Transitions

Time to refresh.

If any long-time readers happen upon this post, they will notice a major change to this blog. Aside from the fact that I'm posting for the first time in over two years. My furry Flartopian muse is different.

I started this blog in the early years of Rosie's reign, a decade ago. She was the furry chow/lab mix I called mine, and served as a constant thread through eight years of writing. Politics, farmers' markets, annoying tv commercials, vacations, housecleaning, you name it; there was probably a Rosie reference in there somewhere.

But life moves on, and change visits all of us. Rosie lived to a respectable 13 years of age, and kept a close guard on my every move until the last. In August of 2017, we had to say a sudden and tearful goodbye to the second Dog of My Heart.

Fortunately, enough time has passed that I can immediately follow that up with the news of our next four-legged loved one. Maddie came to us also from the Humane Society of Charlotte in April of 2018. For weeks and months, I suspected I'd rushed into things, let Miss Chef talk me into the wrong dog, made a regrettable mistake. But four months later, I'm starting to have those heart-squeezing moments when I look at her sad hound expression, or give a belly laugh at her leg-sprawling antics. She's no Rosie, but she's finding her own way into my heart.

Of course, other changes have come in the intervening years since I last put finger to keyboard for this blog. For four years, I've kept up a part-time freelance writing presence here in the Charlotte food world, and made many friends, apparently garnered a fair amount of respect, and had some memorable experiences. I've worked through various part-time jobs with very small food-related businesses, finally landing a poorly-paid but full-time position in retail management (still food-related, though).

And now even bigger changes have been forced upon me. Miss Chef's job is going away, and sadly the other opportunities for culinary instructors here in Charlotte have disintegrated. So she cast her net wide, and came up with a position in a small, very rural community college in western North Carolina.

As I write this, she is sitting in a hotel room in Murphy, feeling ridiculously unprepared for her first day of classes. The job offer and starting date happened within two weeks, and the school seems less ready for her to start than she was. On top of struggling to find the tools and information she needs to start her new job, she's also trying to find temporary quarters for herself, and, if possible, more permanent ones for both of us plus our small menagerie.

So here we hang in the balance, me going about my daily routine while trying to rev up the job-hunt machine; she swimming through a sea of bureaucracy to find her way to the classroom. These are dark, frustrating days, but we have to assume that we will emerge into a much brighter future. Transitions are seldom clean and easy. I hope that the dirtier this one proves, the lovelier will be the other side of it.

Love in the Mountains

Every October, Miss Chef and I carve out a few days to get away for a romantic anniversary trip. The mountains are part of what brought us to North Carolina, and I am happy we take advantage of their proximity on a regular basis. It doesn’t hurt that our anniversary falls around leaf-peeping season.

We usually stay in the area around Asheville, and this year we opted for the small college town of Brevard. We’d stayed here once before, outside of town, but Miss Chef knows the area better than I, having spent a summer here for a high school program at the college.

That time we had rented a cabin in the woods, and brought along Rosie. This time we opted to stay in town, finding our best deal at the Inn at Brevard. Though it sounded promising, and I thought I recalled driving by the grand façade several years earlier, when I later looked it up on Google’s street view I was disappointed to see what looked like an unattractive strip motel.

Ah well, I thought, we can’t always fall lucky. I knew we’d still enjoy our time away, regardless of the accommodations.

Well, I was wrong. We did fall lucky this time. Turns out the main building does have some rooms in it, six to be precise. And somehow, though we’d only booked a couple of weeks in advance, we’d ended up in one of them.

It also turns out that this house is indeed historic, built in 1885 for a wealthy widow from Virginia. It has been maintained in that effusive Victorian style marked by delicate, expensive clutter everywhere you look. Normally this style seems irritatingly fussy to me, but I was instantly smitten by its unapologetic charm. I quickly fell in love with this silly place.

This is the main entrance—clusters of chairs interspersed with lace-covered tables mobbed by family portraits and extravagantly shaded lamps, with walls obscured by paintings of various eras and levels of artistry. As we mounted the stairs, I told Miss Chef it reminded me of Harry Potter, and I kept half an eye open for unexpected movement within the frames.

Our room was decorated in an equally exuberant, albeit more rustic style.

There were three mirrors in the room, not counting the one in the bathroom. I sadly didn’t get a photo of the freestanding tub, but I did get one of the wallhanging over the bed that entranced both of us.

