Kendall Dunkelberg

“A Space Symphony”

featuring the Starkville/MSU Symphony Orchestra

In a new partnership, the Starkville/MSU Symphony and the Columbus Arts Council present “A Space Symphony”, 7:30 PM, Thursday, October 25, 2012 in Rent Auditorium on the Mississippi University for Women campus in Columbus. The concert is free and and open to the public.

The orchestra, under the direction of Dr. Michael Brown, will perform The”March” from Star Wars, “Jupiter” from Gustav Holst’s The Planets, Tchaikovsky’s “Pezzo Capriccioso for Cello and Orchestra” with principal cellist Griffin Browne, and “The Romantic Symphony” by American composer Howard Hanson. The concert also features guest conductors Nadezda Potemkina and Richard Human.

Although based in Starkville, Mississippi, the 75 member orchestra is comprised of musicians from all over the state and beyond. Joining in this performance are several students from the Suzuki Programs in Columbus– led by Diane Ford and Trudy Gildea-and in Starkville-led by Shandy Phillips. These soloists include Aidan Dunkelberg, Lillian Fulgham, Cassie James, Daniel Jones, Helen Peng, Laura Sandifer, Lucy Sandifer, Stephanie Smith, Abbey Swartzendruber, and Grace Swartzendruber, all of whom will be featured on J.S. Bach’s “Double Concerto in D minor for Two Violins and Orchestra”.

Along with the Columbus Arts Council and the Starkville/MSU Symphony the event is sponsored by Mississippi University for Woman, Clark Beverage Group, Commercial Dispatch, Starkville Area Arts Council, Greater Starkville Development Partnership, City of Starkville, National Endowment for the Arts, Renasant Bank, Prudential Starkville Properties, Cadence Bank and Mississippi Arts Commission.

All partners celebrate this new collaborative effort and invite the regional community to this very special evening of music.

Persimmon Frozen Yogurt

Looking for an orange alternative to pumpkin in the fall? Look no further than persimmons. These small autumn fruit start out firm at the beginning of the season. By now, the ones we bought a few week ago were turning soft and mushy, but that’s when they’re at their sweetest best, if a little messy. When not so over-ripe, we like to cut them in slices and eat them with or without the peel, which is fairly hard. Now that they’re soft, I decided to experiment with a frozen yogurt.

I sliced the persimmons in half and used a spoon to scoop out the soft pulp into the blender. Four persimmons seemed about right, and I added about half a cup of yogurt, a little lemon juice and a little honey to taste. In the end, I also added about 1/4 cup of milk to the blender after putting the mix in our one quart ice cream freezer. That helped me to get the last of the good mix out.

The resulting frozen yogurt was bright orange, very creamy, and delicious: sweet with a little tang and a hint of cinnamon (though I hadn’t added any spice). That was the musty persimmon flavor coming out. So if you can find persimmons, as I did at our local farmer’s market, give this recipe a try.

24th Annual Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium

Well, another Welty Symposium has come and gone. We had a great time with a dozen authors and a great audience that included students from two local high schools and the Mississippi School for Math and Science, as well as MUW students and alums and members of the community. Rather than running down the highlights, I will post an excerpt from my introduction to the keynote reader.

For a while now I’ve been interested in Eudora Welty’s first novel, The Robber Bridegroom. It was published in 1943, after she had published two collections of stories, and it was dedicated to Katherine Ann Porter. It takes a Brothers Grimm fairy tale and transports it to the Old Natchez Trace. Welty adds a few historical characters, such as the tough riverboat keel man, Mike Fink, and two of America’s earliest serial killers, Little Harp and Big Harp, who now is just a head that Little Harp keeps locked in a box, but that keeps calling to get out.

