Here are two new cutting boards to help you make dinner.

Board For Your Stove

This board fits over your stove. In my experience, most stoves in rentals have a little lip around the perimeter. This board fits in that lip and can slide left so you can stand at it and mince some garlic, and then back to the right so it can hold your spoon rest and salt cellar.

To make it slide more easily, fry something delicious.

Solid hard maple, 1" thick, with finger joints. Finished with mineral oil / beeswax / orange oil / anise oil.

I don't know about you, but even if having a number of people over, it's rare that I need more than two simultaneous burners.

Custom made to fit the lip on your stove.

Board For Your Sink

Big sinks in small kitchens that take away from counter space make no sense. Here's a board to fit over your sink and put that space to use.

A slot for your knife (placed depending on whether you're right- or left-handed), a lip on the front to make it easy to get the food off the board, and the option to have the canister for your onion skins and divot for wily vegetables or a paring knife. Handles on the sides and bottom, similar to the end-grain boards, make it easy to move.

For this board, the right side of the divot is flat, with the left side gently curving to the top of the board. Two sections are joined with a walnut spline, as seen.

The lip makes it easy to get stuff on the plate, no mess or drips.

You can also use it on your roof to slice an orange for a Tom Collins (can also garnish with an Eames RAR), but bringing up boxes of kosher salt to prop up the board so the knife slot is still functional was a bit much.

Fit to your sink, with handles, lip, and knife slot. Divot and canister cost a bit extra.

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[caption id="attachment_1075" align="alignleft" width="223" caption="Gowanus Pete, © Reilly Brown"][/caption]

This just in from my good friends at  GowanusYourFaceOff - there's a new comic called Power Play, which is described as sort of like the X-Games but with superpowers. One of the characters is Gowanus Pete. He fell into the canal and now has tentacles. That's pretty badass. I've gone canoeing in the canal, but unfortch don't have any new appendages. Sigh. A guy can dream...]]>

Big cutting boards are great if they give you more counter space, but it sucks if they're in the way the rest of the time.

Mounting boards on the wall is way past key:

Standard feature on all boards 1.5"+ thick.

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At long last working on the copper frame for the low credenza. Part of the frame will be joined with standard copper fittings, other sections of pipe will be joined by round wooden pieces.

I turned the piece of cherry so that the ends fit inside the pipe, and the middle portion is the same as the outside diameter of the pipe. I then mitered it for the 90° angle. It'll be a smooth transition along the frame from copper to wood then back to copper again. Awesome.

Here's a pic:

A piece equivalent to the part with the blue tape is inside the copper pipe.  Perfect fit. You can see the piece with tape is a little bigger, so I'll need to correct that, but you get the idea.

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Some recent links:

• Even after an official "cleaning," some sites around the canal, like Lowe's and the Toll Bros. site, are still incredibly contaminated, and can read more here and here. Also a piece about the cleanup for the new "Gowanus Green" development - critics saying it's a pretty meager attempt. Sitting on a giant pile of contamination is never good. Hrm. Ahh, coal tar.
• The canal cleanup, what's involved, and how the canal's long history (since the 1840s) affects the process.
• First-hand account of some of the great works by the Gowanus Canal Conservancy on a cleanup day back in May - mulch, plantings, bird boxes, platforms for swifts, and other good stuff.
• Monte's is open once again.
• Short film about the canal.
• And! Gowanus bike tour June 4th offered by the Historic Districts Council.

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I was out at Long Beach Saturday and Sunday. I noticed this - look carefully at the building in the back:

Compare that with this:

Whoa! That building is at the beach is totally trying to tell me something.  I think it's "eeeeeeee eeeeee...." What could that mean? Interesting....

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Enjoy the long weekend.]]>