Andy Sauce

The official beverage of the holiday season has finally revealed itself!

Recently, when Andy asked me to invent a cocktail that was named after him, he might have been sort of joking, but I took it all quite seriously, as you might imagine. I agreed enthusiastically within seconds (Liquor! Darling boyfriend! Certainly!), and proceeded to develop his magical holiday potion. Since then, we've made many variations of it, depending on what ingredients we have around, but the mainstay ingredients are apple juice and rhubarb bitters. I'd recommend a "good" apple juice -- either a fresh cider, homemade apple juice, or, the easiest choice, Simply Apple brand juice. If you have a juicer and you're feeling like taking this project really seriously, go for it! It will make this cocktail outstanding. (We did this once and it was a complete pain in the ass but easily the most delicious drink I have ever consumed -- no joke.) Otherwise, store bought apple juice will also be delicious and way more reasonable when you're dealing with a crowd.

In terms of liquor, we originally used whiskey, but it also works really well with vodka or gin. The fruit component is also not crucial, but the original had brandied cherries (with juice), which I sometimes have on hand, and they are quite nice. Otherwise, frozen dark sweet cherries work really well -- you can just plunk them in, or defrost them a bit and muddle them into the drink. And, honestly, this is YOUR sauce, so you can do anything you want with it! I'm sure you and the drink would benefit from fruit variations, or any additions of your choice.

Andy Sauce
This is, basically, a recipe for two drinks, to be made in a cocktail shaker. You can multiply the ingredient amounts and prepare this in a pitcher or a punch bowl if you're planning to serve more folks (or if you and your companion are planning on drinking A LOT).

Prepare your cocktail glasses: 
Dip moistened rims in a mixture of cinnamon, coarse sugar, and powdered ginger.

Prepare your cocktail: 
In a shaker, combine ice and equal parts apple juice and whiskey. Add 3 or 4 tablespoons of cherry juice, brandied cherry juice, or just dark sweet frozen cherries. Add a few dashes of bitters -- rhubarb is my favorite for this, although I'm sure other kinds would be lovely as well. Shake. Serve straight up in your adorned cocktail glasses. Top with a bit of seltzer if you're feeling bubbly!

Now then, get on with the new year already, would ya?

Scooby Snacks

Flirt With Me

If you are among the billions of people who agree that potatoes are not at all sexy and couldn't even be remotely sexy if they tried, then this recipe is for you.

On Christmas night, I had the immense pleasure of preparing dinner with my family (my mother and brother in the trenches with me, my father saving our asses all night by standing at the sink in full-on dishwashing mode). In planning the meal, my mom's good idea was to go with some relatively simple dishes that wouldn't exhaust us, seeing as though we would finish cooking the Christmas brunch only several hours prior to dinner preparation (smart, Mama, smart!). I did feel dedicated to trying something new, though, which is how we ended up using this recipe for potatoes Anna.

I had scratched down the details on a piece of paper over the Thanksgiving weekend, and I planned on being thrilled out of my mind if it was actually as simple as it seemed. The dish is, honestly, even easier than I imagined, and, more importantly, it's crazy good. My mom's first comment was "how is this so creamy?!," which is the most crucial thing about this dish that appears so, well, crispy. The inside is, indeed, feathery yet creamy, elegant but comforting. The outside is crunchy and brazen, like the best homemade potato chips. This is the whole point, of course -- for the potatoes to surprise their audience by showing off all their abilities and talents in this one very rustic dish.

As long as you have the patience to slice the potatoes very thinly, and as long as you are steady and precise with the inversion at the end, everything will go swimmingly for you. Even if you don't get the inversion exactly right (I certainly did not, as you'll see from the picture!), it will still taste good, and that is the most important part. It is the perfect accompaniment to a meat-based meal (we paired it with beef tenderloin and prosciutto-wrapped green bean bundles), and a very nice way to impress even your fussiest guests. The thing about potatoes Anna is that, well, it makes potatoes sexy again (assuming, of course, that potatoes ever were sexy).

If you're curious about details, I'll tell you that potatoes Anna was born in 19th century Victorian France during the time of Napoleon III, and was named after one of the grandes cocottes of the time. I love this, because cocotte nowadays means both prostitute and casserole dish, thereby making it the perfect name. In my mind, however, I have made an addendum to the description. I refer to it not only as a grande cocotte of the culinary world, but also the ultimate grande coquette (flirt). Sexy, yet modest. Seductive, yet honest. Anna, I must say: you are a lovely girl. You can come over to my house any time -- I'll have the potatoes ready for you.


Potatoes Anna

5-8 large Yukon Gold potatoes (approx. 1 per person)

2 T butter, melted

olive oil (flavored olive oil works really well for this -- I used a combination of regular extra virgin olive oil and garlic olive oil -- just make sure you use good oils, because you will really taste them in this dish!)

1 or 2 t. kosher salt

ground pepper

fresh rosemary or thyme


Preheat oven to 450.

Generously apply cooking spray to entire interior of a 10" or 12" cast iron skillet (size depends on how many potatoes you are using -- you can also alter this recipe to any other size of skillet).

Using the sharpest knife you have, slice potatoes as thinly as you can without cutting all your fingers off. If you have a mandoline, you can use this, but I went about it the old fashioned way. Aim for at least 1/8" thicknesses, thinner if you can. Reject the end pieces, and don't be too sad if your slices aren't all perfect. As long as they are very thin, it doesn't matter if they aren't all identical. You'll want to reserve the most perfect slices for the bottom layer (as this will, upon inversion, become the top).

Drizzle the melted butter into the skillet on top of the spray oil. Sprinkle salt and pepper over the butter. Place potato slices into the prepared skillet, overlapping slightly and continuing into the middle. Drizzle olive oil and then sprinkle salt, pepper, and herbs on top. Repeat until potatoes are gone, but aim for at least four layers.

Cook potatoes on med-high heat for 6 minutes. Resist all urges to poke, prod, or inspect them! They will be fine without you.

Cover with foil and put in the oven on the bottom rack. Cook for 20 minutes.

Remove foil and cook another 20 minutes on the middle rack. Again, try not to touch them or worry about them!

Remove skillet from oven and let it rest five minutes or so. Slide a knife around the edges. Carefully and quickly invert onto a large plate. If your inversion isn't perfect, try not to be too sad! They will still be delicious. If it looks a little too dark, just reduce the initial stovetop time to 4 or 5 minutes. (My dad loves things burnt and crispy, so I erred on the dark side for him, but feel free to adjust cooking times to suit your guests' preferences.) Slice into wedges and serve.

A Gift of Turnips

I Could Never!

This was a real conversation between two grade-schoolers yesterday:

Child #1: Have you ever tried COCONUT?

Child #2: EEEEEEWWWWWWWWWW!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! GROSS!!!!!!

