The tomolives and tomatilla salsa are going to have to wait. I rushed in to my neighborhood Whole Foods yesterday just to pick up some flour but ran smack into a display of Key limes. I love, love, love limes and Key limes in particular and restrained myself by buying only one bag (although I'm thinking I'll go back for more). I juiced the limes last night while watching the Philadelphia Eagles lose to the Baltimore Ravens, a game in which both teams displayed rampant mediocrity. (As an aside: Yay! Football season is here! Go Bills!)





Anyway, I'm saving the juice to make Key Lime Pie and just a few minutes ago whizzed up the rinds in my food processor. These are now marinating in salt (Fleur de Sel, specifically) and tomorrow while become some lime chutney. My plan is to cook up the salted, minced rinds with some vinegar, golden raisons and cherries (stolen from my son's snack bin) and dark brown sugar. This sounds to me like it will be pretty delicious and easy to do. Since I am rapidly approaching exam week, and my quantitative methods exam is promising to be a killer, easy is what I'm looking for.





Did you ever have Key Lime Pie on a Stick? It's quite amazing - a wedge of pie on a stick and covered in chocolate. The play of flavors and textures is really neat and one of those things that, while you might think it initially strange, you wind up thinking about all the time. I haven't been to the Keys in four years, but I'd go back in a heartbeat if I was promised some Key Lime Pie on a Stick. While I was there, I'd be sure to visit Nancy Forrester's Secret Garden which is always in danger of being razed for a parking lot, condos or some such developmental monstrosity. Nancy and her friends have collected an astonishing array of amazing plants and they have cool birds, too, just lounging about.





The Key limes I bought were grown in Mexico. I don't think Key limes are actually grown in the Keys any more. I'm not sure why, and I'm not sure I want to find out. Usually when I hear the story behind why some item is no longer produced in the area to which it is/was native, I end up very sad. It's usually a story of greed, overdevelopment, staggeringly bad weather or some combination of all three. Still, the limes I bought looked healthy and smelled incredible so perhaps it's not a horrible story, after all. A girl can hope.





In addition to chutney and pie, one can also make Caipirinhas with limes. Caipirinhas are a wonderful, refreshing cocktail made with limes, sugar, and, in Pennsylvania (home of draconian liquor control policies that outlaw the purchase of any item not on an official "o.k." list), vodka. I was introduced to Caipirinhas by Luciana, a young Brazilian woman living with us as an exchange student and au pair. In addition to her sense of humor, intelligence, good nature and love of children, she has brought to our household the Caipirinhas and we will forever be grateful. There are variations which, instead of limes, use mangos, pineapples or other fruits. On a hot summer night, I can't imagine anything better than a Caipirinha in one hand, a pitcher full on the table and a house full of friends with whom to share.





Must run. The banana bread is just about to come out of the oven. We had a bunch of really, really ripe bananas that I refused to waste. The answer, of course, is banana bread. The house smells incredible and I'm looking forward to that first slice to have with a cup of tea. It's a quiet day here today and that seems like just the thing.

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I went to visit my friend Anna and her new baby yesterday. It's funny that although I know a newborn will be small, I'm always suprised that they're small. This baby is now, at about two weeks old, not quite as big as my son was at birth. So, in a real sense, I don't remember my son being so small because I hadn't met him yet. I really don't have a lot of clear memories of those initial postpartum weeks and the squirmy, squeaky infant that relied on me for so very much. Now my "baby" is almost two and sitting next to me playing Duplos with his dad and saying things like, "Here ya go!" and "Cool!" In a blink of an eye the baby I met yesterday will be doing those same things and his mom will get misty remembering his first days. But for now he's small and squeaky and just adorable.





In addition to a couple rompers (sized 12 and 18 months - any parent will tell you that kids grow fast and will need these sizes before you know it) I took over a half pint of mango jam and a pint of strawberry sauce. Anna seemed pleased - I'll have to remember to remind her that this is my first year canning, just in case. Even though I specifically started canning as a way of sharing my love of life and food with my friends and family, I really had to talk myself into taking those jars over. I guess it's a sort of "having your cake" problem. If you start giving it away, then you don't have it to give. To paraphrase the old commercial, "Don't worry, I'll make more." I'm going to get on that right away because when I opened the pantry this morning to make the baby's (uh, I mean "my son's) breakfast, the two spaces where the jars had been seemed gaping. It's becoming clear to me that I'm a full-pantry kind of girl. So maybe there'll be more mango jam coming soon, if I can get a good price.





The tomatoes canned up well, as I knew they would. They're very reliable, but not too heroic. One doesn't get the feeling of having produced something really amazing like I did with the cranberry chutney. Still, I know they'll be useful to have around and will get us through more than one night when no one wants to fuss for dinner and going out is too much of a bother. So now that I've produced something so pedestrian, I'm on the prowl for a really sexy canning recipe.





More and more I'm having the feeling that I'll end up doing tomolives. My friend Jen loves these, and I suspect they'd be great in a martini. They're small green olives that are pickled kind of like an olive, hence the name. Since I have a couple tomato plants that are about to kick the bucket, tomolives could be just the thing to keep from wasting all the fruit that doesn't ripen. I think Jen would be pleased to get a couple of jars of homemade tomolives. Then again, I think her husband usually gives her a jar in her Christmas stocking and I wouldn't want to stomp all over his tradition.





Tonight the baby (scratch that, I mean my son), friend Kelly and I are heading out to our CSA for a summer social after spending some time swimming at her dad's house. The farm has asked everyone to bring a dish to share and I made a beet risotto. It looks kind of, well, fuschia, and at first I didn't like it. After a couple bites it grew on me, though. Just goes to show you that sometimes you have to keep trying things even after you think they're not for you. You'd think as a grown up, I'd know this by now. In case you want to make it, here's the recipe:









two or three beets, scrubbed and diced





two shallots, peeled and diced





2 tablespoons butter





2 tablespoons olive oil





1 cup arborio rice





1 cup of dry white wine





5-6 cups of warm vegetable or chicken stock





1 cup finely shredded parmesan cheese (not from a can!)







salt and pepper to taste







Heat the butter and oil together in a wide, shallow pan over medium heat until blended. Add the shallots and saute until translucent. Add the rice and stir so that the rice is coated with the fat. Add the beets and stir to blend with the rice. Stir in the wine and continue stirring until the wine is mostly evaporated. Add the stock, one cup at a time, stirring until nearly evaporated. After the last cup has been added, taste a grain of rice to test tenderness. The rice should be firm, but have some give. If the rice is still hard, add some more stock, wine or warm water. When the rice is done, the grains should be distinct, but bound together in a starchy "sauce." Stir in the cheese and rosemary. Taste and correct seasonings with salt and pepper. The beets will be tended, but still somewhat crunchy. The dish will be very, very red!

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