The story begins as the tobacco planter Clement Musgrove returns from a trip to New Orleans to sell his crop. Our theme comes from the second paragraph, which starts off, “As his foot touched shore, the sun sank into the river the color of blood, and at once a wind sprang up and covered the sky with black, yellow, and green clouds the size of whales, which moved across the face of the moon.” Clement goes in search of lodging for the night, but the first two innkeepers he meets are both missing an ear, the sign of their punishment for crimes committed elsewhere. When he reaches the third, honest inn, he still must share a bed with two fellow travellers. In the night, he is nearly killed by Mike Fink, yet is saved by Jamie Lockhart. At home, Clement rejoins his daughter and her stepmother, and as every bridegroom must have a potential bride, you might guess whom that will be. But not before there is plenty of robbery, murder, abduction, mistaken identity, jealousy, and yes even love.

From these elements we take our theme of “Crime and Passion in a Gothic South” to explore what has become of the Southern Gothic. We will look at crime, especially in Carolyn Haine’s mystery Bonefire of the Vanities, Michael Kardos’ thriller The Three-Day Affair, and Olympia Vernon’s A Killing in This Town, though there are other crimes than purely legal ones. Josh Russell brings us abduction in A True History of the Captivation, Transport to Strange Lands, & Deliverance of Hannah Guttentag. Ghosts appear in Jessica Maria Tuccelli’s Glow and Chris Lowe’s Those Like Us with a story titled a “Ghost Tour.” Poets Frank X Walker, Anthony Abbott, Catherine Pierce, and Kelly Norman Ellis give us passions of all kinds with a few crimes and fears mixed in, and passion for gardening informs our Welty-Prize-Winning One Writers’ Garden, as you’ve just heard.

When I first saw the cover of Sonny Brewer’s novel The Widow and the Tree, I knew it would be a perfect fit for our theme. I was struck by its similarity to the illustrations in my copy of The Robber Bridegroom, and when I opened the book I found out why. Both were done by Barry Moser, though over twenty years apart. As I read the book, I realized this was more than just coincidence. The Widow and the Tree.combines virtually all of the elements I found in The Robber Bridegroom. There is plenty of mystery about who is after the Ghosthead Oak, a five-hundred-year old live oak tree that has witnessed war and murder in its not so distant past, as well as drug deals and amours in its present life. The widow was passionate for her husband, and the veteran, a recluse from the Vietnam War, is passionate for the tree, the widow, and his privacy. Then there are those who seek to control and tame the tree, claiming it for the public good, though possibly with personal interests that make this act a kind of abduction. There are child abuse and threats of retribution. And much like Eudora Welty, Brewer considers the place of the wild and whether we have any right to own it, kill it, keep it alive, or tame it. His book raises many pressing questions and leaves us to sort out the answers, and he weaves this all into a spell-binding tale that will keep you turning its pages.

For Sonny Brewer is a consummate story-teller, and so it is no surprise that The Widow and the Tree has received accolades and awards, including most recently the 2012 Alabama Library Association Book award for fiction. Orion magazine called it “a marvelous and confusing little book.” And this was a positive review that notes this is the way with “serious literature” and that concludes: “The Widow and the Tree is spare, mean, loving, pungent. Sonny Brewer knows the Alabama coast, a culture threatened sure as the Ghosthead Oak.”

And Sonny does know the coast, having lived in Fairhope, Alabama, for many years. There he founded Over the Transom Bookstore and established the Fairhope Writers Colony that has fostered dozens of great Southern writers. He has collected their writings in five volumes of Stories from the Blue Moon Café and collected their reminiscences in Don’t Quit Your Day Job: Acclaimed Authors and the Day Jobs They Quit. He has published three previous novels: Cormac: The Tale of a Dog Gone Missing, A Sound Like Thunder, and The Poet of Tolstoy Park.And for the past year and a half, he has served as Editor-in-Chief at MacAdam Cage publishing. Yet more important than all his publishing credentials, Sonny Brewer is one of the most genuine people you are likely to meet. He cares for literature, and he cares for people, and this shows in his writing and in his life.