Learning To Let Go

Question! After 28 months in the freezer, what does strawberry sorbet look like? Um, this. Quite shrunken, very freezer-burny, and not at all delicious, but otherwise as colorful and fragrant as the summer day it rode in on. This heartbreak had to come, though! It is not a science experiment, I reminded myself as I pushed it down the garbage disposal with the end of a wooden spoon. It was merely the representation of a substantial labor (the strawberry picking! the entirely obnoxious straining of the juice from seeds! the hovering over the machine as I anxiously awaited the product!) that needed to stop taking up room in my freezer. And so it has. Actually, my entire freezer is now eerily clean and organized, by the way. I hereby declare this day International Freezer Cleaning Out Day. Unless you are reading this tomorrow, in which case you are allowed to transfer the event to today. Good luck! And please! Let me know what the oldest thing in your freezer is.

Last Ones Standing

Well, it's official. I really can't deny it anymore. My herb garden certainly can't deny it. I mean, for crying out loud! The parsley froze, the thyme froze, the oregano froze, the mint froze. All of the peppers froze, except for these three. Winter, my friends, is walking among us. You know, just like the zombies.

Come now. Band together! We can take it! Here we go! Let us be the puffy-coated, mitten-clad survivors!

The Germans Know

I'm on a German kick, you see. Yesterday, it was kummerspeck, of course. Then, on Thursday, it was a discussion with one of my students, Yannick, about his upcoming trip to Germany, where his family is from (and, no, he knew nothing about it except "Umm, it's big and you go there in an airplane.") Several days prior to that, I considered going downtown to the Christkindlmarket, and then decided not to because crowds make me a wreck. And it's 10 degrees outside. But, see? The German things keep happening!

It all started about a month ago, when I made three amazing new friends. Not just friends, you see, but GERMAN friends. Lovely, kind, hysterically funny boys they are, all from Hamburg, which is apparently the coolest city in the whole universe, because it produced these completely incredible humans. We had the most amazing week, strolling about Navy Pier in the fierce night wind, cramming deep dish pizza into our bodies, pub-hopping with cheap American beer on the agenda, tackling that same fierce night wind on the beach, learning idioms in both our languages, eating an odd mishmash of a meal in my dining room, translating words like mullet and mashed potatoes, and, mainly, laughing maniacally about everything. Laughter, you know, that's the same in every language. But, honestly, it just sounds much cooler with a German accent. Everything sounds cooler with a German accent.

We talked a lot about food and cooking. We did a lot of eating, as you can imagine, and I was pretty excited to learn that they each can consume more food in one sitting than I can eat in one year. I was impressed and happy, because this meant that we spent a lot of our time on a food tour of Chicago, and having an excuse to do that is nothing short of delightful for a girl like me. I learned that all three of them -- Ludwig, Francesco, and Lennart -- like to cook, and, apparently, are quite adept in the kitchen. Ah, lovely. Boys who cook! Bring it on!

I had the honor of cooking for them one night and, of course, because I am a perfectionist who is rarely impressed with my own creations, ended up feeling like I completely botched it. They were so appreciative and so happy with the food, but you know how it goes -- I had one chance to impress my new friends who, possibly, will never again be convened around my dining room table, and I chose (naturally) to cook something extremely ordinary. Supremely ordinary. Like, work-night-supper-easy. Why! Why! Why!  Why do I do this to myself? Why can't I choose to make something fancy? Something inventive! Something exciting! Why can't I use this as an opportunity for challenge and discovery?

Well, it's because, first of all, I'm a crazy person, but, second of all, it's because, I suppose, I trust myself in the kitchen. It is perhaps a flaw, or perhaps a blessing, but for some reason I feel all too confident serving incredibly ordinary things when there are guests at stake. Nevertheless, I started to kick myself as soon as the dishes were cleared. I thought, why didn't I make a beef Wellington? I moaned, why didn't I do something even remotely big and impressive? WHY the burgers? Why ANY kind of burger for a DINNER PARTY? Is that ALL I can do? I slumped into myself and thought, why on earth did I serve something as banal as corn? And potatoes! Who on earth makes dumb potatoes for COMPANY?

But here's what it comes down to. I always think these things. It's never good enough, you see. I cook nearly every day, and, naturally, the very best, most impressive things that roll out of my kitchen are when I am cooking for just myself or for Andy and myself. But when company rolls in, I pull the oddest, most mundane things out of the oven. I might as well serve rocks to the guests! And every single time, I moan to myself, Why didn't I make beef Wellington? Yep. Every time. And the hysterical thing is that I have never actually MADE beef Wellington.

Somehow, it stands in my mind as the ultimate impress-your-guests sort of dish. It's not like a rock, it's like a geode! Crack it open and shield your eyes from the beauty! But instead, when the Germans came, I made the most typical meal -- something I would eat on an ordinary day. I beat myself up over it for days, but then! Then Anthony Bourdain saved me, as he tends to do. He opined the beauty of homecooked meals, as he is want to do, and I watched him in the home of a family far, far away. He had been invited to dinner, and the family was preparing traditional dishes. They served with mismatched plates atop a plastic tablecloth on a makeshift table with rickety legs. There was a dozen of them at least, crowded around, elbows touching, dishes clanking, traffic noises coming in through the open windows, the summer's steam wetting everyone's brow -- and, well, it was good. It was amazing, he said. And I believed him.

It was perfect, he thought, because it showed him what this new country was, what family was in this unfamiliar place, and, most importantly, it showed him what real food was. Not restaurant food, not show-offy food, not expensive food, and certainly not beef Wellington. And then, well, then I felt better. The next day, I came across a recipe in the new Saveur for a homestyle German soup. You know, the kind every German grandma makes. The traditional thing, the real deal. I read about it, and I loved learning that it's the kind of soup that you might have when you swing by someone's house, or as an after school snack, or for supper. The thought of serving this extremely simple soup to guests made me smile. It was bare bones, this soup recipe, and I leapt at it. It is, I think, a very nice ode to my new German friends, my German heritage, and all these German puzzle pieces that are settling into my life these days.

Try this soup. I think you will be impressed. And so will your guests.


Graupensuppe (Barley Soup)
based on the recipe from Saveur in, I believe, the October 2011 issue


4 T unsalted butter
1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
1/2 cup pearl barley
4 cups vegetable or chicken stock
1/2 cup finely chopped potato (russet or new potatoes work well)
1/4 cup finely chopped carrot
1/4 cup finely chopped leek
1/2 t dried marjoram
1 German sausage, like bockwurst or bratwurst (optional)
1 piece of bacon (optional)
salt and black pepper to taste

Heat butter in a stockpot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. When it is melted and bubbly, add the onion, and cook, stirring, until translucent and a little bit caramelized, about 5 minutes. Add the barley, and cook, stirring, until lightly toasted, about 5 minutes. Add stock, potato, carrot, leek, marjoram, sausages, and bacon, and cook, stirring occasionally, until barley is softened, about 30 minutes. Remove sausages and bacon from saucepan, thinly slice sausages, and discard bacon. Season soup with nutmeg, salt, and pepper.

See! That's it! So easy!


