Karen Clare

 Every so often, I love to pull out the tea set that I got at the Biltmore Estate in Ashville, North Carolina back in 2004 during a road trip with my best friend, Dori. The Biltmore Estate was the Vanderbilts' summer home, and after touring the huge estate, we went into the gift shop. It was during September, my birth month, and I ended up getting myself this tea set, which is a replica of a set that was owned by the Vanderbilts.  Afternoon tea has three courses. the first course is sandwiches, so I made cucumber sandwiches: white bread, spreadable cream cheese on both sides of the bread, very thinly-sliced cucumbers (I used a mandoline), salt, and crushed celery seed. I cut the crusts off carefully, and then I cut the sandwiches, some into rectangles and some into triangles.  The second course is scones with jam and often clotted cream. The scones I got were store-bought from Publix, and I had some lingonberry jam -- which, if you've never tried it, tastes like cranberry...

 Yesterday was dreary, chilly, and a little rainy... it's been an El Niño winter for sure. But I got myself out of the house in the morning to take a trip to Whole Foods to return an extra power cord I'd ordered from Amazon (they own Whole Foods) for my laptop that was the wrong kind.  I had never been to Whole Foods before, and I have to admit, it's a pretty nice place. I don't typically enjoy grocery shopping, but this place has enough interesting and fun products that it doesn't really feel much like a chore.  They have ready-made pastries that you can just pop into the oven to cook, great meats that aren't much more expensive that Publix lately and look better, and a whole section of custom soaps that I enjoyed spending some time in.  I ended up getting some soaps, chicken wings, two pints of heavy cream, eggs, and toasted sesame oil. When I got home I preheated my oven to 190 F and poured both pints of heavy cream into my white casserole dish. It was about ...