Today, one of the participants in the San Joaquin Valley Writing Project’s Summer Institute picked out an amazing quote to discuss from the NWP’s publication, Because Writing Matters. When I read the book, my eyes must have glossed over this passage, so I’m very glad that Lesli pointed it out:
“If students are to make knowledge their own, they must struggle with details, wrestle with facts, and rework raw information and dimly understood concepts into language they can communicate to someone else. In short, if students are to learn, they must write.”
I love how this quote focuses on how messy learning can be and why writing is such a crucial part of learning. I suppose conversation could take the place of writing here, and that certainly is another important component of learning. But as I think about all the times in my life that I’ve written about a topic . . . even in email when I’m trying to communicate something important . . . I see how writing helped me, eventually, find clarity and a deeper understanding.
A couple of weekends ago, my neighbor Lori and I decided to go to the coast for the day. We chose Big Sur as our destination. We drove (a lot), hiked to see McWay Falls in the Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, sat on a bench and philosophized about life as we looked at the striking scenery, and took a lot of photographs of the gorgeous, gorgeous ocean.
I’ve been on quite the hiatus. I blogged about teaching a couple of times, then grading and all kinds of meetings hit and I disappeared. The last two months have been good. Classes are done, we’ve had two of the pre-Institute days for the Writing Project and are gearing up to start the Summer Institute in a week (love this group, by the way). I traveled to New York for a couple of days, and I’ve been reading a lot.
Today, I decided to de-clutter. I just have so much stuff in my house and I’m always complaining that I don’t have enough storage space, so I started sorting through things. I’m getting rid of books, old journals (everything’s on the internet now, isn’t it?), clothes, an electric blanket, table cloths I never use, and start up disks from a computer I haven’t owned in years. I love the feeling of getting rid of stuff I don’t need–I feel like it’s a way of making room for new things in my life (not just “things” as in “stuff,” but “things” as in “experiences”).
As I was sorting through my possessions, I listened to music and became rather obsessed with Flaming Lips. So . . . in honor of summer, here’s a song that is atmospheric, moody, and a little depressing. Enjoy.
And as long as I’m in Flaming Lips mode. Here’s another song I love, Ego-Tripping at the Gates of Hell:
Recently, I made a quick trip to New York City, a city I love and a city I love to eat in. One evening, I had vouchers to see A Winter’s Tale at Shakespeare in the Park. I traded my vouchers for tickets, sat in the park awhile, and then decided it was time for dinner.
I have a lot of favorite restaurants in New York, but none are on the Upper West side, so I used the Yelp application on my iPhone to explore nearby eateries. One looked especially intriguing to me: Kefi (which, according to the restaurant website, means “bliss” in Greek). It was relatively close, so I dashed through the rain that began en route and took shelter in a bright, inviting restaurant. There were many, many things that looked interesting on the menu, but one thing in particular sounded so appealing: sheep’s milk dumplings with tomatoes, pine nuts, and spicy lamb sausage. I don’t really eat lamb, but I decided to go outside my comfort zone and try this dish out.
I was so glad I did. The dumplings were so smooth and delicious which counteracted the delicious sausage’s spiciness. And the pine nuts were an enjoyable addition to the meal. I think the dish also had spinach in it–which added a pleasing flavor. I ate every bit of this dinner; it was so delicious I couldn’t stop myself. I so recommend this charming restaurant.
Sheep’s Milk Dumplings with Tomato, Pine Nuts, and Spicy Lamb Sausage
Yield: 6 people
Ingredients for Gnudi:
1 lb of sheep’s milk ricotta cheese
1/2 tsp of salt
Pinch of white pepper
1/3 cup of pecorino Romano
1 egg
1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour
In a large mixing bowl, combine ricotta, salt, pepper and pecorino and mix well with a spatula. Beat egg and add to ricotta, folding in well. Sprinkle a third of the flour onto a clean, flat working station. Transfer ricotta onto flour. Begin to incorporate flour until it pulls from the surface. Let rest for 10 to 15 min. Cut into 4 equal parts. Dust the station with flour and begin to roll into logs ½ inch in diameter. Using knife, cut logs into ½ inch long dumplings. Transfer to a tray lined with parchment paper, dusted with flour. Continue until all dumplings are complete. You can freeze dumplings for 3 to 4 days. Wrap in plastic on the tray spaced far enough apart so air can flow in between.
