Simple is Best

Every single time I make these drumsticks, I wonder why I don't think to make them on those nights when

a) BART is delayed
b) I answered my phone at work five minutes before I have to catch the 5:10 train
c) Opened up my son's backpack to discover an insane amount of homework
d) I can't muster the strength to make dinner

This dinner doesn't get any simpler. It's easy enough, my kids cheer when I make it, and I always seem to have the ingredients in my fridge or freezer. Behold! The Wonder Dinner guaranteed to stop you from putting your favorite take out joint on speed dial (not that there is anything wrong with that... Hola La Corneta!) 


Apricot-glazed drumsticks: Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cover a cookie sheet with foil and lightly cover non-stick cooking spray. Place 6-8 drumsticks on the pan and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Put two heaping spoonfuls of apricot preserves in a small bowl and brush it over the drumsticks. After 15 minutes of roasting, flip over the drumsticks and brush them with more preserves. Roast for another 15 minutes.

Sauteed sugar snap peas: Heat a few glugs of olive oil, a pat of butter and a pinch of chili pepper flakes in a skillet and sautee sugar snap peas till slightly tender, about 7 minutes.

Warmed baguette: Wrap a store bought baguette in foil and throw it in the oven with the drumsticks. Remove it when the drumsticks are done.

I realize this isn't gourmet, but it's homemade and as my mom would say, "There is plenty of green on the plate." The kids were infinitely more thrilled with this meal than with my attempts to convince them that Ratatouille is actually not a rat, but a delicious vegetable stew. They didn't buy it.

Necessity is the Mother of Substitution

"Sawry!!"

Remember the scene in the 'Great Muppet Caper' when Fozzie is going over his checklist as the gang prepares to catch the thieves who were plotting to steal the Baseball Diamond? The conversation went like this:

Fozzie: Frisbee?

Spencer: It's lost

Fozzie: Wax lips?

Floyd: Man I just had 'em

Fozzie: Yo-yo?

Janice: Fer sure

Fozzie: Peanut butter?

Floyd: Animal ate it.

Animal: Saw-ry!

This was the scene in my kitchen this evening as I started to make Soba noodles with Peanut Sauce for dinner. I *thought* we had peanut butter but my husband apparently put the jar back in the fridge with about two tablespoons left inside. I considered throwing a Monster-like tantrum, but necessity is the mother of substitution, so I scanned the fridge and pulled out a long forgotten jar of almond butter. Invoking my best Tim "This Concerns Me" Gunn, I made it work.

I used to be the kind of person where if I didn't have exactly what was called for in the recipe, I would abandon ship immediately. If the recipe called for red peppercorns, I scoured every spice store on the Internet looking for them. If a recipe called for dried porcini mushrooms, I was calling every Consentino's in the tri-state area - it seriously never occurred to me to use fresh porcini mushrooms. I just didn't know how to wing it. 

But I've upped my game in the past few years and can say that an empty jar of peanut butter wasn't going to slow me down. I just made do with what I had and it turned out pretty good. The sauce was a little thinner than I wanted, so next time I won't add so much water.

Hash Leftovers A Go Go

Prepping the cabbage

We may have exhausted our corned beef quota for the season, but there is only one way (in my opinion) to use up the leftovers - Corned Beef Hash. I had a sneaking suspicion this would be a hit because my kids have never met a salted, cured meat they didn't like.

There are a zillion ways to make this dish, but I simply sauteed a small chopped onion and one diced red bell pepper in about two tablespoon of canola oil till soft. Then I added two cups of chopped corned beef, two cups chopped roasted cabbage and two cups diced cooked potatoes and let it warm through, browning and crisping the potatoes along the way. The adults fried an egg and plopped it on top of their bowls, but the kids inhaled theirs with a side of When Will You Be Making This Again?

You Could Totally Make That

If you were to ever come along with my mom and I as we shopped together you would think we were nuts for the way we cluck our tongues and say, "Tsk... you could totally make that," to each other as we walk through a store. If we're in a fabric store and stop to browse through patterns, she'll  mutter, "Tsk... you could totally make that." As we stroll through Cost Plus and admire a hand-knit cowl she'll say to me in passing, "Tsk, you could totally make that."

And you know what? I could totally make those things if I had all the time in the world and no commitments and a staff of three thousand (I'm talking to you, Martha Stewart).

