are holes in this argument, sure, but in a general manner, Davidson is right to point out the true expanse of this movement and its effect on our economy. We are moving in a direction of specialization by choice, we are making the crafts that we want to, not working in an assembly line of gadgets. We are, in becoming more passionate economic participants, creating a healthier, happier economy. Slowly, sure, but doing so nonetheless. This makes me so excited. I love to think that if we all gather together with our special talents, that we recreate this marketplace with our ideals and expectations in the proper place.

On that note, read this blog:
http://therovinghome.wordpress.com/2012/03/02/the-golden-age-of-man/
Sure, it’s a love letter to a husband on an anniversary, but it’s the point behind it that rings true to me- we can find a way to support one another (in craft, business, and love) and keep a bit of old-fashioned charm alive.

Nesting and Cooking

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 13:25:04 -0500

I’ve been holing up a bit since settling in Brooklyn. Not only because I spent all of my money in Europe in the last few months, but because it’s winter. It’s grey. And today, it’s even raining. I spend so much of my time working in the restaurant that in my time off, I’m so tired that my bones hurt. This results in those down days being spent wearing loose knits while tinkering in the kitchen.

Last week, for the first time, I made lamb chops. I’ve never much been a fan of lamb, or rather, it’s never excited me the way I see some people fawn over it. I figure, if it incites such love in some people, I’d better let them have it. However, I had a crazy experience a few years back where as my dinner partner finished their lamb chops, I was overwhelmed by a need to suck on the lamb bones. I know that sounds like an inappropriate share, but it must’ve been a deficiency of some sort in my own diet that caused it, and last week, I wanted those lamb bones again. I seared the chops with Herbs de Provence, fresh thyme, and grey sea salt. Paired with roasted purple carrots, beet greens, and fingerlings that I seasoned with whole garlic cloves still in their wraps, a bit of rosemary, olive oil and more sea salt, it was simple, comforting and delicious.

This morning I broke down the chicken I baked on Sunday, saving the bones and au jus to make a stock. It’s simmering now with carrots, onions, rosemary, thyme and celery, making a wonderful perfume for the apartment.

I’m working for a new website, writing about food and artisans. It seems promising. I’ll be researching artisanal sodas this week, made in my Brooklyn backyard, by people likely to be as excited as I am to be cooking and tinkering, making your life and career out of what makes you happiest.

Opportunities that come...And what to do about them

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 12:53:40 -0500

I have twice visited a heavenly farm and world-renowned restaurant in the past two weeks. I watched heritage breed geese settle in to their new home, piglets with long curly tails fighting for their lunch. There were cows scratching their hides against trees while others lingered in a free-flowing brook. The cleanest and most beautiful chicken coop I have ever seen was the home to a hundred or so laying hens. Irrigation drip lines fed into drinking dishes for these hens, and they squabbled around, chatting and napping in the fresh hay. I have wanted to come here for years. The farm is among the best in the nation, the educational and sustainability driven non-profit is one I’ve always admired.

The restaurant runs on these fields, serving their pork and carrots. It is recognized as one of the best, it is a Chez Panisse, it is a French Laundry. I am honored to be offered a position.

The trouble is, It’s a position in a field from which I’m trying to be released. You know, when you’ve stayed too long in a position that comes naturally and easily, but isn’t necessarily using your full potential and passion (that’s right, bartenders and waiters, I’m looking at you)? I’m hoping to just be a writer one day, a writer that focuses on food security, responsible agriculture, healthful eating, food systems and food rituals around the world. I do not want to be a waiter/writer forever. Every time I take a new opportunity in a restaurant, I’m one step further from being only a writer. These are adult decisions; hard to make and definitely hard to know if you’ve made the right one.

I don’t think I’ll take the position offered though. It is not a guarantee that this one will feed into the one I’d hope to have on the farm and in the office. And it’s too risky to add more of my writing time to my waiting time; I’ve waited long enough.

A New Artisanal Seed Company Specializes in Ethiopian Stock

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 11:27:22 -0500

I used to spend hours picking peppers, tomatoes and squash for Fred Hempel. His greyhounds would run around the fields, startling the chickens and causing us to pause our harvesting to watch their speed and grace. We’d get there early in the morning, dew and frost making leaves shimmer and crackable ice on puddles not yet burned away by the sun. I wear farm clothes: old t-shirts, ratty corduroys, sweatshirts with hoods, fingerless gloves, a hat and Wellies. By the time I’ve picked my first crate of tomatoes, the hat, gloves and sweatshirt have been thrown aside.

Fred owns Baia Nicchia, or Bay Niche, an organic farm that supplies to CSA subscribers (private purchasers of a weekly box of whatever is in season) and Bay Area restaurants. He sells at farmer’s markets and caters dinners on the farm. The farm, located in Sunol Agricultural Park, lies to the far end of a long driveway lined with persimmon trees I still dream about. There’s a brook behind the farm and the water temple anchoring the far end of the road. The temple was built in 1910 to honor the Bay Area’s connection to its watershed in the Sierra Nevada mountains. This land is leased from the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and is used by farmers and government officials both. Fred cultivates a large portion of the land, growing and breeding plants that perform especially well in the East Bay microclimate.