Ingredients for the Sauce:
1 lb. Loukanika Greek sausage (Sweet or hot Italian sausage can substitute)
3 garlic cloves chopped
1 shallot chopped
3 Tb. Extra Virgin Olive Oil + 1 teaspoon
1 Cup tomato sauce
1/2 Cup chicken stock
4 oz. triple-washed fresh spinach, shopped
4 oz. crumbled feta cheese
1/4 Cup toasted pine nuts
1/2 Cup sliced sundried tomatoes marinated in extra virgin olive oil
Remove the sausage from its casing and crumble. In a large frying pan over medium-high heat brown the sausage lightly in the olive oil. Add garlic and brown lightly, then the shallots. Deglaze the pan with chicken stock and add the tomato sauce, sundried tomatoes and the spinach. In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook the gnudi for 2-3 minutes. Add the cooked gnudi to the pan of sauce, season with salt and pepper, and toss. Plate the dish, sprinkle with crumbled feta, drizzle with one teaspoon of olive oil, sprinkle with pine nuts and serve.
Kefi
505 Columbus Avenue
New York, NY
212-873-0200
My friends and I hang out at Sequoia’s every so often. Recently, it was my birthday, and I decided it was time for another Sequoia expedition. I didn’t tell people it was my birthday–I didn’t want a fuss–I just wanted to spend time with people who make me laugh and bring happiness into my life.
So we met at Sequoia’s and eventually migrated to Livingstone’s. I stayed out way late, laughed a lot, and had a really great birthday.
I also ate my favorite Sequoia meal: sliders with garlic fries.
Saturday morning, I went to the Fresno Farmer’s Market and was inspired by the many fresh and unusual ingredients I found there. My inspiration led me to finally try a couple of recipes from Rick Bayless’s Mexican Kitchen. I loved his restaurant Frontera Grill in Chicago when I ate there a few years ago–and I thought I would end up preparing something from his cookbook right away. Alas, it took learning to love nopal and buying nopal at the Farmer’s Market this past weekend for me to finally try a few recipes out.
I should have done this sooner as the food I prepared was so delicious and healthy. I actually made two kinds of salsa, a taco filling made of lamb’s quarters (a kind of green I found at the market), and the nopal salad. The verdict? Yum. Yum. and Yum.
This taco was perfect. I loved the interplay of the citrusy tomatillo-chipotle salsa with the sweetness of the greens and the nuttiness of the cotija cheese. I loved the tangy flavor of the nopal, even though I ended up cooking it way too long. The tomato-onion-serrano chile mixture was good, just not very subtle . . . so it’s the only recipe that I would play with a bit to try to improve. And I have to say that eating the leftovers today was just as satisfying as the original meal.
Make these recipes as soon as you can find some nopal and lamb’s quarters.
Roasted Cactus Salad (Ensalada de Nopales Asados), adapted from Rick Bayless
1 bag nopal cut into small pieces (Bayless gives directions on how to prepare the cactus paddle which I was able to skip)
2 T. olive oil
Salt, about 1/2 teaspoon
For the Tomato-Serrano Salsa
1 large, very ripe, round tomato finely diced
Fresh serrano chiles to taste, roughly 2-3 (I only used one and I would clean out the seeds next time, even though the recipe didn’t specify that one should)
1 garlic clove, minced
3 T. chopped cilantro
1/2 c. finely diced white onion
1 t. fresh lime jiuce
The recipe also calls for romaine lettuce, Mexican queso anejo, and radish slices or roses to use as garnish.
Instructions:
Toss the cactus with 1 T. olive oil and salt on a baking sheet. Roast, stirring occasionally, until tender and all liquid has evaporated, about 20 minutes. Cool (I totally overcooked the nopal, but it still tasted great).
