Life with Children

I have an amazing part-time job as a sitter for 2 of my nephews (& occasionally niece, but she's usually at school while I'm there) while my sister-in-law teaches at the nearby college twice a week. I get to play with the boys, feed them lunch, attempt to get them to nap, and clean up from all of these activities. I get paid, and I get to eat delicious leftovers for lunch. (My sister-in-law is an excellent cook.)

Ji, who is currently 3, is always saying extremely quotable things. (For example on Tuesday he told me that he loves me because I let him use "xissors." Which for the record happened once before this statement. It did happen again several hours after this statement, probably because of this statement. He has my number. When I was in college, a friend in the photo program with me once teased me that I would let a monkey use my camera if the opportunity came up. I would just tell the monkey to be careful.) Today when I asked him to go pick out some books to read (a before nap ritual) he said, "Let's do a scary book. Like Mouse Paint. That one's not scary for people." Then I was left trying to remember if Mouse Paint has a cat or a snake in it. (It's a cat. Or at least hints of cat.)

Ra's humor is more the Buster Keaton type, as he does not say words yet. Or do baby signs if an outstretched hand with fingers opened and closed will suffice. It's amazing the range of things you can express with this one gesture. Banging your feet rhythmically against your high chair also draws attention to your recent lack of food or boredom with the food given to you. We think he's going to be a musical genius. He can just reach the piano keys while standing, and gently picks out a very melodious arrangement. Another pastime of Ra's is transferring food from one place to another. Pieces of bread dropped into bowls of yogurt. Baby food poured out of the container onto the tray to be used as finger paint. Today he got meta and put his bowl of yogurt inside of his bowl of soup. (After dumping most of the soup out in disgust.) He also managed to turn his bottle upside-down while I was holding him and trying to wash dishes at the same time and doused my shirt before I realized what was happening. So much for multitasking.

Usually Ra will play quietly and happily by himself in the bedroom while I lie down with Ji to get him to sleep for his nap around 2 pm. (Sometimes their naps align, but it's rare, like an eclipse.) Today Ji was especially cuddly, stroking my arm and nestling against me. His movements stopped and breathing finally slowed, but I was afraid that if I moved he'd wake up again. Ra decided to get out a toy that makes noise and to squawk loudly himself, and Ji woke up, full of energy. I tried to bribe him to by offering a cookie if he'd lie down with his eyes closed again, and I gathered up Ra to snuggle in bed with us (Ra was not tired, but was willing to cuddle for a bit.) But the damage was done. No nap for Ji today.

Sometimes I try to bring something to do with me. Today I brought the ingredients to make our own graham cracker-like cookies and the animal shaped cookie cutters that I bought at Ikea thinking how much Ji (& my sister Ju) would like them. We made some cookies before lunch and then saved the rest of the dough to finish when K got home from school. K was not content just to use the cookie cutters, however. She had a grander plan in mind. She traced around her hand and made a hand-print cookie. Then she made another one of Ji's hand. Meanwhile Ra, who was mad when I shut the dishwasher (his personal playground. I had to stop him from climbing onto the open door), took the plastic lids that I had given him to play with and hid them inside a pot, in the cupboard he managed to open.

 Can you guess which pan of cookies I decorated with raisins and which one Ji decorated? In case you're wondering, it's Ji's professional opinion that the bottom right shape is a wolf, not a fox. Wolves have fluffy tails, too. The squiggliest shapes are from the pieces between the cookie cutters. I got lazy/creative.

Hand-made cookies! You can find the recipe here. It was very simple and delicious. The dough held up well being rolled out multiple times. It's also vegan, so no raw eggs to worry about when Ji started eating the dough. Although I did have to tell him to stop so we'd have dough to make cookies. (I did double the recipe, and we baked 4 cookie sheets worth.)

Photo Essay

Transcript

Ji and I are going to make episodes for a cooking show. I was experimenting today with taping, and although the camera angle didn't work, you mainly see my chest and Bapu's back while he's eating lunch, I had to share the transcript. Although maybe I'll pull just the audio at some point, as it's hard to convey the way that a 3 year-old says "What?" Also, you have to imagine him making his two-face face the whole time, with one side of his mouth held in a grimace.

Olivia: “You punch cookie dough, I don't punch cookie dough.”

Ji: “What?”

Olivia: “I said, 'You punch cookie dough, I don't punch cookie dough.'”

Ji: “What?”

Olivia: “I roll cookie dough with a rolling pin”

Ji: “Uahh... I punch it!”

Olivia: “You punch it?”

Grocery List

I forgot to buy some misc items this week, and so I started a new grocery list on the fridge. They are:

burnfree
magnets
baby wipes

B came into the kitchen, and read them as one item: burnfree magnetic babywipes. She thought this was odd, but if there was such a thing, I would be the one to know about it.

