Sabine news and views

I don’t have much culinary news to report.  Things have been very simple at the Sabine Farm of late.  My busy days have been characterized mostly by a some oatmeal in the morning, ramen in the day or a sandwich, and salad in a evening.  Beans and rise fit in here and there as well.  Nothing either creative or interesting.  I might do something more daring on Sunday.  Depending on what I can find on sale, I might make some pork ribs and sourkraut.  I usually use onion, white wine and juniper when making this.

I received a "Say The Black Do The Red" coffee mug the other day through the cafepress.com store.  This is the over-sized of the two choices.  It is very nice and holds the precious liquid in the quantities I prefer (when it is not espresso, of course).  It is sturdy and the print is nice and crisp.  If you are looking for something to give a priest, especially one whose attachment to rubrics and texts is somewhat fluid, this might be a nice surprise! 

The altar from the other day when I said a Requiem for the late Fr. Dan Schuh.  Alas, I didn’t have my unbleached candles out.

Meanwhile, inside the Sabine house, I have the refugees from the now chilly, closed-down greenhouse.  Within I am preserving various herbs for cooking and also a couple of nice little flowering jasmine trees.  This is not the sort of jasmine I know from Rome, alas.  But they are flowering like mad right now and the house is filled with theirfragrance.

Also…

THE PENJING REPORT
 
I don’t know if it is jealousy or flattery, but Penjing is flowering right now as well.

Many thanks go out to the kind person who, using the amazon wish list, signed me up for a subscription to the National Catholic Register, which is a very good paper.   I am grateful. 

 
I am also very grateful to you who have sent donations through the donation button on the left side bar and some of the pages, such as the PODCAzT pages.   I am going to have to use your generosity also to cope with dental bills, I’m afraid.  I am being given the treatment by the insurance provider.  Nice.  I was contemplating a quick dash to England to burn some frequent flyer miles and recharge my mental and spiritual batteries visiting friends.  The dollar is stronger but I may have to abandon that idea. 

It’s all Adam‘s fault, really.

In any event, on Monday morning I will happily, and with deep appreciation, take a list to Mass of those who have helped in any way since the last time, and remember your intentions.  It is a duty and honor to pray for benefactors.

FLASH!
As I was writing the above, Mr. Rural Route Mail Man zoomed down the Sabine drive to leave a package too large for the box on the road.

A friend, KK of KC has sent me a fruitcake prepared by the Trappist monks of Assumption Abbey, Missouri.

This looks pretty good.  I am not one for fruitcake, really, but I suspect this is good or my friend would not have sent it. 

May I suggest you find gifts for people this year produced by monasteries and convents?  You could be doing them a service during this time of economic downturns.  I think many of these houses depend on what they sell in this busy season. For my gifts, I think I will use the mugs, above, and also things from monasteries.

Perhaps you know some really good monastic sources for Christmas gifts. 

I’ll start a new entry for that: HERE.

 

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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18 Comments

  1. John Enright says:

    Try something really simple, Father. Bratwurst! Boil the brats in a quart of beer and sauerkraut for a little while. Take the brats out of the pot and then grill them (George Forman’s grill works pretty good inside!). Serve the brats on a hoagie roll (or hero or sub roll for those who don’t appreciate the tastiness of a hoagie and the great rolls produced by South Philly bakeries) with heaps of ‘kraut and shards of sharp provo cheese. Wash it all down with a pint or two of Harps.

  2. Geoffrey says:

    Thank you for the picture of the Sabine Chapel! Oh, how I miss the Z-Cam and Radio Sabina! ;-)

    Will you be cooking for Thanksgiving? I love putting my fresh herbs to use that day!

  3. Geoffrey: The Z-Cam and Radio Sabina could be revived, I suppose. But it used bandwidth, and not many people could watch it at the same time. I would want better solutions to those problems. I don’t know much about the technology needed to stream audio and video well and I am not sure my upload is fast enough to handle much.

  4. Jon says:

    From the Trappists a few miles from where I grew up in Western New York https://monksbread.com/cart/

    From those wonderful Traditional Carmelite monks of Wyoming http://www.mysticmonkcoffee.com/

    From the Clear Creek Benedictines http://www.clearcreekmonks.org/CDforSell.htm

    [Post this as the OTHER ENTRY]

  5. questioner says:

    Fr. Z,

    Do you have any monestaries to reccommend as far as purchasing gifts? I want to support the right places. [That is what what the OTHER ENTRY is all about.]

  6. No “Anonymous” comments, please.

  7. mag says:

    In other news have you seen where the National Catholic register has a piece now saying they always liked Obama?

    http://www.ncregister.com/daily/our_president1

    Yes, they like this most anti-life, anti-family, anti-marriage senator in the US as their next president.

    Sometimes I get tired of milquetoast Catholics who will not stand up for what the Church teaches and defend those teachings-no, just go with the flow downstream like dead bodies. I am sorry for this support of this pro-abortion administration coming up. Many freedoms will be lost in the coming years.

  8. Sara says:

    A very dear friend of mine, at the ripe old age of 50, was diagnosed earlier this year with his FIRST cavity… other than braces as a teenager he has never required any type of dental work other than annual checkups and cleanings…the guys at work were vicious in scaring him to death what a horrifying process getting a tooth filled was..then he passed out in the dentist chair when the drill started…

    I, on the other had, am the reason why my dentist’s kids are in private school and how he can buy a new car every year…even his wife knows me by my first name..

  9. little gal says:

    “I am being given the treatment by the insurance provider.”

    As part of my work, I help families with health insurance issues all the time…if something
    is covered as part of the policy and they’re denying payment,make sure the dental provider used the correct codes when billing–sometimes there is some leeway in how things are billed–Another approach is to have the dental provider write a strong letter explaining the procedure with respect to the benefits of your policy.

  10. Greg Hessel in Arlington Diocese says:

    The National Catholic Register really isn’t that good of a newspaper. Notorious for poorly written articles that seem never to have touched the hands of an editor.

  11. JPG says:

    I have had Assumption Abby’s friutcake its ok, too many nuts, Gethsemini’s is better. (the latter to die for ) and I would not eat any but my mothers save for my Gethsemini’s
    JPG

  12. Doug says:

    mag,

    Actually, I’m not all that surprised. The “faithful” seem to be hypnotized lately by a self-proclaimed supporter of murder on a scale of millions per year. NCR seems to have jumped on the band wagon.

  13. Daniel says:

    Dear Father,

    Every time you post a picture of your delightful chapel I wonder if you have servers for your Masses there, and if not, how does a priest say the traditional Mass on his own? Does he read both parts?

  14. William says:

    Care Pater,

    Nescio quomodo communicare tecum debeam. Estne Villa Sabina in Italia vel in Civitatibus Americae Foedatarum? Photographiae ciborum, florum, dulcium, avium, et cetera, stupendae sunt. Dic, sis, ubi Villa sit. Spero fore ut Felicem Diem gratiarum actio habeas.

    Gulielmus Philadelphiensis

  15. Daniel: There are provisions for the older Mass without servers. The new FSSP DVD for teaching priests to say the old Mass explains, among other things, how to say a Mass without a server.

  16. Ohio Annie says:

    I gave up my subscription to NCR for the same reason as OSV, wishy washy faith and a not-so-subtle slant against the TLM.

  17. Maureen says:

    Penjing is looking good! And jasmine in the house… wow.

    Re: the above suggestion — bratwurst and beer is only good if you are talking one of the more red-tasting bratwursts, like the ones from Wisconsin. A gently spiced gray bratwurst, such as is made in Cincinnati or Dayton, could never support being cooked in beer. (White wine, maybe. If it wouldn’t hurt the lovely melding of good German mustard and horseradish.)

  18. Jon says:

    Sorry, Father, you can take down my “monksbread” post. I’ve moved it to “THE OTHER ENTRY.”

Comments are closed.