Life List of Food

While I was pregnant with Charlie, I was inspired by Maggie Mason and her Mighty Life List to write a little life list of my own. Number one on my list? Become a mom. BAM, done! (Yes, I realize this is cheating.) My current list only has 11 items on it. Ok, 12 now as I just added "Put more things on your life list." Some of these things include: getting published somewhere, taking a voice lesson again, singing in a choir, making a blanket out of Charlie's pajamas as well as various trips around the globe.

So, today, I decided I should make a life list that I want to eat.

1. Try foie gras

I know, I know. The poor defenseless geese and I am horrible person for even being interested in such a thing. But when Grant came home to tell me about how AMAZING it was at his lunch at Bouchon in Yountville, CA, I decided that I get to try it too. I should also point out that after lunch he had a one hour deep tissue massage at a fancy-pants spa in Napa. This was on the same day that I had whatever leftovers I could find in our fridge and then after that took our baby to Costco to by diapers. So, it was almost the same. Except it wasn't. Open wide goosey-goosey.

2. Try chicken-fried steak and biscuits

There is something so American about this, in a sad, salty, over-sized, monochromatic kind of way. But come on! It's deep-fried steak!

I don't know, apparently I have a death wish.

3. Make Thanksgiving dinner

Those who know me well know that I make my pumpkin pies from scratch. Like, from a an actual pumpkin and no can opener. (I also make my crust from scratch using an awesome recipe that I link to here.) Sure, it is a bit more time-consuming but the difference in taste makes it all worth it. But, I have never hosted Thanksgiving, or cooked a turkey on my own for that matter. It is incredibly intimidating but I feel it must me done even though I wouldn't be surprised if the meal ended much like that scene in "A Christmas Story." Fa-rah-rah-rah-rah, rah-rah, rah-rah...

In theory, I will add to this list and revisit each one as I complete it. But honestly, I have a 6 month old baby who is about 4 seconds away from crawling so let's be real people!

Post Baby Body

Roughly once a month I go on a diet/cleanse of sorts. Basically, for one week I commit myself to eating healthy and by this I mean, high protein, lots of veggies, low carb and no sweets. I eat three decent meals a day and a snack between each meal. This coupled with the fact that I try to exercise at least four times a week, it works and I have lost the baby weight easily. The thing is, when I was pregnant, I gained a lot of weight. Now, I had a big boy. But you can't blame nearly 50 pounds of weight gain on a 9 pound 3 ounce baby. What you can blame it on are the cookies, ice cream, endless bags of salty snacks and the gallons of milk I could consume in a single sitting. I was nervous as I neared the end of my pregnancy that 1. I would break the scale and 2. The weight would never come off.

As a stay at home mom now, I decided very soon after he was born that I would not let the aforementioned "number 2" happen. I had no excuse to not get up off my ass and do something physical during the day. Even if it just meant a walk around the block with my baby in tow. Admittedly, I do have my days where I just can't seem to peel my eyes away from bad daytime TV while my son sleeps, especially if there is a Real Housewives of New Jersey Marathon on or something. (I loves me some Manzos.) But seriously, I didn't let it number 2 happen.

There are parts of my body that are not the same as they used to be and quite frankly did not change for the better. For example, my muscle tone is basically non existent these days and my tummy has been replaced with a bowl of gelatin that is covered in fading stretchmarks. However, there are parts of my body that, dare I say it, I might even like better post pregnancy. For one, I weigh less today than I did before I got pregnant and this pleases me. And it seems the unbelievable widening of my stomach, ass and thighs may have actually put some things back in a better place than they were in before. I actually have some curves now. This makes me and the jeans I wear very happy as well.

In the past, my attempts to diet always failed because I liked food too much. Food makes me genuinely happy and not in a "food is not love" kind of way, okay? But, food excites me and I want to try it all. And sometimes that means things that are unhealthy. But I don't want to worry about eating that kind of stuff sometimes, because I truly believe in the very clique phrase, "everything in moderation." In fact, I think stressing yourself out about what you eat is likely more detrimental to your health than just eating a freaking piece of flourless chocolate cake or fried chicken once and a while.

But, I am getting older and things are quite bouncing back like they used to. Things are starting to "go out" on me, for example my back, my knees, my brain. And because I am aware of this, I exercise regularly and roughly once monthly, I diet/exercise/detox/get-really-sick-of-salad to stay on track and stay happy. Call it what you will, it works for me. I feel good about myself and I can eat the things I want once in a while without feeling guilty. Most importantly, when I do it this way, I am way less likely to cheat because I can do anything for 6 days. Right?

Well, accept this last go around but come on now, look at these things!



Trader Joe's is the devil. One giant, delicious devil.

More Rice

Like most babies, I'm sure my first words were simple ones. "Mama" and "Dada," probably. Well, those and for some reason, "Motorcycle," pronounced "Mo-cycle." My parents said it just came out of me one day for no reason at all. These single words were quickly replaced with two word phrases which brings me to the story my Dad could tell over and over again. (And he does.) When I was a baby, my favorite food was rice. My parents would give me a little pile on the tray of my high chair and like a ravenous animal, I would attack the pile as though I hadn't eaten in weeks. Due to my lack of fine motor skills and poor hand/eye coordination, most of the rice ended up on the floor, in my lap, in my hair and in my eyes. My parents remember laughing hysterically as I would slam my flat palm, speckled with rice kernels, against my mouth in the hopes that a few would make it onto my tongue. And, as soon as I would look down at my empty tray I would look up at my parents and say, "More rice!" And if more rice was not in front of me the moment I demanded it I would ask for it again, louder and with more conviction.

"Moooorrre riiiiice!"

"MOOOOOORRRRRE RIIIIIIIICE!!!!!!!!"

So, I few days ago, we gave Charlie his first sampling of solid food. And naturally, we chose rice. Brown rice cereal to be exact.

He was a bit hesitant at first.



Then he decided he wanted to hold the spoon. Shortly after this, he proceeded to gag himself with it.



All in all, I think he enjoyed himself.



That's my boy.

S is for Squash

It goes without saying that your life changes drastically when you become a homeowner. In one sense, it is exciting to walk around your new home, touching your walls, banisters, fixtures and baseboards all the while thinking to yourself, "Damn, I own this!" But then, your baseboards fall off or the banister starts coming loose, AGAIN. The toilets keep clogging and the lights won't stop flickering and once again, you think to yourself, "DAMN! I own this!" And then you jokingly say to your husband, "Can't we just call our landlord to come fix this?" Ha ha NOPE.

And then you start to cry.

It is crazy and super scary to think about barely having enough money to take care of all the basic stuff, not to mention any emergencies that should come up. But somehow, you figure it out and make it work. You just have to cut some corners and get creative. This came into play last month when I had three close friends with birthdays in July.

It all started with a garden my mom planted in her backyard. She planted the garden with the intention of it being hers and Charlie's garden. Which makes perfect sense that she did it now. I mean, he is unable to sit upright unassisted but you should see that boy wield a trowel. AMAZING! So, in Gammy's and Charlie's garden, she planted summer squash. With the proper conditions, squash plants can grow like weeds. If you don't pick them fast enough, pretty soon you will be left with giant, dinosaur squash that will leave much to be desired in the area of flavor. This was exactly what happened over a weekend my parents were out of town: they returned home to gigantic gourds taking over the yard.



I asked my mom if she was planning on using any of the squash for anything and she said I was welcome to them. I took one and figured since it was in the same family, yellow squash would have the same effect on bread that zucchini does. And the squash was surely big enough for three loaves of bread—one for each of my friends.

The recipe is one that my family has been using for years. Growing up, my mom watched a show called "People Are Talking." On one episode, they featured a recipe for "A to Z Bread." In essence, it is a basic bread recipe to which you can add an "A to Z" ingredient of your choosing. And for each letter of the alphabet, there is a suggested ingredient. It's the only recipe my family ever used for banana, pumpkin or zucchini bread. (I don't remember what the suggestion for "X" was and quite frankly, I would like to keep it that way.) The recipe still folds along the original creases my mom made in it. Today, those folds are barely hanging on by what's left of the remaining fibers of paper. Oil stains and dried bits of bread batter cover the page. It's gross, but one of my favorite things at my parents' house.

