The other day I was cutting up some zucchini for dinner and as I cut closer and closer to the stemmed end of the veg I saw a very familiar shape emerging:
I love that rounded pentagonal shape, and had sketched different incarnations of it while planning for one of my stock certificate series.
I often find myself marveling at the incredible designs found in nature: the form of a ready-to-burst cherry blossom, seed pods of all kinds, and one of my very favorites discovered when I was ten and had recently moved to Florida: the minute image of sunshine left on freshly picked citrus fruit (it's left where the stem connects to the fruit...look for it next time you have the opportunity to pick a fresh orange or grapefruit).
I've been cooking/baking more lately, and I have to say that it's really refreshing to be enjoying something I've never put much thought into before. That's not to say I've never cooked/baked before, and also not to say that I didn't enjoy it while I was doing it, it's just that when I did them in the past my focus was different...my goal was to make this one thing, and once I had done it and had gotten my "fix" I didn't have to do it again for months.
I'm looking at it very differently lately though, and it is much more absorbing and rewarding to me to make a meal from scratch than ever before (and then to even do it again the next day).
I have to give proper credit to Michael Pollan for his book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma". It was somewhat of an impulse buy early last week, but the more I read the more home cooking made sense to me. Needless to say Martin is really digging this alien woman he came home to last week and is hoping she stays for awhile...me too!
-c