Still I love how we enable each other, often to the point of goading. Sometimes I'll bite and go for a project that is out of my league (and occasionally knock it out of the ballpark) and other times the project that I thought I could do in my spare time sits there as a reminder of how little time I do actually have and maybe I could manage it better.

The point of this long-winded rant is that last week I bought a bagged kale salad mix at a fairly high-end grocery store in my neighborhood. It looked good and I thought it might save me a few minutes in the kitchen one day. Sure enough, it did save me time but the dressing was so overly sweet that I threw it out and made my own quick dressing by copying the ingredients on the back of the bag and omitting the sugar. I could practically hear my mom say, "You could totally make this."

So a few days later I had a bunch of kale in the fridge and a lot veggies leftover from our New Years resolution week. I put the salad together and not only did I knock it out of the park in terms of taste, but it gained another fan - my two year old.

I sat down with her so we could eat our lunches together, she with her peanut butter and jelly sandwich, cheese crackers and sugar snap peas and I with my salad. I got up for a moment to get us a drink to have with our lunches and when I came back, I saw this:

And this 

(Disclaimer: No chocolate chips were used in the taking of these pictures)

And this

I have no explanation for this other than the Rapture is coming, ya'll.

Kale Salad With the Works (aka You Could Totally Do This On Your Own Without a Recipe)

1 bunch kale, washed and torn into bite-size pieces
1 handful chopped red cabbage
1 shredded carrot
1 handful pomegranate seeds
1/2 can garbanzo beans, drained
1 quarter of a preserved lemon, chopped fine

Dressing (shake in a jar to combine):
1 lemon, squeezed
2 Tbls. EVOO
1-2 drops of sesame oil
1 Tsp. sesame seeds, toasted
Few drops of hot sauce
1 Tbls. rice vinegar
2 green onions, finely chopped
salt and pepper to taste

Mix the veggies in a bowl and toss with dressing. Let it sit for 30 minutes in the fridge before eating. The lemon does something magical to the kale to make it softer. If you happen to have a two year old nearby, leave them with this salad alone in a room and watch quietly from around the corner. It's like watching a leprechaun find his pot of gold. Seriously.

Mission Impossible: Impossible Pie

The evening started out on a bad note, BART was delayed due to a protest at one of the stations and the kids and I ended up getting home later than planned. This is often the kiss of death for any meal that I have planned because if I get in that door late - even with a husband that will play with the kids and distract them from the kitchen - things go downhill fast. Not only was I on single parent duty that night, but I was late getting home! I soldiered on because there is nothing like a childhood craving to make me dig in my heels a little harder to get what I want.

I have no idea what made me suddenly want an Impossible Pie, but boy did I want one. The Impossible Pie was on heavy dinner rotation in my house growing up and I loved them all. I am sure my mother loved them because it was a throw together sort of dish - take your leftovers, add some cheese to it, put it in a greased pie dish, and pour Bisquick and eggs over the filling and dinner is done. I can even remember the white Pyrex pie plate coming out of the oven and wondering which delicious cheesy filling my mom had chosen for dinner that night.

A little history on how the Impossible Pie came to be. In 1981 the Bisquick company celebrated their 50th anniversary by publishing a cookbook of old and new recipes, including "a pie that did the impossible - formed its own crust as it baked." 

The Impossible Coconut Pie and Impossible Bacon Pie were the first recipes published in that book and homemakers across America quickly adapted the recipe to fit what their families would eat and sent in their recipes (with over 100 varieties!) to the Bisquick company for publication. And this was before the Internet, people! These industrious folks snail-mailed their own variations on the recipe to the company. Now we just blog about it. Crazy. The Bisquick company published these booklets for sale at grocery stores. My mom picked one up during a shopping trip and a regular rotation dish was born in our house.

So flash forward 30 years and there I was craving an Impossible Pie. I walked in the front door at 6:15 PM, flicked the oven on to 400 degrees and quickly got to work. Instead of using Bisquick, I subbed in Trader Joe's Multigrain Baking & Pancake Mix, the measurements from Bisquick to TJ's mix are exact. I mixed in a  combination of Gruyère and Monterey Jack cheeses, leftover chopped chicken and some left over steamed broccoli. I poured the TJ's mix over the filling and popped it in the oven for 30 minutes as promised. I served this alongside a small salad of avocado with cherry tomatoes. The kids loved it. And here I was thinking that they would just push it aside, but they both ate decent portions and I just sat there marveling how just one bite of that pie could transport me back to my childhood kitchen on Shawnee Lane, watching my mom bop around the kitchen while singing along to Alicia Bridges' "I Love the Nightlife" on the record player.

