Fish Soup

This soup is delightful, and easy to make. Serves 2-3 people.

Ingredients:

4 T butter
1/2 onion, chopped
2 medium potatoes, peeled & diced
thyme
water
3 c. milk (or cream)
2-3 fillets of white fish

Procedure:

Melt butter in soup pot. Saute chopped onions until transparent.
Add diced potatoes. Saute for 1-2 minutes.
Add fresh or dried thyme.* Stir.
Add water to cover, enough to completely cook the potatoes. Boil lightly for about 10 minutes.
Gently stir in milk, a little at a time, and simmer until hot enough to cook fish.
Add 2-inch pieces of fish, and cook about 3 minutes.

If you use cream this dish will be decidedly richer, and probably better as a side dish than a complete meal. (Great for an appetizer to impress dinner guests!) Otherwise, dilute soup with milk to reach the consistency that appeals to you.

Serve with toast.

*When using fresh thyme in soups, bundle twigs and tie together, then remove when the soup is ready to serve. Dried thyme can more accurately be measured in pinches, to please your palate.

I'm a big herb freak, so I use a lot of dried thyme in this delicious soup.

Energy Shortage -- Learning to Cut Back

When fuel prices soar, we find ways to save money, such as wearing long underwear in the house, driving less, and spending less $ on food. It's the logical process of dealing with the economic downturn.

When our bodies are low on energy, the body economizes by getting sick. A bad cold this month has taught me, or rather reminded me, to slow down and conserve energy. January is a tough month in the Midwest. We just came off the whirlwind of holidays -- shopping, overeating, and celebrating. We feel we must keep going. We must get stuff done! For some reason, perhaps it is our American life, we find it disconcerting to be still, even when there is ANOTHER snow storm, and ANOTHER cold snap of zero degree weather. In our culture, it is hard for us to STOP.

As cliche as this sounds, listen to the body. Yes, I know, the body & mind & spirit together all are experiencing cabin fever. There are remedies for that. But if you can't go to Mexico this year, you'll have to use cheaper remedies. Here are some suggestions...

1) Put some really pumping music in your car... do car chair dancing and singing at the top of your lungs while driving.

2) Dance in the house -- arms overhead! Really go for it! With abandon!

3) Play outside even though it is really, really cold.

For obtaining seasonal balance, I suggest...

1) Read books that you can actually devour. That means entertaining books, not intellectual stuff that makes you smarter.

2) Be crafty. Do a tedious craft you would never want to do in the summer. Something using hot glue. Or perhaps drawing straight lines until you can actually draw a straight line. Repetition is key.

3) If you really need something that is creative, productive, and can be done while seated, write letters to your friends. Write letters to your congress members. Become an armchair activist.

It's all about balance.


FRENCH ONION SOUP
Saute 2-3 large sweet onions in butter & olive oil. Add beef stock.
Serve with grated gruyere cheese on top, and crusty french bread.


HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!
YEAR OF THE RABBIT BEGINS FEBRUARY 3
Shopkeepers in China hang lettuce upside-down at their entrances. When the lion dancers parade down the streets, or hutongs, they climb up to grab the lettuce, ensuring an abundant spring.

Community Cooks

Will I start making easy speed-scratch meals? As my child grows, and our lives get even more busy & complicated, will I start making the meals advertised by Swanson on television?

A university, any university -- how about the U of M -- should have students making a study about 40-something adoptive parents. The study should include how they feed their children. After years of making super-conscious meal decisions, with time to cook and appreciate food (plus cleaning up, while drinking wine), how now, do us 40-something parents feed their families? Perhaps you don't care, but it is interesting to me.

A few years ago, my peers were indignant of food establishment Boston Market. It's a liberal thing: isn't it so terrible that women are picking up pre-made meals instead of cooking the full meal at home... this is the destruction of American society... women who don't cook homemade food are immoral... how dare Boston Market try to capitalize on busy families... etc. etc. Oh, wait, is that liberals or conservatives? I get them confused sometimes.

When I think about homes in other cultures/countries, I see a lot of meals prepared outside the home, and what's wrong with that? It's part of what makes a community. We ought to rely on community folks who cook great meals at great prices, for us, to ease our burden. I wish my neighborhood had more take-out restaurants that I could trust and afford. HOLY LAND is one great place to get a pre-cooked meal, and their chickens are cage-free. It is more economical for us to get a rotisserie chicken from them than for me to cook one myself. THAT's what I'm talkin' about.

