Sistering

We were driving home from our spring break getaway to sunny Scarsdale on Sunday and I heard Arthur say to Maze, "Good sistering!" after she shared something with Piper.  I could see the object, likely a fraction of a fig newton (aka "newton bar" - not sure how that one developed, but now it's part of the Baraf lexicon) exchanged between two tiny outstretched hands in my rearview mirror.  I'm pretty sure I had never heard "sister" used as a verb, but I liked it.  A lot.  I am a sister.  I know what it feels like to be sistered.  And today of all days, I need a little sistering.  You see, four years ago today my sisters and I became, well, orphans.  Our mom passed away.  Breast cancer that came back.  Elsewhere.  We had lost our dad just months before.  Tonight as I sit and write this blog I'm not finding my usual find-the-humor-in-just-about-everything voice.  In fact, I'm tearing up watching Dancing with the Stars, my mom's favorite show, which tonight is featuring BALLET DANCERS.  For those who don't watch the show - they never have ballet dancers.  For those who didn't know my mom - she was a ballet dancer.  Those who have suffered great loss likely share my appreciation of these not-so-concidences that pop up as we go about our days, that leave us either smiling or sobbing - but regardless of which - feeling wonderfully comforted in that moment of awareness where memories of our loved ones and our experiences in the present moment connect and the universe or God or god says, Gotcha!

So today has been full of Gotcha moments.  Like when I mentioned the song, "White Coral Bells" to my friend as we walked through some woods together with our kids and heard her say, "I know that song." Whah?  No one knows that song.  And then, low and behold, there they were.  Lilies of the Valley.  Ok, need for another biographical note:  my mom sang that song to us a lot and I sing it to my girls, so I thought that today of all days, it would be cool to try to find some lilies of the valley on our walk.  Gotcha.  There they were.

So why the picture of the Indian food?  A couple of days ago a friend who recently had a baby girl returned some serving dishes to me that I had given to her (filled with veggie curry) a few weeks back.  Tonight I refilled them with chicken in coconut curry sauce, ready to give to another friend who also just had a baby girl.  Sistering.  I learned it from my sisters.  Thanks mom.


The recipe:

One crock pot
4-6 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
one medium onion, chopped
one box (or can) chopped tomatoes
two tables tomato puree
one can coconut milk
one half-box chicken broth
two teaspoons each: ground coriander, chili powder, cumin, turmeric
two teaspoons chopped garlic, or more if you don't mind sweating garlic like me
salt and pepper to taste

Toss in the pot, stir and simmer all day, stirring now and again - about 7 hours on low seems to be just about right.  Serve over rice or with naan.
 

The Hungry Monster

Kids love to be chased.  By monsters.  Overall nice but kinda-mean-sounding ones.  I am that monster.  (Ok, we can say it, momster.)  I'm the weirdo parent often seen walking straight-legged, arms outreached (or reached out, whatev), growling something in a deep voice (so read it that way, ok?), "I'm gonna get youuuu," at the park.  Toddlers flee screaming, eyes and mouths wide open as they run in all directions - making mostly fake-sounding but nevertheless super high-pitched and likely-annoying-to-more-civilized-parents (and children) screams.

The momster doesn't just rear her ugly (Mud-hens baseball hat-adorned) head at park time.  I wake up that way, minus the threatening 'I'm gonna get you' bellows.  (And nooo, I don't really think I'm ugly - for those of you who were concerned about that sentence).  So lately, I'm finding that our usual a.m. barafare isn't satiating the beast and I've been trying to break out of our weekday breakfast rut - cold cereal (the kind in boring boxes from the "natural food" section of the grocery store that still contains about the same amount of sugar as toucan sam), frozen waffles, fruit smoothies, cheese toast.  I found this recipe in MSL and it looked sooo delicious and easy.  I picked up some grainy, perfectly crusty bread from 7 Stars Bakery on Hope St. and added just what was called for in the recipe:  ricotta cheese, dates (I bought organic Medjool ones from WH), bananas, and honey.  I skipped the pecans, because those got used in a salad earlier in the week, and the bread from 7 Stars was nutty enough.

