November 8, 2025

WEEKLY MENU 11.09.25

We’re going a smidge highbrow during the Weekly Menu 11.09.25~

“Got to an Art Museum” day is on Sunday during the Weekly Menu 11.09.25, and if that’s not an opening to wax poetic about my favorite art museum – ever, I don’t know what is. We are a “minimal” museum family. What’s that mean? We are good for a minimal museum experience only. Two hours or so is probably the max length of time we’re good for, before we all start zoning out. Don’t get me wrong – I adore a good museum, but I don’t (ever) plan on spending an entire day there.

Bert and I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (The Met!) last week, and it is absolutely worth a trip. Side note: try to avoid it when the forecast calls for a rainy day. The crowds were a little overwhelming. Honestly? So is the sheer size of this museum. We could visit it every day of the trip and not see it all. This is the beauty of museums, and especially art museums. You can revisit to check out your favorite sites again and again.

I lived in Boston for five years, between college and my first job, and found my museum there. I was too poor to buy a membership at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, but I should have, because I spent so much time there. Imagine, if you will, an entire bulding devoted to the collections of a socialite/philanthropist/art historian museum. It has galleries – ten to be exact. The building is four stories (maybe more? maybe less?) built around a central courtyard, and it is chock full of treasures in every corner. The pieces aren’t conventionally labelled – Ms. Stewart Gardner placed each one in the museum. Her story is almost as interesting as the museum:

Isabella Stewart Gardner was born into a prosperous family in New York City in 1840. She married John “Jack” Gardner—the scion of a Boston family—in 1860. Newly installed in Boston’s Back Bay, the couple struggled to have children, and, tragically, their only child, Jackie, passed away before his second birthday. After this tragic loss, Isabella and Jack began to journey the world, traveling extensively throughout Europe and Asia and returning to Venice again and again. These travels sparked Isabella’s deep interest in art and culture.

At home in Boston, Isabella began to take classes at Harvard, studying art history and Italian literature. She was first a collector of rare books, but at Harvard, she met Bernard Berenson, a student who would go on to serve as her art advisor. Starting in the 1890s, she and Berenson worked together to assemble one of the most important art collections in the world, acquiring everything from major works of Italian Renaissance art to textiles to Chinese sculpture to French paintings made in the 1800s.

Jack and Isabella dreamed of creating a museum together. When Jack sadly died unexpectedly in 1898, Isabella persisted in making their shared dream a reality. Construction of the Museum began in 1899 and was completed in 1901. Isabella spent the next two years installing her wide-ranging art collection throughout the Museum. It opened to the public in 1903 under the name Fenway Court. The Museum quickly became a vibrant cultural center in the city; Isabella hosted concerts, dinners, and gatherings for artists and other creatives.

Gardner Museum

I was back in beautiful Erieland when a heist occurred in 1990, but I was still devastated on behalf of the museum.

The 1990 theft of 13 works of art from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum’s collection remains unsolved, although the Museum’s commitment to recovering the stolen works has never diminished. The Museum, working closely with the FBI and the US Attorney’s Office, continues to seek facts that could result in the safe return of the art. A share of the reward is promised in exchange for information leading to the restitution of any individual work or group of works. An additional reward of $100,000 is being offered for information leading to the return of the Napoleonic eagle finial.

Gardner Museum

So, if you know anything, it could be worth some moola. Just saying. If you are in Boston, please go say hello to the museum. You’ll be glad you did, even if you only spend two hours there.

WEEKLY MENU 11.09.25

Perhaps we’ll visit the Erie Art Museum on Sunday before we have our Italian Feast/Sunday Dinner. We’re starting with a little play on toasties, I like to call Pizettes. They’re crostini smeared with an easy homemade tomato sauce, liberally sprinkled with a shredded fontina/mozzarella mix, similar to the one I use in the Baked Fontina.

If you haven’t tried fontina yet, I’d really recommend it – the flavor is just divine. Mix in some gooey, melty mozzarella and you’ve got a real winner. Homemade pasta sauce is the base for the meatballs and sausage that will simmer in it. Bert’s favorite pasta will make a nice base for all that. Our crazy easy dessert is a ricotta/cream cheese base that we’ll put in a store-bought crust. I don’t even need to cook it!

We’re combining Meatless Monday with Taco Tuesday this week: burritos stuffed with a bean and cheese mixture is a dual dinner!