Why aren't there more places like that in Minneapolis, Minnesota? My answer is: it's just too cold. It might not make sense to you, but that is the reason we don't have great take-out. It's just too cold.

I propose a new movement by Minneapolitans who want to make a good buck: follow Holy Land's model. Make us some good, wholesome, reasonably-priced take-out food. And before you send me a message that I should do it, I'll tell you right now that I love cooking too much to do it every day, for money. It's just not for me.

The problem with Boston Market is that it was a chain, and therefore associated with capitalism ('cause capitalism is a bad thing... ???). I get it. I want my take-out to have at least the feel of home-made food, like Holy Land. Holy Land is now very successful and national, with a wonderful place in the Midtown Global Market. I don't know how they do it; I don't know how they get all those free-range chickens and abuse-free meats. I'm not an investigator; I simply trust them. They are fast becoming part of a large capitalist market that I'm sure liberals won't like. So, someone has to step up and offer us some of the same, with the local trust we have come to love so much.

If that is you, please offer duck and pheasant. Thank you.

Dump Soup

The photos above were taken this morning, and Ariel inspired this post. She brought a variety of things to my bed (a ball, some blocks, paper, toys) and told me she was making soup. Things kept being added to the soup, and stirred. Also, a photo of my pantry, which is right now totally random and messy.

I learned this recipe from a music teacher I worked with when I was teaching in the public schools. She was an unusual woman, a big woman, not exactly fat (although she did talk about Weight Watchers points during lunch every day), just large and intense. She was older than me, lived alone and was concentrating on earning her Masters in Education. Her thesis was on the power of music education in increasing math test scores. She was so passionate about her vocation, that while teaching a roomful of disrespectful, wild, obnoxious kids, her enthusiasm made her sweat profusely.

I liked her a lot, and she was very smart, if a tad socially inept. The kind of person I enjoy working with, but wouldn't really want to hang out with. You know what I mean. When she told me about Dump Soup, I admit I thought it was sort of low-class. I was a bit of a food snob at that time. Nevertheless, I tried it and loved it!


The DUMP SOUP recipe is this: Dump 5 cans of stuff from the pantry into a large pot on the stove. Cook until hot enough to eat.


This is my preferred Dump Soup:

1 can dark red kidney beans
1 can tomatoes
1 can corn
1 can green beans
1 can chicken broth

These days, I don't keep canned corn or green beans or chicken stock in my pantry, so I have to improvise. As always, I'm not going to tell you how to improvise, because I know y'all know how to cook!

I know you don't believe me; I'm telling you: it's good! One time a few winters ago, we had a visitor stop by on a 3-hour layover. I had no time to make something elegant and fabulous for my foodie food snob friend, so I made Dump Soup and didn't tell him what it was. And by god to hell, he loved it! He said it was PERFECT! So, modestly I said, "Oh, I just whipped this up," like, "Oh, this old thing? I just threw this on." And it was true!

Dear readers, that visitor was one of YOU. Do you remember?

The moral of the story is: the flavor of food is about perception. Surrounded by loving friends and family, food can always taste exquisite. Especially if it is pretend food.

Root Veg

Adapted from page 435 of "The Joy of Cooking": Winter Root Vegetable Braise.

This differs considerably from the Joy recipe, mainly because my cooking method was in the oven instead of on the stove. As always, do it your way! I will let you know the essentials to making a dish taste good. Also, I don't follow measurements very carefully, because who knows how much is a pound of turnips? So again, do it your way. Because I know y'all know how to cook.

INGREDIENTS

root vegetables (I used parsnips, potatoes, japanese yams, and onions)
garlic
butter, olive oil
herbs
white wine
chicken stock
flour
cream
dijon mustard
chopped parsley
s&p

PROCEDURE

Preheat oven to 375F. Cut vegetables as you wish. I cut large pieces. Place in a baking dish. Add 2-4 T butter, and some olive oil. Include about 4 whole cloves of garlic (no need to peel! I love that!)

Shove some herbs in there. I used fresh tarragon, dried thyme, and a bay leaf. Oh, and some dried dill.

Bake until sort of bubbling/sizzling but not burning, about 10-15 minutes.

