Cranberry-Orange Relish with Ginger

I bought a bag of cranberries today, soon to become cranberry relish for Thanksgiving dinner. The relish recipe below is tart and orangey with just a touch of spicy heat from the crystallized ginger. It's the perfect fresh foil for the rich mashed potatoes, gravy and stuffing we will soon be enjoying.

I have much to be thankful for. I hope you do, too. Happy Thanksgiving!

Cranberry-Orange Relish with Ginger
(Fine Cooking)

Ingredients:
12 oz. fresh cranberries, picked over and stemmed
1 small navel orange, including the peel, cut into eighths
Generous 1/3 cup roughly chopped crystallized ginger
1 T. granulated sugar
1/4 tsp. kosher salt

Directions:
In a food processor, combine the cranberries, orange, crystallized ginger, sugar and salt.
Process until coarsely ground, stopping once or twice to scrape down the sides of the bowl.

Focal point?

This is a photo of the view across the river from where I live in Oregon. I’d like to use it for my second landscape attempt. But as I look at the image, I don’t see an obvious focal point. The photo was taken on a somewhat overcast day and doesn’t have dramatic lighting. It's a somewhat mundane image, but still, that's the view.

Is there a focal point that’s apparent to others that I am missing?

I could probably use artistic license and put something in the painting that isn’t really there. Not sure what that would be… I have occasionally seen cattle come to the edge of the river to drink, but I really don’t want to put a cow in the painting.

I welcome your suggestions And thanks for stopping by!

Beginning landscape...

I've started taking classes from Vinita Pappas, a wonderful local artist. Vinita is an excellent teacher - well organized, methodical, encouraging and humorous. She's just joined EDM, so you'll soon be seeing her work. She does, however, insist that we do quick value and color studies before beginning a painting. My preferred method is to skip that and go from what I see in my mind's eye to picking up the paintbrush and creating it. But since that hasn't worked out too well for me, I'm making a real effort to slow down and think things through before I begin. Her first lessons have been on landscapes, which I've never done before. I'm not sure that's even an area I want to focus on. But here is one of my first attempts, painted from a photo taken in the rural area where I live. In the first version, I've cropped the badly painted barn and evergreen. Not sure which I prefer. What do you think?

There are just so many things wrong with this. Maybe a few splatters of paint would help...
Probably not.

Watercolor on Arches 140 lb.

EDM #144: Something (sort of) square

This is a very square cow, created out of a folded sheet of cut up rusty metal that sits on my kitchen counter.

Graphite with watercolor on smooth Bristol. (This is the first time
I've used watercolor on smooth drawing paper and I really like the effect.)

EDM #141: Something with Bristles

This is a (partial) drawing of a child's rain cape from China, which has been hanging on my wall for many years. It's a lovely object, apparently made of dried palm fiber. The ends are quite bristly. Palm fiber rain capes are used by the indigenous people of southern China. A photo by John Amato of a similar (adult) rain cape can be viewed here, if you're interested: palm rain cape. (The fringe around the adult cape looks a lot softer.)


Pen with watercolor on Arches 140 lb. (Instant coffee for the background)