The cameraman and I each had two slices and felt FULL.  As in, wow, we're really stuffed.  (But in a good way - not a 'I think I'm gonna be sick' way).  So for those of you who thought ricotta was just for stuffing into shells and tubes and between layers of lasagna noodles and smothering with tangy, garlicky, mouth-watering red sauce, think again, ok?  The momster is asking nicely.

Note:  As I look at the picture, I'm thinking the dates look a lot like bacon.  Next time, I'm subbing in bacon.  That would be so goooood.  Anyone who likes to dip their fries in their frosties knows what I mean.  You people are my people.

Obsessions

My 3 year-old is obsessed with bandaids. She calls them ban-day-jes. As in, she knows the word bandaid, and has heard the word bandage, so she combines them, turning that second "a" into a long-vowell sound. It's cute. She's cute. But what is not cute is that we NEVER have bandaids, bandages or ban-day-jes around when we need them. Thankfully, we don't need them very often. (Which is surprising given at least one of my children's love of being not just barefoot but entirely naked in the outdoors.) Why am I telling you this? Because tonight while I was trying to make dinner, she was trying to find where I'd last stashed the most recently purchased box, screaming at me, "But mom, daddy needs one for his owie!" For the record, Arthur did not have an owie. But I did. Why, you ask? Because a yellow crayon-shaped bandaid was pinching and pulling at my arm hairs. Still not sure when she managed to plant that one on me, that little bandaid bandit. So here I am (or there I was), trying to make this fairly easy (but certainly requiring of at least some amount of concentration) meal that featured one of my own obsessions, mushrooms, and also appease the little bandit. "Why don't you color?" "Do you want to read books to your babies?" "Has anyone seen Piper?" (Ok, I didn't actually ask the 3-year old that one.) Perhaps I'm too tired to make my point creatively. So here it is: we all have obsessions. Some come and go. Some "stick" around for awhile. (Har har.) We do need to indulge in what makes us feel well, indulgent, every so often, but in doing so, we need to make sure we don't lose our grip (assuming we have one in the first place) on reality. And in my house reality reads like this: dinner needs to be cooked, people need to eat. Sometimes, cooking dinner gets a lot of my focus. Other times, being a willing patient and ending up covered in bandaids by my 3 year-old gets my undivided attention. If you share my obsessions with cooking and/or with mushrooms, you'll love the recipe below. If you share Mazie's obsession with bandaids - my only advice would be to guide your kids to place them on your least-hairy spots. You'll thank me for that.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/31/health/nutrition/mushroom-and-grain-cheeseburgers-recipes-for-health.html

P.S. - for those of you who may be wondering about the green stuff that often tops the various patties pictured on my blog - it's coriander chutney, purchased at a local Indian market. Talk about obsessions. Have you tried the stuff?

Come and get it

Ok I confess. The reason I cook so much is...I love eating good food. And I love the satisfaction of making something really delicious. So many rewards - great flavors to savor, a sense of "hey I actually have something tangible to show for my efforts" (we don't get that a lot in my line of work - counseling), and of course the "this is awesome" commentary from my cameraman. I found this recipe about a month ago in MSL, and because I'm constantly on a search to try new grains (and legumes) and then work them into our regular diets, I bought myself a bag of red lentils. Tonight was the second time I've made this dish - and made some adjustments that made the meal come together really exquisitely. Yes, I said that. I made something that I feel is exquisite. The link below shows the recipe. I followed it for the most part with a few changes. I did not have feta but instead used regular goat cheese (I crumbled it from a log of really good but not pricey organic goat cheese I found at WH), and instead of using the green part of the scallions for the slivered green lines you see nicely crusted into the cakes - I used chives. Better flavor. I also didn't use a non-stick pan. The surface of mine is starting to flake off - and I've banned it from use until I do some research about its potential carcinogenic properties. So I used the always excellent but horrible to clean All-Clad skillet and a fairly generous (for me - I'm stingy with the stuff) amount of safflower oil. The recipe calls for mint and I think watercress. Not a mint lover. (Unless the leaves are crushed with sugar and lime and floating about in a pool of rum and ice and whatever else makes mojitos so damn good.) I tossed some red leaf lettuce with my new favorite (store-bought) vinaigrette (pictured) and no, it does not have any strawberry juice in it. But it tastes like it does - and its sweetness was the perfect counterpart to the somewhat creamy tartness of the yogurt sauce (to which I added a little olive oil because it needed a little more of a buttery quality and less tang, and a little salt because, well, it needed that too). I threw in some sliced avocado and meant to add cucumbers for some crunch - but alas, the naked cucumber (I did manage to peel it) sat on the counter until I discovered it at clean-up time. Sorry little guy.

