Tag Archives: food

Contagion

Posted on October 19, 2025 | 1 comment

Taken one way that’s a bad thing. Like my spending five years, successfully, avoiding contracting COVID-19, through PPE then vaccines and boosters. Now while I have my booster, my husband needs a prescription to get his.

In a positive light, contagion can have a good meaning, such as:

Ideas, here’s a small one. My m-i-l grows a garden every Spring. This year’s crop was so successful I suggested a Fall garden and she said no. I planted just greens, especially as my first try at growing Lacinato kale, black kale aka cavolo nero, was ingested in total by cabbage worms while they left the other kales, cabbages and chard alone. A few weeks later I had seedlings and m-i-l said, how about some radishes? So now she’s added more chard, plus broccoli and cauliflower and this weekend wants to add more radishes and greens. Ideas are contagious!

Hope, in that small, sometimes revolutionary ideas, might someday see the light of day. Over my adult lifetime I’ve been placed on boards and advisory committees only to come up with something different that was politically daring at the time, too much so for the powers that be. Years later I find out that City Planning was in the archives and found this remarkable idea to leverage California’s small-town I-5 like the renowned Route 66. Now it’s their idea, but I know it just had to germinate for a couple of decades before someone found it again. Contagion and hope, a winning combination. Which leads to…

Courage, and my 67th birthday gift to myself. Yesterday I joined the No Kings Protest in a small red city in a big red state. There were only about 100 of us who weathered the literal storm (thunder and lightning plus downpour on me and my Ambassadog, as we had to wait an hour afterward to be picked up by my husband). He said he’d “let” me go after we drove past and saw it was a bunch of older folks and families. I replied “I didn’t ask you for permission, dear.” He was convinced that even if participants had no weapons, this is a concealed carry state and he pictured MAGA snipers on surrounding rooftops. I did secretly bring an old cloth COVID mask and saline solution for teargas, but we ended up with just two bored local police officers. Ambassadog Principessa Lulu jumped up to hug one of them (she’s 35 lbs.) and I apologized, he said no problem and petted her. There were no incidents, just two vets yelling at other to “get lost” for a moment, then nothing untoward. Organizers stepped right in and diffused the situation. I was offered a ride home by several participants but “home” was a 30 minute drive so I declined to accept. One gave me her plastic rain poncho, which helped considerably. Now I read that there were over 7 million participants nationwide. It was important to me to go because I love my country and believe in the Constitution and rule of law. I’d like to have a country to celebrate next year, lest I need to move to Canada to avoid prosecution for standing in a local park wearing a No Kings bandanna with my fellow No Kings Ambassadog.

Keep the faith! In democracy we trust, Dee

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Trump’s “Girls”

Posted on August 23, 2025 | Leave a comment

Our fearless president was supposed to do a “ride-along” with the military on the mean streets of our nation’s capital, Thursday evening. Instead, the White House cooked burgers and they ordered pizza in a local park.

Trump, ever the champion of women’s rights, had a job for two of his best gals. It’s no lie that a picture is worth a thousand words.

Seated “manning” the pizza table, over closed pizza boxes, were a lonely and distractedly bored Jeanine Pirro, D.C.’s newest U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, and Kristi Noem, yes, ICE Barbie holding her her head in her hands over a pizza box. What a great job!

I hope they had male supervision to make sure no illegal aliens got a free slice. What, did I just hear that JD Vance had his own booth telling women to quit their jobs and go have babies? Nah, just a rumor.

Makes me want to move back to 1971-1973 when I was a tween and my dad worked PR for the nation’s colleges on Dupont Circle. He must’ve been very woke then because we were living in the nation’s second “planned community” that was very forward-thinking at the time.

What a great nation we live in! I’m stuck in Texas with folks who are in denial that in rural communities they’re going to lose their medicare, medicaid, snap and hospitals. Plus smart, poor kids won’t ever be able to borrow money to attend college. My fellow senior volunteers don’t get it and are waiting for AmeriCorps (which Trump tried to abolish and will, eventually) to tell them what to do. I’m figuring it out without them. Why? Because I don’t just sit at the pizza table and wait for people to stop by. Cheers! Look for that photo of Noem and Pirro, it’s priceless. Dee

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The Summer Garden, Texas Style

Posted on August 18, 2025 | Leave a comment

I’ve had the good fortune to go through an entire Texas growing season, and have learned a great deal. I’m a Northerner, see, and my childhood gardens were no more than small flower beds around the house. As an adult, I’ve mostly had a 4’X 8′ balcony, enough for a couple of long boxes of impatiens or pansies, different color combos every year. Recently I’ve tried container tomatoes from seed (nurtured indoors for weeks) or pot and had fair to middling success, given that the growing season is so short I had to move two plants in for the winter to get just a few more tomatoes.

This Texas year ran the gamut. And it’s over already. School started again on August 4, and nearly everything in the garden is gone. I won’t chronicle the flowers, which ran from irises (tons of bearded beauties in all colors of the rainbow) to zinnias, the ubiquitous impatiens (still going strong) and Texas roses of course.