Notes:
Many versions of the recipe call for celery root, which I didn't use, simply because I didn't have any! So feel free to add that, although I'm not sure it would change the soup drastically. Additionally,  the original Graupensuppe calls for sausage and bacon, which I'm sure would be super-delicious and highly approved by all the German grandmothers. I had the sausage and bacon on hand, but there was an upset belly at my kitchen table when I was making this soup, and I thought a milder, non-greasy version of this soup would be more appropriate for the occasion. Last, there's the nutmeg issue. This soup traditionally has nutmeg, which is added at the end, but I just wasn't feelin' it, so I held off. So. There you have it. I will now sit here patiently, waiting for those aforementioned German grandmothers to call me up and tell me to get my hintern back into the kitchen and add that meat to the suppe before I'm disqualified from the cooking club.

Learning School

Hi, everyone! It's time to learn a new word!
Kummerspeck (German): excess weight gained from emotional overeating
The actual translation: grief bacon


Germans, thank you for being brilliant.

All the Morning Dreams

I consider myself on an endless quest for the perfect breakfast food. I am terribly picky, as far as breakfast goes, and this basically stems from the fact that I'm simply not hungry when I first wake up. (Just like my dad! Hi Dad!) And, with rare exception, I can't stand to eat anything until I've had coffee. So, the basic routine is like this: wake up, not hungry, have coffee, still not hungry, drive to work, still not hungry, arrive at work, suddenly starving. Agh, I know, I know -- first world problems. Sheesh.

My ultimate favorite thing to do is hunt down an egg sandwich as soon as I get to work, from either here or here, but I can't with good conscience spend six dollars on breakfast more than, oh, say, once a week. Right?! So this leaves me unfed and cranky for four days out of the week. So, here's the deal. (Forgive me for re-addressing this issue. Remember when I said many of these same words when I told you all about breakfast cookies?)

I do love a convenient breakfast food, but I don't want to get sugared up, and I don't want processed foods or chemicals to be a part of my morning, which leaves me, ultimately, fending for myself, which is a perfect punishment for someone as picky as me. I've tried many a muffin, many a granola, many a cereal bar, and many an oatmeal, but I recently found something new that is the perfect combination of all four, and it's just so nice.

Nice...nice...nice. What does that mean, again? I forget. Well, let's see! It's versatile, first of all, since you get to pick your jam flavor. It also has oatmeal AND cereal in it, it has nuts for protein and fiber, and you can add all sorts of other nutritious bits, like flax seed or wheat germ. The thing that's also so good is that it can double as a lunch dessert, or an after school snack, or even a dessert if need be. So, really, what are we waiting for? Let's do this!

Oatmeal Breakfast Bars

1 C flour
1 C oats
1 C puffed rice cereal (you can use Rice Krispies, but I prefer puffed brown rice)
1 C chopped pecans or walnuts
1 or 2 t cinnamon (you decide!)
1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
1/4 C butter, softened
1/4 C vegetable oil
1/3 C packed brown sugar (or less, if you'd like)
1 t vanilla extract or paste
1 (10-ounce) jar all-fruit spread (I've tried cherry, strawberry, apricot and they were all good!)
wheat germ, opt.
ground flax seed, opt.

Preheat oven to 350F. Lightly coat a 9" square baking pan with cooking spray.

Combine first 7 ingredients in a medium bowl. At this time, also add the flax or wheat germ, if you're using it.

Beat butter, oil, sugar, and vanilla in a large bowl until well-blended and creamy. (You can use an electric mixer or a wooden spoon -- whatever you feel like.)

Add dry ingredients and mix until moistened and a crumbly dough forms. Reserve 1 1/2 cups of the dough for the topping. Press remaining dough into bottom of pan.

Spread fruit over dough in pan. Sprinkle the reserved dough on top and gently press to adhere topping to fruit layer.

Bake 30-35 minutes or until deep golden. Cool and slice into bars. It's breakfast! You're happy!

Bananagrams Cheater

My Favorite Alien

Wow

This Is Indiana

Not a restaurant. An outlet. Whatever you do, DO NOT call it a restaurant.

Soup Shop

So, let's say you're making pretend soup with a bunch of five year-olds. Let's say this soup-making experience, which is full of paint and glue and sequins and dough, turns into a business model. Let's say that we depart art-making mode and art class morphs into some pretty serious talk about the opening of a soup restaurant, which is to be operated by said five year-olds and, thrown in for good measure, me. I mean, I do know a couple things about soup. If these children have a lick of sense betwixt them, they know it is wise to involve me in their restaurant empire. Clearly.

The next thing you know, you've developed a complete menu and, like magic, you're ready for the grand opening. Now all you have to do is sit back, relax, and sniff the delicious, soupy air as you wait for your first customers to arrive.

Menu
pumpkin-raspberry soup
pumpkin-blood soup
mustard soup
blood in mustard soup
candy soup
salt soup
salt-pile soup
sticky salt soup with little macaroni and papes*
pumpkin-blood soup
blood in mustard soup
glue soup
sugar candy soup time
sugar candy for everyone soup
bunny soup

And yes, you read that right. There were indeed cross-outs. I mean, we were brainstorming, after all! The blood soups were suggested pretty early on, but then the child who submitted the blood-soupn ideas initially reconsidered, offering some pretty solid reasoning: "I wonder if maybe we should take those blood soups off the menu because people might come into the restaurant and think those soups are gross and then they will leave and we can't give them soup." A minute later, after being absorbed in his artwork, he looked up and said, "Wait! Can you put them back on the list? Or uncross them? Because what if monsters come into the restaurant? We need to have a soup that monsters want!" True. Quite true.

This soup shop, well, it's really onto something here. I'll be sure to send you the grand opening flier with coupons attached!




*I don't know what they are, either.

Bookend Soup

It's the weekend! Well, close enough. In fact, here, let's make it official: I hereby declare that all weekends during the months of November through April will begin on Thursday. There! Poof! Weekend! And now that it's the weekend, and it's sleeting and cold outside, and you're most certainly not going out anytime soon, that means you have no choice but to make soup. This soup is so lovely, so incredibly simple, and so divine that you will perhaps find yourself doing what I do, which is to make it for Sunday supper as well, in which case you will call it Bookend Soup.

If your guest is peering into the pot, he or she might say something along the lines of, Welcome to Panera!, which will actually make sense, because this soup is nearly a dead ringer for the broccoli-cheddar soup that is featured there. I do like to have some control over the cooking of the broccoli, though, so that it remains a bit crunchier, and not mushy like it's been sitting in a giant restaurant-sized crock-pot all day long. Actually, when this soup has tons of crisp broccoli in it, it balances out the rich cheese so nicely, and you can actually pretend like it's the healthiest soup in the whole world.

I also appreciate that this recipe won't make obscene amounts of soup. My problem with soup, you see, is that I always end up making way too much, and I get sick of it before I can eat it all, and I don't have enough space in my freezer to store it, and I honestly just want the freaking soup to disappear so that I don't have to look at it anymore. But this soup? One batch will make enough for 3 hungry people or 5 less-hungry people. Or enough for you and your darling to have for supper (with one round of perfectly civilized leftovers the next day).

So, my friends, start celebrating soup season! Batten down the hatches, cozy up your cold little body to the stove, crank up the burners, and spend your weekend in a smooth, dreamy cheese bath. You've had a hard week, and you deserve it! Twice.

