Celebrating Fuctional Pottery and Food

A warm hello to everyone,

I am Claire Delffs, I am an Oregon Potters Association Member. 

I have been making an creating pottery for over 30 years and my business name is Moonfire Pottery.  

I will be blogging about Ceramic Showcase’s 2013 Theme   "Celebrating all things Food". 

Ceramic Showcase is teaming with Chefs in the Portland area and celebrating the artistry of food and the beauty of functional handmade pottery.

I have been cooking since I was twelve. My mother had to leave us in Minnesota and take care of her mother in Florida, who was ill. I found that I was blessed with an inherent knowledge of cooking, so creative cooking came very easy to me. After my mother got back, I would often help her in the kitchen. Later on, my mother went back to work and as a teenager, I often shopped and cooked for my blended family of seven. As an adult, I do most of the cooking for our family. It is a real treat though, to enjoy a meal when my husband cooks, I do love eating other people’s cooking. It is great fun to sample all the wonderful dishes at an OPA potluck meeting.

Much to my husband Bill’s chagrin, I rarely follow a recipe, which means that I can’t exactly duplicate a really good meal. After 20 years, he is still lamenting my inability to duplicate a wonderful tamale casserole I made for him. On the up side he loves food and in between making lots of pottery, we often sit down to some pretty good meals. He has been inspired many times to become a creative cook himself.

This brings me to Our Ceramic Showcase theme,"Celebrating all things Food".  The theme of functional pottery and food is a natural occurrence in Bill and my everyday lives. We are potters and we love the aesthetics of both pottery and food.

Often our pottery forms are inspired directly by our love of cooking.
We love pottery that is functional and comfortable for everyday use and is pleasing to the eye, with or without the addition of food or drink. 

I have cooked and plated food on our pottery. I have taken pictures and I am sharing these pictures in this blog along with my recipes.
I have made an effort to standardize my recipes, but like me, feel free to experiment.

Enjoy!

Claire Delffs
Moonfire Pottery
Oregon Potters Association Member

Not much of our design is visible , but this is our hand painted red rim thistle dinner oblong plate. We have a 1000 square foot pottery studio in our backyard and We are fortunate to work at home. We often have a mid day brunch as our main meal.

This brunch meal for 4 is fairly quick and easy. 

I scramble 2 eggs and 1/2 cup egg whites (from the carton). I let the eggs mostly "set" in the pan before I gently mix them up, we like large fluffy scrambled eggs to fill our soft tacos.

We make a quick 3 bean casserole. I coarsely chop a large peeled onion, spray a frying pan with vegetable cooking spray, add the onions, lightly spray the chopped onions and saute the onion over medium high heat with the frying pan lid on. The lid on the frying pan helps sweat the onions and keep them from burning. I add a little water if the onions begin to stick. I frequently stir the onions until they are medium  browned and caramelized. 

I use 3 cans of different colored  beans.

This time the three types of beans I used are a can each of, black beans, white cannellini beans and pinto beans. I add the caramelized onions, a can of green chilies and a heaping teaspoon of Southwest seasoning. We mix the beans with the seasonings and microwave the casserole for 3-5 minutes.

We heat up tortillas in a tortilla warmer in the microwave.

We add our favorite garnishes, tomatoes, avocados, red peppers, green onions, cheese, sour cream, etc. 

We fill our tortillas with scrambled eggs, beans and garnishes for a yummy vegetarian soft taco brunch.