wherein Liz's mother visits
Mom drove up to visit on Sunday, mostly because it was the Finger Lakes Chamber Ensemble's last concert of the 2013-2014 season, and thus the last concert for which I had a pair of tickets. (Or rather, a season pass for me + a guest, but psssh, details!) This one was not at First Unitarian, but in the Lodi Historical Society building. Lodi is about halfway up the lake, and closer to Seneca than Cayuga, so there was no way I could get there on my own without a car.
She arrived shortly after 11am, carrying some frozen leftovers and household supplies (she likes to bring me food and toilet paper and stuff, which I obviously have no reason to object to), and also bringing two plastic pots and the fabric mesh nets to hang them (the intent is to pot several of my baby spider plant crop and hang them in my kitchen windows). She also brought a random bell pepper she'd acquired and didn't particularly want to grow herself, so I now have twelve peppers to manage. An embarrassment of riches!
We ran one errand before hitting the road: namely, we went to Agway to buy a new pair of screws and two of the little plastic sheaths you use to anchor them better in drywall, because the hook I use to hang my pajamas fell off the wall last week. I'm going to fix it on Wednesday, when I will have good midday light and also won't run any risk of banging tools around after general working hours.
Anyway! We ate at Dano's Heuriger, which is... kind of like an Austrian version of tapas. We started by ordering a small bread basket, accompanied by two spreads and one small salad. The breads are an assortment that includes a really nice oat bread, a white baguette sort of thing, and a rectangular white bread with interesting spices. We chose the Hotel Sacher spread (very interesting, involved peppers and dill and some other stuff), the roasted red pepper spread, and the cucumber & dill salad; the latter was for Mom alone, obviously, since raw cucumber is tied with tomato for the vegetable I am most allergic to. *wry* Then we each ordered a sausage -- bratwurst for Mom, smoked Hungarian sausage for me -- and split a side dish of spätzle and a side dish of seasonal vegetable (which was green beans that day). The sausages come alone on a plate, with a little cup of coarse spicy mustard to use as a sauce if you wish.
It was definitely an odd meal, but quite tasty. And now I really want to fry some bratwurst, cook a bunch of sauerkraut, and make a bratwurst-and-saurkraut sandwich. Which is a delicious sandwich that I first encountered in Nürnberg back in the 90s, and wish were more common in America. It's best if the bratwurst is charcoal grilled, of course, but frying will do in a pinch. :-)
After lunch we visited two Seneca Lake wineries before heading back to Lodi for the concert. The music was as follows: Mozart's String Quartet in D (KV 575); four of Max Bruch's Eight Pieces for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano (Op. 83); and Antonin Dvořák's String Quintet in G (Op. 77). The Mozart was lovely; he is not my favorite composer, but I don't think I have ever disliked any of his music; he is very listenable. The Bruch was a really interesting combination of instruments. I think it works best when the viola and clarinet are not playing in unison, since they have such different tonal qualities that they can sound slightly out-of-tune with each other even when they're not. The four pieces chosen were the "Allegro con moto," the "Nachtgesang: Andante con moto," the "Allegro vivace, ma non troppo," and the "Rumänische Melodie: Andante." I liked the second and fourth best. And the Dvořák was awesome, particularly the second movement. Mom was not wildly enamored of it; she said that string pieces with a lot of sawing back and forth are not really her cup of tea. Which is fair enough!
We headed straight back to Ithaca and Mom left immediately after changing her shoes, since this was a one-day visit and it's a long drive back to New Jersey. And that was pretty much that. :-)
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She arrived shortly after 11am, carrying some frozen leftovers and household supplies (she likes to bring me food and toilet paper and stuff, which I obviously have no reason to object to), and also bringing two plastic pots and the fabric mesh nets to hang them (the intent is to pot several of my baby spider plant crop and hang them in my kitchen windows). She also brought a random bell pepper she'd acquired and didn't particularly want to grow herself, so I now have twelve peppers to manage. An embarrassment of riches!
We ran one errand before hitting the road: namely, we went to Agway to buy a new pair of screws and two of the little plastic sheaths you use to anchor them better in drywall, because the hook I use to hang my pajamas fell off the wall last week. I'm going to fix it on Wednesday, when I will have good midday light and also won't run any risk of banging tools around after general working hours.
Anyway! We ate at Dano's Heuriger, which is... kind of like an Austrian version of tapas. We started by ordering a small bread basket, accompanied by two spreads and one small salad. The breads are an assortment that includes a really nice oat bread, a white baguette sort of thing, and a rectangular white bread with interesting spices. We chose the Hotel Sacher spread (very interesting, involved peppers and dill and some other stuff), the roasted red pepper spread, and the cucumber & dill salad; the latter was for Mom alone, obviously, since raw cucumber is tied with tomato for the vegetable I am most allergic to. *wry* Then we each ordered a sausage -- bratwurst for Mom, smoked Hungarian sausage for me -- and split a side dish of spätzle and a side dish of seasonal vegetable (which was green beans that day). The sausages come alone on a plate, with a little cup of coarse spicy mustard to use as a sauce if you wish.
It was definitely an odd meal, but quite tasty. And now I really want to fry some bratwurst, cook a bunch of sauerkraut, and make a bratwurst-and-saurkraut sandwich. Which is a delicious sandwich that I first encountered in Nürnberg back in the 90s, and wish were more common in America. It's best if the bratwurst is charcoal grilled, of course, but frying will do in a pinch. :-)
After lunch we visited two Seneca Lake wineries before heading back to Lodi for the concert. The music was as follows: Mozart's String Quartet in D (KV 575); four of Max Bruch's Eight Pieces for Clarinet, Viola, and Piano (Op. 83); and Antonin Dvořák's String Quintet in G (Op. 77). The Mozart was lovely; he is not my favorite composer, but I don't think I have ever disliked any of his music; he is very listenable. The Bruch was a really interesting combination of instruments. I think it works best when the viola and clarinet are not playing in unison, since they have such different tonal qualities that they can sound slightly out-of-tune with each other even when they're not. The four pieces chosen were the "Allegro con moto," the "Nachtgesang: Andante con moto," the "Allegro vivace, ma non troppo," and the "Rumänische Melodie: Andante." I liked the second and fourth best. And the Dvořák was awesome, particularly the second movement. Mom was not wildly enamored of it; she said that string pieces with a lot of sawing back and forth are not really her cup of tea. Which is fair enough!
We headed straight back to Ithaca and Mom left immediately after changing her shoes, since this was a one-day visit and it's a long drive back to New Jersey. And that was pretty much that. :-)
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comments)