Bookend Soup 
AKA Broccoli Cheddar Soup
serves 4-6

1 medium bunch broccoli
3 T butter
3 T flour
2 C vegetable broth
1 C milk
1 C shredded cheddar cheese
1/4 t salt
1/2 t black pepper
1/2 t hot sauce
1/2 t Worcestershire sauce
1/8 t ground red pepper

Chop the broccoli florets and stems. In a soup pot, melt the butter over medium-high heat. Add the chopped broccoli and cook until bright green (about 3 or 4 minutes). Stir in the flour until absorbed. Stir in the broth and milk. Cook, stirring, until mixture comes to a boil. Stir in the cheese, salt, pepper, hot sauce, Worcestershire, and red pepper. Cook, stirring, until cheese is melted, but don't let it boil at all once the cheese is in (or else you'll end up with a curdled mess). Serve with croutons, more hot sauce, and scallions.

Your Roots

I didn't have my first sweet potato pie until I was well into adulthood, which, I suppose, simply proves that I did not grow up in the South. In fact, I don't even think I had many sweet potatoes at all until then, either. They were, I believe, mainly something that we had for the holidays, baked with sugar into a landmine of delicious syrupy sweetness. You know how there are just some foods that, in your brain, are not everyday food? Thanksgiving sorts of foods all fall into this category for me -- things like stuffing (or dressing, depending on where your mama is from), pumpkin pie, and whole turkeys. Whole turkeys! Up until a few years ago, I don't even think I realized you were allowed to prepare a whole turkey if it wasn't Thanksgiving.

A few years ago, when my dear friend Meghan still lived here in Chicago (you may remember her and her bulldog, Tug, from such antics as the sausage factory) I found myself in her lovely, steamy kitchen one afternoon to find her preparing -- that's right! -- a turkey. As in, a whole turkey. A massive, entire turkey. And it wasn't even Thanksgiving! Or Christmas! Immediately I realized: A.) that she was even more brilliant than I ever thought and B.) that I wasn't as smart as I thought. Turkey! Did they even sell turkeys when it wasn't November or December? Did whole turkeys even exist the other ten months out of the year? I mean, I liked turkey, especially when it wasn't a cold cut, and now, well, now I could have a new relationship with it. As Meg stuffed her non-holiday, un-celebratory bird with oranges, rosemary, and onions and smoothed it with butter under and over the skin, it glistened smartly and offered me new poultry promise. And I felt brand new!

Sweet potatoes have been like this for me, too. Once I finally released them from their holiday shackles, I was able to see their true potential, and they made their way into breakfasts, lunches, and dinners throughout the year. They made their debut as hashbrowns, french fries, soup, tempura, a pizza topping, curry, chips, cakes, and, of course, in pies. This pie, if you've not had it, is similar to pumpkin pie, and the two could certainly spend a weekend at an identical twins convention and no one would even bat an eye. Besides being similar to the pumpkin, the sweet potatoes are certainly as versatile as their dear friends, The Regular Potatoes, but as you've no doubt learned, they are wildly nutritious. You know, especially when they are fried. Or when combined with heavy whipping cream and sugar. I mean, nutrition is nutrition, for crying out loud. Especially when it's not Thanksgiving.

Your Holiday and Non-Holiday Sweet Potato Pie

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1" chunks
1/2 C sugar
1/2 t ground ginger
1/2 t ground cinnamon
1/4 t ground nutmeg
1/4 t salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 C heavy (whipping) cream
1 pie shell (unbaked)

Place the sweet potatoes in a large saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium, and simmer until potatoes are very tender, about 20 minutes. Drain well and place in a large bowl.

Preheat oven to 375. Mash potatoes and then stir in the sugar, spices, salt, eggs, and cream.

Place the pie shell on a baking sheet and ladle in the filling just to the rim. Bake for 20 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 350. Bake about 30 minutes more or until filling is set (it won't jiggle around anymore, the crust will be golden,  and a toothpick inserted in the center will come out relatively clean).

Serve with marshmallow fluff, or whipped cream, or caramel sauce. Or plain! It's really nice when it's just plain. Oh, and keep this thing in the fridge when you're not eating it.

Pie Shell (if you're feeling it)

1 1/4 C AP flour
1/2 t salt
1/2 t sugar
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks
3-4 T ice water

Mix the dry ingredients in a food processor until combined. Add the butter and process until it resembles coarse meal. Add ice water very slowly and stop when the dough starts to come together. The next part is where I am a bit of a cheater: typically, one is instructed to roll the dough out a bit into a thick disk, refrigerate in plastic wrap, and then roll it out. I find that it's much easier to roll out while it's warmer and softer, so I form it into a ball immediately and then roll it out into a large enough circle to fit in a pie pan. Then, poof! Into the pie pan, then into the fridge (covered in plastic wrap) for about an hour to set up.

Potato Potahto

Do you smell that? Sniff the wind! There! That! Did you get it? Crunchy, whirly, burning leaves! Earthy, sweet, honeyed apples! Mothball-scented cozy wool sweaters, creased from months of storage! And, of course, I'm sure you're getting those soup smells, wafting from my kitchen straight into your nostrils. Right? Okay, well, one fine day, when real technology finally kicks in, you'll be able to scratch and sniff all the photographs on your screen -- but, until then, you'll have to do it all the old-fashioned way, which means making the soup yourself and then sniffing that. Deal?

So. This soup will do several things: make your belly really happy, make all your friends really happy, and officially call upon autumn to show its darling face. It's the kind of soup that will even satisfy all your must-eat-meat guests, and it will be so easy that you will actually have time to play with them when they arrive, rather than having to poke around at the stovetop while they sit in the living room, getting really drunk without you and talking about how much they miss you. Plus, as with most soups, it just keeps getting better as it ages in the fridge and as the fall days go on.

Soup. So many soups! I made a list yesterday of all the soups I want to make next week. Grand total = 26. Hmm. We'll see how that goes. I predict that it might be wise to hold off on, oh, say, maybe 25 of those? At least for now. It might also help me if I could learn how to make smaller batches of soup. Plus, then the new issue of Saveur came in the mail, and I added even more to the list. That barley soup! That dumpling soup! O, soup! Marry me! But, for now, let's stay focused on the matter at hand. Soup #1 of the season. Deemed by a certain someone as "the soup that has everything I want in a soup." Enough said, right? Okay. So here ya go.

Potato Soup
3 large baking potatoes, peeled (or partially peeled) and diced or chopped into chunks*
6 T unsalted butter
1 large yellow onion, diced
3/4 C flour
3 C vegetable broth
1 C milk
1/2 C half & half or cream
1/2 t Tabasco or other hot sauce
1 t salt
1 t pepper

Melt butter in a big pot and, when it gets sizzly, add the onions and start to cook them down on medium-high heat. Cook them until they are the way you want them for your soup -- I tend to like them on the more-cooked side, edging on caramelization, but if you just want to cook them until they are translucent, that works, too. Stir in the flour with a wooden spoon and cook for 1 minute. The mixture will be very thick and dry, but keep moving it around in the pan so that the flour-taste can cook out. Add broth, hot sauce, milk, and half & half. Stir well. Add potatoes and adjust with salt and pepper. Cook down a bit until you reach desired consistency. Add more milk if it seems too thick, and cook longer if it seems too thin.