Yes, as far as I could tell, that’s real, thought Miss Chef seemed obsessed with the possible authenticity of the teeth. I suppose this recalls a Victorian gentleman’s hunting lodge décor, though several of the amateur paintings leaned more in the direction of Wild West cabin.

The next morning, I had to snap a few more pictures downstairs before we left for the day.

The main dining room. There’s a small bar through the white door you see on the far side of the dark wood sideboard. This isn’t just an inn, it’s a bed and breakfast with dinner service open to the public.

 

I couldn’t resist the gravitational pull of that highly ornamented sideboard. There was just so much to look at!

 

Here’s a shot from the far end of the dining room across the main entrance and into the breakfast dining area. Mirrors, mirrors everywhere.

 

And another angle into the breakfast room.

 

Though we did spend a lovely morning wandering through downtown Brevard, it wasn’t until we headed off in the afternoon toward Asheville that I felt compelled to pull the camera out. We took the long way around, through Pisgah National Forest and along the Blue Ridge Parkway. Miss Chef drove the whole way, for which I was enormously grateful. She seemed to enjoy my ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the ever-changing views as much as the views themselves.

I retouched this photo to lighten it up, as the day was pretty overcast and the camera failed to capture the scene as well as the eye. I’d guess we finally hit the area during the peak of the fall color. It really looked like the mountains were overlaid with a fluffy quilt picked out in colors of gold, orange, red and burgundy. A color scheme I’d never choose, but which Mother Nature uses to incredible effect.

We dined at Nightbell, the second restaurant of Katie Button, who owns Cúrate where we’ve had to eat during every trip to Asheville the past five years or so. It was ok, but several of the dishes seemed better in theory than they turned out in reality—flavors overcome with sauces, traditional dishes that were good, but not particularly interesting.

We returned to Asheville the next morning, for brunch at Rhubarb, which was much more our style. Lots of locally-sourced ingredients, and Miss Chef was happy to find a brunch that included lunch items as more than an afterthought.

Of course I had to explore the offerings of French Broad Chocolate Lounge, which recently moved into much larger, more centrally located digs.

Miss Chef spoiled me by stocking up on any bar of 60% cacao she could find. She does know what I like.

And I know what she likes. So I was perfectly ok with taking another detour on the way home, to visit Fonta Flora brewery in Morganton. Nothing like a midafternoon drink to ease your way back into reality.

Getting away, and coming back

After our unexciting weekend in Elkin last month, Miss Chef and I wanted to get back to our real mountain adventures and apple picking.  Usually we go for our anniversary, closer to the end of the month, but with her quarter break this past week and a full docket coming up later on, we decided to get out there while the getting was good.

As it turned out, Miss Chef had more preparation than usual for the upcoming quarter, so we really only had one day to play with.  We drove to Flat Rock late on Wednesday, then rose early on Thursday to head out to Skytop Orchard, where we’ve gotten apples the past 3 or 4 years.

It was foggy when we left the hotel, but by the time we arrived at the orchard and headed down—and up, and down—the slopes with our baskets, the skies were clear.  We managed to draw away from the multiple school and church groups full of excited children, and had the Cortland row to ourselves. 

Most of the trees were picked out, or had only green apples within our reach.  We had to walk nearly to the end of the row before finding trees with ripe fruit low enough for picking, but in the end, we had more than enough to fill our baskets. 

Then we had to carry them back uphill to the store to pay for them, along with several more varieties, to fill Miss Chef’s annual yen for apples.

After lugging a bushel of apples plus two gallons of fresh cider out to the car, we returned empty handed for our reward: hot, fresh apple cider donuts, plush an applelicious slushy.

 

Yum!

The road down from the orchard is a steep, torturous drive, but having driven it several times made it easier to maneuver.  It also helped that the leaves haven’t turned yet, so I wasn’t distracted by gorgeous fall color.  Who knew I’d ever be grateful for missing the date?

Our next destination was Asheville itself.  We had an hour or so before our lunch reservations at—where else?—Cúrate.  We parked on the street, right next to this fun wall of inspiration.

This wall has been here for years, protecting a fall-off between two buildings.  Turning it into an artful community conversation exemplifies the character of this city.

After lunch it was my turn to visit a new favorite.

My name is Alison, and I am a chocoholic.  And I’m very okay with that.

