This was a relatively quiet week with a busy weekend.  As we have started to settle more and more into our new life in Oakland, I am starting to really miss my friends.  We have had some lovely interactions with people here and everyone is so friendly that I know I will make friends here.  But at times I really miss just being able to sit down with someone who I know well and just chat.  Just catch up.  It takes time and energy to build those relationships – I realize I just need to be patient.  I also need to be proactive.  Not always easy for an introvert.  (I know I may not seem like an introvert.  I’m good at pretending to be an extrovert.  It makes me tired.)

Anyway!

I got two cookbooks from publishers this week, both from bakeries in Seattle.  Perhaps they contributed to my homesickness.  I’ve long been a fan of Macrina Bakery and love the first book.  There are about 100 things I want to make in here.

While Graham and I work on his homework, Spencer plays.  It often involves tape.  Why do my children love tape so much?  This is the, wait for it, pencil-vania bridge.  He kills me.  The best part is he wasn’t trying to be funny.

If you follow me on Instagram, you know that I often post photos of my shoes.  What can I say, I love shoes.  These are a recent purchase.  Cute and comfortable.

I repeated a dinner from last week so I could take pictures and tell you about it.  Also because my mom said I should definitely post about the salad.  So you can thank her.  Stay tuned.

I mean to include this last week.  October 20th marked the anniversary of the Oakland fire that destroyed over 3,000 homes.  Our house is in the area that was destroyed.  Our street is long and only two of the houses are original.  This plaque is at the end of our street and I just found out that the woman it honors lived in our house.  Or the house that was here before it burned.

The second book’s arrival.  Tea, new cookbook, sun.  Not a whole lot better than that.

We went to the Jack London Square area of Oakland on Sunday to check out the farmers’ market and get some lunch.  The place we chose had us wait so long for our food that we missed the market.  I had to take the boys walking around the block four times to distract them.

Our real estate agent kept telling us that this part of Oakland is poised for a great revival.  I was skeptical, especially after brunch, but then I saw Miette was there.  I think that is a good sign.

October 28th.  Open back door to cool off the house.  Pinch me.

Fancy.

This is blurry and dark but it is Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi.  They were in town to celebrate the release of their new book, Jerusalem.  They did a very cool event at a local restaurant where they signed books and then the restaurant prepared a four course dinner based on recipes from the book.  The two of them were very charming and it was a wonderful night.  Toward the end, about half the room starting cheering and it turns out the San Francisco Giants had just won the World Series.  When the guys got up to say a few words, Yotam said, “I have to admit, I have no idea who the Giants are”.  Cute.

To all of my East coast loved ones, friends and family, please be safe.  We will be thinking of you.

How was your week everyone??  I did lots of cooking, more than usual.  I catered a party for a neighbor and had a dinner party on the same night.  Thankfully, years of multi-tasking in the kitchen made this possible.

Banana peanut butter bread from the new Baked cookbook just because.  I let this have an extra 5 minutes in the oven because I often underbake quick breads out of fear of overbaking them.  I thought I had, in fact, overbaked this one because the outside was rather dark.  But nope, nice and moist inside.

Randy was out of town two nights.  Dinner for one.

I met Tracy and Denise at our friend Allison’s restaurant Homeroom.  It is a mac and cheese restaurant with plenty of other delicious things too.

Spicy mac.  Sooooooo good.

Graham had a sick day this week.  No other symptoms besides a fever, thankfully.

I decided to make an apple cake for the catered party and decided on this one.  I posed this question on Instagram (I’m @danatreat), does anyone else hold their breath when they release a Bundt cake from its pan?  I do every time.

Found in a random box.  Not our official wedding portrait but taken on our wedding day. Ten years!

Salted Caramel Ice Cream.  Nothing else to say about that one.

The chocolate chip cookies I love so desperately.

Just because I won’t eat figs doesn’t mean I won’t cook with them.  These are marinated in balsamic vinegar, sugar, and water and then seared.  Served with greens and Camembert.

Pumpkin patch!

Stinson Beach.  Can’t wait to go back there.

Both my boys have awesome hair.  Spencer always has bed head.

Hide your candy!

Tomatoes and even a few strawberries from the garden.

After 14 years of doing yoga, with a three year hiatus for birthing and nursing babies, I decided it was time to take a little break.  Yoga classes in my neighborhood are an hour and a half – 15 minutes longer than classes at my studio in Seattle.  For some reason, that extra 15 minutes sent me over the edge.  I’ve been taking these barre type classes at the Dailey Method and they kick.my.butt.  Like legs shaking during and can hardly walk after.  Ouch.

I did a post about my hair.  That is the most I have talked about my hair ever.  If you have curly hair, it’s worth a read.

Smoky brownies from the new Baked cookbook.  Lots of cinnamon and a full tablespoon of ancho chile powder.  They were great.

I took BART into San Francisco for a day.  I can’t believe I live so close to such an amazing city.

