Your Letters from the March 2015 Issue

Send letters to Editor Rick Broussard, New Hampshire Magazine, 150 Dow St. Manchester, NH 03101 or e-mail him at editor@nhmagazine.com.

Honoring Chef Haller
Susan Laughlin’s article on Chef Jim Haller in the February issue was read with pleasure and brought back a memory or two of the time when I did typing (yes, real typing) of the rough drafts for his first three cookbooks. He came into the store I worked at and as we talked he asked if I knew anyone who might like a job typing for him. That’s how we became friends, and my knowledge of cooking terms, utensils and the magic of mixing unexpected ingredients together to create treasures are things that I will always remember. He will always be the first “celebrity” I met and consider myself privileged to know such a talented and creative gentleman. 

Mary Ann Roberge
Somersworth

Editor’s Note: We received so many online notes from friends and admirers of Chef Haller that he responded with the following: “Truly, I’m not quite certain how to handle all this, nonetheless I am honored, surprised and humbly grateful, especially to have been a part of Portsmouth, and all of the chefs who continue to amaze the world with their brilliant cooking. Thank you everyone.”

Beautiful Effort
During Christmas weekend, my wife and I rode Amtrak to Boston in order to visit our son in Concord, NH. Amid the conversations and the visiting, I looked through some of the magazines in his apartment. I’m a long-time motorcycle, car, plane and railroad nut — since well before I bought my first Honda in 1966.

I’m also a business and technical writer, and an English teacher. I read Ms. Tryba’s “Color Guard,” for two reasons: the riders’ reverence for veterans and their families, and the motorcycles. And, as somebody whose parents were also in the word police, I’m frequently annoyed by the many news writers who seem to function only when there is a box of buzzwords, misused terms and half-truths nearby.

This is a great article, not only in its elegant precision, but in the fullness of the meanings that stick with the reader- — it’s much more a meal than a snack.

Please, for me, commend and congratulate Ms. Tryba for this beautiful effort.

Andrew R. Fabian
Lancaster, Penn.

Challenges and Joys
Thank you so much for your excellent article on the photo project and cultural diversity issues [“New in Town,” January 2015]. I have heard from many friends working with immigrants and refugees who say that you captured so well the essence of the issues in New Hampshire. This article will be helpful in educating the public on the challenges and joys that immigrants face in our state. 

Becky Field
FieldWork Photos

Rebecca is Right
Kudos to Rebecca Rule for her spin of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s ode! [“Last Laugh,” February 2015] I read this just as my husband had come in from filling my bird feeders … ’cause I feel so sorry for those poor little creatures in the cold. I walk to the car in the morning and feel the crunch of the salt that he’s placed on my path.

Rebecca is right … forget the waxy chocolate. It’s the dead-of-winter kind of love that trumps stuffed animals holding hearts and flowers that only fade in days.  Thanks for a fun read!  (And yes … we have lived on Browning Drive here in Dover for 30+ years now.) He also helps me find the newts! Grow old along with me … my eyesight isn’t what it used to be!

Cathy Mack
Dover

New Cheesemakers
Someone just pointed out to me that you ran an article in 2012 on the various sources of farmstead raw milk cheese in NH. There are a couple new places that have come into existence since (including our own operation in Goffstown); and one of the farms, Brookford Farm, has since moved to Canterbury.

Here are a few I can name, but I’m sure there are more: Benedikt Dairy, Goffstown NH; Millcreek Dairy in Chester, NH.

Temple-Wilton Community Farm in Wilton is now producing cheese (and this is where we bring our milk to be made into cheese).

Melissa Benedikt Blindow
Goffstown

Again? Really?
Since you sent a “Health Issue” with Feb.’s magazine, must you again have a Best Doctor contest? I would rather have my subscription money go to newsworthy information and not publicity for a few MDs (or lawyers, etc.). Why not have one of these Best Docs or Dentists write a monthly column of an appropriate health issue (thus getting a moment of fame and free publicity too!). I’m tired of the best of … unless it’s a place to visit — museum, gallery, scenic views, lobster shops, etc.  

Pam Arpin
(Subscriber through 2018 because all of my children bought me subscriptions!)

Editor’s Note: A magazine has to be many things to cover such a remarkable state and not everything we do delights everyone, but our Top Doctor issue is actually one of our most popular. Hope you find enough of interest in our “Top” issues to validate your children’s choice of gifts.  

Tiny Ships
I wanted to congratulate your magazine on bringing to light some of the rare lost arts here in New England and New Hampshire. Without articles such as this these forgotten arts would not flourish and most definitely become forgotten.

As an artisan and shipwright, I know first-hand how an art form can be lost. I am an artisan located just over the border in Massachusetts and I practice the old lost art of building ships in bottles. Out of roughly 4,000 people worldwide who practice this art only 100 create miniatures.

I am the vice president and membership chairman of SIBAA, The Ships In Bottles Association of America. Most of our members are located here in the United States with another 50 overseas.

Building ships in bottles is slowly becoming a lost art as the number of people who practice it gets fewer and fewer. I can only hope that periodicals such as yours will enlighten people about this rare art form by publishing an article about it.

I do have my own company, Bottleneck Treasures, builderofships.com.

David Lavoie
Methuen, Mass.

Important Comma
In reading the article about Edie Clark [“Too Good to be Forgotten,” January 2015] I was puzzled by the following sentence: “… clam chowder made — naturally — with milk and fried clams.” Actually, I read the sentence twice and thought, “This can’t be right, nobody — especially not a Yankee — would make clam chowder with fried clams and milk.” Then I realized that the sentence is missing a comma: “… clam chowder made — naturally — with milk, and fried clams.”

What a difference a comma makes!

Connie Kirwin
Antrim  

Editor’s Note: Thanks, Connie. I hope we don’t get letters from anyone who actually tried our new “fried clam chowder” recipe.