Some things I like about living in Süsterseel, Germany

I mentioned that we settled in a small town called Süsterseel here in Germany. It's located in the Heinsberg District, and within the municipality of Selfkant. I don't think it has much more than 5,000 people in it, although I could be mistaken.

I'm within walking distance from a great little bakery. Maybe 3 blocks away, tops. Some of the gals who work there speak a little English, some don't, but that's fine. They are always helpful and eager to help me learn German, which I appreciate. I have not yet found one baked item that wasn't fresh out of the oven and delicious. And the pastries! Oh. My. God. They're not overly sweet. Also, because it's three blocks away, I don't feel naughty buying some, because hey, I walked first! And afterwards!

It's generally quiet. No noise at night; this town is in the middle of farmland. Even during the day, all I pretty much hear are birds singing, with the occasional lawn mower. There has been some hammering in my back yard, as one of the neighbors has taken down part of the fence and is building it up again. But that's all. Rarely any traffic noises. Sweet!

People are friendly. It's nice to walk or drive to and from home and get a friendly nod or "morgen!" from people in the neighborhood. Some people say that Germans aren't friendly. They are indeed a private people, but perhaps it's because we live in a small town that people will smile and greet you as you pass. Regardless, it's nice.

The surrounding landscape is beautiful! It's spring, the grass is green, and the fields are bright yellow with flowers. These are rapeseed flowers, used to produce oil. Certain types of rapeseed produces Canola oil; whether these are the same, or whether they're used to produce biofuel or as feed for cattle, I don't know, but nevertheless, these fields of yellow flowers are so intensely yellow they seem to glow like something out of the Wizard of Oz when the sun strikes them just so.



Corellary to #4: People's gardens are lovely, and they have large vegetable gardens. In fact, our neighbor across the street has a large vegetable plot that has onions, shallots, potatoes, cabbage, and other vegetables.

Surprising things happen, such as marching bands marching down our little street on Ascension day.

There is an antique furniture store within walking distance. I might just buy one more item there. ;-)

The Netherlands is within walking distance. I kid you not. As the crow flies, it's one third of a mile. Going along the bike path/pedestrian trail, it's just a tad over half a mile to the border.  We saw this gentleman in his horse-drawn buggy about a mile away from Süsterseel in Jabeek, Netherlands.

Last but not least, I live within walking distance of Anna H, also of WA U.S.A., who totally is in tune with my yarn addiction; indeed she aids and abets in it. She also understands how to alleviate homesickness using fast food therapy.

Along the Green River

I decided to drive out into the countryside for a few hours; it was a beautiful day, hardly a cloud in the sky, and temperatures in the upper 70 degrees F. I live just up the hill from the Kent/Auburn valley, through which courses the Green River, made notorious by the Gary Ridgway, the Green River Killer. In truth, his depredations only touched the river a few times, but he was given the name because of the first few bodies found near the river.

But this 65-mile river has a history much longer and more pleasant than this, and the road that meanders next to that river goes through some lovely pastoral landscapes, dotted with farms and more than a few palatial houses. Near Christmas, my husband and I make our yearly trek along the Green Valley Road to the Christmas tree farm to choose our tree, bundle it onto the truck, and drive triumphantly home with our winter catch. It's a lovely drive during the winter. More than a few times, I've seen signs next to the entrance of one farm or another, and I've wanted to see what they had to offer, but of course few if any vegetables are in season in December, and so we pass them by.

This time, however, the hubby was out motorcycling with his dad, and I decided to skip church and get to know Divine Creation from another perspective. Much inspired to listen to country music because of Kevin Skinner's YouTube audition, I turned the radio to the local country station, and headed out.

I went along the Auburn-Black Diamond road for a bit, until I saw the intersection of Green Valley Road. You can see a map of Green Valley Road here:


View Larger Map

You can see the river just as you turn onto Green Valley Road; today I saw a number of cars and trucks just past the intersection, where I suspect more than a few fishermen and women were casting out lures into the water. I don't know what the fishing is like , but since I see more than a few cars and trucks parked there whenever I've passed by, I suspect it must be at least promising.

I passed by Green Valley Meats, making a mental note that I must stop by there on my way back, because they have some of the best smoked meats around, and other more exotic cuts of meat, such as buffalo and elk, at quite affordable prices. They're a butcher and smoked meat shop, but they are well supplied with any picnic goods you might want if you and your family decide to take a day trip into the country or local national park. I also noticed they have large inner tubes available, no doubt for rent to go inner tubing down the river. They don't have a web site so far as I can tell, but the link above will take you to a site where people's reviews are spot on. I cannot say enough about their cuts of meat, and God only knows how many varieties of jerky and pepperoni they have. They are locally and family owned, and I mention this especially because I like to promote local businesses and farms expecially if they offer superb goods at a decent price. One warning, though! It is totally possible, especially if you're a "foodie" like me and like to cook, to run up a hefty bill in a short time. As I passed by, I made a pledge to myself not to go over $50 when I stop there.

My first stop is a few miles farther on, at Mosby Brothers Farm:

I've been there before, and they have very nice produce in season. They supplement their own produce with item from outside the state, and they also feature some goods from other farms and home-based businesses in the area. I noticed that they had a good set of bottled preserves made from their own produce, but this time I didn't pick up any.

I also noticed that they had some blueberry jam from Canter Berry farms just down the road. I have seen that farm more than a few times on the way to our yearly Christmas tree hunt, and have always wanted to see what it was like and what they had to offer. I bought a lemon (always good to sprinkle on Swiss chard, my new favorite) and some cibatta bread and went on my way.

The speed limit is not that fast--25 to 40 mph, depending on what stretch of road you're on--so I had ample time to flick my gaze to either side of the road, watching for any signs of fresh produce or any other goods that might be available at a farm, as well as signs of any bicyclists who are doing their own private version of the Tour de France, except I suppose it might be the Tour de Auburn. The road is not very wide, so I'm careful to look out for them. Some years ago, a bicycle trail was proposed to go through various farmlands, which was met with much opposition from the farmers there. Since apparently no compensation was going to be given to the farmers for the loss of arable land (some of the most fertile in the world), and they'd still have to pay taxes on land they could no longer use, I can't imagine why King County thought everyone would be hunky dory about it. Hmm, let's see, growing food and trying to make a living wage vs. people biking through your land. Which would you choose?

As a result of my careful driving, some signs caught my eye, and most notably the word "YARN" stood out, as well as "LAVENDER" and "MARIONBERRIES." These appealed to both my foodie senses as well as my fiber art heart, so I eagerly looked for an entrance to what must be a magical place. To my delight, I found the small entrance to Edeldal Farm, which is the home of Little House Rugs. Dolls decorate the area between the marionberry bushes, giving the entrance a sort of fairy-tale feel.

Though Judy Taylor's little Little House Rugs storefront is essentially half of her two-car garage, it is chock full of goodies, such as her lovely rugs (see picture to the right), yarn, fiber dyes, books, and felted items; there is something a little magical about all this colorful fiber-art goodness in a neat, compact space. Though her work focuses on rug hooking, she is also a spinner, and it was so enjoyable to serendipitously find and talk to a fellow fiber artist. She is a young, slight woman with a pretty complexion and smiling eyes (I seem to be noticing complexions lately, I don't know why), and I felt quite welcome to browse her shop at my leisure. I admired her yarn she had for sale, and marveled that it was so soft, as I had always thought Jacob sheep fleece was coarse in texture.

She hand dyed her soft pretty yarn herself, and has three spinning wheels! I have only one--well, two if I count the one I gave to my mother, which she doesn't use. I bought some fiber dye (purple!), and when she brought my attention to the marionberries, I could not resist and bought a pint of those as well. As it was, I was glad to have them, as I had not any lunch yet and had only brought a peach with me to eat (with plenty of napkins--yes, it was one those juicy sweet Washington peaches I bought yesterday). The dye was different from the kind I usually buy (Jacquard Acid Dyes), but they were a very good price for the amount of dye in the bottle.

I could not resist taking pictures of some of the things she has to offer at her shop, and when I went to her website tonight, I saw that she has so much more to offer than what she had in her little store. I don't know if you can click to enlarge the photo on the right, but if you can and do, you will not only be able to see some of her very nice hats and purses, but a reflection of her quilt in the mirror.

I will definitely have to go to Little House Rugs/ Edeldal Farm again. I enjoyed chatting with Judy, and with luck she'll have a blog up soon, as I talked with her about how to set one up at Blogger or Wordpress. Such creativity in her fiber arts as well as her lavender work must overflow in words as well--or at least, I hope it does. I didn't tell her about Ravelry, as I didn't think about that until I left, but I will no doubt e-mail her about it later.

I reluctantly left Judy's place (I'm sure I could have spent at least another half hour there) as I wanted to finish my little trip before 2:30 pm, as I had a Chrysalis closure to go to for a young woman I'd known since she was a child. A few miles down the road is Canter-Berry Farms, the blueberry farm that produces the blueberry jam I wanted. It's a lovely place, dominated by a very old barn, built in 1879. This may not seem very old to those on the East Coast, I'm sure, but it is pretty old out here. Clarissa Metzler Cross, one of the owners, says that when she and her husband decided to use and remodel the barn, they found a post that had the date etched into it. She is a slim, athletic-looking woman, perhaps about my own age, who had just come in from farther out in the farm to get a drink, and found that she had a few people come in to see her blueberry goods. Fortuitous timing!

The reason why her place is called "Canter-Berry" Farm is because they have American Saddlebred horses as well as blueberries there. It's clear Clarissa loves those horses, and it shows in the number of awards they've recieved. She has quite a few pictures of them in her shop--I don't know much about horses (though I'm fascinated by them), but even I can see they truly are beautiful animals. We had an enjoyable chat about the horses and her blueberries, and I complemented her on the lovely grounds around the shop--very pretty!

Being the foodie that I am, my attention soon turned to the blueberry goods. I bought a jar of blueberry jam for my mom (she is to have surgery on Tuesday, and she loves blueberries, so I'm bringing the jam over to her that day so that she won't be so miserable after the procedure), and I was highly tempted to buy some for myself, but did not. I did, however, buy the blueberry vinegar, with the intent of making a salad with spinach, fresh cucumbers, tomatoes, and feta cheese, with the vinegar sprinkled throughout. One sample taste of that vinegar convinced me it would be marvelous in a spinach salad. Or even lettuce salad. It has a smooth fresh taste, not as harsh as regular vinegar, so I expect it'll go well against feta cheese, though not as well against something like gorgonzola. However, you never truly know about tastes until you experiment. Canter-Berry Farms has recipes on their web site, so I will no doubt try those as well.

I drove farther along the Green Valley Road, past our favorite Christmas Tree farm, and decided at the last minute to take a turn around the Flaming Geyser State Park. As I approached the entrance booth, I noticed a pile of beer cans and liquor bottles near the park ranger booth. My suspicions of those worthy gentlemen were dispelled when I saw a sign prohibiting alcohol in the park. Yet, as I passed, I noticed the beer cans were crushed, obviously empty. Why take empty beer cans from park visitors? And if they weren't empty, why were they empty now? Hmmm.... Nevertheless, I informed the comfortingly lucid and cheerful ranger that my purpose in visiting the park was to drive around and take some pictures, and I was waved through. Best, I thought, to avoid asking awkward questions of park rangers when wanting to enjoy a sunny half hour or so in a State park. I wanted badly to take a picture of the pile of beer cans, but there a line of cars sat behind me, waiting to get through.

The park was fairly full, with families and couples out for picnics and general fun in the sun and the river. Even so, there were plenty of shady spots, with picnic benches and little park grills. I cannot imagine a better day than this to be in a park.

I spent perhaps 20 minutes there, as time was growing short, and I did want to visit Green Valley Meats on the way back. I kept going east for a while through unfamiliar territory and a road I have never been on, found myself going through Black Diamond (did not stop at the superb Black Diamond Bakery there, alas), looped around back west on Auburn-Black Diamond road, then decided to take the SE Lake Holm Road, which I knew would take me back to the Auburn-Black Diamond road again, and then into Auburn proper. I seem to have a good sense of direction; even when I'm on an unfamiliar road, if I know the general area, and the sun is not at high noon, I can find my way back somehow. But I easily get lost in a city, go figure. I had plenty of time to shop at Green Valley Meats (I ran up a $40 bill, but hey, it didn't go over $50!), getting a bag of pepperoni, ground buffalo, smoked chicken ($6.87 each!), and smoked pork tenderloin, and get home with plenty of time before I had to go to the Chrysalis closure.

Dinner was a meal of the smoked chicken, with a side of lettuce, tomato, and cucumber salad with non-fat feta cheese, Wheat Thins crackers, and dill dip. I did indeed put the blueberry vinegar on it, and it exceeded my expectations.

Altogether a satisfying day.

Peaches and Kevin Skinner

Washington peaches are in! I went to the Federal Way farmer's market today (after getting my tire fixed and my hair trimmed), and what a beautiful day it is. Not too hot--around 75 to 80 degrees F when I went--with a slight breeze. I often make it to the market just short of closing time around 3 pm, but this time I got in around noon.