I almost bought these shoes.  They look weirder in the photo than they did in person.  Still just a bit too weird for me.

One of my most favorite things I have made recently.  Fresh corn polenta with sautéed mushrooms and a tomato corn broth.  I know I’m behind with my promised recipes but this one will be posted this week for sure.

Advice we all could use from Spencer’s kindergarten classroom.

My parents came to visit.  They taught the boys how to play checkers and Old Maid.

We took them into the city for dinner.  How do you choose a restaurant in San Francisco?  I decided to go with a classic and we had a very disappointing meal.  Total bummer.

Apple pie filling.

Apple pie.  I made dinner for my parents on the last night they were here.  I made a great Thai green curry dish with eggplant, mushrooms, and delicata squash.  I also made a salad with roasted portabello mushrooms and asparagus with a ginger vinaigrette.  Everything was delicious and we all ate so much that no one had room for pie.  Except the boys.

I now live on a street where the neighbors gather on nice weekend nights and drink wine while the kids play.  They order pizza or sushi and pull out the fire pit to make s’mores.  We lived on our street in Seattle for 5½ years and I only knew the people right next door to us.  I’m pretty excited about this street.

It’s not the Marais in Paris, but there is some very good felafel and hummus in Oakland.

Sunset.

Art table, meet art

If you ever sat in my dining room in Seattle, you are familiar with this painting.  Now it has prime positioning over the fireplace.  I love having a bit of the Pacific Northwest in Oakland.

Waiting in the Berkeley post office.  And waiting and waiting and waiting…

Korean rice bowl.  All kinds of yummy things in there.

This plus

this equaled

this.  Recipe coming this week.

Hmmmmm.  What do the dishes drying in my kitchen say about me?

Lots of requests for a hair post.  Coming up this week!

Have I shown you these shoes yet?  I love them.  I bought them in Paris for half off and they are comfortable enough to wear all day.

White sale.  Sur la Table.  Bowls.

Do you make your own hummus?  You should.  I tell you about this week.  (Sense a theme here?)

I got the new Baked cookbook.  It is split into chapters by their ten favorite ingredients.  One was malted milk.  So I made Vanilla Malted Milk Milkshakes.  Recipe coming – you guessed it! – this week.

Neighborhood street fair.  Beads, pumpkins, sno-kones.  Like you do.

A sunset dinner in jammies.  Before you judge the adult beverage choice, that is rosé Lillet and you are supposed to drink it with ice cubes.  Just didn’t want anyone thinking I was a white zinfandel drinker.

Another week of trying to figure out where things are, being lost only 85% of the time (last week it was 90%), doing the last bits of unpacking and picture hanging.  I figured out how we can walk to school.  It’s only ten minutes and it includes this endless stair way.  The first day we did it, I subconsciously thought, “Oh too bad I figured this out just in time for rain to start”.  And then I remembered that I live in Oakland now and that season, the one that is dark and rainy for nine months, doesn’t exist here.

We put up the weather vane.

I made the chocolate chip cookie recipe that is in the latest issue of Saveur.  It was a pain in the butt.  The cookies were good though.  Will post soon.

I have this little window seat in the kitchen.  I bought these pillows this week.  When I miss my friends, I imagine them sitting right there while I cook.

Soaking potatoes for oven fries.  It’s a step you have to take.  Read all my tips here.

I bought fennel pollen and promptly bullied Ashley for her shortbread recipe that uses fennel pollen because it’s amazing.  Coming soon!

Monkeys.

My hair and I have gotten to a previously unknown high in our lifelong relationship.  In other words, I am liking my hair better than I ever have.  Part of it is product, part of it is technique, and part of it is putting it in this ridiculous get-up every morning.  Interested?  Should I do a hair post?

Figs.  One of a very small handful of vegetarian things that I won’t eat.

I made this gigantic cake with them and plums and was careful to cut myself a piece of only plum.  The cake wasn’t as good as I thought it would be and who needs a 13×18-inch cake anyway.  Recipe NOT coming soon.

Awesome ice.

Picking lemons.  As you do.

This is my mom’s charm bracelet.  All of the charms were given to her by her grandmother.  When I was a child, I would ask her to see it all the time and she, knowing I would be gentle, let me.  A few years ago, she gave it to me and I wear it on special occasions.  I love the camera charm.  The charm below that is the Plaza Hotel in New York where my parents got married.  The anniversary date is on the bottom.

The special occasion of the week was getting invited to have brunch with Denise at her house.  Three years ago, I attended BlogHer in San Francisco and made some lifelong friends.  Cheryl, Tracy, Denise, and Allison all live in the Bay area and Denise put together a fabulous spread to welcome me.  I’m a lucky girl.

Saturday, we had two power outages in a row.  We ate dinner by candlelight out on our deck while the boys did a puppet show for us.

Farmers’ market avocados.  Heaven.

Today, Monday, is the clearest day we have had so far.  Also the hottest – 91 degrees!  Where did fall go?