a day with morgan (or cooking knödel)

 

waffles with morgan for breakfast before heading to trader joe's to buy ingredients for knödel.

it's a beautiful fall day . . 

taking a short cut home through the elm furniture store after shopping . . (commenting on the christmas decorations the store had already put up!) . . 

i love these swivel chairs . . (morgan is admiring the napkins) . . 

and this chair . . 

and this wing chair . . i love all the elm chairs. they're not too big (perfect size for me) and cozy with material that a cat's claws couldn't tear a hole through.

i even like these swivel stools . . 

halloween decorations along bank street on the way home (thankfully, not christmas decorations yet!)

toasting the bread for the dumplings . . 

weighing them!

chopping the onion . . 

now to mix the oinon and the bread with the spinach . . 

and shape the knödel!

guten appetit!

cleaning up after dinner . . 

our last round of cards before morgan heads home to london tomorrow night. korrina headed back to queens after dinner as she was tired from a long work day and needs to be up early again tomorrow. she took some rice pudding dessert to have back at her apartment.

it was a very lovely night together.

lunch in queens

 

 returning from the green market at 8:30 am morning i passed two men in expensive black suits on their way to the westbeth courtyard. i couldn't imagine what it was all about; 9/11 commemoration? fashion week?

it proved to be a fashion week show, specifically rodarte which i was not familiar with but which chanda was. the music was beautiful and it was fun to watch from the window.

at the end of the show all the models sauntered across the courtyard together followed by the audience. i missed filming the models, but you can see the audience leaving after them.

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around 1 pm we drove out to queens for lunch with korrina and josh.

 

the place was called sotto le stelle, under the stars, and it had a very nice outdoor courtyard table which korrina had reserved.
 

greg and i shared a pizza and salad and it was incredibly delicious.

we went for a walk in the neighborhood afterwards . . 

specifically to admire korrina's company's new commissary space. they're also opening two smaller restaurant spaces on the east side and west side of manhattan.

walking back through the neighborhood . . 

passing a popular local brewery . . 

. . it was a special afternoon for me, though it always feels much too short and how is it that our families are suddenly so grown up and spread out? here in my neighborhood there's a millionaire building a mansion just a few blocks away, and rumor has it that the building connected to the mansion is an apartment/townhouse for his children. if i had money like that i suppose i would do the same. has he created jobs for them too? do you remember the ending to fiddler on the roof? tevye's one daughter goes off on a train to join her fiancé in kiev and the other goes off with her fiancé to krakow (the little chavaleh song always makes me cry), while tevye and the rest of his family have packed up their belongings and are forced to leave their village. why am i writing this? maybe because life feels like such a struggle these days and it has always been a struggle (always so much conflict) and leaving family is a never ending part of it. 

on the other hand, maybe i just need to lighten up and adjust my attitude.

saturday dinner on a late summer evening

 

i made a big dinner tonight with everything i bought at the green market

 

 buttered potatoes, fresh tomatoes and sea scallops (sautéed in butter and i forgot the garlic, even though i had minced it!),

 

kale sautéed with olive oil, onions and a little bit of sea salt, and fusilli with fresh basil pesto sauce.

 

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morgana and i took a walk to morgenstern's for ice cream, but there was such a long line we walked instead to the market for a pint of ben and jerry's (new york super fudge chunk) and lemon sorbetto.

 

these two graciously let me take a photo of them together . .