Crocus a Bloomin'

Cold, blustery day in Boston. But that doesn't stop these crocuses from glowing in a garden on the corner of Fairfield and Marlborough Streets.

Eggplant with Chocolate: Oh My!

Our friend Sam is in town, so we tried Erbaluce in Bay Village for the first time. Lovely! Amazing to be at a restaurant on a Friday night and be able to hear our conversations!

Food was splendid: we shared two pastas as appetizers: a mushroom lasagnette and fettucine with beets, beet greens, speck, and sage. Both were so delicious and unusual, I wish I'd had my own portion. But then, I wouldn't have had room for dinner -- or dessert. Rack of wild boar with wild grape musto was melt-in-your-mouth tender. The dessert? A traditional recipe from Amalfi:  white eggplant, which has been roasted, then wrapped around ricotta sweetened with honey, black currants, and white chocolate, drizzled with dark chocolate ganache and garnished with saffron marinated oranges. Bellisimo!

Wine and service couldn't have been better.

Erbaluce
69 Church Street (Bay Village) Boston, 02116
Tel. 617 426 6969 Fax 617 426 6909

Hours: Sun, Tues-Thurs 5-10pm Fri-Sat 5-11pm (closed monday)

Glass Flowers

Took some time out for a peaceful lunchtime visit to the Harvard Museum of Natural History with my friend Blue Magruder, who is director of communications there. The justifiably famous glass flower collection is the perfect antidote to a damp and dreary March day. Everything in bloom from iris to rhodies to cacti. Did you know the flowers were created not for beauty, but to provide perfect specimens for the study of botany?

Making Time For Solitude

From an article by Leon Neyfakh on the Power of Lonely in today's Boston Globe:

  "An emerging body of research is suggesting that spending time alone, if done right, can be good for us — that certain tasks and thought processes are best carried out without anyone else around, and that even the most socially motivated among us should regularly be taking time to ourselves if we want to have fully developed personalities, and be capable of focus and creative thinking.

There is even research to suggest that blocking off enough alone time is an important component of a well-functioning social life — that if we want to get the most out of the time we spend with people, we should make sure we’re spending enough of it away from them. Just as regular exercise and healthy eating make our minds and bodies work better, solitude experts say, so can being alone."

What better reason to take time out to explore peaceful places? What are some of your favorite places to search out when you want a little solitude?

Konk-La-Ree!

Arriving today in Portsmouth on the south wind: our first red-winged blackbird of the season, singing in the oaks beside Sagamore Creek. A hint of those warm, peaceful sunny spring days to come -- once the remaining foot or so of snow melts!

Addison Gallery, Andover

My friends, Jeri and Elliot, accompanied me to the Addison Gallery of American Art on the campus of Phillips Andover Academy. Amazing art collection and truly peaceful place! There's a special exhibit called Inside, Outside, Upstairs, Downstairs: The Addison Anew, there through March 27th. I especially loved the Jackson Pollack, Ansel Adams' breathtaking El Capitan, Sunrise, Winter, Yosemite National Park, CA,  and seascapes by John Singer Sargent, Winslow Homer, and Georgia O'Keefe -- the latter's work Wave/Night, painted in 1928, was inspired by her two-week vacation at York Beach, Maine in the spring of that year.