I implore you to try this meal. Pardon me if that smacks of bravado. It's not tricky. Mind you, I have no real cooking skill or technique - just some whacky (that word so needs an "h" - am I right?) internal drive to make good eats. (Thanks Alton Brown for stealing that phrase so that now as I say it I have to 1. feel kinda weird about it and 2. give you some kind of credit for making it a thing. Geez man.) One thing - harissa is not a type of flour. That's something else whose name I can't recall right now but that sounds like harissa. It's a red hot pepper paste used in North African cooking (yes, I googled that). Totally worth the 3 or so bucks at WH. Or, just come get some of mine. As good as this meal was I'm guessing I won't make it again for awhile, and making use of the rest of the jar of harissa could be a challenge. Most of you know where I live. I'll leave it in the milk box.

http://www.wholeliving.com/155623/lentil-cakes-feta-yogurt-sauce-and-cucumber-cress-salad

Is it summer yet?

My mouth is ready for summer. The flavors of summer. As much as I do love stews and those creamy-type comfort foods (remember, I'm not afraid of condensed soups, after all - every decent casserole's primary ingredient), my palette is longing for some zing and freshness. Tonight we approximated summer flavors. And although I settled for pan-fried turkey burger sliders instead of an actual grilled burger, the meal wasn't disappointing at all. And it was quick and healthy. Here's how it went down... I realized I mistakenly bought 99% lean ground turkey (that must have been one skinny bird) and figured out that, because the grill was all wet and I didn't want to deal with removing a sopping cover (sensory issues? um, yeah) and therefore would not be grilling the sliders, I'd have to add a little cooking oil to the indoor grill - aka skillet - so that the little guys wouldn't stick like crazy. I added aforementioned oil with great effect. The burgers didn't stick. Two (no longer) secrets to great indoor burgers - brown lightly on both sides and then cover the pan with a lid of some sort. The burgers will hold in their juices while continuing to cook. Yum. And add a little garlic powder (not garlic salt - way too hard to control how salty they get). Double yum. I served them with freshish Florida corn that was actually REALLY delicious. And served them on whole wheat hot dog buns - which are perfect for sliders because you just cut them in half. I found a whole bin of them at WH - I wondered why they were all tossed into a bin instead of positioned nicely on a shelf. My guess is that they were a little undercooked or something - they were really mushy. So I toasted them a little and that remedied the problem. Quick meal. So easy and so good. Not quite as satisfying as grilled corn (if you haven't tried it, make this the summer you do!) and grilled burgers, but hey, the propane tank is full and summer will be here before we know it!

