Summer in Santa Monica- and a recipe round-up

Farmers' market beauty in Santa Monica.

The first notes from our

Santa Monica summer sublet:

After living in the brittle high dessert of Northern New Mexico for three years, I am drunk on oxygen. I walk Ocean Avenue cradled in moisture, intoxicated, breathing deep. And although we sleep seventeen blocks from the Pacific, I smell the ocean in the sheets. I wake with the sensation, the awareness of the sea. It infuses the day with an unnameable pleasure I can almost taste. If I could live on air I would eat the on-shore breeze with a spoon.

Steve has found his own source of bliss at Caffe Luxxe on Montana Avenue. Rich, caramel Italian espresso with the perfect artful brush of creamy foam. If further persuasion is needed to lure him into staying here, I only need to whisper, “Una bella tazza” and he'll be putty in my hands.

Things are looking up.

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Gluten-Free Strawberry Cobbler Cake

Dear Gluten-Free Goddess,

Not another strawberry recipe. Please. And a cake recipe at that? Pfffft. I've had it with all your so called strawberry deliciousness. Will you just get over it already? (What do you think this is, strawberry season?) I'm totally bored with the whole strawberry thing. Good Gracious Lord In Heaven.

Where the bleep are the broccolini recipes? The watercress and sardine tarts? The marinated scapes, head cheese, and tripe? Where's your squid ink linguini recipe? And croissants! I can't find them anywhere.

And must I beg you for boutique bean recipes? You of all people- living in your precious New Mexico desert. Or have you moved to Hollyweird now (that figures). I need boutique heirloom bean recipes. I need my daily local vegan fiber, if you get my drift.

Hmm? None of the above?

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Fifty Five Things I've Learned in 55 Years

Last December, my blogging amiga Kalyn posted a list for her birthday: Sixty Things I've Learned in Sixty Years. Like so many readers, friends and fellow food bloggers, I was inspired by her post. So as birthday number fifty-five (fifty-five? how is that possible?) sat on the horizon as opaque and huge as June Gloom in Los Angeles, I was inspired to write my own list of hard won wisdom. Just to cheer myself up. And shake some cobwebs loose. Fifty-five just scares the pants off me, I gotta confess.

Fifty Five Things I've Learned

in 55 Years

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Gluten-Free Millet Buckwheat Wraps

Gluten-free wraps- an easy recipe with millet and buckwheat flours.

What's keeping us fortified during our transition from the wild desert of northern New Mexico to the cool big blue of the Pacific? In a word, wraps. We're munching Lime Quinoa Salads, leftover Veggie Garden Loaf, stir-fry veggies and quinoa, and sandwich fillings in these handy, tasty beauties. They sustained us as we whittled down our food supply, making both lunch and dinner easy as pie. I froze a dozen for the road, thinking that in a pinch, I could always buy a salad to stuff inside.

They're completely fabulous hot off the griddle. The best. I could scarf them down bare, without adornment. In fact, I started with a basic crepe recipe when I was developing this wrap recipe. Which is why they're pliable, tender and delicious. Unfortunately, they're also fragile after day one- a problem I am working on. But if you freeze them right away, snugging rounds of wax paper in between each wrap, they thaw easily and remain fresh enough- though slightly less flexible.

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Vegan Celery Soup with Ryeless Rye Croutons

A creamy celery soup that is dairy-free and gluten-free? Indeed.

By the time you read this new soup recipe, we'll be well on our way to Southern California. It will Monday, you see (it is Monday, right?). It will be bright and early. And we'll be waving our coffee fueled good-byes to piney Flagstaff, Arizona, the infamous gateway to the Grand Canyon (inspiration for Steve's movie) where we stayed overnight. We'll be up with the chickens, Honda packed with gluten-free treats, hitting Route 40 West for the second leg of the trip.

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A Vegan Basil Mint Parsley "Pesto"

Fresh, raw vegan pesto. Yep. You heard me.

