Bindlestiff Family Cirkus

Bindlestiff Family Cirkus - jackalop logo
Originally uploaded by Caution Mike

Okay. It's officially a triple-header. THREE shows in a week. We know how to live.

Sunday afternoon it was the Bindlestiff Family Cirkus with their show for kiddies at the Spiegeltent. Whips, contortion, sword swallowing, balloon animals, the whole schmegeggy. All backed by a live band. How cool. Since they are practically neighbors, we plan on becoming groupies.

The Bindlestiff's next local show will be in Hudson on Saturday, August 29th at 3:00. It's free and family focused (though you must see them after dark one of these days - it's a whole different Cirkus!). The show will be at the Henry Hudson Waterfront Park. Check their website for rain location info.

Natalie Live and Local

Natalie Merchant's Birthday
Originally uploaded by jurvetson

Did you catch Natalie Merchant at the Spiegeltent last night? On Saturday night, she decided to perform new material from her forthcoming album, and with some scurrying, a piano and an appreciative audience gathered Sunday night. Intimate, casual and an utter delight.

She is a singer-songwriter in her bones and has been writing songs continually since her last release about five years ago. With her lovely little girl off to kindergarten last fall, she turned her full attention (almost full) to creating her new album. As she said last night, many of her collaborators have been dead over 100 years. With a cultural anthropologist's eye, she has unearthed children's poetry (some familiar and some wholely new to us) and set it to music. Collaboration with the living rounds out the project. It's a musically diverse recording with a New Orleans jazz band and a full orchestra appearing.

But, last night was just Natalie, a piano, a little red notebook of music she compiled in the wee hours the night before, and a pen. She sang, played, joked, and made notes in the margins as she worked through the material. It was as much a song-writer's workshop as a performance, and aren't we lucky to have been there.

Cuttings

For years now I've bought amazing local potatoes and no-spray veggies from Debbie and Darryl Mosher of Brittany Hollow Farm in Red Hook. When we first met at the Rhinebeck Farmers' Market, their three kids were little enough to sit together on the tailgate of their farm truck dangling their feet.

For the last couple of summers, their son Ross, now a really, really big guy, has been planting a pick-your-own flower field just north of the family farm on Route 9.


It's a pretty simple operation, really. As with so many of our local farm stands, the farmers are too damn busy to sit there and collect your money. There's a rusty old metal box with a slot in the top for your 5's and 10's.


Grab some clippers and a bucket, large or larger. Hit the field. Clip away among the bumble bees and butterflies. Teach your three-year-old the names of all the flowers and bugs.


Then contribute to Ross's college fund. Stuff your bills into the slot and drive home with enough beautiful zinnias, coxcomb, cleome and cosmos to fill all the vases you own.

Brittany Hollow Farm is located at 7115 Albany Post Road (Route 9) just south of Holy Cow. Pick-Your-Own morning to dusk. $5 for a six-inch bucket. $10 for an 8-inch bucket. 845-758-3276.

Blueberries

I grew up in Maine where blueberry picking is one of the great joys of summer. The blueberries of my youth were teeny-tiny and intensely sweet. We usually picked them along the camp road. In places where they were thick, we were ever mindful of bears (who were likely to be meandering along picking them too).

If you find yourself in Maine this summer, you'll spot wild blueberry pickers selling quarts off their tailgates. Buy as many as you can carry. It's tough work picking those low bush berries, and they are delicate. You'll want to eat them before you cross the New Hampshire line, as they will perish in the heat of the lesser New England states. I mean lower.


But, wait! This blog is about Tivoli. Lucky for us, nearby Greig Farm has rows and rows of beautiful high bush blueberries laden with ripening fruit. No bears. And no bending, squatting or crawling around to fill you pail (unless you just can't resist the urge to pick like a pro).

While I was grazing along picking at eye level, a lovely Jamaican guy was whistling his way down the next row picking for the farm. I hope you get the same relaxing serenade while you tip the darkest berries into your pail... kuplink, kuplank, kuplunk.