Serve with lots of baked-potato-ish toppings: bacon, scallions, hot sauce, croutons or toasted bread crumbs, blue cheese, or cheddar cheese.

*If your potato pieces are large, you'll want to steam them for a bit before adding them to the soup, or else it'll take ages for them to soften in the soup. If the pieces are small, you can probably get away with putting them into the soup raw. BUT if you are in a hurry and you want to make the soup really fast, I would recommend steaming or microwaving the diced potatoes first.

How To Get A Pickle

O! October!

 

 

The Way Around It

Remember how you don't make biscuits very often?

Remember how you actually have a very good reason, which is that it's quite a complete pain?

Remember how it makes your eyes roll to even hear someone talking about making biscuits?

But remember how much you LOVE biscuits? With gravy! With butter! With jam! With honey! Oh, the magical biscuit carries condiments so well!

But. It's a little tough, this biscuit-making thing. You know, working that cold, hard butter into the flour, getting it to just the right consistency -- all that business? Well, I'm going to tell you something: times are a-changin', everybody! Biscuits just got way more flexible, way more kind, and way less ornery. As it turns out, you don't even NEED butter. In fact, you don't really need much of anything to make the loveliest biscuit you've ever had. All you need, truly, is two ingredients and approximately 10 minutes. Yes! Consider your life changed!


Clever Biscuits
2 cups self-rising flour*
1 cup whipping cream

Preheat oven to 450F. Combine flour and whipping cream in a bowl. Stir just until blended. (The dough will be a little bit stiff.) Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface and knead 10 times. (That's it! Ten times!) Roll out to 1/2" thickness and cut with a 2-inch cutter. Place biscuits close together ona lightly grease baking sheet or a Silpat. Bake 10 minutes. Makes 12. Eat them all up right away! (We all know how miserable biscuits are when you try to save them.)

*About this whole self-rising flour thing: I don't always have this on hand, so I science-d my way into it. Combine 1 cup flour, 1 1/2 t baking powder, and 1/4 t salt and...presto! Self-rising flour! Granted, you no longer used two ingredients to make these biscuits, but let's pretend, shall we? Good!

Milk Capital of the World

He drinks milk.

"All kinds!" he tells me enthusiastically. "I love all kinds of milk. Give me your cow! All the percentages of cow! Your soy! Your almond! Your coconut! Your rice! I like it all!" And he wasn't kidding. It's all true. He drinks milk.

I found out about it the first time I made dinner for him. A seemingly banal question yielded quite the unexpected response:

Me (looking into the refrigerator and yelling from the kitchen into the
living room):  
What do you want to drink?

Him (not yelling, because, as it turns out, he was actually in the kitchen):
Do you have any milk?

Milk...milk...milk. My eyebrows raised. My eyes squinted. I cocked my head to the side.

Me (turning to look at him, confirming politely that I heard him correctly):
Milk?

Him (a bit sheepish, but, indeed, completely serious):
Milk. Any kind will do.

The answer was yes. Yes, I had milk. But I was confused. I think my reply was something like this: Like, to drink? You want a drink of milk?

And, of course, you know the rest. Of course he did. He drinks milk!

Now, to clarify, cow milk is his favorite, but he will indeed drink all varieties very happily. He is a living, breathing milk council ad. The dairy industry should be paying him at this point. They should really know how much he's done for the milk business. It's substantial.

As you can imagine, he was given milk that evening, and pretty much every other evening since then, too. No matter what the meal, milk. The exception to this is breakfast, which is when he is busy either drinking the milk at the bottom of his cereal bowl, or consuming his other favorite breakfast "food" called Carnation Instant Breakfast (which actually nowadays goes by a different, more idiotic name, but that's neither here nor there). Now, it's not a hard and fast rule, this milk drinking thing. It's just the ideal thing. He is relatively flexible when it comes to consumption of foods and drinks, so he will sometimes be found drinking other things at dinner, like beer or water. But, if given his druthers, it's milk. When we toast, it's his milk glass clinking against my non-milk glass, and it makes me incredibly happy.

My experience with milk as a drink has to do with a fair amount of required milk drinking at dinners throughout my childhood. The gallon of 2% milk, blue cap and all, was a common thread in every dinner during my childhood. Granted, I am grateful for the nutrition and, of course, wickedly strong bones (thanks, Mom and Dad!) but I'm not sure I actually ever loved milk as a drink. Here's the thing. Milk doesn't pair well with many foods, in my (humble, folks, very humble) opinion. It seems to wash out the flavors of foods, which is, of course, why it's such a perfect antidote to viciously spicy foods. I remember thinking that I would prefer to drink the milk either all at the end of the meal or all at the beginning of the meal, rather than taking sips in between bites. I never actually did this, because, as a child, I determined that this could possibly be construed by the cook as rudeness, which was a great fear I had. (I'm still overly conscious of my actions around someone who has cooked for me -- never season the food unless the cook offers the salt or pepper, always accept homemade food if it is offered to you, remember to compliment with specific description at the beginning and end and even sometimes in the middle of the meal, never ask for something that isn't already at the table, and so on. Mainly this is because, well, I have this gigantic fear of offending the cook. The sort-of-funny thing is that, in other areas of my life, I have no problem being a bit rude or obnoxious, but there's something about the sanctity of the table, about the rules of dining. It's sacred.)

Ah, look at me digress! Back to milk. It's kind of like the 50-watt paging horn of palate cleansers. It's going to do the job a little too well. This, though, is why milk is the perfect thing to consume with something sticky or extremely sweet, like cake or peanut butter or a box of Oreos. (Um, I don't even think Oreos come in a box. I don't get out very much, as you can tell.) You've gotta wash down your powerful food with a powerful drink so that you can keep on consuming it. Plus! It's so filling. Like drinking Guinness. It's seems like much more of a liquid meal than a drink.

I was just so excited to hurry up and get older so I could stop drinking milk at meals! Suddenly, it happened. I was eventually able to have water or iced tea if I preferred (which I most certainly did) and I was relieved beyond reason. This way, milk in a glass could be saved for times when I really needed it, like when there were doughnuts to be had, or cookies, or cereal, or a peanut butter sandwich. Plus, I could finally focus on putting milk where it truly belonged, like as an ingredient in pudding or a sauce or, of course, in coffee. Milk as an ingredient, is vital, I think, and this is why there is always, always milk in my refrigerator. As a cook, I always somehow have managed to plow through loads of milk, which means that my house is quite the haven for people who, you know, see it as the most important drink.

Babies! Kittens! Milkmen! Boyfriends! Come one, come all. This is your safe place!


Really Thick Milk (AKA Pudding)

As you can imagine, he also loves pudding, which makes me like him even more. This is the pudding I made last week. He asked for seconds, which means it must be pretty good -- considering he isn't much of a seconds kind of guy because he just doesn't eat very much in general. (I know! Weird!)