Ghosts at the Welty Symposium

Of course when you think Gothic, one thing that comes to mind are old mansions full of ghosts. This year’s Welty Symposium has a few literary ghosts of its own. Of course, Sonny Brewer’s novel The Widow and the Tree is about the Ghosthead Oak, a 500-year-old live oak tree, and there are many memories and legends associated with the tree. And Carolyn Haines Bonefire of the Vanities (and other Sarah Booth Delaney mysteries) feature a a ghost or two, most notably the ghost of Sarah’s grandmother’s maid, who gives her advice (sometimes unwanted). But did you know we have some other ghosts in the symposium?

Several characters in Jessica Maria Tuccelli’s debut novel Glow see ghosts, and at least one is seen as a ghost. One of the main characters has a ghostly friend, Lovelady, who appears in an earlier time before her death. Another couple of characters are intimate with many ghosts and help the youngest protagonist deal with her own. There are other forms of conjuring in this novel as well, filled as it is with African American and Native American lore from North Georgia.

Christopher Lowe’s debut collection of short stories, Those Like Us, includes a story “Ghost Tour” that may not have actual ghosts, but tells of a character who makes up ghost stories, some of which may be more real than she’d like to admit, or may become real to her in the telling. Other characters in these linked stories struggle with death and loss. As with most ghost stories, there is an element of reality or normality that the paranormal brings to light.

Mystery and Mayhem

There’s plenty of mystery in this year’s Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium keynote novel, The Widow and the Tree, and there is crime, both contemplated and perpetrated, though I wouldn’t classify the novel as a mystery exactly. It blends some elements of that genre, along with the gothic modern fairy tale that Welty uses in her Robber Bridegroom. Both books serve as the inspiration for our theme this year, and consequently, we have a few mysteries in the group.

Carolyn Haines’ Bonefire of the Vanities may have the greatest claim to that fame, coming as the 12th in the Sarah Booth Delaney mystery series. Her intrepid detective is aided and abbetted by her sidekick and two dogs, as well as a relatively friendly ghost. Together they solve mysteries in the Mississippi Delta, bones of all kinds providing the common theme. Carolyn Haines will read on Friday 10/19 at 1:30 p.m.
Olympia Vernon also explores crime in her novel, A Killing in This Town, though the tone is a bit more sober, as she delves into the motives and the ramifications of a fictional civil-rights era slaying in rural Mississippi.

Finally, Michael Kardos brings his debut novel to the symposium. The Three-Day Affair has been called a mystery thriller involving a somewhat unintentional kidnapping and the college buddies who have to weigh their allegiance to each other against their conscience and better judgement. Both Michael Kardos and Olympia Vernon read on Saturday 10/20 from about 10:30-12:00.

Welty Week

Every October, the week I look forward to most is this one. Each year Mississippi University for Women brings a dozen writers to campus to read from their fiction, poetry, and essays at the Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium. It’s an intense three days (and intense preparation beforehand). Everything is lining up fairly well. So far, no crises, and only a few last-minute details to wrap up (have to save a few of those!). On Wednesday, the first couple of authors will arrive, and Thursday, everyone will descend. I’ve been doing interviews to try to encourage folks to come out to the W to hear free readings. And of course, we sell books.

For the past 5 years, I’ve been the director. Before that, I helped out any way I could, including running the book table for a couple of years. It’s a great chance to meet new writers and connect with people I’ve known for awhile. I’m always amazed at how gracious everyone is, and what a great time we all have.

If you’re anywhere near Columbus, Mississippi, you should stop by and check it out.