The day was on the warm side, so we did a little “housekeeping,” to get a cooler and ice to keep our cider (and chocolate) from melting.  After a short break back at the hotel, we returned to Asheville for dinner at Rhubarb.  We’d been wanting to eat here since seeing their menu go up at their doorway on Pack Square, but they’d been closed the one other time we’d had a gap in our eating schedule.  Yes, when we travel, our days are planned around our meals.

I didn’t take any photos inside Rhubarb, but here are a couple I found on the web.

The entry area, with a simple, gaze-pulling display of wooden spoons.

The main dining area is through that arched doorway, and this is the area where we were seated.

I’m not sure of the story behind that rough wall, but I spent half the night trying to decipher the lettering barely visible in the patchy green paint.  All I got was “the.”  I think.

The food here is much like what we seek out at home—locally grown, creatively combined without too much manipulation.  Our two favorites were a rabbit-and-leek rillette served with house-made “sel-tine” crackers, and the “Autumn sharing salad.”  A dark green salad with goat cheese and toasted pumpkin seeds was built atop a roasted kabocha squash.  Miss Chef discovered this squash a couple of years ago, but we could never remember the name, always confusing it with kombucha, a fermented tea drink she’s brewed in the past.  Anyway, Miss Chef liked the salad so much she’s stealing the idea for a farm dinner she’s helping with next month.

Stealing is accepted practice among chefs.  I think sounds better if you use the words “inspired by.”

Friday morning we were up and out of the hotel, headed for home.  Miss Chef was anxious to get into the school to rework her menus and recipes—she’d been informed after finishing them earlier in the week that budget cuts meant she had to slash her food costs, a difficult prospect when you’re trying to teach fine cuisine with local product.  I stayed at home to unpack and reassure our pets that the world had not ended and they were not to be abandoned.

Also to prepare for a big Fancy Party.  The local paper I freelance for does an annual Best of Charlotte issue, with both critics’ and readers’ picks for everything from best barber shop to best farm-to-table restaurant.  I’d received a mailed invitation to the VIP pre-party, and thought it was a good opportunity to see my editor and meet some of the other staff.  You see, I met my editor once at a coffee shop back in May, and everything since then has been via email.  I’ve been asked in conversation if I know this editor or that staff writer; people must think I’m dropping off hard copies at the office every week.  I don’t even know where their offices are!

Somewhere in this entertainment complex north of Uptown sits my editor.

Anyway, neither Miss Chef or I were looking forward to this gala event.  For me, it was mostly because of the cocktail attire.  I didn’t even think I had a dress anymore that would fit me, since I’d moved to mostly slacks or skirts at work.  Fortunately, I had unburied one in my closet, so felt more or less prepared.  But I was still groggy from our quick out-of-town trip, and neither I nor Miss Chef are particularly into small talk over drinks with folks we don’t know.

Sadly, the party lived down to and even beneath our expectations. There didn’t seem to be anyone filling the role of host, nor any plan for the event, aside from a few drag numbers that I mostly missed, due to the poor audio from the stage. I was expecting some kind of welcome, an introduction of the judging panel or an awards ceremony, but after the drag queens left the stage, there was nothing to watch but the crowd. 

Most of the attendees were young, see-and-be-seen professionals that continue to live the college party life after graduation. Miss Chef and I were both surprised not to know anybody there aside from the folks behind a couple of the food tables.The music was far too loud to carry on a conversation, so the idea of mingling and networking was just plain irritating.  I had a couple glasses of wine to help ease my irritation, but it was mediocre, and the only food was small bites from three of the nominated restaurants. Yes, the paper’s staff was nowhere to be found, while the honorees were asked to work the event!    

After an hour of sipping insipid wine and making ourselves hoarse trying to talk over the din, Miss Chef and I absconded for dinner elsewhere.  We went a few blocks up Tryon Street to The Wooden Vine, a tapas and wine bar we’ve enjoyed before.  I let Miss Chef do most of the ordering.

My camera wasn’t focusing any better than my eyes, apparently.  At the top, from left to right you see locally-made burrata (seasoned ricotta inside a mozzarella skin), roasted brussels sprouts and braised short rib with hominy corn.  On the bottom, roasted potato, and tortellini with house-made ricotta .

Chef Nick, whom I recently interviewed for an upcoming “Chef Horror Stories” piece, was working his last weekend prior to leaving to open his own place.  He also had a big party in the back of the restaurant, so most of this was not up to his usual level.  The tortellini made me very happy, though.

