Why do they treat little old ladies like little old ladies? My 6 year old PC is about shot....my 5 year old laptop is getting more stubborn everyday. So, when I heard about the new Microsoft Surface, I thought maybe I should investigate. Well, it looks just as technical as the Apple products! You know what that means don’t you? This little old lady is going to have to learn some new tricks. I hate that.  I’ve just mastered the art of texting (almost, sort of,  except for the strange abbreviations...I'm just not clever enough) . Now I have to learn that thing with dragging things around the screen, stretching it, shrinking it, ......I’m nervous.... It seems to me that if I save and budget for several months to be able to pay for this new computer, it ought to be simple to use. Maybe I will just nurse these old Dells along for a month or so.

Great News!...the Somerset Ridge Painters are self-publishing a cookbook! There are 9 of us and I can’t imagine a more inventive bunch of women. Our intention is to publish a series of cookbooks. I think I’ve gained 10 pounds just typing the recipes! We are working fast and furiously to have our first cookbook ready for the shelves before Thanksgiving!
I can’t say any more....but stay tuned, I will tell you more very soon.

Happy Birthday Mom!
My Mom just celebrated her 94th birthday. Lots of get-togethers and some of my favorite relatives came to help her party. My sister Ann and her husband Bruce, came from North Carolina. As usual, genealogy crept into the conversation. I mentioned the old cassette tape with the interview of my grandfather saying his “mother’s people came from the Lake Como region in Northern Italy”, but that I had no luck in finding who was the first Estes to leave Italy. Ann said she remembered hearing the part about how an Estes had left Italy for Scotland after trying to invent dynamite back in the 1800s and accidentally blowing up the village there by the lake. He had to flee not only the village, not only the region, but apparently, the country! I figure if he actually blew up the village, he must have indeed invented dynamite....but credit for the invention was given to Alfred Nobel (of the “Nobel Peace Prize”) stating it was the first safely manageable explosive stronger than black powder. Ahhh, I see the difference......Just think, if he had been more careful, they would be awarding the “Estes Peace Prize”!

So, if you had just blown up a village on Lake Como in 18-hundred something....how would you flee Italy and escape to Scotland? That is a long way to walk! Looks like I have my work cut out for me. Too bad I can’t go to Scotland....it certainly would  be easier.



The Tyrol



When my ancestor left Lake Como, he left behind some of the world’s greatest food. Northern Italy isn’t known for tomato sauces....not in the land of butter and cheese! The hills and mountainsides around beautiful Lago de Como are dotted with herds of dairy cattle. To the east across Northern Italy is the Tyrol, a beautiful area with an amazing blend of Italian, German and Austrian foods.



speck



One of those foods is a smoked ham known as speck.

This recipe features pasta, speck and heavy cream.....heavenly!

Creamy Tagliatelle with Speck                       serves 4
3/4 pound fresh tagliatelle or fettuccine (store-bought is fine)
4 scallions, including some green part, cut into thin rounds
1/4 pound speck thinly sliced, and the slices chopped (see note)
1 3/4 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Set pasta water to boil, and when it does salt it and cook the pasta.
In the meantime, heat the olive oil in a large deep skillet and saute the scallions and the speck briefly. Stir in the cream, check seasoning, and keep the sauce warm until the pasta is done.
Drain the pasta when it's done, and turn it into the skillet. Turn the heat up to high and cook, stirring, for 30 seconds. Serve at once.
Note: purists will frown, but you can use either lean pancetta or bacon (thinly sliced, and low in sugar) if you cannot find speck. If you use bacon, crisp it briefly and drain away some of the fat before adding it to the scallions because bacon is fattier than speck.
Enjoy!