Tanglewood 2010 highlights

Berkshire Eagle announced next year’s Tanglewood highlights on Friday:

July 3-4: James Taylor and Carole King perform as part of their world tour.

July 9: The eight-week BSO season opens with James Levine conducting Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony.

July 18: At the Shed, Arlo Guthrie and the Boston Pops under Keith Lockhart. At Ozawa Hall, Audra McDonald’s recital “The New American Songbook.”

June 26: Garrison Keillor and the “Prairie Home Companion” radio show.

July 16: Levine conducts a pairing of Mozart’s Requiem and Stravinsky’s “Symphony of Psalms.”

July 23: The BSO and guest singers perform Mozart’s comic opera “The Abduction from the Seraglio” in concert form under Levine.

July 24: Seiji Ozawa returns to the BSO podium in a Brahms program.

Aug. 8: Yo-Yo Ma presents a program of Asian music with his Silk Road Project.

Aug. 15:  Oliver Knussen’s “Where the Wild Things Are” opera given in concert form by TMC students.

Aug. 29: The BSO season closes with Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, conducted by Kurt Masur.

We’re wondering if there will be any pop music this year…more programs to be announced in a few months.

Tickets go on sale Feb. 14.  Information: www.tanglewood.org.

Pottery Barn in Hudson

Thanks The 12534 for posting this video and this video on art + antiques destination Hudson, New York.

Pottery Barn ’style expert’ Jeffrey Moss made a recent trip to Hudson to explore is its farms, architecture, antique and curio shops, and watering holes.

We haven’t been to Hudson since the summer, but I’ll be there next Friday picking up Anuj at the Amtrak station.  These pieces have inspired me to pop into some of my favorite shops like Foley & Cox for some browsing and fantasizing about my two-hundred-year-old Dutch colonial on fifty rolling acres…

Photo with Havens article on Hudson, The New York Times

Inside the Beacon

Here’s a quick tour inside the Beacon Cinema in Pittsfield, Mass. led by general manager John Valente.  The Beacon opens tonight with a midnight showing of Twilight: New Moon.

Unless we somehow get sucked into the Twilight mania in the next week, I’m guessing our first film at the Beacon will be Fantasic Mr. Fox or The Yes Men Fix the World.

these are the people in our neighborhood: “Deborah Berke Artist’s Studio in New York”

Remodelista featured a home in Hillsdale, NY today designed by architects Deborah Berke & Partners.

I love its simplicity and the strong, classic New England lines.

this year’s thanksgiving menu

Will not include a turkey.  I’ll be cooking a meal for my side of the family on Saturday, two days after Thanksgiving.  We’ll be spending Thanksgiving Day at my sister-in-law’s with her Dutch in-laws where there will be a turkey and lots of other goodies.  Large families in different states (and countries) require that we split the holiday into two meals/occasions.  This turns out to be a wonderful thing.  I get to host one of the meals, which I love to do, and just show up for the other.   Then of course there’s twice the mashed potatoes and desserts…

I decided not to make a turkey since everyone will still be probably eating their leftovers from Thanksgiving Day.  And because Anuj wanted to try something different. 

So what will I be making the Saturday after Thanksgiving?  I recently got my hands on a secret family recipe from our neighbor in Harlem for this:

Brisket!

I’m salivating just thinking of the version our friends made a few weeks ago and have so graciously offered to pass the recipe along.  I’ve never made a brisket and I’m a bit nervous.  It takes a lot of time and prep and you end up with either a delicious, juicy brisket, or dry airline food.  It seems there’s no in between.  My neighbor has promised to walk us through the recipe step by step.  I’ll be taking copious notes.

Now I’ve just got to assemble some dishes.  Any ideas?

(Photo epicurious.com)

apple crisp

A dozen peeled and sliced apples (rome, cortland, macintosh, golden delicious)…

layered with cinnamon and piled high…

topped with brown sugar, flour, more cinnamon and cold butter.

40 minutes later…

seven (going on eight) days of gluttony.