The pea sprouts are from Mindy at Tega Hills.  I delivered those pea sprouts here for a couple of weeks, back in June.  I love seeing the whole trajectory of food from greenhouse to plate.

After dinner we had an easy stroll about 4 blocks to the car.  Though small, Charlotte’s downtown area is really charming at night; much more bustling than the dead business blocks I saw growing up near Cleveland, and of course the weather here is much more benign.

I stopped to take a couple of pictures.

A fountain in front of Capital Grille…

…and the top of the Hearst Tower rising in the mist, where Miss Chef searched to no avail for the Bat Signal.

It had been a long day, and we both had to remind ourselves it was only that morning we’d arrived back from Asheville.  I was very happy to crawl into my own bed and lay my head on my own pillow.

And while Miss Chef crawled out of bed with the first glow of the morning sun, I stayed put.  Yes, this Saturday I skipped the markets entirely.

I guess that counts as vacation, right?

Apple-tacular

Miss Chef and I had an...interesting weekend last week. It involved local travel, wine-tasting, antiquing and apple picking. I've written all about it, but you'll have to hop on over to my food blog, Amuse Bouche, to read it.

Enjoy!

Mountain Getaway

Three years ago, Miss Chef and I celebrated our 10th anniversary by renting a cabin in the woods in the mountains of western North Carolina.  We enjoyed the entire weekend so much that it’s become our annual tradition.  Just as the long nights close in and winter signals its intent to return, we enjoy a last hurrah of sunshine (usually), beautiful color, and apples.

We have never stayed in the same place twice, and this year found us heading to Lake Lure, just down the road from Chimney Rock, which we visited a couple of years ago.  It seemed more difficult to us to find the kind of place we wanted this year within our price range.  Miss Chef found one in a gated community, which I assumed meant more of a townhome kind of arrangement, or at least not quite the isolated cabin experience we’ve had in the past.

Regardless, I was excited to get away for a long weekend.  It’s only about 2 1/2 hours to drive to the Asheville area, and it seems only an hour or so before we are already enjoying our first mountain views.

 

Although Lake Lure is on the near side of Asheville, we couldn’t check in to the cabin until 3:00.  So Miss Chef assumed that we would naturally head on into Asheville for lunch at her favorite area restaurant…

…again.  We haven’t been to Asheville without eating here, since we first discovered it.  So I didn’t bother to suggest we try something different.  Besides, there are always a few more items left to explore on this menu.

Miss Chef leapt at the chance to sit at the bar, which is prime seating for the open kitchen.  We both enjoyed watching the many cooks at work, serving up our lunches while also prepping for dinner.  I swear one cook stood in front of me separating cloves from heads of garlic for half an hour.

With all the movement going on, it was impossible to get a good, clean panorama shot, but I like the sense of energy.  I was impressed at how quietly the cooks worked, and how they seemed more or less oblivious of their audience.  Even the sauté pans were shiny and clean.  No cursing or sex jokes out here!

After lunch, we wandered Asheville for a bit, visiting Mast General Store and French Broad Chocolate Lounge…yum!

 

Then we headed on a rather lengthy drive down (and up, and down…) a lovely, winding mountain road toward Lake Lure to get the key to the cabin.  Though we had been getting hints of early fall color for the past week or so in  Charlotte, everything was still mostly green.

 

Once we had keys and directions in hand, we found our way to the “gated community” and quickly realized this wasn’t your average neighborhood.  Almost immediately we were driving up a narrow, twisty gravel road with cabins strewn here and there on the wooded slope.  And when we finally reached our cabin, I had to give Miss Chef her due…she had found us a perfect mountain getaway.

 

It was small and warm, with a second-story loft area serving as master bedroom.   The opposite wall of the cabin promised a lovely first view in the morning.

 

It wasn’t until I looked out the back window, and stepped onto the balcony that I fully appreciated where we had landed.

The name of the property is “Me, You and the View,” which had stuck me as just too cutesy, but I have to hand it to them…it’s a perfect name.

After settling in, we drove back out to get a few essentials—coffee for the morning, deli sandwiches for dinner, and our first gallon of apple cider.  Then we retired to our cozy getaway and enjoyed a few hours snuggled in front of the tv with hot mulled cider.

The next morning, I arose just before dawn and discovered the view had many faces…

…and that it changed quickly and frequently.  The fog rising off Lake Lure became rosy in the morning sun before slowly dissipating.

