sarah & gabe

back view, with their cool t-shirts that have one of my favorite slogans on it: "slap some butter on it"

Sarah Ladd and Gabe Blauer’s return appearance to Selma Cafe’s Friday morning weekly breakfast was a huge hit.  And I mean huge. These two brought in and fed 140 hungry guests.  Since I was expediting the specials this week, with Remi and Jeff out of town, I really didn’t have an idea of how many plates we filled, garnished and sent out with the servers.  I knew we were busy, and that the waffle iron decided to call it quits early on, but Sarah and Gabe are so uber cool I never felt stressed out.  In fact, expediting is fun. Sad to say, Remi is leaving soon, and we will need someone to fill his shoes.  Do you like to be in the middle of the kitchen action, calling out orders to the chefs, garnishing plates to make ‘em pretty, and keeping track of who takes what specials to guests as they are ready? Come on over and try out the expediting role sometime!

The first special this week was a lovely Swedish pancake, Ann Arbor style, with local everything.  The pancake was rich with eggs and milk, topped with luscious strawberries and Calder dairy whipped cream.  We served it with some smoky bacon and a beautiful salad mix given to us from Beverly at Needlelane Farm.  Not too sweet, just full of the juicy deliciousness of fresh berries, balanced by the perfect salty finish of the bacon.  I can see Swedish pancake, which was a first for us, becoming a regular feature as more and more fruit becomes available through the summer.

The second special featured Mill Pond Bread’s Lithuanian Rye which is the most flavorful rye bread around.  Toasted and slathered with butter, it was a toothsome balance to the soft and creamy omelette, filled with sheep’s milk goat cheese, garlic scapes and two kinds of choi.  This was also served with bacon, a side of salad and garnished with a baby carrot harvested from our Tessmer Farm hoop house.

We had a full house of prep helpers on Thursday evening, many of them first timers eager to do all the things that need to be done to make FM@SELMA a success.  Thanks to Susie Baity Stearns for rounding up all the enthusiasm and focusing it on getting tasks done! She had her list, and newbies Rob Caplis, Sarah Juster, Andrew Bozio, Matthew Bertrand, Mira Fishman, Sonya Major, Aly Halpert, Megan Zlatos, and Milagros Parades got everything done, along with Heidi Kumao, Jennifer Jensen and Nevon Clark.

Friday morning support came from Megan Zlatos, Laura Brown, Jesse Walker, Sarah Gerk, Dorran Dihle, Shawna Lee, Kris Kaul, Matthew Bertrand, and Susie Baity Stearns.  Big thanks to Michelle Fortin who comes every week to facilitate the after-breakfast clean up crew.  What a thrill to come home after work and have my kitchen clean and organized! Thank you one and all for your hard work, positive attitudes and big-time support of RP&F’s mission.  You know we can’t do it without you!

Enjoy the rest of the weekend, and I’m looking forward to seeing you in our kitchen soon,

~Lisa