Think about it for a minute: babywipes that attract poop so that you don't have to wipe, and also don't burn your baby. What a wonderful product that would be!

I also had a conversation with Bapu, my grandfather, about needing more patience. This is what he said: "I would like to be able to buy patience from the store. But you can't, so I buy ice cream instead. Then when I need patience, I eat some ice cream."

Pancakes!!! For Lunch!!!

Grandma G, Ji, and Grandma V:  3 generations bonding with Bisquick!

      My mom came for a visit last week. She was mostly here to see grandkids, but I did get to hang out with her some too. On Saturday she came over with my oldest niece and nephew. M and I had been talking about making pancakes for lunch (after deciding that we should pioneer bagel smoothies: "It's Not Nearly as Bad as it Sounds"), and I thought this would be a fun thing to do with the kiddos. Just as I set the Bisquick down on the counter, Ji materialized next to me and pronounced his desire to help. His first step was scoot a chair to the front of the fridge so that he could reach the freezer, where he knew that there were frozen strawberries. (This kid knows where we keep the good stuff.) I partially defrosted some and let him at them with a butter knife. (I did stress that he could only use a knife if an adult was supervising.) Turns out even the blunt side of the blade can cut through partially frozen strawberries. K was much more interested in making signs for our restaurant. They have their own restaurant, Rosie Rose's, at home. Ji is the cook in their play kitchen and K manages and markets the restaurant. I have eaten many a plastic fruit and vegetable soup there. I am occasionally employed to work in the office at Rosie Rose's, where I take internet orders and balance the books.

      Reader's Digest (which keeps coming in the mail even though Grandma stopped subscribing) had some ideas to liven up pancakes: dividing up the batter and making each a different color with food coloring, using a squeeze bottle to make lacy shapes; that I thought would be fun to try. Instead of just using food coloring, though, I thought we could also use different ingredients. So we made one batch with peanut butter, dyed yellow, and one with strawberries, dyed pink.

      I had gotten a Tolovo Pancake Pen as a gift, and M (check out his new haircut) was the master of pancake creation. He went beyond just letters to pictures using both colors of batter! Notice the lion face on the left below:

      We all enjoyed a hearty lunch of pancakes and scrabbled eggs. Although Ji's request to have ketchup on his pancakes went unanswered. The best part was that Mom volunteered to do all the dishes and cleanup :).

Hanging with the horses while the pancakes cooked. Notice Dell, Ji's nephew.

International Baking Party

A few days ago, my sister and I had a baking party via skype. It was Friday night for me, and I made peanut butter cookies in my kitchen in nyc. It was Saturday afternoon for her, and she made cheesy biscuits in her kitchen in Thailand. They were both delicious, although my cookies were a little dry. I added some milk and some applesauce, which made them less dry but more biscuit like.

We both got a kick out of this illustration from my vintage Joy of Cooking that my brother got me one Christmas:



I don't think that it really describes how to press cookies with a fork.

Hooray for skype!

Plantains and Potatoes--same difference?

So, I recently (meaning yesterday) learned that plantains are known as "potatoes of the air," as well as being in the banana family. It turns out that potatoes (the ones in the dirt) contain potassium in amounts comparable to that found in bananas. This doesn't make me want to start putting chunks of potato into my breakfast cereal, but it does make me feel better about making mashed potatoes for dinner. Maybe we should start calling potatoes "bananas of the ground." Actually, I think the French already call potatoes the apples of the earth...but that's comparing apples and bananas!

S'More!

I am currently suffering from a s'more obsession. I've had one other prolonged episode, when I was in college. Preparing them in the microwave wasn't cutting it, so I would hold them over the burners of the stove with a fork...

This time, I have discovered the joys of owning a toaster over. I have been making s'mores under the broiler. After much experimentation, I have decided several things:

-the toaster over solves the problem of how to get the chocolate to melt--you can put the cracker, topped with chocolate chips and marshmallow, on a pan and as the marshmallow crisps the chocolate will melt. Just be sure not to leave it in too long, or the cracker will burn.

-mini marshmallows work better than regular ones. Regular ones tend to puff up so much that they fall over, and only a little bit at the top is browned. Mini ones provide more overall crispiness. Although strawberry flavored marshmallows are an interesting idea, and are fun to eat raw, plain ones are better on s'mores.

-putting peanut butter on the cracker before adding the chocolate chips and marshmallows not only holds everything on, but also tastes great. (Not to mention adding protein.) Freshly ground pb is the best, and is even better when lightly toasted.

-fruit is another fun add-on. I have tried blackberries, which were good, and just recently pomegranate seeds, which are fabulous.

-using Anna's Ginger Thins instead of graham crackers is also a delicious, international, variation, and very Christmas-y.