A to Z Bread

3 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
3 tsp cinnamon (The recipe says it is optional but in my opinion, absolutely not. Love the stuff. I'd take a bath in it if I could.)
½ tsp baking powder
3 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups sugar
2 cups A to Z
3 tsp vanilla

Sift the dry ingredients together and set aside. In a separate bowl add sugar, eggs and oil and cream together well. Add "A to Z" ingredient of your choice and vanilla to sugar mixture and mix. Add the dry ingredients slowly until everything is incorporated.

Grease and flour two loaf pans and pour half of the batter into each pan. Bake the bread at 325 degrees for one hour.

I promise you it will be worth it, and your whole house will smell like my childhood.

Shameless Plug!!!

My dear friends, Melia and Darren enjoy so many of my favorite things. To name a few, they appreciate pop culture trends of the 90's, participate fully in costume and theme parties but most importantly, they eat, they drink and they are about to be married. And they have decided to celebrate that by writing about it here:

http://www.eatdrinkandbemarried.com/

Take a peek when you get a chance.

School Lunch

I have been known to be fairly competitive, especially in the area of academics. In college, Grant and I took three sections of English together. This means we wrote our own versions of the exact same assignments over the course of three semesters. I could hold my own but my husband was and still is generally a better writer than me and he always scored just a little bit higher than me on each of our papers. It fried me every time. I remember one assignment in particular. It was a research paper which I worked my ass off to complete. Long hours were spent in the library going over and over the material until finally I was satisfied. Grant, who went on to get his degree in journalism, always worked better under pressure and likely busted his paper out in a day or two.

When our papers were graded and returned I cautiously looked at my score. 98 percent. O to the M to the G! Eat that, Grant Shellen! Victory is MINE!!!

"What did you get?" I asked him.

"I don't want to say," he said.

Do you want to know why? Because Grant got 100 percent. ONE. HUNDRED. PERCENT. That means that there was nothing, NOTHING, about his paper that could be improved upon.

Ass.

Anyway, I have grown as an adult (clearly) and I am not as competitive with my husband as I used to be and really it does help being married to someone who gets 100 percent on research papers, for editing purposes. Grant tells me he thinks I'm a pretty good writer. He even thinks I could write a book someday. So I'll let you in on a little secret: I think I might actually try. But my worry is that I will never be able to put something out there that is a "100 percent" which is also known as "perfection."

So I threw my back out today and my absolutely perfect husband came home early to help take care of our boy, cook dinner and assist me with general movement. While laying on an ice pack in bed, I picked up Anne Lamott's book on writing, "Bird by Bird," and happened to start reading the chapter on "perfection." In it she says

"perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won't have to die."

She then reminds her readers that the reality is that our death is inevitable and that "people who aren't even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you." Amazing advice.

But, Heather, you have a food blog? What the hell is the point of all of this?

I know, I know, I'm getting there. Just bear with me.

Lamott also talks about the importance of having a "shitty first draft." It is the catalyst to your second and third and so on. The need to constantly produce perfection does not allow for the very important shitty first draft to be written. One exercise she often does with her students is to write about school lunch. That's right, for 30 minutes, just write anything you want about brown bagging it to school. According to her, you can learn a lot about your family and where you came from with this topic. So I present to you my version of "School Lunch." I cannot guarantee 100% but I can guarantee it is absolutely my shitty first draft.

School Lunch

I never thought that that as an adult I would thank my mom for the kind of lunches she packed for my sister and I while growing up. For one, we were the only kids at school whose sandwiches were made on wheat bread. Being as young as I was, I was unaware of the the importance of whole grain in your diet. I was, however, aware of the importance of being cool and more often than not, cool equated to bread that was white in color, not brown. Then there was the beverages she packed for us. It was always all natural, 100 percent fruit juice. Apple, pineapple or orange.

