Moving

Nope, not moving houses, moving blogs.

I realized I was feeling guilty for not doing more gardening, which was what I had intended this blog to be about.

Since moving to San Francisco, gardening has been at a minimum.  We no longer have a backyard to tend, and the markets have so much cheap, plentiful produce, that we don’t grow much of our own.

And like telling stories about other things than gardening.

So I’m moving over to fairytalesofthecity.wordpress.com

I’ve already posted a few things over there and I am still tweaking the settings and such.

Having said that, head on over and check it out.  Let me know what you think.

-a

Meeting the Neighbours

How do you guys get out and meet your neighbours?  Are you involved in your community?

On Sunday, Peter and I joined our fellow Nopa-ers (North of the Panhandle) in a bike ride through Golden Gate Park.  It was a beautiful sunny day, although it got a little foggy down by the beach.

We rode under one of the oldest steel reinforced bridges, through an old fern grove, by the polo fields, down to the beach and back up through the police horse stables.

Afterwards, we joined some of our neighbours for lunch at the new mexican restaurant in the ‘hood.

One of the riders wrote this blog post about it.  You can see me in the black and white striped shirt!

It was a fun ride.  I look forward to the next one on Hallowe’en.

Street art

On the way to the grocery store, I walk past this street art on the sidewalk.  I keep thinking it will get covered up or the cement tile will be replaced.

It makes me smile every time that it’s still there.

<3

-a

ps. Happy Birthday to Sara and Jenn!  You two are amazing, strong, brilliant women.  I hope you both have an amazing day!

Taking a break

Lucky Sign

Have you been looking for a sign to do that thing you’ve been thinking about?  Here it is.

Happy Tuesday,

<3

-a

Coffee Roasting

This morning, Peter and I were off in another neighbourhood and smelled the irresistable smell of roasting coffee.  We were getting peckish anyhow, so we stuck our heads into the coffee shop to see what was happening.  We discovered this amazing machine.
Peter struck up a conersation with the roaster and we learned all sorts of things about roasting, colour and roasting decaf! 
Peter and I love to roast our own coffee beans and Peter managed to convince the guy to sell us some of his (they’re surprisingly hard to find.)
Thanks to The Beanery!

Peanut, peanut butter. Jelly!

What is your favourite kind of peanut butter cookie?

I always figured I was a peanut butter cookie purist.  No chocolate chips or anything else added.  And I *do* love them.  However, I am starting to come around to those with chocolate chips in them.  So, today I decided to experiment with different additions.

I made regular.

Then I added dollops of strawberry jam to the tops of some of those a la thumb-print cookie style.  (I have a beautiful jar of home-made strawberry jam in the fridge made by one of my lovely friends.  It’s disappearing at an alarming rate!)

Half-way through forming the cookies I added some chocolate chips to the batter and formed some of those.

Then I dolloped some strawberry jam on top of the chocolate chip peanut butter cookies.  Is that going to far?

I don’t think so.  Peter didn’t think so.  When offered the choice, he went straight to the chocolate chip jam cookies.  And he says it is “Mmmmmmmmrmrmrmmm.”

What else do you think would be good in or on peanut butter cookies?

p.s. When did this turn into a cooking blog?  That’s all I seem to be doing lately…  not so much gardening.