So here I am, almost two weeks in New Orleans, and I’ve written almost nothing. What have we (ten of us from NY, Chi, Philly, and SF, just today joined by a similar number from mostly the same places) been doing?

We knock on doors of teachers who are not members of the union. Patient, slow, we find a few who want to join now. We keep up visibility and know that more will join in time.

We helped publicize a Back to School event where school information, free school supplies, immunization, games, food, and an insectorium were all available. Road signs, flyers door to door. We assembled and sorted the book bags and supplies and books. And then we worked the tables at the event, helped with set up, clean up, etc. (The insectorium was cool)

We go into schools where teachers are overwhelned, and help set up a few classrooms, straighten, discard, rearrange, assemble, and just try to make ourselves available to teachers who could use help.

And then in the evenings we go for dinner. Lots of New Orleans food. Tonight was Voodoo barbeque. Emeril’s Delmonico on Sunday. The steakhouse in Harrah’s one night. Some Italian another. But mostly gumbo and more gumbo. Crawfish etouffe. Jambalaya. Po-boys for lunch. Or soul food. Food is important here. Food fills the gaps between work.

Run over to Meeyauw to catch it.

Recipes. Teacher Stuff. Pie (of course). Even a picture of a Pie-shaped lolzcat.

Of course I forgot to submit again. Even with this wonderful photo (left) from Whatsit to remind me!

But Andrée does serious recipes. Look closely at those pistachio cookies!

Ms. Whatsit started a great tradition: teacher’s potlucks -  a sort of social, food-oriented, teacher carnival.

The Leap Day Potluck just appeared over at Meeyauw. Neat stuff - recipes, food pictures, food stories, and teacher chat. Go visit. And don’t skip the recipe for herbal cough drops!
Next one is  also at Meeyauw, Pi Day, March 14. I’ll put something in for that one. Send e-mails to meeyauw[at]gmail[dot]com. Figure March 12 or 13 is the deadline.

…over at Meeyauw’s place. Buttermilk pie. Southern food. Pizza. Fruit faces. Various teacher stuff. And of course, soup.

Click the carrots to get inside.

A carnivallette of bone marrow recipe and dishes blog posts from the last few months.

Pork “ossobucco” from the Reluctant Gourmet, left.

Bone Marrow, St. John, from Eating with Jack (an elegant dish, right).

How do you like bone marrow? A discussion from just a week ago on ChowHound (listed under my NY links) and a NY marrow recommendation from a few weeks earlier.

An English roast bone marrow and parsley salad recipe from Married with dinner.

Bone marrow dumplings from KQED Bay Area Bites (sort of their chowhound?). It’s the last in the list of 2007’s top meat dishes.

Lee Anne Wong includes NY’s Blue Ribbon and its bone marrow marmalade on her top 10 (#8).

The Hawaiian blog, onokinegrindz, visited London and took a wonderful photo of roasted marrow bones.

And then there’s me (soup bones above left), Fred (cabbage soup), and Spamwise (roasted bone, at the Beacon in NY, right).

Fred wraps it up neatly in his Chronicle of Bone Marrow.

(ps, there’s a ton more out there. This site has medieval recipes for marrow pies (”sluberkens” in some form of Dutch) and marrow-stuffed quinces. Tip of the iceberg.)

I’ve often boasted about my winter soup. Here, live on this blog, you finally have a chance to see this gross-looking, olive brown colored glop.

Unpeppered marrow broth, left, parsnips and carrots (hiding other stuff) right.

The basic idea: boil the hell out of barley, split peas (yellow and green) and lentils, about a pound, pound-plus altogether (1 hour). Throw in marrow bones (can add neck bones with some meat, if you want), and boil them hard (1 hour). Then pepper, spice, and throw in chopped carrots, parsnips, onion, and celery, and boil a bit, then simmer.

After an hour, hour and a half, you have edible soup. Reheat repeatedly (adding water), and you thicken it to porridge. Just reheat what you want, and you get to keep it at the soup stage. I do a bit of each.

More beneath the fold, mostly pictures —>