Salsa: in a large bowl, mix the tomato, chiles, garlic, and cilantro. Add onion and lime juice.
Don’t mix the cactus and the salsa until right before serving.
Roasted Tomatillo-Chipotle Salsa (Salsa de Chile Chipotle y Tomate Verde), again from Rick Bayless
3 to 6 canned chiles chipotles en adobo (I used 3)
3 large garlic cloves, unpeeled
5-6 medium tomatillos, husked and rinsed
Salt, about 1/2 t.
Sugar, about 1/4 t.
Heat an ungreased skillet to medium heat and roast the garlic cloves. Turn occasionally until the garlic is black in spots, about 15 minutes. Cool, slip off the skins, then roughly chop.
Lay the tomatillos on a baking sheet and place about 4 inches below a very hot broiler. When the tomatillos blister, blacken, and soften on one side, about 5 minutes, turn them over and roast the other side. Cool completely on the baking sheet.
Scrape the tomatillos and any juices they have secreted into a blender and add the garlic. Pulse the machine until everything reaches your desired thickness. Add the chiles and pulse again. Transfer to a serving bowl and stir in 3 to 4 T. water (if desired), and salt and sugar to taste.
Tacos of Garlicky Mexican Greens with Seared Onion and Fresh Cheese (Tacos de Quelites), from Rick Bayless
9 c. loosely packed, stemmed lamb’s quarters (I ended up buying a bunch and just roughly chopping them)–chard would work here, too
1 T. olive oil
1 medium white onion, sliced 1/4 inch thick
3 garlic cloves, minced
Salt, about 1/2 t.
Cotija cheese
corn tortillas
Tomatillo-Chipotle Salsa
Bring 3 quarts of salted water to a boil in a large pot. Add the greens and cook until barely tender, about 2-3 minutes for the lamb’s quarters, 1-2 minutes for the chard. Pour into a colander, then spread out on a large plate or baking sheet to cool. When cool enough to handle, roughly chop.
Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring frequently, until golden brown, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic, stir for 1 minute, then add the greens, and stir for a minute or so longer, just enough to heat them through. Taste and season with salt.
Place some greens in a heated corn tortilla, sprinkle with the cheese and add a dollop of salsa.
I’m not a tamale fan, but this place has transformed me into a believer. Tamales are good–not the heavy, tasteless items that I once thought they were. Almost every tamale I’ve ever had has had too much masa, not enough filling.
Casa de Tamales gets it right. The tamales are small, but with just the right proportion of filling and masa. The chef makes traditional tamales, but s/he also experiments with a “gourmet” menu. The owners are from Michoacan, according to Alex, from the same town that his family is from. For Alex, eating at Casa de Tamales is like having his mother’s home cooking, so we went there to celebrate Mother’s Day.
I thought and thought before selecting. I decided on two–a soyrizo version and the chicken alfredo tamale. I wanted to try the soyrizo tamale because I like soyrizo, but also because it was topped with nopal. Since eating a nopal soup in Oaxaca, I’ve been longing for good nopal . . . which is what I found at Casa de Tamales. The soyrizo was good, but the nopal was what really stood out to me with its crunchy, fresh taste.
I loved the second tamale for the filling: chicken, roasted poblanos, potatoes, and casero cheese. The restaurant uses a jalapeno masa topped with a creamy tomatillo sauce and a black bean salsa. I know it sounds strange, but this was delicious, a fabulous combination of creaminess and spiciness.
The combination dishes come with sides of rice and pinto beans. I loved the rice, which is not something I say very often.
I want to try the more traditional tamales, too. Alex’s shredded beef tamale with guacamole looked really good.
And Kyle’s tamale with mole and chicken with tomatillo sauce looked tasty, too.
We also ordered dessert tamales. My chocolate cake tamale was forgettable, but Kyle and Alex seemed to love their raisin and cinnamon tamale.
I’m so glad to have finally eaten a good tamale. No other version will ever live up to it, I fear.