What the hell was that about? Where was all the red dye number 3? How about the high-fructose corn syrup? The stuff that is so far from juice, it can't even be called juice but "fruit drink," rather? I remember the one time we begged and begged my mother to buy us the ever popular 1980s beverage, "Squeeze-its." These are the drinks that Grant has, I believe, correctly renamed "Sting-its" because of the lasting sting the drink would leave in your throat. I imagine that sting is due to the crack cocaine the drinks are clearly laced with. She finally caved into our incessant nagging and bought us some. I think she bought us strawberry or purple or unicorn farts and gumdrop flavor, I can't remember. What I do remember is that they were completely disgusting. We never admitted it to Mom, of course. I was never so happy to see apple juice in all my life after we choked those down.

We also rarely found desserts in our sacks at lunch. As a kid, I did not see why lunch should be made up of anything else but pie and gummy bears. My mom thought otherwise. I suppose it is because she thought dessert should be saved for a special occasion and not something that was to be expected. I remember one particular time in kindergarten when my mom packed me two whole marshmallows as a treat. I could not wait for lunch; they were all I could think about. I remember thinking about how I was going to eat them. There were two so I could eat one at the beginning of lunch and one at the end. Or, I could save them both for last. That was probably what I decided on. I knew that things like marshmallows in my lunch box were a rare occurrence and I wanted to savor every minute of them.

However, being the very complacent and quite child that I was, I was easily coerced by my classmates. Before I knew it, two kids had convinced me to give them my marshmallows. I remember they asked me if I would "share." Oh, how they manipulated me with their words! Share! Share my ass! Those little punks just stole my pillowy treats right out from under my nose! I went home that night in tears and told my mom what happened. I was convinced that I had missed out and feared their would not be another treat in my near future. The next day before school, my mom told me she packed me two more marshmallows and this time, I was not "share" them with anyone. In fact, if I was feeling threatened in anyway or if I feared for the life of my marshmallows, I was to go to the back of the playground and eat them first before anyone saw if I had to because they were MY marshmallows. And that was exactly what I did. I stuffed both marshmallows in my mouth and chewed like hell to get them down before anyone even noticed me. They were awesome and so is my mom.

Last Supper

I fear I may have eaten my last meal. I know this because after this meal, I am sure to perish. I think it would be hard not to after consuming a meal that starts with a pound of bacon. And the part of the bacon that is used is not the meat, but the fat that is rendered from it. They say that everything is better with bacon, and my friends: this includes fried chicken.

Let me back up for a minute. This meal begins 24 hours before cook time as the chicken is soaked in a briny bath of buttermilk, an onion and salt. The breading is a simple mix of flour, old bay seasoning, poultry seasoning, black pepper, Nature's Seasons, one or two teaspoons of sugar to help the coating stick to the chicken, and of course the experienced and loving hands of a mom who has spent years perfecting the recipe (thank you Carolyn Poppe!)






Now onto the part about the bacon—the part we would rather not think about. Once brined and breaded, the perfectly moist chicken is fried in a sinful combination of 1/4 cup of vegetable oil, a stick of butter and the bacon fat. But now you are presented with a problem: an entire plate of bacon, crisped to perfection. A plate of bacon that has served its purpose but now has no place in the meal. It is a problem with a simple solution, which is to consume the bacon as a pre—fried chicken snack, naturally. Judge all you want, but we ate it not because we wanted to but because there are starving children in Africa or China or some crap like that and it is just not responsible to waste. So yes, I ate the bacon (for the kids.)



When the chicken is nice and golden brown on both sides, place the pieces on a paper bag on a cookie sheet and place the oven to cook the chicken through.



By the way, you will notice I did not include a picture of what the paper bag looked like after the chicken was finished off in the oven because, well, what you don't know can't hurt you. Well, in this case it can in the form of clogging your arteries but that is neither here nor there. Anyway, here is what it looks like when you are done. Please resist licking your monitor:



And to go along with this this amazing dish, we made mac and cheese, homemade biscuits, pan gravy and cole slaw. Because, you know what? I say go big or go home. As I said, this was clearly my last meal. So my friends, I bid you farewell. Dear Lord, it was worth it, though.