My husband, the centerfold

HaHa! Gotcha! All you readers that usually just skim by the PIT (that would be Practice In Time) for the eye candy are in for a treat. Yes, my husband really and truly is a centerfold.

Wait- expecting something else?

OK, he's not that kind of centerfold (even though he is to me).  Allow me to explain.

Some of you probably consider yourself foodies (as do I), so you may have heard of the lovely ladies who run the Canal House. They are the best kind of cook- they source locally, eat in season and write and cook for real people. Their credentials are impeccable, being former editors for Saveur and Martha Stewart.

They publish a recipe anthology three times a year, in cookbook form. And true to their professional lineage the book is absolutely gorgeous- just like the pages of Martha Stewart Living and Saveur. The recipes are totally manageable, even for novices, and use simple techniques and common ingredients.

So it happened a few months ago that they came by my husband's butcher shop to do a shoot for their latest offering.  His shop is a bit unusual (old school, or vintage, if you will) in that they bring in the whole animal (already slaughtered) and cut it to your specification, as opposed to your supermarket that buys vacuum-packed cartons of pre-cut meat and re-packages them. 

They took some photos of him breaking down whole hanging pigs for hams and the like and whaddya know, when we get the cookbook, there he is, right in the middle across two pages! My kids think this is the coolest thing ever- their dad is in a book. And now that he's a foodie celebrity, he's even autographed a couple copies. (No one has to know that he doesn't cook!) But I try to keep things in perspective- he will always be a centerfold to me!