I Assaulted a Countertop and Ate Food

I may have been blogstalking Communal, the new restaurant from chefs Colton Soelberg and Joseph McRae of Pizzeria 712 fame. Look, that's them!

Do you remember eating at P712 with me? Wasn't it lovely? Shouldn't we go back again soon?

My friends Noelle and Janet invited me to lunch at Communal, in the old Goldsmith's building in downtown Provo. I yanked a few pictures of what we ate from Lindsey:

Airline Chicken

Poached tuna with frisee and olive tapenade, served with heirloom tomato bread pudding

Butterscotch Pot de Creme and cookies

Yes, it was all delicious, better than it looks, which, I know, hardly seems possible. I adored the sea scallops with tomato relish, and the roasted squash with apples and thyme the very best. The service? I stepped away from the table to answer a call and when I got back, the crumpled napkin I'd left had been replaced by a clean, folded one set neatly at my plate. So unobtrusive I almost didn't notice it. I dared the girl sitting next to me to run to the bathroom and see if her napkin wasn't replaced, too. I walked away from the table just for kicks and got another fresh napkin. NEW GAME!

I completely geeked out, and after feeling up the concrete countertops polished with beeswax, I asked Soelberg and McRae how Alice Waters has influenced them. Why? Because all those long months ago, when I first stepped foot inside P712, I saw an Alice Waters quote on the wall, and I knew I'd found my local culinary mecca.

Colton and Joseph (may I call them by their first names? I forgot to ask,) understand Waters' primary directive: when you pick the freshest ingredients, as close to where they grew as possible, in the right season, and cook them with respect, it yields extraordinary food.

I decided to ask which cookbooks Colt and Joe (more familiar as this post rambles!) love in case I could suck in my breath, push up my glasses, pull a Mary Catherine Gallagher, and say "Me too, me too, me too."

The Chez Panisse books - Alice Waters (duh)
Zuni Cafe - Judy Rogers
Sunday Suppers at Luques - Suzanne Goin
The French Laundry, Bouchon, and Under Pressure - Thomas Keller
Au Pied de Cochon - Martin Picard
Il Viaggio di Vetri - Mark Vetri
Think Like a Chef and The Craft of Cooking - Tom Colicchio

You big time foodie geeks just found soulmates, didn't you? Me too, me too, me too. For the rest of you, let me translate: Communal knows what they're doing. Why "Communal"? Because it's supposed to be like Sunday dinner: sharing a table, being with cherished ones, and communing over bread made with love.


Thanks, C & J.






Want to go? I asked, and Communal would love to have you. $40 gift certificate goes to one commenter who leaves me a note on this post with their favorite cookbook before Friday, October 16th expires.

If you win, can I go too? We can make a reservation, sit in the private dining room, and I can tell you stories that are too inappropriate to blog about in public. I'll pay for myself, swear.

Dear Anthropologie,

You’re the best! I mean, you know, at offering great things that are priced far above my ability to buy with any kind of regularity.

Lately you’ve been in touch a lot. It seems you want me to buy things from you. In fact, you want me to buy things from you a lot. I’ve gotten an email from you every day, sometimes twice a day, for more than a week.

It’s not that I don’t love hearing from you, I do, but you are starting to sound, how do I say this…DESPERATE.

I have an idea for you, and I’m offering it for free:

MAKE YOUR STUFF CHEAPER and I might buy more*.

And so might my friends.

And so might the world.

Kthanksbye,

-Jet Set




*But I'm never, not ever, buying your harem pants.

Nov 1 Gear

AKA: The outfit I was sporting when I was pulled over by the fuzz. Red swing jacket with lantern sleeves, chain link pattern top, dark straight leg jeans. Straight legs are my secret (actually my sister's secret) for getting the skinny jean look without the utter ridiculousness of trying to pull off the skinny jean cut.

Update: Jacket- Anthropologie. Top - Banana Republic this fall. Jeans- Banana Republic last fall.

Casual

A friend sent me a picture of a Battlestar Galactica t-shirt with a toaster on the front, pleasing me immensely. I mentioned how much I wanted one to my office-mate Nathan. His brow furrowed a bit, “But, you don’t ever wear t-shirts,” he said. Now that’s true, but I do happen to love t-shirts with fun sayings or clever statements. I don’t, however, actually wear t-shirts. Most of the time t-shirts are cut for a man and I am not a man. The ones that are cut for a woman aren’t usually long enough in the sleeve for my tastes.

In fact, I pretty much don’t like casual clothes whatsoever. I figure, it’s just as easy to put on something amazing as it is something boring. And to me, casual is boring. The dress code at work is casual, not business casual (khakis and collared shirts) but actually casual, which is precisely one train stop from beachy (ugh.)

So that got me thinking, maybe, for one day, I should try dressing like all the rest of the guys. This is a big step out of my comfort zone. What if I wear a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers? Sneakers. Hold on, I might be hyperventilating.

What if I can’t do this? I mean, I’m not even sick, or on my way to the ball park. Just kidding, I wear a skirt to the ball park, too. Do I have to wear sneakers? Don’t even suggest flip-flops, the very idea gives me the heebie-jeebies. I wonder what will happen if I leave the house and go to work looking casual (not effortlessly casual, because that takes a lot of work, believe me.)

Do you think this experiment could have far reaching implications? Will the developers relate to me? Will the collar of my t-shirt constrict my breathing? What else could possibly happen? I guess I’m embarking into the great unknown.

This is a challenge, a challenge I have…artificially set for myself.

Hey, a girl’s got to have goals.

Lovely Hideous

Dear El Guille,

I can’t believe this time in our lives is upon us, the time when you start giving me things that you’ve made as presents.

Dear child, I love you to the moon and back and always will. I looked you in the eye and told you that your present was amazing and it made me so happy—and it’s true, your present does make me happy!

However, your present is still ugly.

I will never tell you that to your face, of course. I prefer to have you discover my true feelings when you are 14 and decide (along with the rest of your Freshman class) to go back and read your mothers’ blog entries. For now, I will proudly look at this…tchotchke that is a hot mess of rainbow colors because, as you insisted, “You love rainbows, mama!” I do?

This weekend children all over the land will give their mothers ugly, useless presents from the heart. I think this is how we find out that you can love something ugly, because someone you love gave it to you.

What am I supposed to do with this thing?

And to my mom, sorry about that penguin plate I gave you in the sixth grade; it seemed like a good idea at the time.