We'll see how long this obsession lasts. It started on my birthday, when my roommate asked what dessert I'd like. I am on my 2nd bag of marshmallows, box of graham crackers, and bag of chocolate chips (although I tend to eat them all separately, too).

I'm noticing that a lot of my blog posts are about food...what does that say about my life?

The Day the Garlic Press Died

So, I was cooking lentils today, and wanted to add some garlic and onions. I got out my garlic press, and a bulb of garlic. One clove went through fine, but when I put in the second clove to press, the press cracked! I didn't cut off the tough end, like I usually do, and I guess it was just too much for the press. I'm sad, because I got this garlic press when my oldest (though younger than me by 18 months) brother came to visit me 7 years ago--has it really been that long? I was a sophomore in college, and he was shocked to find that I didn't own a garlic press. (He cooked for me while he was there. Weeks later I found all my hot pads on top of the refrigerator. Which, since he is 6'6" is probably a reasonable place for him to keep them.) So he, my best friend/roommate, and I went out and bought a garlic press.

We didn't get a fancy one that doubled back to clean itself. We just got a basic one. And today it died. A noble death. At least no pieces ended up in the lentils. (I hope!)

Rosemary & Thyme

Today's post is about baking, which I've been doing a lot of lately. You're probably wondering what the title and this photo of my Rosemary plant have to do with baking.

Well, recently I've enjoyed gourmet food from two wonderful places, Lil Treats, and Sacred Sweets, and both had herbs added to their desserts, which gave an extra dimension to the flavor. I really loved the vanilla thyme loaf. I've been baking recently, and experimenting with cookie recipes, so I decided to try adding rosemary to cookies, since I have a rosemary plant. (Thanks to a lovely friend!) I made chocolate chip oatmeal cookies, and added some fresh rosemary as a garnish (before baking). I used a cookie recipe from the 1964 edition of Joy of Cooking that my brother found for me one Christmas. (Which is a literary delight in and of itself, in the section on canning it says, "the pleasure of serving the fruits of your labor comparable only to a clear conscience or a very becoming hat.")

I thought the rosemary-chocolate-chip-oatmeal cookies turned out very well, and really liked the flavor combination.



I also made some bread the other day, which I haven't done in a long time. It didn't take too long, and is the hearty, dense kind of whole wheat bread that I prefer. Here's the recipe, one that my great-great-grandmother reportedly used. Here's the recipe.

Stella's favorite bread:

Into 3 C warm milk (can use 1/2 water) put
2 T honey, brown sugar or molasses
Add 1 T butter
1 package yeast
1 T salt

Add 6 or 7 C fine ground whole wheat flour.
Just enough so that dough does not stick to the
sides of the bowl. Do not make too stiff.

Knead 10 min. or more

Shape into loaves, put in greased pans, half full.
Cover and let rise in a warm place (80*F) until almost
doubled in size.

Bake at 375*F for 40min-1hr (depending on size of loaf)

A cup of wheat germ can be substituted for flour.

Makes 2 loaves.

I made the short list

You would think that since I'm in my late 20s, am done with college, and have held the same job in the "real world" for at least 2 years, I would be comfortable thinking of myself as an adult. But much of the time, I'm not. I still often feel like a 17 year old who is waiting for life to really start. But every once in awhile, something happens to me, or I do something, that make me feel like I really am a grown up after all, and life is the way I imagined adulthood would be.

One of these moments come one summer in college, when a friend and I got together and canned cherries. When I was little, my mom canned every summer, and often we'd get together with her sisters and mother and have a huge canning party. My brothers and I would help wash the fruit, slice or pit it, and neatly slide each piece into the jars under adult supervision. So by doing the whole process myself, including the actual sealing of the jars, I was taking my place as one of the women. When I told my grandmother that I wanted to can, she gave me her old canning pot and jars. I looked through some cookbooks and searched online, and then called my grandmother to find out her exact method. (For one thing, she uses much less sugar than most recipes call for.) Then my friend and I bought a couple of boxes of cherries and other supplies, and spent a Saturday afternoon canning together. A smaller group than my aunts and grandmother, but a enjoyable one none the less.

Home canned fruit is so much riper and tastier than store canned. My grandmother had cherry trees for many years, and I so she would often serve us bowls of home canned cherries, giving us an old lid from a jar to spit the seeds into. My mother would usually get some of the cherries from my grandmother's tree, and we had apricot trees. She would can apricots and also make jam, which she would give out at Christmas. We loved all the canned fruit, there would usually be peaches and pears too, but she'd tell us that we needed to save most of it to eat for the winter. When I canned cherries, I probably only did about 9 bottles. I did try and keep the last one for a special occasion, but it never quite came. I think I finally ate it before I moved, so I wouldn't have to worry about it breaking during the move.

