Simple home recipes for my daughter. Original poetry.
There is a performative aspect to this painting. The curtains remind me of theatre curtains, the fruit is oversized, and the dual plates and knives are carefully positioned downstage. But the kitchens of the 19th century were not performative. Tucked…
There’s pumpkin soup, and then there’s roast pumpkin soup, which in my opinion tastes better. And hand-mashed roast pumpkin soup gives it a rustic edge. There are some naming differences around the world, when it comes to pumpkin. Some call…
Risoni is another one of the kitchen’s greatest shortcuts. It’s super quick to cook and has a wonderful mouth-feel. Add it to soups or salads, use it as a side dish, or, like here with this creamy salmon risoni, as…
Granddaughter of Isaac Newton, Amanda Almira Newton contributed nearly one-sixth of all the 7,600 archived botanical illustrations for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Her watercolour work for the Department from 1896-1928 documented an expanding industry at a time when photography…
Known for his “radiant sunlight” and “filmy atmosphere”, Sanford Robinson Gifford’s style as a master landscaper was well established by the 1860s. Around the time he was painting Two Pears, he was chosen as one of two artists (the other…
Such is the photo-like quality of Green Plums, I didn’t realise until reading the National Gallery of Art’s discussion of Joseph Decker’s paintings in American Paintings of the Nineteenth Century, Part I (pages 123-125) that not all the plums are as…
The inspiration for this simple poem came not just from this John Frederick Peto painting, but from a photo I took a while ago (see below). It’s a warm night. I’m on holiday. I’m inside a city pub having a…
Well, this one was a wild ride, much like the famous Banquet for Rousseau itself. More of Rousseau’s works here. More on the outrageous party can be found here. Apollinaire’s full poetic tribute to Rousseau can be found here. A…
I deliberately chose to use the British/Australian “plough”, instead of the Americanised “plow” here. There is a weightiness to the visual of the word “plough”, I just don’t see in “plow”. I also see “dough”, “rough”, “tough”, even “ought” –…
The first time I looked at Conviviality Near the Inn, all I saw were the peasants, dancing and hawking wares. The second time I looked, the more to me it seemed the castle (or church) dominated half the painting, not…
My mother-in-law’s recipe for beef stroganoff (see photo below) takes up to two hours to cook. It’s great if you have a tougher cut like topside (top round). It also, non-traditionally, doesn’t use mustard. Or, you can try my quick…
One of the joys of this food/art/poem project of mine is imagining life outside the painting, which leads me to research. Information on child labour in the US here. A little look at historic tin toys here. And it’s not…