Casa de Tamales
3747 W. Shaw
Fresno, CA
559-275-9300
Recently, Marisela Norte was in town to do a reading at Fresno State. Alex had a party for her the night before the reading–but I wasn’t able to attend since I taught late that night. The next day, however, after I was done with a student teacher observation, I met Alex, Kyle, and Marisela for lunch at the Chicken Pie Shop.
The Chicken Pie Shop is Fresno to me. I think it was one of the first restaurants I ever ate at in Fresno, and there’s something about the place that is incredibly appealing. I’m not sure that the decor has ever been changed–so it’s easy to feel like you’ve stepped back about 60 years when you walk in. There’s a lunch counter and cooking area on the left . . . and tables with green vinyl benches on the right. Hanging on the walls are big metal chickens, just in case you’re not sure what the specialty is by the name of the place.
I hadn’t been to Chicken Pie for years . . . so I was really glad to have an excuse to go back. And Marisela, who is both poet and artist, loved the interior so much that she took pictures of the green vinyl which matched the sweater I was wearing that day.
I ate the BLT for lunch–and it was quite satisfying. Once I was done with the sandwich, I dumped the salad on my plate so that I could pour the ranch dressing on top of the iceberg lettuce. Yes, that’s the kind of place that the Chicken Pie Shop is.
So many weeks ago I barely remember it, I went to lunch at the Daily Grill. I may or may not have been there before–Alex and Kyle raved about it when they first moved here, but I can’t remember if I ever went. Anyway, I went twice in a week about a month (?) ago.
The first time, my friend Izzy and I had lunch there. I had the grilled vegetable plate and he had the cheeseburger (as he always does). My veggies were great–although later on at the baseball game, I needed a hot dog to balance out the universe.
Then, a few days later, I took my friend Toni there for her birthday. Toni had been gone for several weeks, so it was also an opportunity to get caught up. I had the trout almondine which was scrumptious.
Toni had the chicken marsala which she very much enjoyed.
I like the Daily Grill’s atmosphere with its swanky booths, dark wood, and stark white table cloths. I also like that it serves classic dishes done to perfection. I don’t like that it’s a chain–but it’s just a mini-chain, only 22 locations in the U.S.
Daily Grill
7855 N. Palm Ave.
Fresno, CA
559-435-5550
Tomorrow, I’ll be talking about technology and teaching in both my classes, so I decided to try out some new sites last night. One of the most interesting sites is Wordle, which allows one to enter text into a box, then generate a word cloud. After a couple of tries, I learned to limit the number of words (150 is the default, I found that 40-50 created a more accessible cloud). I also learned to use the “mostly horizontal” setting, which I liked better than the other settings. Here are three examples of the word clouds I made:
This word cloud is made from the prompt I use for the unit plan assignment in my Methods class. I think it demonstrates how Wordle could be used to help students understand what’s important about the assignment. Notice that, besides the word unit, the largest words are “teaching,” “writing,” and “students.” The word “include” is quite large, too, a lesson to me that I need to find other verbs to use.
I also made a word cloud from my course description in my literacy studies class:
I was relieved to see words like “language,” “communities,” “practices,” and different forms of the word “literacy.” The important verb in this cloud seems to be “understand,” an unconscious reminder that this was new content for me and that this semester I’ve been learning with my students. If I teach this class again, I’ll do a new course description, then see what Wordle creates.
I can imagine using Wordle to help students process their own writing–and then to analyze what the results mean. Do certain words show up because they are important to the argument/topic? Or do they show up because the writer needs to expand their vocabulary?
I can also see using Wordle to replicate a passage from a literary text. Last week, I observed a student teacher who was just finishing The Great Gatsby. I love the last few paragraphs of the novel . . . which create this word cloud:
What stands out to me here are the words “green,” “wonder,” “back,” and “hardly.” That last passage emphasizes both the wonder of the New World and its loss–and these words remind me of the sense of impossibility at the end of TGG, the difficulty of going “back” to recover what once was.
I’ll be trying to use Wordle occasionally in my teaching. I see it as a tool that can help students focus on and analyze text.