A few months ago, I was telling my dad about another adult moment I had experienced. (Now I can't remember what it was exactly.) He shared with me his one of his pivotal adult moments. It was when he was discussing sprinkler systems with a friend, since he was going to have one installed in the front yard of the house he'd recently bought. His friend pointed out that this was something only adults would talk about. I laughed about it, but was also a little shocked, because at that point in his life, he already had 3 children, of whom I at age 5 was the oldest! I always assumed that having children would make you feel permanently like an adult, but I guess I was wrong. Of course, I also assumed that marriage and children would come naturally and in my early 20s. That I would be a mother before I was an aunt. (I'm not married, and don't have children, and am not yet an aunt. But I may be an aunt before I am married, and I decided one day on the subway that if I don't get married, I'll still adopt at least one child.)

Tonight I got a call from the husband of that very same friend that I canned cherries with. At first I was surprised that he was the one calling me, but suddenly I realized what he must be calling about. Their first baby had been born! (This is the baby that I made the pink sweater for.) She arrived a couple days ago, and is now at home with her parents. Both mama and baby are doing well, and dad was dispatched to call with the news. I forget her size and weight, but her middle name is Eve.

This is the first time that I have been called personally by proud new parents! Usually I find out later by email (or blog) or through a family member passing on the news. But I'm a grown up now, and have close friends who are having babies, and are calling (or having their husbands call) to tell me about it. Hurray!

Pumkin Pie! Pumpkin Pie!

I love Thanksgiving. I love that it's about family and gratitude, that there are special foods that we always have, that it's not commercialized.

Did you know that Thanksgiving was instituted as a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, during the civil war? Here's a link to his proclamation:

http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/speeches/thanks.htm

Growing up, Thanksgiving was my dad's holiday. He usually made the food, with a little help from us kids, and my mom got the morning off. My brothers made mashed potatoes, jello, and rolls. I always wanted to make the pies--using Libby's pumpkin pie mix and frozen pie crusts. (Once we gave a pie to our neighbors across the street, and he complemented the pie crust, saying that it was better than many grown woman's that he'd had. I had to tell him that it was store bought. Someday I would like to master pie crusts and be a real woman.) We'd cook all morning, eat in the early afternoon, and then watch movies and play games, going back for more food as we felt like it. There is also a important family story about my sister having to do with Thanksgiving. My mother points to this incident as the beginning of my sister's vegetarianism, at age 4. She took one look at the turkey and announced "I don't eat dragon."

During college, I spent many Thanksgivings at my aunt & uncle's, driving up to their house with some of their friends who lived near me. We'd often have the main meal at their house, then pack up the leftovers and spend the remainder of the weekend camping in the mountains, in a cabin with some electricity and a wood stove. We'd go hiking and play in the snow.

This year I went to spend Thanksgiving with many members of my extended family & one of my brothers. My aunt and my grandmother divided up the cooking. My aunt and her family made the pies and rolls, and my grandmother made most of the rest. I decided to make a cranberry chutney from my good friend/adopted cousin's family, where I spent Thanksgiving a couple years ago. I also asked my dad for his stuffing recipe, he makes his own every year that is unlike any that I've had elsewhere, and I missed it. It turns out that it's based on what his grandmother used to make, so it's a family tradition that I can now carry on.

We had a plethora of pies--my aunt, uncle, and cousins made peach, apple, cherry, lemon meringue, banana creme, pumpkin, and a fruit tart! Here's photos of them working. Each child got to roll out at least one crust. (So they are real children!):




Zesting a lemon



preparing fruit for the fruit tart




the key to a good photo is to hold something right in front of your face.


my helper with the cranberry chutney. I love blenders!


Peach pie, prior to baking.


cherry! sweet, not sour.


mini gluten-free pies & pumpkin.


2 different apple--crust and crumb topping


can you tell which dressing I made?


Here's the recipe for the cranberry chutney, thanks to Kim!


-1 LB. Cranberries
-1 unpeeled apple
-1 whole orange (skin and all)
-2 C. Sugar
-1 small can crushed pineapple
-handful of pecans


grind cranb. apples and orange and pecans
add pineapple and sugar
stir alottt
make well in advance
refrigerate

I didn't add all of the sugar, though.

I'd give you the stuffing recipe, but I'd probably have
to kill you. ;) Just kidding, but I think I'll keep it a
family secret for now.

Adventures in Food

There's a farmer's market a few blocks from where I live, every Saturday. I'm enjoying the fresh produce and experimenting with new recipes.










The other night, I was talking to my sister on Skype. I told her that I needed to go so that I could make dinner. She suggested that I just take my laptop into the kitchen and keep talking while I cooked. So I did, and I had my own cooking show! (Slow moving though it was.) I made a beautiful, red stir fry with fresh beets!

Here is some more colorful produce: