Sunday, lazy.

After breakfast we went on an adventure. Our goal was to explore a Middle Eastern market, in the vain hope of finding green, fuzzy almonds. They're only available for a few weeks a year, but we didn't know what they were when we spotted them in a store near Foxboro.

Today we ended up in Burlington, ostensibly to go to H Mart and Market Basket, but also to go to this Halal grocery store. The little plaza that we ended up in did indeed have a Halal marketplace, but it also had “Spice Land,” “Foodland” and “China Merchandise” (now specializing in Indian groceries). Each shop was wilder than the one before. Spice Land had good prices on microwaveable papdum, but Foodland had amazing mangos. China Marketplace was the most amazing, we decided, with an aisle labeled “Flower Pot Vases” that contained mostly pan-Asian noodles, just as an example.

H Mart was another story completely. It was Family Fun Fest (apparently), so there were a dozen tented tables in the parking lot giving away samples of daifuku red bean cakes, teas, sausage (for S) and fruit. Inside were another dozen sampling stations. I was actually uncomfortably full by the time we left. No room left for a sample of Vermont Curry (my favorite. It’s made with honey. Nothing else to say.).

After coming home and unpacking all the groceries, I ended up going to Mudflat. I finished glazing a bowl and a vase, putting the final coats on (my bowls have at least four glazes right now), I trimmed a large bowl, which took about an hour, and threw a few new pieces. I have a fair coming up next month, and I realized I only have about eight mugs to sell.

Aside from the need to make pieces to entice people to buy, I simply love the act of throwing. The hot water, the mud and grit under my fingers, the cool clay slowly moving away from where my fingertips press. It’s like a dance sometimes. I move, the clay moves, I try to respect where the boundaries are, and we reach a subtle balance. I appreciate the process almost more than the product sometimes.

Art therapy dogma. Ugh.

Sunday Brioche

One of my favorite moments of the week is Sunday morning. S and I wake up usually around eight, and quickly get ourselves presentable to the outside world and head to Petsi's.

Well, actually. Every other week for the last month or so we've been running on Sunday morning before Petsi's. We've been cycling through the 5k 101 training program with six day weeks, running every other day. So last week on Sunday morning there we were, sweaty and happy at Petsi's around nine a.m., following our run of three eight minute intervals of jogging. We looked so happy, and were still talking about the high and low points of our run, that the scruffy gentleman behind the counter asked:
"So, has running stopped hurting? Because it's always just painful for me."

We gleefully got to respond, "Yes! No more pain!" Thanks to my new shoes from Marathon Sports.

But our weekend run fell on a Saturday this time around, so straight from bed to Petsi's today.

I walk by Petsi's every morning on my way to work, and it smells amazing even at seven a.m. I often stop for coffee during the week, and have to steel myself against the beautiful delights behind the glass. Sweet potato pecan breakfast bun, filled with a core of sweet potato fluff? Raspberry jam-filled corn muffin? Ginger raspberry scone? I'm a weak person. I barely stand a chance. When asked by an employee how they can help, I often say "I'll just get a coffee," so there's no chance of the kind person asking if there will be anything else.
Sunday is a special treat, though. My amazing husband gets me breakfast every weekend, and it's always the same thing - delicious Rao's coffee (the Petsi House Blend) with a bit of soy milk, and a vanilla sugar brioche.

Brioche is a sweet, eggy, buttery bread, which always (from Petsi’s) tastes like the love-child of challah and a croissant. This special specimen is doused with vanilla syrup, flecked with the tiny black dots of an authentic vanilla bean. They bake the individual brioche rolled in spirals in a muffin tin. So much of the joy is in slowly unrolling the layers of sweet, sticky bread. Today’s brioche was warm. Whether it was warm from the oven or, as I suspect, the microwave, I simply don't care. It was absolutely delicious.