Frivolous fashion

There's been a distinct lack of frivolous fashion in the blog recently, but I can do something about that. My trip to Florida included several visits to high-end malls. One mall, Coconut Point, is a combination mall and apartment/condo complex. You live (or vacation) at the mall. What an idea.

I'm back, with a couple of cheap hoodies (from a beach store), a beautiful gray belted sweater and a long denim shirt (from Chico's), and two princess-seamed long-sleeve t-shirts (from Coldwater Creek, my mom's favorite store). I'd wanted to include a link to the sweater, but can't find it on the Chico's website. I tried on their Elizabeth dress, a classic "little black dress" with 3/4 sleeves, but unfortunately I was right between their medium and large sizes.

We also visited the Fossil store, which continues to have the best collection of bags around. They're beautiful, the colors are stylish without being garish, and they're affordable. I suspect that last reason is why you rarely find them on sale. But that standard pricing worked against them because, when I found two bags I liked (Sasha Large Top-Zip), I had no motivation to make a decision on the spot — I can see the same bags at the same price at Macy's or at eBags and figure it out later. Note to Fossil: Use a colored lining, rather than black, on your black bags and you'll have my undying loyalty. At the moment, I'm trying to figure out if your beautiful black Sasha bag is worth it if I'll have to root around in the darkness to find whatever I put inside it.

I've added a new blog to the Food, Fitness, Fashion blogroll: No More Frump. The writer is a fellow fan of Kut from the Kloth jeans.

Have you ever heard of Yummy Mummy cookies?

Apparently they are a Halloween tradition. Very cute.

Let's get demonic: Going to the mat over yoga

It would be tempting to dismiss the "Yoga 'Demonic'?" story on the front of the Metro section in today's Seattle Times as idiotic, but in truth, there is something demonic going on.

To recap: The influential pastor at the head of Seattle's church for hip young born-agains, Mars Hill, said flat-out that yoga is demonic. He was giving local support to an essay by the president of a Baptist seminar that warned that yoga is contradictory to Christianity.

Jaws dropped.

Not mine. I'd been prepared for his argument, though I thought at the time the preparation was overkill.

Turns out that Susan (my yoga teacher, Susan Powter) was right.

She believes firmly that men do everything possible, at a political, cultural, societal, and family level, to prevent women from being healthy and fit. They load them down with kids, work, responsibilities, guilt — and then outright discourage them from eating right and taking care of their bodies.

"Oh, Susan," I used to think, as she lectured on this topic while we lay on the floor doing yoga stretches and crunches, or did wind sprints and lifted weights, "isn't this just a bit paranoid?"

Turns out, not if you're a gal in the Mars Hill congregation. Can you imagine trying to get healthy and fit by taking two hours a week to get to a yoga class ("HOW DARE YOU!")— and now your pastor is blasting you from the pulpit for engaging in demonic activity?

I'm particularly incensed because yoga is a great activity for women who have been utterly out of shape and want to get back into it. You can start with gentle stretching and core strengthening and later build yourself to aerobic fitness with Ashtanga or Vinyasa workouts. It's low impact, it's cheap — all it takes is a mat and you can do it in your living room.

And now it's demonic, too! Does this mean I can skip my usual witch costume for Halloween and just go in my yoga outfit?

All I can say to the pastor of Mars Hill Church is "thank you!"

If I ever need motivation to stay strong and fit, and get to my yoga workout on a regular basis, I'll just think about you and your ilk. Praise the Lord!

Jeans that look and feel great: Kut from the Kloth

Eddie Bauer changed the cut of their jeans a year or so ago, as did the Gap, and I haven't been able to find cute, comfortable jeans to wear. The new Eddie Bauer jeans look awful on me and the Gap jeans look great in the dressing room but when I get home they are just too low-cut to be comfortable or practical to sit down in.

I'd just about given up when I stopped in at Buffalo Exchange (a thrift shop chain focused on clothes for 30-somethings) on the way back from the Ballard Sunday Market. I spotted two pair of jeans, tried them on, and loved them both. The best pair was called Kut from the Kloth. The saleswoman raved about them but said the were no longer in production. I bought them — for $19.

Fortunately, the saleswoman was wrong. They're still going strong, and Macy's carries them in Better Denim (remember "Better Dresses"? Now it's "Better Denim."), and you can find them on eBay.

Turns out I'm not the only person who thinks Kut from the Kloth is the gods' gift to the short, curvy woman.

Check out these reviews from The Demoiselles and Cleveland's Shopaholic blog.

The one caution about Kut jeans? Watch out for the ones with the flaps on the back pockets. Ugh.

Unboxing adventures

The new trend for online merchants seems to be including little gifts with your shipments. My order of Mediterranean pine nuts from Nuts Online came with a gift of pistachios and my order of coffee stirrers (long story) came with a gift of oatmeal-raisin cookies.

Well, yum!

Beware of (Chinese) pine nuts

Fresh basil from the garden, local garlic, some genuine parmesan cheese — and some awful pine nuts from China.

This is close to the recipe for pesto, but that last ingredient renders it a recipe for "pine mouth" — a hideously bitter taste that kicks in about 24 hours after you eat the pine nuts and then recurs every time you eat anything for up to a week or two.

Anything.

No one knows why this problem — which doesn't affect everyone who eats the pine nuts — is associated with Chinese pine nuts, not European or American ones. But it is.

Unhappy anecdotal accounts abound; check out this one from the Cincinnati Enquirer's food writer, who was felled by a homemade salad with pine nuts. She'd gotten them at Trader Joe's, which said the nuts were from Korea, Russian, or Vietnam. She was so traumatized by two weeks of having everything turn to bitter ashes in her mouth that she vowed never to eat another pine nut, no matter where it comes from.

Not me.

I'm now shopping for safe pine nuts for my next batch of pesto. It seems that the American pine nut industry has been pretty much driven out of business (it's too labor-intensive to compete with cheap imports). However, I bought some lovely pine nuts in Arizona last year from a road-side truck in Flagstaff and have come across a homey online purveyor from the Southwest:

• Goods from the Woods — their fresh raw shelled American pine nuts are currently being harvested and will be available soon. $38 a pound.

For the traditional European pine nut:

• Nuts Online — Mediterranean pine nuts at $34 a pound.

Nuts Online ordering system gives the option of sending a message with the gift. It was tempting to check "Get Well Soon" for my pine nut order!

A short history of sugar on our shores

The Culinary Curator offers a primer on sugar in the American kitchen.