Thursday, June 5, 2008

A simple day at home

cappuccinos and toast; fruit; vegetable soup, bread and salami, green salad
P1010830.jpg

THE FAEMINA IS BACK! I'm sure I've written about it before: how Lindsey found it in a junk shop in Berkeley, apparently brand new; how we had to borrow $12.50 from my mother because we didn't have the $25 they wanted for it; how for years we alternated between using it and giving up on it; how it came back from one disastrous repair missing a few parts.
A couple of weeks ago I took it down to Mister Espresso, in Oakland, for maintenance; gaskets were leaking, the piston was getting stiff… Alex sounded gloomy a few days later on the telephone: dismantling it risked wrecking it. Go ahead, I said; Exactly my opinion, he said.
Yesterday I picked it up, all tight and shiny (the Faemina, not me), and this morning we had our morning coffee as we like it. Not bad for a machine nearing sixty years old. Thanks, Alex.

P1010832.jpg   Then tonight this nice vegetable soup: leeks sweated in olive oil; chicken stock; peas, diced carrot, garlic cloves… a few slices of ciabatta, a few more of good salami… green salad with that tender "Dutch" arugula from the garden…
Cheap pinot grigio; cheap Nero d'Avila

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Charles. I photographed your Faemina about twenty years ago. I'll try to dig up the film and scan it.
I see you are in Healdsburg--visit Jimtown Store and say hi to my old friend Carrie Brown.
Bob Schenker
Oakland

Charles Shere said...

Yes! I remember your visit and your photo. I'd love to see it again. The poor Faemina has gathered a few scars since, but haven't we all...