EPISODE #133 -
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 3, 2012
We are moving quickly
into the holiday season! The day after Halloween we ended up going to
our first holiday open house. It is weird to see all the Christmas
decorations up while I’m still having a chocolate hangover from all the
Halloween candy! Still this time of year always moves fast for me. The
only time it moves slowly is the late winter and early spring when I’m
itching to get outside again and the weather is not cooperating.
Mama
Mia Cioppino
We love Italian food
and we have found one of the best places to get Italian food at
Mama Mia Trattoria
(503-295-6464) in downtown Portland. We recently visited when they
offered to share their signature dish Cioppino! We met owner Barry Brown
in the kitchen with Executive Chef Dan Frosaker where he had all the
ingredients ready. This dish features some great local seafood and other
local produce. Mama Mia works very hard to include local ingredients in
their recipes and they encourage you to do the same. The ingredients
included olive oil, garlic, basil, and thyme. The mussels and clams
should be scrubbed and the outside shells need to be cleaned. There was
also fish, scallops, calamari, fish stock and white wine. The final 2
ingredients were fresh spinach and a pomodoro sauce (which they make
every day!).
Handmade Soap
Recently when we were at a press event at
the Rogue Hopyards in Independence we watched a demonstration of how to
make soap. It was fascinating! Now you may be thinking that there is a
beer in our future since we are at the Rogue, and there is, but it is in
a bar of soap. Tammy Taggart from Farmland Soap joined David to show him
how she makes her special beer soap from Dead Guy Ale. To start we had
to get our safety equipment on. Making soap uses lye and it is highly
caustic, so gloves, eyewear and a long sleeve shirt are all required.
When the lye is added to the oils the reaction makes soap and glycerin.
1911
Home Remodel
We find it really cool to see a new home
built with the latest design and gadgets. What makes it cooler is when
the new home is a remodel of an older, historic home. We caught up with
Bill Henderson and Lori Katz from
RePDX to check
out a home that was built in 1911 and to see what they had done to bring
it back into the new millennium. This home was in the Irvington
neighborhood and in keeping with the historic nature of the neighborhood
they tried to keep it as close to the character of the rest of the
homes. That was a problem, especially when you have asbestos and other
problems that have to be taken care of. Once they took care of the
asbestos, then it was a matter of keeping true to the original
character. Still they needed to bring in some modern appliances when
needed. The kitchen was redone and made a little larger by knocking a
large hole in the wall to tie it into the dinning room. The master suite
was also an eye opener! The master bath and bedroom were so large and
cozy; you could just stay there and never leave. It is a great home for
the growing family. You can check out this home and some of the other
homes they have by going to their website.
Standard Adaptive Kitchen
Sometimes as we age it
is harder to get our homes to age with us. Appliances and furniture that
we have used all our lives is harder to use. This is especially true in
the kitchen. Recently we stopped by
Standard
TV and Appliance (503-619-0500) in Beaverton and met with Glenda
McAdam, who is a ‘Certified Aging in Place’ designer and she has a
demonstration kitchen at their Beaverton store with all kinds of
appliances and ideas for those with age related problems or other
accessibility issues. We started with a small refrigerator. This one was
elevated off the floor so you don’t have to bend over so much. It also
had a glass door so you can see everything inside without opening it.
Then we moved over to the oven, which was also elevated off the floor
and had a door that swings to the side. This is great if you are
confined to a wheelchair. You can roll right up to the oven to get your
pans out. The same concept was used with the microwave oven as well. In
the same counter top area we had a special bowl/cutting board. The
cutting board had a hole in the center of it to hold a large mixing
bowl. This holds the bowl and allows you to stir without needing hand
strength to hold it. The counter tops were also unique. They were a
2-tone design which allows people with poor eyesight or macular
degeneration to see the edge of the counter better. |
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