Short n Savory

Tonight's message is going to be brief. Lots to do. Progress notes (sometimes more aptly named lack-of-progress notes) to write, bills to pay, cluttered house to stare at, oops, I mean pick up. But first, some updates from my kitchen... You'll see two pictures - the one that's not half-eaten (sorry if that looks a little gross - my camera man put pleasure before business the other night and before we realized it, most of his meal was at least partially digested) is (are?) enchiladas, or some take on that wonderful dish. Here's how to make this super fast and mostly healthy, entirely delicious meal:

You'll need: soft corn tortillas (8 or so), a jar of your favorite salsa, frozen or fresh corn, frozen or fresh spinach, mushrooms if you like them, a can of black, refried beans (yes, this exists), any cheese that doesn't clash (I used jack), some cilantro if you have it, may half a white onion, cumin, a can or partial jar of tomatillo salsa (that's the green one - and I think I used about a half-cup) and some sour cream. I almost forgot the secret ingredient. Promise not to cringe - about half a box of condensed soup. Something creamy - I used cream of chicken because I had it. By box I mean one of those small ones - the size of a can of soup. Even Stop n Shop sells an organic brand of condensed soups in boxes - nice to avoid the cans where we, um, can.

You'll need to: Spray a baking dish with some olive oil or other spray, and pour about half the salsa in the bottom of a baking dish. Then chop up what doesn't fit into a reasonably sized enchilada and mix every other ingredient except the sour cream and tortillas. Heat up your tortillas one by one on your gas-top stove, being careful not to catch the tortilla or your hand on fire. (Heating them will help them not fall apart and will also give them better flavor.) After you heat one, and it cools enough to work with it, spoon some of those refried beans and that squishy veggie mixture into the tortilla, roll it up and place it seam-side down in the dish. Repeat until the dish is full, cover with more cheese if you like, and then dump the rest of the salsa on top. Bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Serve with sour cream and if you really want the full Barafare experience, some of that smokey new Tabasco. No wonder the camera man succumbed.

Next dish: Pork (did I actually just say pork?) tacos. Until this week, I don't think I have ever bought ground pork. Sure, plenty of hot dogs and brats have made it home in my shopping bags, but this week I found a recipe that looked interesting. I made some modifications, but more or less, here is what I did:

Combined in my crock pot 1 meat counter package (average size - how's that for a specific measure) of "premium" (whatever that means, right?) ground pork that I browned a little first on the stove, one link of chopped up Chorizo (it's called something else here in RI but back in CO it's Chorizo - spicy un-Italian sausage) without its casing (I was able to easily peel that away), a half a bag or so of Whole Foods brand hash browns (that I nuked in the micro for like 2 minutes), a decent sized lump of chopped garlic, cumin, a chopped white onion, about a cup of water and some of the cilantro from the other mexicanish meal I made this week. And some dried oregano - maybe a teaspoon. Stirred all that up and let it cook on low for about 5 hours. I added a little water when needed. I served it on soft flour tortillas with some of those leftover refried beans, cheese, and easy corn salsa (corn, lime, cilantro, cumin, garlic, salt, lots of lime). My mouth is actually watering right now thinking about it. I hope yours is too. Enjoy!

easy peas-y

Ah Friday. Friday friday friday. We needed an easy dinner night. On account of all the cookin, ' I did earlier in the week, Arthur and I had plenty of leftovers to eat - frittata and pasta and soup (both the root veggie soup and the coconut curry one), in various combinations. The girls got some souped-up mac n cheese, and honestly they were the big winners. I highly recommend these add-ins to boxed cheesy mac. And start with a decent box (oxymoron noted) - I bought the "Back to Nature" white cheddar spirals kind. Here is what I added: dried ground mustard seed, garlic (the minced kind from the jar), turkey bacon (the good kind from WH), peas (actually, as I remember now, they were lima beans - but I love the catchy title so let's just pretend they were really peas), and chopped fresh spinach. And a little smoked paprika. Great spice. Some fresh mango cheered up the plate. And me too. It cheered me up too. Because every time my kids eat and more of the food ends up in their tummies than on the floor, this is indeed cause for celebration.

Fort Meyer(s) Lemon

Ah, spring break time. The time of year we make the tough decision about where to go for that glorious week of sand and sun - Scarsdale (yes, the one in New York) or Madison (that's western New Jersey people - which, to be fair, is actually quite lovely). Though we do live here in the Ocean State, our sand experiences tend to come in a box these days (a sandbox that is) and normally end up sounding something like this: "Not in your mouth!" or, "Oh, sweetie we don't throw sand" (kindly stated to some random park kid throwing sand at or near one of our children). Ah, vacation.

