Friday, March 11, 2011

San Francisco Earthquake

Today if we turn on the television or read the news on the internet, we'll see up-to-date information on the terrible destruction of the earthquake in Japan. In 1906 the earthquake that struck San Francisco  registered approximately 7.9 on the Richter scale, much less than the recent earthquake in Japan. Yet it left the city in ruins, as much from the ensuing fire as from the earthquake itself.  An estimated 3,000 people were killed and nearly two thirds of the city's residents were left homeless.  Instead of the internet and television, the destruction of this earthquake was documented in newspapers and with postcards.

Wait a minute...is that dog lifting its leg?

Although these photos and many other postcard photos of the San Francisco earthquake were very dark and grainy, the National Museum of American History recently uncovered some real color photos from the aftermath of the earthquake. They look a bit like Polaroids from the 1970s. Pretty amazing. For pictures of many different colors, put on a hard hat and make your way over to Sepia Saturday.

Quantico, Virginia

There's a lot to look at here - a grill, a cafe, rooms to rent, drug stores, great cars.  I'm not sure which street this is, but the cross street is C Street. I wanted to show you a current view for contrast, but it looks like this is one of the few places that the Google street view truck hasn't visited. Maybe it's because the city is surrounded by a military base.
The back of the card is not so much a message as a notation.

On the left it says:
Souvenir of Gemma and Wilfred Lavoie from Quantico, Virginia 10 Dec 1952.

On the right it says:
Charles Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic for the first time in 1927.


Lindbergh was so badly misspelled that I had trouble making out what it was at first, and it has nothing to do with this postcard as far as I can tell.  Maybe it's a cold war spy message.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

All Roads Lead to Pastries


No matter which Paris avenue these gentlemen choose, they will definitely encounter a pastry shop. Chances are the pastries will be delicious.  They may even decide they want to go to several pastry shops and compare; I know someone who did that.

I was particularly enchanted with French macarons, those crunchy, chewy meringue-based cookies with the various fillings.  They have become popular in the United States now too, but I have yet to find a good one here, or at least any that compare in any way to the ones in France. In case you've never had one, macarons look like this. If you were just buying something based on appearance, you might never try one.
Renard Gregory's chocolate macaron is the best.
Then there are pastries based on the macaron, like these:

This is called an Ispahan, a magical creation that combines the flavors of rose and raspberry with litchi. One of them was from Ladurée and one was from Pierre Hermé. Although they were both excellent, one was better than the other. Unfortunately, I don't remember which.
Maybe it was the one from Pierre Herme. I suggest you try both!

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