Tributes: A Food Writer Mom and a Toon Blogger

Visits with Substackers Amie McGraham in Maine and cartoonist Crowden Satz in New Hampshire

Amie McGraham with her mother’s 2001cookbook. Amie’s Substack blog, a tribute to her mother’s column and newsletter, includes her own reflections on recipes and memories of growing up in Maine.

It’s been a bit of a hard landing following our recent trip. Just as I was thinking of writing more about our visit to Maine, another mass shooting occurred—this time in the very paradise we had fallen in love with a week or so earlier. How could this be? With gun violence happening all over America, as we keep being reminded, no place is immune, not even a state as idyllic and beautiful as Maine.

But my cell phone is filled with images from the New England part of our trip, especially from an enjoyable afternoon with native Mainer and fellow Substack blogger Amie McGraham. I actually found out about the shooting from a moving piece Amie wrote in response to it. So here are a few words and pictures from our time with Amie, plus a second meetup the next day with another talented Substack writer and cartoonist, Crowden Satz.

A very old church we visited on the small Maine island where Amie grew up and still spends part of her year.

Amie writes the fabulous Cook and Tell blog based on the newspaper column and subsequent newsletter that her mother, Karyl Bannister, wrote for almost 40 years from her home in a restored farmhouse on a small Maine island, where she moved with her parents in the early 1970s, when she was just 8. We were lucky enough to get a tour of the small island and the house, which Amie has kept much as it was when her mother lived there.

 Her mother “had an artist’s eye,” Amie said. This antique tea cart with the china she collected is one example. Her daughter has preserved things much as her mother kept them, though she “pared it down a bit.”

As Amie explains, the blog came about after she returned to Maine a few years ago to care for her mother, who had developed Alzheimer’s.

Amie, an only child, had left home years before and moved to California and later to Arizona; she’d worked in the insurance industry for many years and traveled extensively, but she maintained a deep passion for writing and for food (you can read more about her and by her here). These days, Amie divides her time between Maine and Arizona, where she lives with her husband and dogs.

Writing and art runs in her family. Her paternal grandmother Barbara Webster was an author, with many of her books illustrated by Amie’s grandfather, Edward Shenton, who also provided the artwork for The Yearling and Tender Is the Night.

Amie holds up a copy of her mother’s newsletter from February 1998, which injects a little politics liberally leavened with humor: “There is much to cover. And nothing, by the way, to cover up. We have always owned up to our mistakes. Who can forget the recipe for Mac(corn)roni and Cheese, with the cheese left out?”

As Amie was caring for her mom, she read through her columns and newsletters and came to appreciate her talents as an artist and writer. Following her mother’s death in 2021, she inherited all the back copies of her column and newsletter, along with the restored farmhouse, which dates back to the mid-1850s.

The newsletter was a monthly publication of some 14 pages that, in those pre-Internet days, her mother typed, illustrated, did paste-up, printed and mailed. It went out to a national and international readership that eventually numbered some 10,000 subscribers, all built through word of mouth!

 “I thought, ‘What am I going to do with all this?’” Amie told me. “So I decided to revive the old newsletter and the old column she wrote and combine it with my own, with a few comments about some of the recipes and stories that she would write. It’s kind of a living tribute to keep her spirit alive.”

Amie calls her version “a digital reboot of the foodletter my mom, Karyl, created 40 years ago, featuring vintage recipes and occasional Orts from me.”

An “ort” according to the dictionary, is “a scrap or remainder of food from a meal.” Amie’s orts are prize morsels, and her mother’s contributions are often as timely today as they were when they were written. Amie’s Cook & Tell post titled “Fake Food” is a prime example—and the recipe at the end for Harvard Granola—is definitely on my “must-try” list.

Karyl Bannister’s illustration of the kitchen where her daughter Amie now cooks and bakes her mother’s recipes and her own.

