NOURISH YOUR BODY— A FEAST FOR NORMALCY

A Feast for Normalcy

WITH VACCINATIONS IN ARMS IT’S TIME TO GATHER AGAIN FOR A SUMMER GARDEN PARTY

BY REBECCA CRICHTON

My mother was a wonderful hostess. She was among the cadre of suburban post-WWII wives who decorated their homes with modern furniture and bold colors, attended museums and live theater, and experimented with continental food different from the Eastern European food they had grown up with. When she died, I snagged a slim hardback cookbook from her kitchen. The book, published in 1957, was Thought for Food: A Cookery Book for Entertaining Occasions, by Cecily Finn and Joan O’Connor. It is a quirky, witty cookbook that reads like a mash-up of the culinary and conversational musings of Dorothy Parker and Norah Ephron.

For instance, under the category “Occasions of Love” you find “Dinner for a New Love, an Old Love and an Old Love’s New Love.” The “Aim,” which means the goal of the meal, perfectly toned, includes one detailed sentence requiring careful reading:

“Very complicated. Putting it as simply as

possible, we would say: to flaunt your new love before your old love and at the same time, and in the nicest possible manner, to show your old love’s new love that, were your new love not so much more attractive than your old love, you could, if you so desired, bring him to heel again with the flick of an eyelash.”

Don’t try finding the book as it’s long out of print. But an Internet search for Cecily Finn will turn up the 2020 novel, Miss Cecily’s Recipes for Exceptional Ladies, by Vicky Zimmerman. This is a lightweight, chick-lit, food-focused romance, in which Kate, about to be 40, is food-obsessed and seeks true love. She diverts herself from heartbreak and overeating by volunteering to demonstrate cooking to the senior residents of the Lauderdale House for Exceptional Ladies. There she meets 97-year-old Cecily Finn—yes, the author of Thought for Food—and the two bond, despite Finn’s sharp tongue, depressed attitude, and disapproval of Kate’s choice in men. This is a story about the value of books, food, and friendship.

In one more serendipitous discovery, we learn that Vicky Zimmerman, who usually writes under the name Stella Newman, is actually Cecily Finn’s granddaughter. In an interview at the end of the book, she apologizes for making her good-natured, kind grandmother into a “spikier, more irritable” character in the book.

I’m pretty sure my mother never cooked from this book, given its pristine condition. But I am sure she relished the smart and funny take on food and events.

Rebecca Crichton taught cooking to seniors and others, and she can reel off food ideas and recipes for any part of a meal or event. She believes in easily prepared, healthy, and taste-filled food that delights and satisfies.

In the style of Thought for Food, I invite you to A Festive and Ritualistic Post-Pandemic Outdoor Gathering for Qualifying Participants

“If we don’t have each other, we go crazy with loneliness. When we do, we go crazy with togetherness.” —Stephen King

AIM

This is not your usual gathering. The combination of garlic and creativity makes for a potent mix. Presuming we are fully vaccinated, and steadfastly mask-wearing in public places, we will gather to hug heartily, drink abundantly, and eat voraciously. Invite those with a sense of fun and a bit of gallows humor to this event. Keep the sanitizer handy for messy eating and greeting.

SETTING

A long or round table—think Tuscan feasts in villa vineyards—strewn with branches and fresh flowers in Mason Jars, battery-operated candles, plenty of compostable and eco-friendly plates, flatware, cups, and napkins.

MENU

Le Grand Aioli

• Garlic mayonnaise • Roast chicken, cooked fish, or seafood • Fresh veggies from farmers markets or your garden

Method

• Garlic Mayonnaise: Scratch recipes abound online or you could just buy a few jars from the store. There are many commercial versions, not as good as homemade, but adequate. Have enough to slather on everything. • Fresh herbs: Mint, parsley, basil, dill, and cilantro.

When you are done with the garlic, chewing on parsley or mint might remove the flavor. (I say, why bother?

You shouldn’t have invited anybody who doesn’t like or can’t handle garlic!) • For those who won’t or can’t tolerate garlic (poor souls!) offer Greek yogurt with cumin, lemon or lime juice, and a mixture of chopped fresh herbs. Or good quality plain mayonnaise will do.

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LE GRAND COOKIE BUFFET

• A variety of purchased or homemade cookies:

Shortbread, ginger snaps, chocolate chip,

Snickerdoodles • Array of toppings: Lemon curd, fudge sauce, homemade preserves • Fresh berries: Raspberries, strawberries, blueberries Process: Choose topping, spread on the cookies you like, top with berries. Consume. A short, but safe, distance from the table designate a space where, over the course of the gathering, an amorphous structure is created from branches and other burnable materials supplied by participants. Its many arms and other protuberances will be decorated with masks and other pandemic-related paraphernalia, and completed with an artistic wrapping of TP. (Admit it, you have a year’s supply stashed at home.) Tap into your inner teenager for this. At the appointed time, the well-fed participants gather to declare whatever helps them to feel unburdened. Written statements can be added to the blaze. Someone with a penchant for barbecue lights it up. Watch in wonder and sing whatever songs of merriment and liberation that you remember: “Happy Days Are Here Again,” “Freedom,” “Celebration.”

*Intended to be ceremonial and celebrational, only. Please continue to wear masks as directed by the CDC.

Every Meal Fit for a Queen

The Finest Dining IN SENIOR LIVING

Chef Darren McGrady, personal chef to Queen Elizabeth II, Diana Princess of Wales, and Princes William and Harry for fifteen years and has cooked for five U.S. Presidents. At Madison House you can look forward to personally curated, world-class, signature menu items by the Royal Chef.

madisonhousekirkland.com 12215 NE 128th St / Kirkland, WA Be our guest, dine well, and know you’re eating like royalty. (425) 650-2406

LEARNING TO SEE

A MYOPIC LOOKS BACK TO THE FUTURE BY VIVIAN MCINERNY

My high school science teacher back in the 1970s was a geeky guy who loved tech and sci-fi. He once asked the class to imagine the future. Students talked excitedly of flying cars, robotic maids, and picture phones!

He wanted us to consider the computer. At the time, computers were about the size of a VW bus and used only by global corporations for tasks none of us understood or cared to understand. But he insisted that in the not-toodistant future, most jobs would involve computers.

“Just think, girls,” he said. “One day, you might use computers to cook for your husbands.”

I groaned. Loudly. His vision of our future sucked like the ‘70s. He wasn’t a bad teacher, just a traditional man of the times.

The lesson stays with me as a reminder of how difficult it is for people, no matter how earnest, to escape the confines of their times. Few people are true visionaries who can imagine a better world and make it happen. Most of us just grumble and stumble along. There are those rare moments when a single event seems to shine a spotlight on society’s darkest corners, illuminating institutional racism or inequity or misogyny in the glaringly unflattering light it deserves. More often, illumination comes slowly. Instead of a quick flip of a switch it’s more like the slow turn of the earth toward the sun until it finally dawns on all of us.

As soon as we can see, we claim we always knew what was there. And on some level I suppose that is true.

Like the accidental lesson in sexism I learned in that science class, I didn’t know what I didn’t know until it was laid out, blatantly obvious, before me. And then I immediately jumped in to shame the teacher for being such a bumbling dimwit. Other girls in class agreed. One determinedly contrary boy said he didn’t want to work, and we girls should count ourselves lucky that we could stay home and cook. Shame, I thought, he was just trying to muffle the roar of our newfound girl power. I was strong. I was independent. I was stupidly smug because, honestly, I still didn’t get it.

I say that because my main takeaway from the computers-are-our-future lesson was to refuse to learn to cook. Nobody puts Baby in a kitchen! I also resisted typing class. Nobody puts Baby in a secretarial pool! Thankfully, the typing teacher pointed out that knowing my way around a keyboard might also be useful if I wanted to be a writer. I was grateful a few years later when I landed my first job in a newsroom where grizzled old reporters struggled to hunt-and-peck out stories on typewriters—electric typewriters because it was a modern newsroom. Six months later, all the typewriters were replaced by computers. I thought then of my science teacher’s seemingly far-fetched prediction, and I realized he got it partly right. In the half-light before the dawn, he foresaw the shadow of technological advances while I’d focused solely on shifting gender roles.

The truth was, neither one of us saw the big picture in sharp focus. Everything looked blurry. But we at least tried, both of us searching the horizon with eyes wide open, eager to usher in the change.

Vivian McInerny is a career journalist. She’s working on a collection of related personal essays about traveling overland from Italy to India at age 18. Her first children’s book, The Whole Hole Story, will be published in 2021 by Versify, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Olympic Sculpture Park

Urban Art Al Fresco

expressions in areas that allow you to meander as you take them in on self-guided, or volunteer-guided, jaunts. Since it opened to the public in 2007, this welcoming and award-winning nine-acre greenspace, a project of the Seattle Art Museum, has become a prime attraction for tourists and local strollers alike. Located at the foot of Belltown, and the south end of Myrtle Edwards Park, the once-contaminated industrial site formerly owned by a gas company has been redesigned, ecologically conserved, and beautifully landscaped. It showcases both the gorgeous natural views of Puget Sound, Mt. Rainier, and (on a clear day) the Olympic Mountain Range, as well as an array of world-class artworks (most permanent, though some on temporary loan from other collections). Broad paths make the park accessible to visitors of all abilities. As you wander along the 2,200-foot paved walkway, the winding path reveals different sculptures every 30 feet or so. As we go to press, some Seattle museums and art galleries These works, created by leading artists from the 1960s to are gradually opening their doors to visitors in restricted the present era, can be quite dramatic. numbers, and with COVID-19 safety protocols in place. Alexander Calder’s “Eagle” is a compelling, red-hued,

Hopefully there will be more opportunities for abstract version of America’s most symbolic bird. Teresita patrons to visit the Seattle Art Museum, Bellevue Arts Fernández’s “Seattle Cloud Cover” is a sculptural Museum, and other local fine arts institutions come BY MISHA bridge that displays images of “changing sky summer. BERSON discovered in nature and art.” And Spanish artist

But the mild weather opens the door to spend more time Jaume Plensa’s towering “Echo” is a white sculpted enjoying ourselves in the fresh air. And what better season head more than 45 feet tall that looks like a serenely to visit some of the many outdoor public art installations in monumental marble bust. (It is actually made of fiberglass Washington State? One can build a walk around art displays coated with marble dust.) in numerous areas, or even plan a full-day trip around an art The Olympic Sculpture Park is open daily, from 30 outing—with no admission cost. minutes before sunrise to 30 minutes after sunset. Guided

Public artworks are bountiful in our region. They are tours are offered several days a week, and dogs on six-foot commissioned and funded by state, county, and local leashes are allowed. governments, as well as private institutions and individual More information: www.seattleartmuseum.org/visit/ art patrons. Seattle alone has more than 400 permanent olympic-sculpture-park pieces of art on public display throughout the city. It was Bellevue Arts Commission Art Walk actually one of the first cities in the United States to adopt Not all Eastsiders realize that Bellevue’s downtown boasts a percent-for-art ordinance, a program that specifies that a a wide range of public art, much of it of recent vintage. A percentage of eligible city capital improvement project funds civic art map, in fact, lists more than 100 pieces supported be set aside for the commission, purchase, and installation of by public funding and local corporate and business artworks in a variety of settings. underwriting.

You will find listings and photos of public projects on the Spread across a wide swath of downtown, the map points websites of many Washington counties and municipalities. to statues, murals, and stone etchings, as well as indoor Here are just a few of the most noteworthy, walking- works on paint, canvas, and other materials. Some of these friendly outdoor collections of sculpture, murals, and other works are on display, outdoors or inside, at the Meydenbauer

Center, the Westin, the Bellevue Arts Museum, and the Bellevue Library.

For more details and a downloadable map visit: www.visitbellevuewa.com/things-to-do/arts-and-culture/ public-art-walk/.

Downtown Puyallup Outdoor Art Gallery The city of Puyallup in Pierce County is widely known as the home of the annual Washington State Fair. (Yes, the one traditionally serving up those delicious scones, along with a slew of nationally known pop and country music acts.)

It was also the first city in the state of Washington to receive an AARP/World Health Organization “AgeFriendly City” designation for optimizing opportunities for people of all ages.

One of its all-ages attractions, year-round and at no cost, is a streetside outdoor art gallery featuring permanent and rotating sculptures from professional and amateur artists creating in a variety of media.

Some of the works draw on traditional and modern Native American artistry, like “Rising,” by Louis and Sandie Nadelson. It is an arching form of a whale, constructed of recycled metal inspired by images of Orca whales as depicted by Northwest Native Americans.

In another vein, the charming “TA DA” by Oregon sculptor C.J. Rench is a balancing act of two playful X-shaped stainless steel figures. And Lance Carleton’s “Fat Tire #7” is in the form of a bicycle constructed of recycled steel. The artist says it is definitely not a “Do Not Touch” piece, and viewers are welcome to “climb aboard.”

Puyallup’s Arts Downtown consortium offers live, self-guided and phone tours. For details visit: www.artsdowntown.org.

Misha Berson writes about the arts for crosscut.com and many other media outlets, teaches for the UW Osher program, and is the author of four books, including Something’s Coming, Something Good: West Side Story and the American Imagination (Applause/Hal Leonard).

Opposite page: Olympic Sculpture Park from Elliot Bay. Photo by Jaume Plans. This page: Alexander Calder’s “Eagle,” just one of the stunning sculptures—with equally stunning views—at the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle.