Peggy Markel

the thrills and miracles of ‘mystery’ wine dinner parties

It’s exciting to open mystery wines that promised to be great once but have languished so long, it’s impossible to know if there’s something delicious inside. When one proves to be lovely, it’s like a little miracles has arrived.

Sardinian Women Show How to Wash Dishes with Passion and Joy

Our friend Peggy Markel took this remarkable little video of women in a church rectory’s kitchen in Sardinia washing dishes as one sang loudly in dialect, refusing to be shushed…The BEST way we’ve seen to transform an ordinary household task.

Gift: The Essential Rumi’s Poetry and Wisdom

The Essential Rumi is a beauty of a book, one that you can open anywhere, even mid-poem, and find a perfect bit of illumination. It makes a fine gift. Here’s a taste with a new way to read poetry.

Folding, Height Adjustable Ironing Board Table…Desk…Table Base

Ironing boards, with their adjustable height stands and ability to fold away into a closet, are really an ideal dual-purpose surface. We started remembering beautiful vintage ironing boards we’d seen and envisioning their chic, useful possibilities.

Quick, Improvisational Custom Chai

Masala Chai is the lovely milky spiced tea of Indian Cuisine that has become wildly popular worldwide and is infinitely variable. Long ago, I made my own chai spice mix because I kept encountering ones I didn’t like. I vary the balance of spices according to my mood and embellish it with additional flavorings. Here’s my basic formula, along with alternate routes and rules you can easily break when whipping up your own

Murals Inspired by Frescoes to DIY or Buy

These images Castello Sonnino’s frescoes that Peggy Markel emailed us from Tuscany got us thinking about mural services we’ve come across in our wanderings, and just what images we would put BIG on a wall.

Recipe/Method: Herb-Scented Tuscan Pork Roast

Herb-Scented Tuscan Pork Roast has been one of my most popular recipes over the years. I learned it while hanging out with my friend Peggy Markel during one of the Culinary Adventures she regularly leads in Tuscany. Peggy learned the recipe from chef Piero Ferrini (and so it goes, recipes passed on from cook to cook, making…

unplanned still-lifes (they’re all around us)

Last weekend, we had a friend over for dinner, to hang out in the new space. Toward the end of a long evening of talking and eating, we both happened to look over at the kitchen counter at the same time and said in unison: “Look at that still life!” It was though someone had…

to do or not to do, that is the question

Yesterday afternoon, I looked at the massive to-do list that would keep me working into the evening and…actually for days – an impossible amount of tasks from writing posts to the endless details of moving to tending an elderly mom’s affairs. I wondered if there was another way to be handling things that allowed for…

dance for friday: Tunak Tunak Tun

(Video link here.) We found ourselves so burnt-to-a-crisp after an all-day photo shoot, we couldn’t write a word about the millions of wonderful ideas in our files…We were about to call-it-a-day, secretly wondering if something would come at the very last minute to be our post for tomorrow (it often does, mysteriously)… In one last…