Thanks for the memories, Impossible Pie.

SAHM Chronicles: Mommy's Little Helper

I wish I could say that mommy's little helper was an episode of Caillou or a cold glass of Contadino sparkling Pinot Grigio (side note, if you have not tried this delight in a bottle, get thee to Trader Joe's right away!). But sadly the item that gets the most play in my dinners is this

I buy it at Costco and without a doubt it is the most used condiment in my everyday cooking. There are so many great things about this bouillon - it's organic, it comes in a tidy glass jar that can be recycled as opposed to boxes of stock that cannot, and best of all?  You measure out one teaspoon per one cup of water which means that my 16 oz jar yields 96 cups worth of stock. I mean what is not to love*?

*This post was not paid for by the Better than Bouillon folks. Just raving is all I am doing.

Dinner fail

Last night we had ratatouille with egg pasta made with fresh vegetables from the farmers market, you couldn't get more organic and fresher than this (did my kids eat it? No way). But Geoff and I did, we lapped our bowls and greedily arranged lunches for the next day with the leftovers.

And then you have a day like today. A mere 24 hours after VegFest I had what I consider a dinner fail.

Sometimes the weather thwarts the greatest of plans - even dinner plans. I had big dreams to use up the basil, the yellow wax beans with some salmon from Trader Joe's. But an unseasonable June storm came through the Bay Area and I had to put the salmon on hold. I opened the freezer with no plan and saw my stash of frozen Trader Joe's orange chicken, frozen brown rice and those wax beans in the fridge. Dinner was done. The kids loved it - naturally and I got to use my get out of jail free card. I consider it a dinner fail because god knows what is in that "chicken", but then again, we all sat down together and ate dinner together and isn't that what it's all about? I do believe it is.

Obsessed with: Everyday Food

Majority of my dinners are planned out of looking at a few blogs and with my collection of Everyday Food magazines. My mother gave me a subscription in 2009 and I quickly fell in love. They clearly know the audience (which I feel is me at times, specifically - how did you know I wanted to make lemon curd??). In the past I'd buy a few issues on eBay or buy some at a garage sale or thrift store. But I truly hit the jackpot a few weeks ago. I was with my mother in law in Sonoma cruising our favorite thrift store, the Church Mouse and I was done looking at the children's books. I looked around for her and found her standing in the food book area. I offhandedly mentioned that I am always on the lookout for Everyday Food magazines and she gestured to a pile sitting on a desk. She gestured towards them the way you would point someone to the bathroom, I mean, come on! My mouth dropped open, there sat 25 issues of Everyday Food in mint condition. I gathered them up and bought them on the spot. I mentioned to her as I bought them that its nearly impossible to find Issue #1 of Everyday Food and that they go for a pretty penny on eBay. We got into the car and headed to the second Church Mouse down the road. I walked into the store and started my usual perusal of kitchen gadgets and my mother-in-law walked towards me with a huge grin on her face and in her hands were issues #1-#10 of Everyday Food. I just about screamed with delight. I quickly purchased my beloved magazines for a whopping $2.50 (@ 25 cents per issue, take that eBay!)

At home I organize them by month and carefully wrote down which issues I am missing. I recently decided to place post its on all my favorite recipes so I can find them easily. The web site does not have a good archive at all, so I find the magazine is what I gravitate towards rather than the web site. When a new issue comes in the mail I pull out my issues for that current month and keep them in my kitchen for quick reference for that month. On Sundays I use them in my meal planning for the week and create a week's worth of meals from these magazines. Yeah, its a little OCD of me to do things this way, but I love looking at the recipes for whats in season right now and I always find a new recipe in there and wonder "Now why didn't I see or even try this last year?" If you have a chance to check them out, I really recommend it. So many friends think that because it's published by Martha Stewart that it's going to be full of difficult recipes. But that could not be farther from the truth, this magazine was made for working parents and people who have about 30-40 minutes to make dinner. Well done Everyday Food, I am officially a fan for life. And for the record, I missing issues #9, #19, #25, #29, #32, #33, #34, #40 and #47.