You can do anything with this pudding. I often turn it into coconut or banana pudding, and it's the base I used for cream pie filling. It is crazy easy, and, as you can see from its name, it's kind of like drinking really thick milk (if you're into that kind of thing).

2 C cow milk (I prefer 2%, but any kind will do)
3 egg yolks
1/3 C sugar
3 T cornstarch
1/4 t salt
1 T butter
1 t vanilla or vanilla bean paste

Combine first 5 ingredients. Whisk (somewhat constantly) over medium heat until thick. Try not to leave it unattended for very long, as it will love to stick to the bottom of the pan and turn into a gross mess. Turn down the heat if it seems like it is getting to bubbly or violent. When it looks almost thick enough to eat, turn off the heat and add the vanilla and butter. Whisk until butter is melted. Pour into a glass or ceramic dish, cover, and place in the fridge until it's the temperature you like. (It will thicken as it cools and sets.)

You can also put the pudding in individual cups, of course, and it'll make approximately four servings. Sometimes I like to hide bananas or berries under the pudding for a nice surprise. For a nice non-surprise, toasted coconut or almonds are a good addition for the top.

President of the Coconut Club

 

After discovering that a certain someone loves coconut with all his might, I decided it was time to finally figure out the macaroon mystery. It's like this, you see: I've never been able to get them right. Ever. 

Here's the thing. A macaroon is so stunningly simple. And yet, there are so many lousy ones out there. And the ones I make? Well, they aren't terrible, they aren't inedible, but they're just not amazing. Just not perfect. That is, until now! A-ha!

After all these years, I have finally (finally!) found the perfect macaroon recipe. Praise to you, coconut! You're finally getting the treatment you deserve. (And apologies for all those times I basically ruined you by swaddling you in unnecessary ingredients, like sweetened condensed milk and other such nonsense ingredients). 

 

Let's just clarify, first of all. Here's what I want in a macaroon: crisp exterior, creamy interior. I want them to be this way when they come out of the oven, and I want them to be this way when I am eating them for dinner, three days later, instead of my vegetables. I want them a bit sweet, but definitely not too sweet. I don't want to wince from sugar overload when I take my first bite, because I sometimes want to be able to eat one for breakfast. I want them to look good too -- golden brown wisps on top with crisp golden-brown bottom. Really...is this too much to ask? It can't be. And it's not! Hurrah!

When you read this recipe, you will maybe roll your eyes. You will say, cake flour? I'm not buying cake flour just for these silly macaroons! You will say, room temperature egg whites? I don't have the time! And you will say, Refrigerate two hours?! Absurd! But. But! Hear me out. You must do these things. They are important! And you will thank me later, preferably by swinging by my house with a basket of sample macaroons, so I can see just how well you did with your coconut project.

Macaroons

makes about 2 dozen

3 cups shredded, sweetened coconut

4 egg whites, room temperature

1 t vanilla (use good vanilla is you can -- preferably vanilla bean paste)

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup cake flour

1/4 t salt

In a heatproof bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water, whisk together the egg whites, sugar, and salt. When this mixture is warm to the touch and looking creamy, remove from heat and whisk in the vanilla extract and flour. Stir in coconut. Cover and refrigerate for about two hours, or until firm.  

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper (or use a Silpat, which I highly recommend for this project). Place small mounds (use heaping tablespoons or a cookie scoop) of the batter on the baking sheets, spacing several inches apart.  Bake for about 16 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.  Remove from oven and let cool on the baking sheet for about 10 minutes and then place on a wire rack to cool. Store in an airtight container. Eat frequently.

The Architecture of Love

There are so many important things for you to know about him! You've been asking, and I want to tell you everything immediately!

I'm keeping pages of notes about him, as though he's a science experiment -- which is quite appropriate, considering that he is a very science-y sort of person. So I'm pretty sure he doesn't mind the data collection. Sure, it's a little creepy...but how else am I going to figure out the best way to love him? This is an important process, folks!

So.

Clearly, we like to make forts. The first time he asked me to make a fort (as in, a human-sized fort), I fell for him. Hard. Okay, so I had already fallen for him, but this really sealed the deal. Do I want to make a fort? Um, let's see. Do I want AIR to breathe? Do I want food and sleep and water?

Yes. Yes! Of course! Yes!

It's certainly not everyday that someone asks you to build a fort with them. In fact, I have absolutely no idea why there aren't more adults out there building forts. It's a sad state of affairs out there! Growing up, my brother and I used to build forts with the pillows and cushions in the living room, and we were pretty good at it, although I seem to recall that we usually ended up trying to squash each other with the biggest cushions while giggling hysterically. There wasn't a lot of time spent in the actual fort, though, because building it and taking it down were the best parts. (I'll admit, I was always a little distraught by the deconstruction of the furniture, and was a little anxious until the living room was returned to its normal, organized, non-forted state.) And all of that was good for then. But now?

Well, fort-making has advanced to a whole new level. See, I am (just to remind you, in case you'd forgotten) a real adult, which means that, for me specifically, I have processes and strategies and a very linear organizational pattern. Not just any fort will do, you see. Playing isn't as easy as it used to be!

After drawing up several diagrams and painstakingly strategizing the structure using elaborate blueprints (okay, so they're not all that elaborate, but they at least suggest forethought), I was ready. I will lightly brush past the bit about us not even using any of the ideas I had, because for some ridiculous reason, I did not even consider for one second that the dining room table would make the best fort ever. Let's also not mention how I was SITTING at the table when I was drawing the fort blueprints, and yet my plans included complicated objects that lacked stability and/or promoted danger once one was inside the structure, like a t-square, a gigantic ladder, and stacked-up chairs. Sheesh.

Well, I was eventually guided in the proper direction (thank goodness I wasn't left alone to build this fort!), and the next thing I knew, we had (and still have) a tremendous fort in the dining room. Stable, precise, and very secretive -- just how I like it. See? I told you he had good ideas! Granted, adults over 3 feet tall pretty much will all whack their heads on the fort ceiling, but these are the kinds of adjustments we need to make in real life.

I think I'm getting a bit off track here, since really the purpose of all this is to tell you that he likes Triscuits, which also happens to be my brother's favorite cracker. (Do you see it?? I already have the perfect date arranged for him and my brother! Triscuits + fort building = best friends forever!) So. He likes Triscuits as his favorite cracker, although he also enjoys Wheat Thins (just like my mom!).

Anyway. When my mom and I were on vacation a few weeks ago, I spied a new invention on the shelf at the grocery store: Triscuit babies, aka Triscuit minis! And I think you know what happens next. Triscuit babies came home with me, Triscuit babies were eaten,  and Triscuit babies were discussed at great length (Why did it take them so long to think of this idea? Do other crackers come in baby sizes? Why do they taste so much better than big Triscuits? Are they one-quarter of the size of a regular Triscuit? Will we ever be able to eat a big Triscuit again? How much more equipment did the Triscuit factory need in order to produce these? They aren't as poky! They aren't as dangerous to eat! They are really fun! And...Hey! These would make a really great fort!).

And then we built fort #2. A miniature fort, a quaint fort, convenient for all the small creatures of our imaginations, and all of it very structurally sound, as you can tell. And, most importantly, all extremely delicious. Not to mention, the start of something quite grand.