 

 

 

The temperature had dropped well below freezing the previous night, and neither of us was eager to head out on a tromp through the woods on this chilly morning.  So we opted to drive back to Hickory Nut Gap Farm, which we had passed the day before.  Miss Chef has been here before to pick up pork and beef for the school, and for one of the restaurants she’s worked at.  Today it was time to pick up some supplies for ourselves.

Which included apples.

 

Once we’d cleared out a good portion of their inventory, we decided to head on back to Asheville, since the farm was about halfway there anyway.  The day was still chilly, so we stopped to eat at a noodle shop right on Pack Square.  The place was teeny-tiny, reminding me of some of the no-frills restaurants I’d enjoyed as a student in Paris, many years ago.  The food was warm, delicious and filling, and we were soon back on the sidewalks, exploring the storefronts of this funky, creative city.

We stopped at the renowned Malaprops independent bookstore.

 

We tried out a new business, the Gourmet Chip Company.

I got the plain-Jane salt and pepper chips, Miss Chef tried “the Parisian:” white truffle spritz, herb crusted goat cheese, rosemary and thyme.

We checked out any number of gift shops, food stores and art galleries as the day warmed a bit.  We eventually found ourselves in the general area of the parking garage where we had left the car, and decided to head out of the city.  My vote was to enjoy a drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway.

For those who aren’t familiar with it, this is a beautiful two-way roadway constructed in the 1930s.  Today it is, in a sense, the longest National Park in the country.  According to Wikipedia,

“[i]t runs for 469 miles (755 km) through twenty-nine Virginia and North Carolina counties, mostly along the Blue Ridge, a major mountain chain that is part of the Appalachian Mountains. Its southern terminus is on the boundary between Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the Cherokee Indian Reservation in North Carolina, from which it travels north to Shenandoah National Park in Virginia and offers access to the Skyline Drive.”

And according to the official National Park website, construction began in 1935 as part of the New Deal, offering jobs for the unemployed.  Today it is a lovely tourist attraction, but considering the state of technology nearly 80 years ago, it’s also a monument to human determination and ingenuity.

Ride along with us for a minute or so (please ignore the windshield specks).

 

The construction of the parkway tunnels gives testimony to the careful craftmanship of a bygone era.

 

The parkway also features many, many pullouts to stop and enjoy scenic overlooks.  We took advantage of several.

 

 

It seemed that the overnight cold snap had finally started some of the trees into their first bright show of color.

 

However, as you can tell, the sun was promising to soon drop behind the distant ridge, so we headed back to the the nearby town of Hendersonville for a warm, tasty dinner.  It was close to bedtime when we drove our way back up the gravel road to our home away from home, and we didn’t waste any time snuggling in for another cozy night.

Sunday morning I slept a bit later than the day before, and was eager to see what the view offered this day.

 

After snapping this shot, I settled into breakfast, only to look up no more than five minutes later and discover the scene had changed remarkably!

And ten minutes after that…

 

Did you notice the fake owl sitting on the balcony railing in a couple of those shots?  Miss Chef found it a bit unsettling…I can’t imagine why…

 

This was checkout day, so Miss Chef was busy cleaning up while I finished breakfast and stripped the bed.  I decided that, although we’d missed our chance for stargazing with the telescope near the back window, it might be interesting to see what it could do in gazing across the valley.  I’d never used a telescope before, and it took me forever to see anything besides white haze.  But in a one-in-a-million stroke of luck, I happened to zero in on the top of Chimney Rock!  I had Miss Chef come out to see, and we were both surprised to realize our cabin was sitting at least as high as that formation. 

Before driving back to the office of the rental agency, we went a little out of our way to visit the small lake where a kayak belonging to the property had been available for our use.  It had been too cold the previous day, but we were interested to see what the lakeside looked like.  And we were quite glad we took the time!

 

We also discovered a short nature trail across the road, and were happy to get in at least a short hike in the woods.  There was a picturesque waterfall…

 

…and a gorgeous wide, rocky river alive with swirling eddies.

 

 

We spent quite a while here, seated on a huge boulder, just watching the water flow by.  Isn’t that what vacation is all about.

 

Soon enough though, we were headed back to the highway—a couple of stops for more cider and other regional treats, as well as lunch in Hendersonville, and then back down to the flatlands.  We collected Rosie from “camp,” where she stays with a friend in the country, and then finally home.

Only to realize, fall had followed us into our own front yard.