High Gear with Bright Spots

Have you noticed it’s that time of the semester again? It’s been a month since my last blog post, and that’s because I’ve been busy! It happens every semester that school takes over, but this time it seems to have happened earlier than most. I’ll blame it on SACS. For those not in education (in the South), that’s the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and it’s time they evaluate Mississippi University for Women for accreditation. That means lots of people on campus have to scramble to tell them who we are and what we do (and to get our ducks in a row before we have to do that!), and I’m one of those scrambling, since I head one subcommittee and serve on another. A few more committees have cropped up, and then there are the usual classes — it’s midterm time and grading is in full swing.

But there are brighter moments, even if they’ve added to the stress. For one, the family all gathered in Albuquerque last month to celebrate my niece’s wedding with a lovely ceremony out in the desert with a view of the Sandia Mountains behind. Great food and even dancing were enjoyed by all. Aidan proved he has rhythm, and his parents even took a step or two on the dance floor. And we got to spend a few days with Rudy, Michael, Elizabeth and the whole Lucero clan, which is always great fun. Aidan, Rudy, and I took a hike one day up a trail into the mountains a ways. On that hike we even saw a tarantula cross our path. That weekend was a much appreciated break from the daily routine of school.

Another Bright Spot in the fall is always the Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium. It keeps me hopping, organizing authors (every plane ticket has been reserved and I have al their other travel plans), buying books (making my last orders for the book table this week), planning food and beverages for our lunches, dinners, and receptions (have met with food services once, more meetings to follow, I’m sure), writing publicity (our press release is out, the poster is printed, and the program is almost ready to go press). Things are looking pretty good, though there’s always the nagging feeling that I’m forgetting something (usually true, though usually I remember in time). It’ll be a great group and a wonderful weekend when it arrives in just over two weeks. I hope to make a few posts on this year’s authors before the time comes!

So my apologies to my blog readers that my attention has been elsewhere. It’s part of the cycle, maybe a bit more intense this time around, but I hope to be able to post more frequently again soon!

Luddite or Geek?

Here’s a question: if you spend the occasional Saturday morning, or even all day, messing with old technology to keep it working, are you a luddite or a geek?

That’s what I’m wondering about myself after spending the morning in our attic, adding one more piece of equipment (a small RadioShack pre-amp) to try to get the antenna setup in the attic to pull in a distant station. (The what? You might ask.)

Yes, we still pull our TV in over the airwaves (or I might say, we do again). We cut our cable long before the switch to digital over-the-air TV signals (did you miss that, oh cable and satellite users?) The expense of cable wasn’t justified by the lack of time and lack of interest we had for its programming, though we will admit to watching some cable series after the fact from Netflix.

We live in (or actually near) a historic district, so the idea of putting an antenna on the roof wasn’t in the mix. We could, but we’d rather not. However, we learned that a good antenna in your attic can work — and it does well enough to pull in our closest stations. There have always been some that are a bit of a challenge, though. PBS (one of our favorites) is one. So awhile back, I added a second antenna in the attic, connected with a Join-Tenna from Channelmaster that separates the signals so one antenna only receives our PBS station, and the other one receives everything else. (I see a lot of these are now on clearance for about $4, so I don’t know how long they’ll last.)

Everything was fine until our local ABC station went off the air suddenly. I don’t mean we stopped receiving them, but that they stopped broadcasting. With a week’s notice, we realized we’d need to do something, especially since it is one station that broadcasts Alabama football and since we’ve started watching Once. Other than that, we could probably live without the channel — we don’t watch a lot of TV. Fortunately, we could sometimes pick up Birmingham/Tuscaloosa station (33).

That’s where RadioShack came in. I knew I could get a pre-amp there and get it right away, not next week. So to give it a try, I bought one for less than a month of cable would cost, and hooked it up. First I connected it to our main antenna, leaving out the Join-Tenna setup. It worked well, and seems to bring in ABC better than it had (we tested right before I made the change, and it was breaking up (pixelating) before, but not after, though the signal is only marginally better). Of course, the fear is that tonight, during the game, the signal won’t be quite good enough, but we’ll see!