Blueberries are $2.50 per pound, and $2 for the plastic pail. You want the plastic pail. Red and yellow raspberries are $5 per pound, and seniors get a 10% discount on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

Greig Farm is located at 223 Pitcher Lane in Red Hook. Pick Your Own daily from 8am to 8pm, rain or shine. 845-758-1234.

Wear your sun hat! And watch for blackberries, apples, and pumpkins as the growing season continues.

Bubby's Back!

The little Burrito Stand is open again. You don't need me to tell you, unless you haven't traveled 9G on your way to Tivoli in the past couple of weeks.


It's a sure sign that Bard graduation will soon be upon us, when Bubby comes back home from Mexico and sets up the Burrito stand. All winter she and her husband run a cafe in San Miguel. Not a bad gig. But, in summer, she's all ours.


You can get your black bean burrito with guacamole or without, and there's a cheese quesadilla on the menu too. The most you could possibly spend for lunch is $7.50, so add this to your cheap date list.


If you hang around the stand to eat (which is the best part), just watch out for the chicken. She's a burrito-eatin' chicken, and if you are part of the under 3-foot crowd, she just might steal your lunch.


Bubby's Burritos is located at the Montgomery Place Orchards Fruit Stand on Route 9G just north of the light at Route 199. She's open Tuesday to Saturday from 12 to 5. And, she'll be with us until early fall.

Burger Joint

If you're a fan of a good old burger, once in awhile, you should give Uncle Chippie's a try. Located in Red Hook's cheap-date quadrangle between Holy Cow and the Lyceum 6, Chippie's does burgers, fries and Cokes. It's a mom-and-pop shop run by Chip and Cathy Slesinski of Tivoli.

Chip is a kid from Brooklyn who grew up on White Castle. Not being from Brooklyn, or anywhere near there, I never acquired the taste, but the Uncle Chippie Slyder is popular with those who did. It's a funny looking little thing. Kind of squarish and flat, as you might have guessed. The little guy loved it. I'm thinking its the "special seasoning powder" which Chip dusts on the thing that keeps kids coming back for seconds.


Bigger people might be better off with a real burger. Chip gets his beef from the local slaughterhouse in Pine Plains, as he says, one beast at a time. If you're eating meat, you may as well know where it's coming from. And certified organic grass-fed beef from a farm in Ancramdale is available, if you ask for it.

The menu started simply enough, but within the year, Chip has added lots of stuff to his burgers. You can get yours with chili, jalapeno, blue cheese, tzatsiki, peanut butter, stroganoff, or chow mein. Yes, peanut butter, stroganoff, or chow mein.

Crazy me. I got a cheeseburger. And it was good. This is not your lettuce-tomato-onion-mayo burger. This is the old ketchup-pickle-onion burger. No messy vegetables to slide out of the bun. Warning, the fresh cut fries are HUGE. A large basket would feed a family of five. And they would devour every last one, quite happily.


Feed your soul. Order a Coke. Or an egg cream. And Chip will have shakes by summer. Just add another day at the gym.

Chip's regulars are a mix of families with kids, high school kids who park themselves in a booth to nibble and giggle, and Bard students who roll in a bit later. The proximity to Holy Cow cannot be overlooked. Make that two more days at the gym.

Chat with Chip a little bit, and you can see this guy really likes food. He is a deli man and was hunting around for a deli location about a year ago. Get him talking about a deli, and you'll get hungry. He imagines great food smells coming out of the kitchen and a big deli case full of beautiful mounds of this and that. He almost went to Tivoli - too bad for us. But, he found this location on Route 9, looked north and south, saw delis all around and settled on burgers (chicken, turkey and vegan burgers also available). Give one a try.

Uncle Chippie's Old Fashioned Burger Shop is located on Route 9 at Old Farm Road. Open Tues. - Wed. 10:30 to 8:00, Thurs. - Sat. 10:30 to 9:00, Sun. 11:30 to 8:00. Summer hours later Thurs. - Sat. 845-758-3070. Free delivery.