fave five #1: ruth barry
featuring peanut m&m's
welcome to the first installment of fave five, a new vertical i’m excited to launch here on darn good. when i started this newsletter last year, my goal was to publish one new recipe per week. i’ve been able to stick to that relatively well, but there were times when even that one recipe became unmanageable. whether due to travel, illness, bad planning or a lack of creative juices and motivation, i know that there will continue to be weeks here and there where i won’t be able to publish a recipe.
if you’ve been here for awhile, you’ve already met the reading round-up, a collection of links i put together on occasion to offer a bit of light reading and inspiration for those in between weeks. now, i’m excited to share fave five: a short and sweet (read: v short, v sweet) collection of five things worth loving right now from various people in my—forgive me, but i lack of a better word—”network.” it will give me a break every now and then and hopefully introduce you to fun new people, places, things and ideas.
today’s fave five is from ruth barry, the baker and writer behind black isle baking.
ruth and i first met many years ago, when i wrote about the opening of her first brick-and-mortar iteration of black isle bakery for cee cee berlin. lots has happened in our lives since, including but not limited to us both ending up here on substack. i hope you enjoy ruth’s fave five and check out her newsletter, too.
ruthy barry’s fave five
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer—My sister-in-law gifted me this book. Whenever I read from it, I feel hopeful and a deep longing to feel more connected to the land. I pay more attention to the natural world because of it, I’m more curious. And I dream of a garden to put some of what I’ve learned into practice one day.
Reservation Dogs—One of the best tv shows I’ve seen. It follows four indigenous teens living in a small reservation town in Oklahoma. I love how it celebrates indigenous culture, the complexity of friendship, and the necessity of community. It’s funny and heartbreaking and uplifting and important. It’s pretty much a perfect show.
Peanut butter M&M’s—Whenever we visit family in the US, we come back with a giant bag of these. The ultimate M&M!
As Above, So Below by Sampa the Great—This record is defiant, joyful, affirming, ferocious. And I love it. Sampa the Greatest, more like.
Taking photos on film—Shortly before my son was born, I bought a cheap, second-hand point-and-press camera. I’d spent time looking through family photo albums and loved the nostalgia of moments snapped on film. I wanted my son to have that experience too. Every time I get a roll of film developed, I’m so excited to get the photos back.
Have fun!