Stir. Add 1/4 c wine. Stir. Cook until alcohol cooks off. Stir in 1 T flour.

Add 2 - 2 1/2 c. chicken stock. Stir. Bake about 20-35 minutes. Cooking time totally depends on your baking dish, oven, amount of veg, etc. You know this. You want the veg to be tender. This is great if it turns out like a meatless stew.

When looking good (I mean the dish, not you. Of course, you may be looking real good by now if you are drinking the wine. Whatever!), reduce heat to 310F. Combine 3 T cream + 1 T dijon mustard with chopped parsley. Add to pot. Stir. Cook about 5 minutes. Taste & add salt & pepper to taste.

It's done!

Truly, you could make this dish countless different ways. Honestly, it's the flour thickener and the cream/mustard/parsley that really make it. If you skip that, you are making something different.

Bon appetit!

P.S. Still taking contestants on the turnip butt pun contest.

Tandoori Chicken, and Swimming

I had tandoori chicken for the first time about 10 years ago. My friend, Debra, who is a really, really, great cook, served it at her home. Now that I think about it, my best friends are really great cooks. They can make something spectacular from scratch in no time at all. I continue to be amazed by my friends, who are just regular weirdos, by the way they cook truly delicious meals inspired by recipes from all over the world. How blessed I am to know such people.

Indian cooking requires many ingredients, though the cooking is actually very simple. You just have to have the spices on hand. You can make an out-of-this-world cauliflower dish, very simply, if you just have the spices on hand. If you read an Indian recipe, you may be put off by the list of ingredients; once you get that under control, you can cook anything quickly, and simply, without much prep.

For some reason, tandoori marinade has always scared me. It seems so exotic and complicated. Ten years ago, Debra told me it was easy. And yet....
But the real truth is that the DH is lactose-intolerant, and therefore I avoid cooking with dairy. Yogurt is the main ingredient in tandoori marinade.

The chicken is marinating right now, and I just hope I can cook it properly on the grill. Friday is always a very good day. My daughter has a new saying this week; each morning she says to me, "Mommy, I am so happy today!" She has such joie de vivre, and has brought so much joy to our home. And why wouldn't she be happy? She has a great life. Check out the video of her swimming this morning.

The Great Thing and The Neat Thing

News! I made Tortilla de Patata alla Carmen de las Casas, and it was great! The family devoured it (i.e. no leftovers). I was really surprised at how easy it was for me to flip the tortilla. Success!

In other news, I have been reading a lot about cooking and family. Hungry Monkey is particularly interesting. The great thing is that there is so much out there on the Internet to eat up (no pun intended). And the neat thing is that there are a lot of people out there who share the same values as me, as us. I mean, there's a lot to celebrate about humanity.

For example, Orangette reports on how happy she is to have her grandma's recipe box. I can totally relate to that. She goes on to describe the notes grandma kept, dated notes listing the menus she served at specific dinner parties, and who attended. To me, this is a truly fantastic treasure. And it's cool to know there are others out there who share this love of the little things, the little records that people keep of their day-to-day lives.

In even more news (well, not really news, but just something to share), Ariel and I made cookies today, and as the forgetful woman that I am I forgot to push up her sleeves when she packed the brown sugar, and I forgot to grease the cookie sheet.

Yesterday, I got out of the shower and forgot if I washed my hair. I love being me!

Rice & Tuna

No one knows what they want for dinner. Quick fix!

White rice
Canned tuna
Mayo
Soy sauce
Jalapenos
Tomatoes (optional)

Don't mix it all together!!! Each forkful (or spoonful) should be an individual creation of mouth watering sensation.

We used to eat this dish quite often. Then I read "Bottomfeeder" by Taras Grescoe. It broke my heart. It is very bad to eat tuna. I have too much knowledge about the woes of poor Mother Earth. The ocean is... well, you don't even want to go there. It hurts. It makes you have to make really tough decisions about what you eat.

I have always liked my tuna in a can. I don't really like tuna steak, or tuna sushi, but I can totally go for tiny morsels of seared tuna on a bed of micro greens.

Alas, I found myself at the grocery store just missing my canned tuna so much. I said to myself, "Should all the ignorant people eat all the food that is available without so much as a wince, as the oceans become depleted and our planet is destroyed, while I, with all my stupid knowledge, go without the splendors of seafood on my table?" I shrugged. I bought the evil food.