Saffron. Yuh-uhm.

You know, saffron is one of my favorite spices. It was well represented in The New Spanish Table and at Sunday's dinner party. Deeee-lish.

(I wrote this part in an email I sent to some of you today and upon Katy's suggestion have reposted it here as a blog.)

I had such a great time with you guys. I raved about Kookbook Klub so much that my reluctant old man, Tim, wants to attend next time.

Ha!

HA!

And when a cookbook gets chosen for next month Tim said he'd check the book store's inventory (used and new) for us...so maybe those of us who want to buy it could maybe buy it used.

Maybe.

I dug the cookbook. I mean, I'm really in love with The Art of Simple Food (Alice Waters) right now and The New Spanish Table was very different (not so, uh, simple). Life feels really complicated to me a lot of the time (I'm complex, what can you do?) so I love the idea of keeping it simple in the kitchen. That was what I found challenging about the book --.a lot of the recipes are fairly complex. I think that is also what makes the book beautiful. My experience of the book was definitely influenced by my relationship to time right now. For me, right now, there's a perceived scarcity when it comes to time and I was extraordinarily resistant to slowing down, planning for, shopping for, and making most of the yummy sounding dishes I found in the book (if it requires a double boiler or more than one or two basic steps it seems I'm not your girl). I almost made a roasted asparagus dish. Simple. I really want to be in a place in my life where I can slow down (my eternal struggle)...with Tim moving in (Yay!) and work being crazy and being gone two weekends out of last month I felt short on time and it impacted my relationship with The New Spanish Table. I can see that this is the beginning of a really wonderful process for me. Every six weeks I get the opportunity to struggle with this stuff. I get to learn to slow down and enjoy the entire process. The choosing, the planning, the shopping, the cooking, the eating. In time I'll be double boiling the shit out of some chocolate...like it was nothin.

Thanks for the rad times.