So as the Facebook pictures and other news feeds come our way documenting our beloved friends' and family's excursions to places exotic or at least positioned below the Mason-Dixon line (not exactly sure where that is but I'll bet it's south of Warwick), we here in little Rhody have to do what we can to brighten up our stacation-y existence. I ran (ok, I walked quickly) into Whole Foods early this week to get a few things I had forgotten to get or couldn't find at Stop n Shop and low and behold, was confronted by the Meyer Lemon pile. I had to have one. That fruit has perfected yellow. It IS sunshine. If rain slickers really came in that color no one would ever mind a drizzly day. And since I was also aiming to buy some shrimp, it seemed like a good pairing. Why shrimp? Shrimp equals vacation. And vacation equalled - note the past tense - Florida. (Sigh. I miss you you long, delishusly hot, alligator and mediocre Italian restaurant-filled state brimming with cute slash tacky mom-can-we-PLEASE-go-in-there shell shops and opportune afternoons of poolside magazine-flipping.) I digress...

When I was a kid, we rarely ate seafood - which is surprising because back in the 70's I'm pretty sure the Great Lakes were pretty clean, and Toledo, that hot spot of a hometown I so often boast of - Go Mudhens! (see what I mean?) - is nestled in there right close to Lake Erie and not so far from Lake Michigan. Anyhoo - we really only ate seafood when on vacation. (Correction! My badly damaged long-term memory is kicking in here - we did eat fish sticks! With LOADS of tartar sauce! ) And yet I digress again...actual seafood meant one of two things - fried shrimp or shrimp cocktail. My sister (the older one) and I would see it on the menu and ask, a bit nervously I think (it wasn't cheap), "Can we get the shrimp?" Big party when we were given the go-ahead. Pair that with a Shirley Temple and we were over the moon. Sigh. Good times.

Aaaaand back to dinner. I had seen a gorgeous picture in BHG of a pasta dish with shrimp, dill, lemon and spinach - flavors I love. I mostly copied the recipe but because I didn't have "Italian Seasoning" (I put that in quotes because it somehow feels as though it should be in quotes - like it's a bit of a joke or something, as in, "get it, 'Italian. Seasoning?' Ha ha ha ha ha." I had some reasonably fresh (as in: the fuzzy parts could be picked off) oregano and some actually fresh basil and used those instead. I used the Meyer lemon instead of a regular one, and this gave the dish a less acidic taste, which was nice. I also didn't use regular old white fettucine. I almost always buy whole wheat pasta. In this dish, I think (no, I know) I'd have preferred the lighter and more buttery, less starchy quality of white pasta. I also added peas because my kids will eat them. The more green the better, right?

Score one for mom - everyone ate it. Not at the same time, mind you, but everyone ate it. Small victories. Baby steps. Take the win when you can. And as for Florida, well, we'll get back there one day. Sand in toes. Lump in throat. Tiny wrists adorned with fantastic, if a little tacky, pinkish shell creations.

Progressive Dinner

So here's the wacky thing. We managed to eat the same thing for once - an oven-baked potato and egg frittata thing I roughly copied from a magazine - but all at different times. I was of course starving by dinnertime and ate my piece the second it came out of the oven. Piper gobbled hers up once it was no longer steaming, and Maze, well, she took bites here and there while also drawing "tiny bugs" with badly-needing-to-be-sharpened colored pencils, handing out stickers to all of us (cats included) for "doing a good job" (still not sure what we did to merit those), and playing the xylophone (chopsticks and a sushi roller-mat-thing). Arthur ate his two hours later - post-yoga. The meal was actually put together while the girls napped - around 2 p.m., then refrigerated until we were ready to bake it. That's almost as good as a crock pot meal - mixed in the morning, delish by dinner. It's crazy to me how tough it is to get everyone to eat the same thing, at the same time. We're not even dealing with soccer schedules yet (I cringe just writing that) or ballet rehearsals or chess team matches (whatever floats their boats, right?). We're just a fairly boring family of 4 who, aside from work and some occasional yoga, doesn't do a whole lot. So I definitely see the challenges before us - dinners together could get gobbled up by so much other stuff. Writing this blog is reminding me that dinner isn't just something to lovingly create - it's something to lovingly protect.