Fight or Flight

My husband and I recently had to take a four day trip out of state for a funeral. As our flight approached the runway on Sunday it occurred to me that I had no plan for dinner that night but I quickly brushed the thought away because I just wanted to see my kids. We got home in good time and played with the kids and began unpacking. I looked at the clock and realized it was dinnertime and I had no idea what to make for dinner. We could either go out to dinner (not appetizing to us after eating out for 4 days straight) or stay home and make do with what we had. I was in no mood to go the grocery store after 12 hours of airports and flying.

Remembering that I had some sugar snap peas in the vegetable drawer and some frozen shrimp, I thought about making a stir fry. But my toddler wouldn't eat it and I wasn't in the mood to make a separate meal for her. Then I remembered my favorite in-a-pinch Everyday Food recipe for Spaghetti with Shrimp and Bacon.

But I didn't have the exact ingredients! I figured I could riff on it and make it with what I had on hand - I also found some bacon in the freezer too! Here is what I made for dinner tonight. I am proud to report that my son asked if this version could be our new Sunday night dinner. The toddler happily ate sugar snap peas and pasta. Mom Score: 1 Family Score: 10

Shrimp, Bacon & Sugar Snap Pea Pasta

3/4 pound whole wheat angel hair pasta
3 good handfuls of sugar snap peas, ends and strings removed - roughly chopped
3/4 pound frozen peeled and deveined shrimp, defrosted (I just put mine in a bowl with warm water and they defrost quickly)
5 slices bacon
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Juice from 1 lemon

Bring pasta water to boil and throw in the sugar snap peas for about 2 minutes. remove them with a slotted spoon (don't throw out the water, you'll use it for the pasta!) and run under cold water to stop the cooking. Set aside.

Now cook the pasta in the boiling water.

In a separate pan, fry the bacon, reserving about 1 Tablespoon of bacon grease in the pan. Cook the shrimp and garlic in the pan with the reserved bacon grease and when they curl up and are opaque, add a small ladleful of pasta water in the pan with the shrimp and garlic. Toss in the sugar snap peas and squeeze the juice of one lemon (or more to taste) into the pan. Bring to a boil and then turn off the heat.

Drain the pasta and place the cooked pasta and the shrimp mixture in a bowl together. Toss well and add salt and pepper to taste.

The 15 Minute Wonder Soup

My husband IMd me at 3:30 during the workday to say that he wanted to play tennis tonight. This notice came at a critical juncture for me in the day when I'm approaching fight or flight. I had a dinner plan for the week, but no way was I going to attempt chicken with a tomato marscapone sauce on SPOD (Single Parent on Duty) Night. I had to change my plan and quickly. I did a mental tally of the contents of my freezer: Frozen pizza, homemade tomato sauce and frozen cheese tortellini. Then I remembered that my five year old was coming down with a cold and it hit me - soup! I needed to make soup for my child, even though I don't have time to chop and dice and sautee. Impossible. Then I remembered 'Avgolemono' which is Greek for "Super Fast Soup."

I came into the door from work with two kids in tow at 6 pm. I set up the five year old at the table with his homework, got the toddler interested in some crayons and some paper (if she ate the crayons, I will never know) and got to work. I defrosted (nuked for 1 minute) some bread I had in the freezer (Costco bread freezes incredibly well), wrapped it in foil and stuck it in the toaster oven at 500 degrees. As it came time to incorporate the eggs into the broth, my toddler started to ram her baby stroller into my legs and my 5 year old is asking me difficult questions from his homework like "What comes after 23?" I pleasantly ask my daughter to stop hurting me and answer "24... I think?" and I whisk the soup into creamy submission and add some salt and pepper and taste it... sweet god,where has this soup been all my life? Delicious! I throw in some leftover chicken from the weekend, get the bread out of the toaster oven, slice it and throw it all on the table as my 5 year old finishes his homework. My son ate it, my toddler gulped it down and I had to resist eating my husband's portion.

I love nights like this where a plan comes together. I felt like MacGyver with my Time for Dinner cookbook! I made a healthy and nutritious meal out of what felt like nothing and I didn't even have to break open the frozen pizza box.

Back to our regularly scheduled menu tomorrow night, barring any last minute schedule changes.