Coffee. Or, What Is Love?

When I met Matthew, he detested coffee, and he really wanted nothing to do with it. He was (gasp! barf! eek!) one of those people who liked to drink soda in the morning, which is something I will never be able to understand. Before I kidnapped him and made him live with me, he lived with his twin brother, and together they would plow through obscene amounts of soda, never once stopping to think about coffee. (Or water. Or vodka. You know, the liquids that matter.)

I tried for years to bring him over to the other side, to show him the solid, unflinching love that coffee has to offer. I tried not to complain, I tried to be strong. I told myself to relax. Figure it out. I could drink coffee alone in the mornings! I didn't need a coffee companion! He was good for lots of other things, like carrying heavy stuff, eating strange things that I cooked, making sure I didn't get hit by cars, and happily watching musicals. But...still. When I met him, I was just out of college, where I spent 99.2% of my time drinking coffee. With people. I couldn't just magically turn myself into a solo coffee drinker. I was lost. I needed a plan.

The years passed. We'd go out to breakfast, and I'd have my coffee. He would drink juice. Sometimes he would pick up a coffee for me in the morning and bring it back to me. He learned how to tolerate the smell of coffee, and once even declared that he was starting to like the smell of it. He learned how I liked it -- two spoons of sugar, and diluted with cream to make it the color of a camel. I brought a coffeemaker over to his house, and I could finally at least pretend that he was a coffee drinker like me. See! A coffeepot on the counter! This must be a coffee-drinking household!

I'm honestly not sure what the big deal was. I could embrace all (well, most of) the ways we were different. It was interesting to see the ways he created messes, the kinds of books he treasured, the ways he loved other people, and the kinds of ideas he collected in his head. I mean, hell -- he was an accomplished, unflagging meat-eater in my very vegan world during the first several years of our relationship. This wasn't something that bothered me in the least, and yet I somehow just couldn't get over the coffee thing.

Coffee marked the beginning of every day for me, and it felt as crucial as the rising of the sun. I had had some of the most profound conversations of my life over coffee. I had figured out the answers to massive problems over coffee. I linked coffee drinking to accomplishment, I think, and (thanks to, uh, probably Folgers commercials) I had so many images in my head of happy-family-morning-coffee-time, so many coffee-scene movie clips in my head. And it didn't help that the other half of my previous relationship also refused to drink coffee. A psychotically avid cyclist, he claimed coffee would ruin his physique. (Or something like that. Everything he said was so absurd that I stopped listening after awhile.)

I asked Matthew why he didn't like coffee. His answer: it doesn't taste good. Hmm. This was not an acceptable answer. I eventually got a little more information out of him, and learned that the only coffee he had ever experienced was the cheap, pre-ground stuff and served strong and black. His parents would drink it like this, and he tasted it once. He recalls it as impossibly bitter and horrid. I could not argue with this. Cheap coffee tastes like, well, cheap coffee. It is awful. It shouldn't be consumed by humans. It was a terrible first impression. But scary coffee has some remarkably civilized sisters and brothers out there who could make a convert out of him. I knew it. Armed with this knowledge, I began to formulate my plan. I would change his mind about coffee. I would show him how impossibly perfect coffee could be. 

The remaining details of the road-to-coffee perdition journey are surprisingly hazy, probably because the moment I keep in the forefront of my memory is the one in which Matthew decided he did indeed like coffee. And! And! And! He liked it just how I liked it! He liked it so much that he started having it together some mornings, and eventually it was every morning, and then, the next thing we both knew, he couldn't possibly think of starting the day without it. He became interested in trying different kinds of coffee beans and he began to see the value in grinding them fresh every morning. He experimented with different kinds and brands of milk, cream, and half & half. He started to care about the vessel it was served in, and the temperature it was when he started drinking it. I had created a monster, and I was very, very happy.

Several years ago, I went to one of those paint-it-yourself ceramics studios and designed a special, huge coffee mug, since he had become obsessed with serving coffee to himself in the largest vessel he could find. That was back in 2008, and he used it every single day, which, yes, melted my determined little coffee-lovin' heart. It became such a required part of his day that it was sort of like a kid's security blanket -- you tried to offer him a different stuffed bunny when his regular stuffed bunny was in the wash, and you were received with disbelief, perhaps a glare, and then complete refusal.

I'm not sure how the coffee production got so serious around here, but I started to really like it. I liked hearing him whoop for joy when the coffeepot gave out its three beeps that signified the end of the brewing time. I loved the coffee songs and dances that we created while either in extreme coffee withdrawal or extreme coffee high. Then came the advent of the milk-frother. You know, the whipper. Showing him this toy of mine was like showing a dog a flank steak. There wasn't a part where I was like, here's this cool thing I have, wanna see it and then shortly after, I put it away. No, no, no -- it was here's this cool thing I have, and then his eyes lit up, he cautiously took it from me, and then he never stopped playing with it. Stiff peaks of frothy milk became every morning's goal. I woke up to incredible cups of coffee, and we laughed wildly anytime we talked about the terrible days long, long ago, when coffee wasn't a crucial part, the shining beacon, of our life together. Things were really making sense.

A few years ago, when I switched to decaf (as part of an experiment), I know his heart sank. We went from coffee twins to coffee strangers, which meant different pots of coffee every morning. Not only did this mean more dishes to wash, it meant total disconnect! How on earth can you bond with someone when you're drinking two different kinds of COFFEE, for crying out loud? It's impossible, clearly. I eventually switched to half-caf, which is still my coffee to date, but it was never the same. He would shriek in fake horror as I threatened to pour decaf or half-caf into his mug, and together, we laughed our way out of our differences, which is, as you know, pretty serious business within the confines of a relationship.

So. Differences. Ah! Differences. I've been wanting to tell this story for awhile now, but it hasn't felt right. When Matthew and I split up at the beginning of May, I had already started writing about the coffee, and the story that you just read sat silently, gathering all sorts of digital-dust, and I couldn't figure out what to do with it all. Here's the thing that you really should know, though. When he moved out, it was a process that took several weeks. During that time, we crossed paths as little as possible. The kitchen didn't see me really at all, because how do you cook for a broken heart? The only thing either of us used the kitchen for was...you guessed it. Coffee. I was devastated and confused about everything I thought I knew about our relationship, but coffee, that magical siren, held us together in a way that saved me from going completely insane. Oh, coffee. You saved me!

For days, I'd come home to a house that was little more packed up than the day before, and it was the most gut-wrenching, miserable thing to watch. Packing stirred up dust in every room, which made me want to scream. Everything, physical and emotional and mental, was a complete and utter mess. But. But I would also come home to my washed-out espresso pot, drying in the rack. He would wash my coffee pot, you see, without washing his own. I would see my clean pot, and, amid the waves of fury, I would be able to see a flicker of the love I had for him, and that was the thing that propelled me through the sheets and sheets of anger that coursed through my veins during the days of dividing our things and shifting our dreams. In exchange, I would wash his coffee pot for him. It was silent, this exchange. It went on like this for several weeks, until he was completely moved out, along with the beeping coffee pot, his blue mug, and the milk frother. I was starting over. Ten years later, I was beginning again. It was just me, my espresso pot, some half-caf, and a carved-out heart. I could handle it. I did handle it.