There is something wonderful about the bounty of a farmer's market. It's all laid out there for you to see on the tables, with the farmers or pickers themselves manning the outlay. It's so fresh, you can smell the scents of the fresh vegetables, fruit, and cut flowers, in addition to the lunch-time treats made up by local restaurants and cafes. The colors are gorgeous; today there were the first tomatoes I've seen of the season, huge heirloom tomatoes that go from the rusty orange red kind, to the ones that are more of a red with a purple undertone. Some of these tomatoes are huge, bigger than my outstretched hand. Some of them are the smaller ones on the vine, small enough to pop into my mouth so that when I bite down, the sweet-tart tomato juices flood my mouth all at once (a.k.a., a tomato orgasm). Glistening green zucchini, gleaming bulbs of onion, and corn! The first corn that I've seen at the market today, the candy-sweet kind with alternating white and yellow kernels. There were apples from Quincy on the other side of the Cascade mountains--Fuji, Pink Lady, Braeburns--big and beautiful, blushing red over light green. Deep red raspberries and dark purple blueberries. Bing and Rainier cherries (the Rainiers are my favorite--I eat them like candy). Flowers, from delicate fragrant pastel-colored sweet peas to huge white and magenta lilies.

And the peaches. Washington peaches. There is nothing better than ripe, fresh-picked Washington peaches. Oh, I'm sure the California ones and famous Georgia ones are lovely, but you know they're shipped not-totally-ripe so that they keep well in the stores, and the fact is, they just aren't as sweet and juicy as the local ones. I'm sure this is why buying local fruit and vegetables is simply better. You get them ripe, you get them fresh, and they are incredibly delicious. You can smell the scent of them, and I'm sure that lends a great deal to the anticipation of the flavor.

I have a peach now at my computer desk, and I have to have a damp towel as well, because this big luscious, golden-dawn-colored early New Haven peach is so dripping sweet, the juices just run off my chin and over my fingers, that's how good it is. There are few treats better than this on a hot summer day.

So when John comes home from his bike ride, he is going to be presented with a NICE dinner. Fresh clams from Quilcene Bay (from the farmer's market) just picked this morning, corn-on-the-cob, a side of Swiss chard (my newly discovered favorite vegetable), and toasted pita bread with either aioli sauce or sour-cream dill dip. Dessert will be a strawberry smoothie, made with frozen strawberries (earlier bought at the farmer's market, then frozen).

I can hardly wait. Yum!!! There is nothing like fresh fruit and vegetables in season.

Later: I changed my mind. Instead of pita, I decided to have crackers and dip instead, as I wanted to save the pitas for pita pizzas. Just the right size for the two of us. Also, I decided to combine the Swiss chard with some Russian pirogi dumplings, which is looking pretty good (I'm cooking them now. The pirogi, I bought at the farmer's market, and the gentleman there suggested that if I were to eat them later, I might want to fry them. (They are cheese and potato stuffed pirogi.) But...just by themselves? So I sauted some garlic, added chopped Swiss chard, and it is looking pretty danged good. I will report back after dinner.


About Kevin Skinner:

I'm not fond of reality shows, and the talent ones often pain me because of how the not-very-talented ones are booed so horribly and made fun of. However, I can bear to see the ones on YouTube, as I love discovering new talent, and I love seeing talent from ordinary people get a chance to shine. I especially love it when ordinary-looking people upset people's very surface opinions of them. Susan Boyle was one such, and Kevin Skinner is another.

I will listen to country music every once in a while--I only came to listen to it as an adult, and a middle-aged one at that. But Kevin Skinner made me want to listen to more of it.

I suspected that since he was the last one to audition for that day, he was going to be better than most. Indeed he was. He has a southern backwoods accent which I have never heard before, so I was intrigued (I love hearing different accents), and wore clothes that were casual in the extreme--stuff that I'd probably wear at home when gardening in cool weather. He talked a bit about his past employment and what he wanted to sing, and though I don't think Ms. Osborne was malicious when she laughed at his accent (she seems like a very kind person; I think she was more surprised and delighted than anything else, and you know, his accent was so very strong), I don't hold out much hope for some in the audience.

Yet, the audience seemed spellbound to silence when Mr. Skinner played and sang in his warm and kind voice, and with good reason. He did indeed play well and with grace and plain dignity. I read some of the comments on YouTube, and he did what all good singers and musicians do: he moved so many to sit by their loved ones and cherish their time with them. I saw more than a few from soldiers and sailors going off to war, and I think it must have been a comfort to them, as well as to those who wrote that their loved ones were ill or dying. And what better thing can an artist do than to uplift and give comfort to those in need of it?

Regardless of how Mr. Skinner does in the rest of the competition, he rose above petty expectations and gave the world some comfort and hope. So God bless you, Kevin Skinner, for gift of that moment.