I have really been remiss in posting (Farmer's Market and bread baking)

My apologies. I've been busy with other sites and sort of ignored this one. Not like many of you noticed, though, right?

Two things of note to report:

1. I've made it a goal to visit the Fort Collins Farmer's Market once a week on Sundays. So far this goal has been very, very good to me. It's easy to spend a lot now because there's not much actual produce available. Thus I'm reduced to the ever-present specialty items. Don't worry, I'm limiting myself to two a week (until produce comes in, and then all bets are off). Purchases to date:

- a mixed bag of Hazel Dell mushrooms
- a chunk of Rustic Blue from Bingham Hill
- a big bag of organic lettuces from...well, I didn't get their name. Shoddy of me.
- pasta from Pappardelle's Pasta: 1 lb. tomato-cracked pepper linguini(?), 1 lb. spinach-garlic linguini(?). (honestly, I don't know if it's linguini or not. It's long and flat. The tomato is wider than the spinach)

Somewhat pricey for pasta (which is normally dirt cheap), but this last purchase has been by far my favorite. I haven't tried the tomato yet, but I made the spinach garlic this week (with some mushrooms and sundried tomatos thrown in). Let me tell you: it was SPECTACULAR. A huge improvement over Barilla. Tasty (it actually tasted like spinach and garlic; not just 'green'). And more importantly, the texture was fantastic. Supple, stretchy, yummy. And NOT ONLY THAT: the leftovers were quite good as well.

My biggest peeve with pasta is that recipes make a lot but I don't feel like eating the leftovers. They're usually just gummy (the strands stick together) and kind of gross. I've thrown away quite a bit of gummy pasta because I just couldn't bear to eat it. Part of my problem, yes, is making too much; I'm working at that. But gummy leftovers that are not fun to eat (and therefore are thrown out) kind of defeats the purpose of buying cheap pasta in the first place.

These leftovers were lovely. While not quite as fresh-tasting as they were when first made, the strands separated beautifully and reheated VERY WELL. I actually looked forward to eating the leftovers, and polished them off quite quickly.

So, I am a Pappardelle's Pasta convert. I aim to eat my way through their whole dried pasta product line by the end of the summer. If you check out their website, you'll see that this will take some doing. There were about 25 flavors (I'm estimating) available at the stand. I'm going to have to buy AT LEAST 2 a week to get through everything. No more buying whole pounds, though; 1/2 lbs. are quite enough. Furthermore, the stand had recipe suggestions for every flavor of pasta. I won't stick to these recipes religiously, but they'll give me ideas. However, this pasta is so good that I can just throw in whatever vegetables and cheese I want and it will be a tasty meal.

2. In other carb news: I am finally ready to start baking again. Yeah, great timing; it's almost summer! The weather here for the three day weekend promises to be mild and not too hot, so I'll be delving into Peter Reinhardt's Crust & Crumb (courtesy of the Fort Collins Public Library) for some rustic loaves. I would like to try two different types; I'm nost sure which yet. I need to make sure there's room in the freezer (or be prepared to give one away). If they are very beautiful, I'll enlist Ben Harshbarger to take a few pix with his fancy-schmancy digital cam so that I can share them with you.

Come to think of it, I'll need a decent cam for Guatemala. Not great, DECENT. Shouldn't cost me too much. I'd really like to post some pix of particularly nice-looking meals, the Farmer's Market, the process of cooking - this blog is so drab without visuals. Disposable point-and-shoot will never get me where I want to go - photography genius I am NOT.