Which brings us to, well, today. It's nearly September, and I swoon when I taste autumn in the morning air. Coffee is still the liquid love in my world, as you might imagine. Months are between Matthew and I, and each new day, each inch of space, holds me up a little more. I am different now, but I am good. I've learned a lot, I've moved back into the kitchen, I'm thinking a whole lot about you, dear reader, and I am, if you can believe it, involved with someone new. He (insert laughter here) wants very little to do with coffee because, well, he's way too busy drinking milk. Milk! What on earth?! It's so incredibly charming that I can't possibly feel concerned about shadows being cast on the coffee around here. Basically, I'm planning on not forcing this one. Not this time. If there's anything I have learned this summer, it's that you must certainly stop forcing it. That, and you must always, always hold yourself up.

And coffee? Well, coffee wants to help. Coffee is a very good holder-upper. Coffee, well, that's what love is.

Meat Messages

I've Been Meaning To Tell You

1. The foil has a purpose after all. It has to do with transmitters, or something else technological that I don't really understand. But apparently it does not have to do with the fact that the I-Pass people ran out of proper packaging materials, nor did they try to trick me into thinking I was receiving chocolate instead of, well, an I-Pass. Anyway. Glad we figured that all out.

2. I miss you.

3. Really! I miss you! Sorry it's been so long.

4. My kitchen is buried underneath four feet of dust.

5. Please stay tuned for Evil Meat artwork!

The Answer

It's not chocolate! It's my new iPass! They mailed it to me like this! Weird. So, so weird. Right?

Aluminum Foil Quiz

I received this foil packet in the mail. What is it?
The answer will be revealed tomorrow!

All About Prison

Important information from a seven year-old:

"If you set off the alarm, the fireman will put you in jail. When you get to jail, you can NEVER EVER pick out your own food. I don't think they give you any food at all. If they did, the food would be really bad. And the beds are so hard with no sheets."

The Ketchup Chronicles

When you ask a group of 6 through 10 year-olds to tell you
Things About Ketchup, here is what they say:

tomato-based
aaaaah! blood!
ketchup? You'd better catch up!
it's so good on cheeseburgers
you can dip ketchup in potato chips
you can put it on Wheaties if you have to
it's a food
it's red
I don't like it
it has a lot of sugar in it
it has a lot of high fructose corn syrup in it
it's a liquid food
it's good for french fries
it's made out of tomato sauce
eat it with chicken nuggets or other foods
I like it

It's Not Blood

 

Let's just say it's 1,000 degrees on a Monday evening in July, and you decide that the butter on the counter got so melty during the day that you might as well make cookies with it. So you make the dough and you think, hey, this isn't so bad, this whole cooking thing, and then you remember you haven't turned the oven on yet, so you turn it on and immediately the kitchen is sweltering. And, then, well, you're hot, and baking sounds like the worst idea ever, and and even though you're pretty tired, you think a nice icy cocktail would make you feel better. So you mix yourself a nice Manhattan, complete with brandied cherries from the brand new batch you just made a few weeks ago, give it all a stir, then put the cherries back in the fridge. Except. Except, wait. Instead of putting the cherries on the actual shelf, your brain decides it would be a good plan to put them on the invisible shelf. And the cherries decide its good to be mobile, and the next thing you know the entire jar is on the floor, gigantic glass shards are everywhere, and it certainly looks a bit like a murder scene. Hmm. Interesting.

So, what's a girl to do? My advice: pivot around without moving from your location. Survey the glass damage. Confirm what just happened. Figure out the most important thing: are the cherries ruined? (Answer: yes.) Determine that glass is everywhere, remind yourself you have bare feet. Still standing in a semi-awkward position, reach for your Manhattan. Drink. Quickly. Review damage again. Think about how incredibly hot it is in the kitchen. Realize you're burning the cookies. Curse. Save the cookies, creeping stealthily through the shards. Wonder if the red syrup is staining the floor. Decide it's probably not, and if it is, it will be cool because it will look like a bloodstain. Classy! Gorgeous! Contemporary vampire culture is calling!

Eventually, you find yourself leaping over the mess to gather your camera, because what could be more important than documenting this catastrophe? It's worth it. Eventually, you're cleaning up the spill, using an entire roll of paper towels, finding glass bits in the oddest places, and you're on your hands and knees, and you're very close to the oven, which is really hot, and you're sweating, and the jar of cherries has to go in the trash, and you make a new grocery list that says: cherries, brandy, paper towels. And the floor is still really, really sticky, and you're sitting on it, thinking you hope you aren't sitting on glass, and you think, these ridiculous moments are the most important moments of my life. And it's gloriously absurd, really, and, well, you can always make more cherries, and you can always get a new jar, and the floor can get un-sticky again, and, well, it's summer and this is all actually quite funny, and, well, everything is okay when you have a cocktail and when you're happy in your heart (which likely looks quite a lot like that mess on the floor).

Better-In-A-Drink-Than-On-The-Floor Brandied Cherries

Start with 12 oz frozen dark sweet cherries, thawed with juice reserved. You should end up with about 10T juice. Add water to equal 1 1/2 cups. Add 1/2 cup sugar, cherries, and bring to a boil. Simmer 1 minute, remove from heat. Remove cherries with a slotted spoon and place in a jar. Add 1/2 C brandy or cognac, cover, and set aside. Bring cherry syrup to a boil, then continue until reduced to 1 cup. Pour over cherries, refrigerate. Do not balance precariously on edge of refrigerator shelf.

To make the best summery Manhattan-ish drink: add 2 or 3 T of the cherry juice to whiskey or bourbon in a nice, tall glass. Add bitters (I am quite smitten with rhubarb bitters for this drink). Add ice and seltzer and stir vigorously to make the top frothy. Add some of your cherries, but leave the glass shards out.

A Real Dialogue

(as overheard in the strawberry field of Thompson Strawberry Farm in Bristol, Wisconsin)

Kid: (about 8 years old, shifting his weight around in a bored kind of way, and half-moaning, half-whining) Ughhhh. Can't we just go to Harvest Land (grocery store) and get fruit there?

Mom: (in the most irked, matter-of-fact, deadpan, sarcastic, way possible)
No. We can't. (now jerking the berries off their stems rather violently and glaring at him) And I'll tell you why. It's. Because. We. Like. This. Better. 

Let's Talk Cheese

Remember how you were just saying yesterday that you wished you had a nice piece of cheese?

And remember how you wished you had a special place where you could get that cheese?

A place you could go and feel both medieval and modern, all at the same time?

A place where you could find a cheese store that is inside the house of the person the shop is named after? And whose name is also on the mailbox?

A place where cheese is king, and queen, and the doted-upon darling of the Midwest?

Well, look no further!
Get thee to Kenosha, Wisconsin immediately, where you can complete the cheese story of your very own life. (Please also note: an incredible u-pick strawberry farm is just down the road.)


Get out your cheese boards, people. You have been beckoned.