As a biologist, Fred uses his expertise in genetics to choose seeds with characteristics that ensure high yields, disease and pest resistance, delicious flavor, and attractiveness. He does all of this by watching the plant grow, eating lots of the fruit it produces, and saving seeds. Ok, maybe there’s a little bit more to it, but observation is the primary key. By choosing wisely, Fred is able to tailor seeds to the Bay Area grower.

Herein lies Fred’s latest project; he’s starting a seed business called Artisan Seeds. His project is being funded through generous donors (yours truly included) on the website Kickstarter. His first seeds for sale will be six of his striped tomato varieties, two mustards, and three peppers, the mustards and peppers being Ethiopian varieties. Through collaborating with a local Ethiopian pepper seller, Fred has found these plants to be ideal in flavor and well-suited for growth in the region. Through Artisan Seeds, Fred is offering the following Ethiopian varities: Highland Kale seeds, Highland Mustards, Mareko Fana peppers (the backbone of Berbere spice), Mareko Fana Red peppers, and Mitmita peppers. Fred is bringing even more biodiversity to his fields, and in doing so, he’s expanding the palates of peppers eaters far and wide.

Baia Nicchia is trying to raise $22,000 by March 10th. Pledging any amount gives you a packet of kale seeds, but the incentive to donate more to the cause is great. The more you donate, the greater the prizes: other varieties of seeds and more of them, tins of organic, grey dog tea (grown on the farm and named for the dogs I remember so fondly), an invitation to a dinner catered on the farm, and the end-all reward, naming a new breed of tomato.

Donate to Fred now, help bring obscure and delicious vegetables to the masses.

photo credit Fred Hempel

GranDaddy/FryDaddy

Wed, 8 Feb 2012 14:05:50 -0500

This is the original Bob Bell. He’s 93, he dresses like a cool guy in his twenties, and he’s taken up frying recently. He lights a Yankee Candle when you arrive, offers you a breakfast beer, and tells you about his recent egg supply from his lazy chickens. Goats bleat in the backyard, Abby the blind dog bumps into your knees, smacks into the legs of the table. He’s a welder and bought a new snow plow last year, installing it without aid on his truck. He also just bought a brand new red car. Last week he mailed me a twenty dollar bill.

My fate lies in this game

Wed, 8 Feb 2012 13:51:42 -0500

I’ve just relocated to Brooklyn, the next step in my search for a sense of place and home. I am forever searching, my romantic comedy mind convinced that there’s some place that will ground me and cement me to a community forever. Haven’t found my heart’s home yet, but haven’t given up hope.

The irony of my endless search culminated in the unlikely combination of Superbowl teams this year. We knew the Raiders wouldn’t make it, Oakland having been my home of many, many years, but when San Francisco lost to New York in the playoffs, I knew my California days were really over. Let me note at this point, that I don’t give a hoot about football, but the teams listed all over the news and internet over past weeks have been the teams of my homes. I couldn’t ignore that I thought they were fighting for my future. And California had just lost me in this race.

So, the true test was between New England, the place of my birth and my home for the last 1.5 years, and New York, my newest home and maybe where I will spend the future.

It was a good game, wasn’t it? I really felt like both teams wanted to win, to win for me, obviously. With such a tight score throughout, I watched, rapt in the dual unfolding in front of me. Clearly, whoever won this game was going to reveal where my true home lies. There was a lot on the line.

While Tom Brady threw many a pass at my destiny, New England didn’t hold on tightly enough. New York won. In my life, and in football, New York came out on top. I had already known the outcome, I guess, since I left New England behind last month, and should have wagered accordingly. It was the only time I’ve ever known how a bet would turn out. A missed opportunity there, sure, but maybe it’s better that way. The Cosmos can still send me their messages about the future, however ridiculous the medium.

We the largest BLT I’ve ever seen, with crispy strips of bacon, herbed, garlic aioli and the freshest tomatoes you can find in NYC in the winter (they were still not good enough). My friend Liza came with individual jars of three-meat chili, Jenna and Mitch made football shaped deviled eggs and french onion dip, because Superbowl is really just an excuse to eat chips and dip for dinner. That, and apparently, a contest that decides my fate. Go Giants?

Comfort eating

Wed, 1 Feb 2012 23:38:11 -0500

I have been sequestered in the kitchen in recent days. As the family descends to say goodbye to our grandfather, Pepère, I aim to feed the masses, to make it so no one has to think about what to make, what to eat. It’s an attempt to make my mother’s time easier, for she’s normally the one to organize each meal, to execute each plate and to exhaust herself in the meantime. Judging by her thin frame, this hasn’t been her priority in the last few weeks. While she cares for my grandmother, Memère, I bake a chicken with French herbed butter, I make pâte brisee and file it all into a casserole dish for a chicken pot pie (kale, sweet potatoes, carrots, celery, tarragon). I make salads: tortellini (tomatoes and sunflower seeds), tuna (with balsamic and dill) and egg (aioli and a bit of dijon) for lunches during these busy days, brownies with walnuts for dessert, lentils and barley. I make breakfast rice- jasmine rice with cinnamon, golden raisins, milk and vanilla. I follow up with chicken stock simmering for hours on the stove, pizza with homemade dough and sauce, rocket salad with shaved pecorino. We drink a bit of wine; we soothe our frazzled edges. Tomorrow, Turkish coffee and a coffee grounds reading; my mother and I will awaken to the future in more ways than one.