WW: Largest and oldest chestnut in the US

(The plaque below lays out the basics of the story. This American chestnut [Castanea dentata] is thought to be the largest, and possibly the oldest, left on the continent, after an introduced blight killed off virtually all of the once-ubiquitous trees. Because they're not native to the North Coast, this one had no peers to communicate the fungus. Today it's the centrepiece of a cemetery in Tumwater, Washington.)

The Buddha's Practice

"In the morning, I take my bowl and robe and go into the village to beg for food.

"After my meal, I go into the woods, and gather some grass and leaves to sit on. I sit with legs crossed and a straight back and arouse mindfulness.

"Then, far from sense pleasures and bad states of mind, I do jhana."

The Buddha, according to the Anguttara Nikaya 3.63 (1).

WW: Sorb jelly

(Just the thing on bannocks, hermit bread, and scones.)

Hermitcraft: Champagne Plums

Here's a quick hint from Rob's Hermit Kitchen:

The plums have ripened here in the Northern Hemisphere, and those with trees are being inundated by their annual surfeit of sweet, juicy fruit. Plums (also called prunes or damsons) are relatively labour-intensive to preserve, and other treatments are either specialty projects (wine) or not especially compelling compared to other options (jam).

But here's something you can do with them that's delicious and easy:

1. Place a number of fresh, unwashed plums (any kind) in a non-reactive bowl.
2. Mix up a slip of flour and water, about as thick as pancake batter, and pour it over them. 
3. Cover the bowl and leave it to work for a day or two.
4. When the batter is bubbling merrily, remove the plums with a slotted spoon and rinse them clean.
5. Eat.

Why are they now so succulent, and slightly tingly(!)? And what's up with that batter?

Well, to begin with, the powdery white "bloom" you see on dark plums is yeast. (Yellow varieties have it too, it's just not as visible.) So when you immerse the fresh fruit in flour-based batter – a nutritional medium – the yeast goes nuts and multiplies like crazy.

Meanwhile, water from the batter soaks into the plums, causing them to swell and opening tiny fissures in their skin. Dark streaks of plum juice in the cream-coloured batter attest to this process. (Some plums may actually split wide open, leaving little doubt about what's going on.)

Yeast from the working batter penetrates the broken plum skin, hits the sugary juice inside, and begins to ferment.

Then you eat it. I don't know how much alcohol this process creates, but it isn't much; I've eaten many of these in a sitting without feeling any effect at all.

When the plums are gone, you're left with a unique and tasty sourdough starter that makes great pancakes and coffee cake. In fact, with a little advanced planning you can pit the fermented plums, poach them in a light syrup, and use them as filling for some epic crêpes made from the batter they just came out of.

So have at it. Rarely do you get so much good for so little effort.

(Plum photos courtesy of Wikimedia Commons users Sakurai Midori and Zebulon.)

WW: Hermit flag

(The Bandana Banner signals a practicing hermit.
Here flying on a boathook.)

Career Opportunity

I recently speculated that hermits might be going mainstream, and now a friend apprises me that a Catalonian heritage-preservation association just posted a vacancy for a hermit at the ancient hermitage of Mare de Déu de la Roca (Our Lady of the Rock). The successful candidate stood to receive €1.000 for a year's service, described as "all the proper functions of a hermit". (According to the trust, these amount to showing visitors around, playing hôtelier, and not acting out of character; the announcement makes no mention of striving for transcendence, but to be fair, religious institutions rarely do that either when filling ordained positions.)

This sort of thing is actually not new; the same friend earlier directed me to the Wikipedia entry on Europe's one-time garden hermit market, wherein aristocrats supplied one of us (or someone pretending to be one of us) with rustic lodging in exchange for service as a living garden gnome. But few of those billets approached the cachet of the Catalonian opportunity.

Because the announcement is mute on spiritual matters, it's hard to know how they're defining "hermit", as opposed to "guy in a robe overseeing food service"; one gets the feeling they're really looking for a national park-style re-enactor, a college kid who wears a costume and does schtick for tourists. But I'm going to guess that Roman Catholic convictions are compulsory; it's hard to picture a waraji-wearing Zenner getting that handshake.

Nevertheless, this could be someone's entry to the lucrative and fast-growing field of eremitical monasticism. Too bad the deadline was Monday. But chin up: it looks like we're entering a seller's market.

WW: Mystery of the cranes

(These are two of the cranes that the Port of Olympia bought a few years ago to unload ships. When I asked how they were delivered, I was told, "Why, by ship, of course." Leaving me with this troubling mystery:

How did they unload the cranes?)