Fresh, mostly

So I've learned something about fish. It's not supposed to smell fishy. Walk by the seafood case at your fave grocery store. If it smells fishy, keep walkin' past the frustrated lobsters and buy some ground turkey instead. Something else I've learned about fish - when it's fresh, it looks shiny. (But not too shiny as in eeeoooh that's really shiny - that's not a good sign.) Don't buy dull-looking fish. Turns out the shiniest fish in the window this week was flounder. Really thin filets. Here's how we ate 'em...

I sprayed a large ceramic baking dish with olive oil spray and then laid, layed, ok, spread them out, and then squeezed fresh lemon juice liberally over them. Dusted them with a little salt and brushed on a little olive oil. In a small bowl I tossed panko with some parm shavings and pepper, and then sprinkled the mix on top. Here's the best part - they bake in 15 minutes because they're so thin! So while Maze and Pipes were milling about the kitchen mostly naked (still not sure why that was the case because I was at work when they disrobed), Arthur and I ate fish and greens and dammit did we enjoy the meal. So now you're wondering about that delicious looking lasagna, right? That's Amy's Organic - Arthur tried to get the girls to eat it before I got home, but SURPRISE, they wouldn't touch it. Why the surprise? Because last time I made it (ok, microwaved it), they totally gobbled it up. Kids = nuts. They eventually did a fridge-raid and made due on some yogurt, other leftover pasta, some pears, and some of that cheeseless (why is my computer telling me that's not a word?) Rhode Island "pizza."

The large ramekin (that's restaurant talk for smallish-sized bowl) is soup I made yesterday. An easy go-to for those root veggies you bought the last time you went to the farmer's market (maybe like a month ago, when they were actually fresh) and thought looked like something that would be so easy to incorporate into a meal or two (but alas, they're still in the fridge). Here's the how-to on the soup: slice up carrots, beets (they add some nice bite) and sweet potatoes to broth or stock (still don't know the difference) and some ginger (fresh or powdered). Boil until soft and then blend the whole thing (ok, not all at once) with a can of cannelloni (cannolini?) beans, some salt and pepper. Serve with sour cream or creme fraiche and something green like parsley or chives (not pictured). I found this recipe in a magazine recently - BHG I think. (For those not from the midwest, that's Better Homes and Gardens). Anyhoo. Get fresh people or at least, resurrect some veggies from the vault and brew them into something new.

Saucy

I have a certain fondness for coconut milk. And for cans in which a million great spices and something red (chiles I'm guessing) have been shmeared together into some seriously savory paste. And why should I not? The duo turns chicken broth into something exotic. And let's face it, exotic flavors do a lot for us these days. We don't go out. We don't travel. (Ok, we do go to New Jersey.) But we do eat. Tonight was a feed-the-kids-quick-before-someone-explodes-from-low-blood-sugar kind of night. The girls had pasta with red sauce, lima beans (they still don't know they're supposed to find them blech-y, hee hee), and applesauce. Applesauce that Mazie felt should go into her milk. "It'll be so yum mommy!" Ok, then drink it. Seriously, drink it Maze. "Not so yum mommy." You get the picture. Kids ate basic kid shlop. I try to feed all of us real food - but the growing divides between what a one year old, a three year-old, and two well, older people will eat are well, still growing. Sorry kids, grown-ups won tonight... Chicken marinated with lime, soy sauce, basil, sugar, some other stuff Martha told me to include. Grilled. In the rain. It is April people. And noodles. Chinese ones. From a package. The end result: Spicy, Succulent, Saucy. And thank you to the English cucumbers for their crunchy coolness. And to Becca for her crunchy coolness, and for reading my blog!