Once I knew that was working, I changed the connection in the house so the preamp was connected to our distribution amp (this sends the signal to two rooms and boosts it slightly again). It still worked, but both ways PBS wasn’t getting a very good signal. Finally, I put the Join-Tenna back in the mix. All is well, though PBS still ain’t the best. Here’s the setup:

Antenna-Main and Antenna-PBS both connect to Join-Tenna. The Join-Tenna connects to the prep-amp close to Join-Tenna, from there coax cable goes to the power supply for the preamp, which then connects to the distribution amp, which send the signal to 2 (up to 4) TVs. Our antennas are boom antennas that are about as big as our attic will hold. Once, I even took a TV into the attic to adjust the main antenna to the absolute best position without having to shout down to someone in the house. I may have to do that (or shout) with the PBS antenna if I want to get a better signal there.

If the RadioShack preamp doesn’t work or doesn’t last, I’ll probably look for ChannelMaster or Winegard, since they get better reviews. But in a pinch, RadioShack had something I didn’t need to ship. I could get a more powerful preamp or one with less noise (though that doesn’t seem to be a problem).

The only other improvement I could make is to put the antenna outside, attached to the house or up higher on a boom. As long as I can avoid that, I will. And for now, everything seems to be working. So am I a geek because I spend time wiring, reading about equipment, etc., or am I a luddite for trying to keep old over-the-air broadcasting working for as long as it’s still available? If it’s any consolation, we also have a Mac mini hooked to our TV, and we get a lot of our entertainment streaming online. And then there’s that other technology that our whole family (besides the dog) loves: books. Maybe I am a luddite after all.

More Okrafusion

This afternoon I found another good recipe for okra. Searching online for recipes, I came across what appears to be a Malaysian recipe for okra and fried egg. After reading a couple of variations, I decided it would be fun to try, though of course, I lacked a few ingredients so had to make do. And I thought I’d add a few other vegetables. Here’s what I did:

In olive oil, I sautéed onion and garlic, plus some fresh fennel seed (from a plant that’s gone to seed). I then added the okra, cut into 1-2 inch pieces (I cut most pods in half). I also added some red bell pepper, and a small tomato. Finally, I added some more spices: cumin, turmeric, pepper, and basil. After this had all sautéed for awhile, I mixed up 4 eggs and scrambled them into the pan.

That was all pretty close to the recipes I had found. Here comes the fusion part, though. Those recipes called for white rice, but we were out. So I cooked up some grits to have on the side. And since we love cheese grits anyway, I added some grated cheddar cheese. I served the grits on one side of the plate and the okra on the other, overlapping a little, so you could see both individually. Serve with sriracha if you want to spice it up a bit.

Another okra recipe we have been enjoying this summer, I like to call barbecued okra. Yes, I’ve heard you can cook okra on the grill, but we rarely grill, so we don’t bother with that much. My barbecued okra is just pan fried with onion and garlic plus spices like cumin and cayenne, maybe some cardamom or coriander, then near the end, just add ketchup and Worcestershire sauce and let it coat the okra. I wouldn’t call this a main dish (like the fried okra with egg), but it’s a good side with other vegetables.

Okra Fusion

If you live in the South and have a garden, know someone who has a garden, or visit your local farmer’s market regularly (as we do), then chances are you are awash in okra this time of year. We love this slimy little vegetable, but even so, the steady supply can sometimes be a bit overwhelming and challenging to find new ways to cook it.