When we left, Amie handed me a copy of her mother’s 2001 cookbook, which she wrote and illustrated. In the acknowledgements, her mom says, “My daughter Amie gets a lifetime of hugs for apparently listening, or at least not interrupting, all those times I pushed her around as an infant in a supermarket shopping cart and needed to talk. She taught me it was OK to chatter away and never shut up when the subject was salad greens or ground beef.”

Amie with her mom; china cabinet in Amie's childhood home, filled with English china her mother and father had collected, and Karyl Bannister from the jacket of her cookbook, Cook & Tell.

Though I haven’t yet made the Harvard Granola (or should that be Hah-vahd granola?), I did make the Irish Oat Scones from the cookbook Cook & Tell. I subbed some whole wheat flour for about one-third of the all-purpose flour and some mixed dried fruit for the golden raisins, but the recipe would be great as written. Here it is:

Amie said her mother really loved British food and customs, especially tea, even though her background was actually French.

Illustration from from the Cook & Tell cookbook. Many of the recipes for Karyl’s column, newsletter and the cookbook came from readers.

Notes: My scones were rather small, which I didn’t mind—they were crisp and flaky. If you’d like bigger ones, just use a larger biscuit cutter or cup—or simple pat the dough into a large round and cut into triangles. Split and slathered with butter and/or jam, they’re delightful whatever their circumference! You can also freeze them , wrapped air-tight in two layers of plastic wrap. To defrost, best to bake in a moderate oven (or toaster oven) for a few minutes—or microwave for a few seconds.

Irish Oat Scone with blueberry-rhubarb jam from Maine.

Meeting Crowden

A day after our afternoon with Amie, my husband and I met another Substacker, Crowden Satz, and his wife Claire in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Crowden writes Letters From Satz, a mix of cartoons, reminiscences, philosophizing, topical observations, linguistic commentary, and scientific musings, plus the occasional ornamented latte, with evocative swirls by Crowden.

During the pandemic, Crowden, like so many others discovered (or rediscovered) sourdough bread, but then he decided to apply his talents to coffee. Aiming for more than rosettes, he used a paintbrush to turn foam into art—and voilà! From left, as described by the artist, a self-portrait of the tortured artist, a bug and a dragon. Here’s a link to the post in which he writes about it all.

By profession, Crowden is a mechanical engineer who uses Crowden Satz as his nom de plume for his artistic persona while saving his professional name, Benson Tongue, for his teaching duties, which these days are mostly online. Claire said he took his name because he liked crows and was partial to the name “Satz.” With his cap, mustache, glasses and an earring in one ear, the name does seem about right.

At one point the couple lived in Northern California, but he and Claire had need of more land about them and proximity to family in Massachusetts, so they removed to New Hampshire, which is how we happened to meet up as we were passing through.

Crowden Satz (aka Benson Tongue) and wife Claire in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. (Photo by Jefferson Graham)

We met in a cafe called the Elephantine Bakery, a cozy eatery with an enticing menu that reflects its Mediterranean decor.

My Egg Simit from the Elephantine Bakery in Portsmouth: Jammy eggs, hummus, beet pistachio spread, za’atar feta and spinach on sesame-crusted bagel-like bread.

For our rendezvous, Crowden had suggested Portsmouth, which is just over the border from Maine. He described it as the Northeast’s answer to Sausalito, and he wasn’t far off.

We had a delightful afternoon poking our noses into Portsmouth’s diverse collection of shops—particularly a large and well-stocked cooking store, LeRoux Kitchen. Turns out Crowden and Claire are kindred foodies. Unlike my parents, Crowden’s must have encouraged him to play with his food when he was kid. Particularly timely are these pumpkin creations:

And then there’s his mischievous alterego Nicky:

After we parted from Crowden and Claire, I got a rare tribute of a drawing the artist had drawn of yours truly! Many thanks, Crowden!

Do check out Letters From Satz and Amie’s Cook & Tell, the micro mashup and other writings. With all the heartache that seems to be our daily portion these days, it’s nice to meet such talented, interesting new friends.

See you soon!

Ruth