Paris Panorama

We leave Paris this afternoon for Chalon sur Saone, but here are some parting images until we return in mid-September:

Ile de la Cité

The Louvre

Palais Royal

Memories of a Day in Paris

Setting out from our apartment in Pigalle

An arcade, somewhere in Paris

Au Jardin du Luxembourg

Hot chocolate and pastries at Angelina's

The Eiffel Tower from Montmartre

The Louvre Pyramids

Nous Sommes Arrivés!

We arrived in Paris without trouble, and thanks to Miriam's invigorating and informative tour of Paris - taking us from Montmartre/Pigalle to the Louvre and then across the Seine to St. Germain - we haven't felt a bit of jet lag: slept like babies last night and woke up at 8 this morning, just like vrai Parisians.

A sampling of pictures:

Be It Ever So Humble

Didier has a new software program for making panoramas. Our house has never looked so good!

The best zucchini soup ever . . . .

. . . is Chilled Zucchini Cumin Soup, which we enjoyed with Didier's old friends Marie and Jean before taking them to the airport for a trip out West and then home to France. Top the soup with plain yogurt and chopped basil: Parfait!

Summer Supper

Grilled shrimp
Pasta with pesto











Chocolate zucchini cake

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup butter, softened
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons grated orange peel
2 cups coarsely shredded zucchini
1/2 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Combine the flour, cocoa, baking powder, soda, salt, and cinnamon; set aside. With a mixer, beat together the butter and the sugar until they are smoothly blended. Add the eggs to the butter and sugar mixture one at a time, beating well after each addition. With a spoon, stir in the vanilla, orange peel, and zucchini. Alternately stir the dry ingredients and the milk into the zucchini mixture. Pour the batter into a greased and flour-dusted 10-inch tube pan or bundt pan. Bake in the oven for about 50 minutes (test at 45 minutes!) or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes; turn out on wire rack to cool.

Charlotte Idyll

Didier, Mary Lou, and John wander the woods of Charlotte


in search of the elusive chanterelle


Recipe for Wild Mushroom, Haricot Vert, and Shallot Saute

A Birthday Greeting for Hannah

Lunch with Brian

Wild Alaskan salmon with dry rub grilled on a cedar plank




Greens from Brian and Pat's garden and tomatoes from Nancy's



And a good meal was had by all!

Recipes Worth Repeating

Chicken with plum barbeque sauce

Recipe for Gingered-Plum Barbeque Sauce

















Chocolate souffle












Recipe for Individual Chocolate Souffles

Garden Dialectics

A living thing is at each moment itself and yet something else.
Frederick Engels, Anti-Dühring

Hot Peppers

Recipe for Pork Chops Scarpariello


Zucchini



Recipe for Zucchini Carpaccio



Green Beans
and
Tomatoes



Recipe for Grilled Tuna Salad Niçoise
(Didier says skip the potatoes - an American addition)