Hi Ingevald, very nice reading, I read in great depth. I particularly enjoyed masseriaficazzana. It was very familiar to me, not only the figs, but the wonderful other fruits I haven't had in a while. Thanks again, I enjoyed it greatly. Ciao

I once had that cabin, Michelle. But, my retreat was year-around. It was right at the base of a couple of mountains, still on valley soil. My problem as a gardener was that the mountains "collect" the clouds, as you note. The only time of the year when it is obvious that I'm not all that far from the coast is during our cloudy Spring days. With the cloud gathering nature of the mountains, my cloudy days at the cabin stretched well into Summer. This was beside the nature of cold mountain air to drop into my garden during the night hours throughout the year. So, with a short season and limited sunlight, turnips did well . . . I don't think I could handle much drier country than here (more than 1/3rd inch of rain yesterday, hurray!!). Right now, I feel like a dried-up Autumn leaf. (I'm goin' to try to use that Neti pot more for the sinuses. Gosh, I think I'm blowing dust . . . ;o) Four seasons, is what I'm always hearing about this country. Yeah well, hot too hot; cold too cold; & windswept. Sometimes, when it is "socked-in" with fog in the Autumn - one has the oddest feeling. Where did all this moisture come from? The landscape looks like toast. One comes to appreciate the healing nature of water. Steve

Sharon, I did use the recipe and method in Charcuterie. I found that the last step, which is steaming the pastrami for a couple of hours, really helps cut the saltiness, the first batch I sliced and froze, and didn't steam. It was far too salty. David, Elery has a MasterBuilt electric smoker. It's in my garage, so he uses it year round. My garage is not heated, and the electronic display doesn't like it when it's under 35F or so, so we have to remove it, take it inside and warm it up, then put it back on. Thankfully, it's easy to do. We smoked the pastrami over cherry wood, the last one we did with apple. Why did we choose those types? Because I pruned the apple and cherry trees last spring and that's what we had. I think Jessica was referring to the deli because of my reference to pastrami... Annie

Our Miele is to the left of our range alcove. It's only an issue when I inadvertently burn something in the oven. I'll typically open a window and crank the vent hood up to max, which I think helps. Otherwise I agree with trailrunner that it's not in the same league as, say, searing something on the range. It's certainly not as nice as when I burn something in the Lacanche ovens, which are (duh) under the burners, but the difference is not vast. Get a good hood, though not just for that reason (and sayde I think I've tried to sell you on my Modern Aire before...).