We're getting so close to our departure now I can taste it. The house is swept and cleaned, boxes and bags are packed. Anticipation is hanging in the desert air. You can almost hold it in your cupped open hands. The hardest part will be trying to sleep Saturday night. I told Steve, If it's 3 AM and we're lying side by side in the dark listening to the whir of the ceiling fan, just waiting, can we get up and go?

Why not? he responded.

This earned him some extra bonus points.

Not that he needs any. His bonus point status is pretty high to begin with these days. We've had an exciting week. I'm so proud of him. His first script sale, an independent movie titled The Canyon just released its first trailer. If you'd like to catch a sneak peek at the movie, see The Canyon trailer here. You'll see why I fell in love with Yvonne Strahovski and Will Patton when we visited the set.

So what does all this California dreamin' taste like? I decided it tastes like basil and mint with a bite of parsley.

Green. Earthy. Alive.

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Roasted Sicilian Potatoes

Roasted potato love- Italian style.

Here's an easy, vegan summer side dish recipe you can bake or grill in foil packets. It's an intuitive toss-together combo of potatoes, onion, garlic, tomatoes, olives and raisins--- with some hot pepper flakes thrown in to kick it up Sicilian style. I don't even know where the inspiration came from.

It all started with cleaning out the pantry.

We're leaving on our long pined-for road trip next Sunday (can you say, Stoked, Babycakes?). I've been trying to use up the remaining lonely bits of our fresh ingredients and whittle down our stash of friendly staples. I'm determined to scour the cupboards bare. One way or another. I'm leaving no can of fire roasted tomatoes behind. Or bags of organic popcorn. Whatever is left standing next Saturday night? It's all coming with me. Because deep in the cockles of my private tiny girl heart, I am not coming back. Nope. Not even to say good-bye.

So if you spy a black Honda Fit humming its little heart out, streaking across the Southwestern desert on its journey to Los Angeles stuffed with homebaked vegan goodies (translation: Strawberry Rhubarb Muffins, Gluten-Free Ryeless Rye Bread, Chocolate Pecan Brownies, Lime Quinoa Salad with Mint, Two Potato Salad) and gluten-free comestibles (translation: several pounds of rice pasta, three boxes of quinoa, two sacks each of millet flour, sorghum flour, and tapioca starch, five jars of sugar-free organic preserves, one unopened bottle of Annie's ketchup, a shoebox packed with a baker's dozen bottles of dried herbs, sea salt, cumin and sesame seeds), well.

That would be, me.

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Quinoa Recipe with Summer Vegetable Stir-Fry

Delicious quinoa stir-fry with summer vegetables.

Easy. Easy. Easy.

Trying to find a Los Angeles sublet for the summer- within our budget- is as slippery and twisted as charting Madonna's romantic liaisons post Guy Ritchie. It's a serpentine endeavor, this whole reading between the lines thing, deciphering what is true and what is only mostly true. It's all those key buzz words peppering Craig's List and Westside Rentals. "Convenient to the 10" can mean the eastern bedroom window sucks in freeway exhaust during rush hour. "Pet friendly" might translate to everyone in the building works all day and leaves their poor pooches to yap and woof until the cows come home. Which, as we all know, in LA is after sushi and mojitos.

"Cozy studio" can mean cute and comfy or it can mean as cramped and tight as a walk-in closet. Not Madonna's closet(s). I'm sure hers are bi-coastal and coordinated by era, each epoch's collection larger than our entire casita. We're talking my closet here. The five foot black hole currently crammed with winter parkas, too many mismatched socks to count, and the book-filled boxes I'm storing for this alleged, yet-to-materialize summer getaway.

And the price for the privilege of said 150 square feet of space in Venice Beach?

If you have to ask, Darling, you can't afford it. Which as it turns out, is a moot detail anyway, because no one on Craig's List ever answers your e-mails (especially when they notice your out of town area code). So here we sit. Grazing the Internet till the migraines kick in, picking through rentals beyond our budget, hoping for an affordable hidden gem amongst the inflated glut of summer housing in Los Angeles. Unless we're looking for a roommate. We could afford one room. Shared bath. With a UCLA student.

So what am I cooking during all this rental drama, you impatiently ask as I ponder our next move?

That would be quinoa.

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