Of course, we know and enjoy the traditional way to fry okra, though usually we opt for something a little less greasy. When we have fried it recently, we take some corn meal, some flour, some Cajun seasoning (Zatarin’s if we have it, cayenne pepper and cumin, if we don’t), and salt and pepper to taste. Lately we’ve been combining okra and yellow squash in the same pan. Take equal amounts of okra and squash cut in 1/2″ lengths (either cut the squash in rounds, if it’s small or quarter round, if it’s bigger — huge squash probably shouldn’t be used, look for medium to small squash for this recipe). Dust in the flour/corn meal/spice mixture and let sit. Sauté onion and garlic in some olive oil (or if you want to be really traditional, use corn oil or canola oil). Fry, stirring occasionally. Yes some of the coating falls off (or most of it does), but it keeps the okra dry and adds seasoning to the mixture. Serve with field peas and a tomato for a fine Southern-style vegetarian meal. Don’t forget salsa or a nice chou-chou (a sweet, spicy relish) to on your peas. Potatoes or corn on the cob go well with this meal, too. Especially if your appetite is big…

But you can’t cook like this every night. So we mix it up with some bhindi, Indian-style okra. Essentially it’s a lot like Southern fried okra without the breading and with a little different spices. We usually use lots of garlic, cumin, maybe some cardamom or curry, and quite a bit of red pepper. There are good recipes online, if you want something more specific than this. Serve with lentils and rice, or eggplant and rice, or another Indian-style vegetable.

One way to vary the experience of okra is to change the way you cut it. In typical Southern okra, they are sliced in 1/4 to 1/2″ slices. For bhindi,we like to pick out the smaller okra pods or choose a small, thin variety and just cut off the caps (if they’re tender, you might even leave some of the cap on), then fry the okra whole. Sometimes with larger okra pods, I’ve cut them in quarters or halves lengthwise for a change of pace. This affects the texture and the taste (and if cut lengthwise, more of the seeds fall out, especially with the larger varieties).

When we want to go back to Southern cooking, we often stew okra with onion, garlic, and tomatoes (fresh are best, but canned crushed or diced tomatoes will do in a pinch). And of course, we sometimes cook up some vegetarian gumbo or jambalaya.

But my favorite way to cook okra (at least before I married into a Souther family) is in a stir-fry. There the okra doesn’t overwhelm, but adds texture and flavor. There are many ways to do it, spiced with curry or (as last night) with lemon grass and chiles to make a Thai influenced dish. I ground fresh lemon grass, lime peel, cayenne pepper, and garlic in a stone mortar to make the main spices, added a little curry powder, then stir-fried with eggplant, mushroom, carrot, onion, and green pepper.

The Fusion recipe that led to the title of this post, though, was a combination of all of the above — well almost. It was a stir-fry served over soba noodles (though any asian noodle would do). The recipe was born out ofone of those “what can make with what we have left in the fridge” moments. We had made field peas earlier in week, and I had saved the left-over broth, since I’d used vegetable bouillon when I made them and didn’t want to throw it out. The stir-fry itself included okra, eggplant, yellow squash (small ones that I quartered and then cut into okra-sized lengths — I often like to match shapes in a stir-fry), and purple beans (that turn green when you cook them). I began by frying some onion, garlic, curry powder, and okra in the wok. Since we had no tofu, which I usually use in a vegetarian stir-fry, I added an egg and let it fry, coating the okra a little. Then I added the other vegetables, saving the beans for last so they would remain fresh.

Next came the field pea broth, which was pretty much a gel when I added it. It always stiffens up in the refrigerator, but usually gets more liquid when heated, so I figured this would make a slightly thick sauce. To this I added a little soy sauce and a tablespoon of tahini to help thicken it up and add flavor (you could use peanut butter, if you don’t have tahini on hand). To this I added a few quartered grape-sized (or slightly larger) tomatoes from our garden and let them cook just long enough to warm through but keep their shape.

Served over noodles, this recipe went over very well. Though it was done on the spur of the moment, I might have to try to repeat it sometime. Often I ask Kim and Aidan if they can guess the secret ingredient. This time, I didn’t bother. On the one hand, I thought they might guess tahini, but I didn’t think they’d ever guess field pea broth, the ingredient that really makes it a fusion dish in my mind. I also didn’t know if they would both appreciate it as much if they knew what it was. I guess I’ll find out, if they read the blog, anyway…