We planted starting in February, onions which we’ll have stored, hanging in the shed ’til mid-winter, red and yellow. Beets. Early growers were snap peas and salad greens, both long gone, and a bit of asparagus. Potatoes, harvested and eaten already. We grew chard which was mostly left alone by the bugs. Why? Because I added cavolo nero (Tuscan or dinosaur kale) to the mix and it only served as a decoy. My beloved cavolo nero was bitten down to nubs before I could harvest a leaf.

The basil was profound and long-lasting. Three plants are near the end, the rest are gone to the bumblebees. We still have some marjoram, oregano and parsley, but the sage has already been dried. We had one watermelon, a tad overripe, that finally disappeared from the bowl on the table yesterday. My favorite, cantaloupe, grew where we planted it, and volunteered all over the garden. I picked two huge ones that grew over the fence into the pasture, the other day, enough to have for breakfast this week and some was given to church folk yesterday by my in-laws.

Beefsteak tomatoes were abundant while they lasted, and the tomatillos made for some nice sauces and salsas. The few peaches went into a tasty, tangy peach dipping sauce with some frozen for winter months ahead. Now we’ve a ton of pears to process into preserves and pear butter. I always add an interesting twist on whatever is grown, expanding palates is my everlasting goal, so I’m going to try a chutney or, if really brave, a Tuscan mostarda.

Cherry tomatoes are on the wane, yet every day my husband, while watering in 98 degree heat, picks at least a hundred more. We tried eggplant, two plants donated by a grower. Big leaves, no fruit. Peppers are nearing the end, no hot ones this year, but will still grow for another few weeks, I think.

So I’m pushing the envelope. Hundred degree days mean no fall planting, unless I start seeds indoors, which I’ve done. Twelve cells with three each curly lettuce, romaine, parsley and my off-the-wall addition, radicchio Trevisano, the long red tapered leaves that’ll be great in salads. We’ll put out the plants in one bed with the lone rosemary that’s starting to thrive, probably early to mid-September for some fall greens.

As a parting gift, I give to you my seat-of-the-pants chicken and sausage “recipe” from yesterday’s dinner. I used two huge chicken breasts, cut in 1″ pieces and 1# andouille sausage, cut the same. I sauteed a home-grown onion and a large clove of garlic, minced, and removed. Dredged chicken in seasoned flour and sauteed. Poured in 1 can chicken stock. Added home-grown peppers, 1″ pieces, chopped parsley and oregano from the garden, and about a pint of halved cherry tomatoes. Salt and pepper to taste. Simmer about 20-30 minutes and you’ve a nice light chicken stew with gravy that was served over heated, leftover Spanish rice. The dish was pleasingly spicy and the entire pot disappeared for a table joined by four family members. Yum.

Here’s to fall planting, Texas style! Dee

p.s. I’ve you’ve extra pears I poached some in whole, food-processed Mandarins, orange juice and cinnamon, removed and sliced them. Boiled down the poaching liquid into a syrup and that was dessert. Just a thought. It reminded me of our cooking school venture into “pears poached in ponchos,” an elaborate affair that poached pears in bourbon. Then we made pastry, clothed each pear in a 1/2 circle “poncho” that was given an egg wash and baked while the syrup reduced for our sauce. Of course the French have to make everything elaborate! d

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Corn “Quiche”

Posted on August 14, 2025 | Leave a comment

Annual holiday conundrum. New apartment, great building, maintenance service that actually saved our lives when a holiday sauce I was making boiled over, flame went out but gas was on all night. I hate the impersonal nature of giving cash, or gift cards. So what can I do?

I looked up recipes online and found this corn casserole that looked good for “my guys.” It’s on Epicurious, look up Corn Custard with Chorizo for the recipe. It’s still there all these years later! They won’t let me print it and I don’t want to get sued so I’ll just point you in the right direction.

I made them a casserole and they loved it. Jeff loved it so much that the next year I made him a mini-custard just for himself. He got another job and told his replacement, Tom, that he could stay in his apartment for the weekend and when he returned, Tom had eaten the entire casserole. Uh oh. Big stink.

Post-Jeff, I kept making the recipe for Tom (and the guys) every year until he got another job as well. I had the recipe, just hadn’t dusted it off in a while. The boys always called it “corn quiche.” Manly men that they are, I thought the term quaint.

In the boonies, you can’t get cured, smoked Spanish chorizo, so I decided to make my own Mexican choriizo. It’s from a recipe on daringgourmet.com. Note that if you want to make this recipe, you have to mix the pork sausage meat with the spices and leave it in the frig for three days before using. Don’t let it become a timing issue! I cooked it up and we tasted it, not too spicy and very flavorful.

Tonight I’m using my brand new 3-day old homemade chorizo (doubled the meat for the hard-working ranchers) for dinner at my in-laws. I’m serving it with a plain green Romaine salad with sherry vinaigrette.

This post is for Jeff and Tom, wherever you may be. Sorry I haven’t been around much. Lots to do and like everyone, I’m overwhelmed by the politics of everyday living. Cheers! Dee

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A Sixties Spring

Posted on May 28, 2025 | Leave a comment

New things this year. As we take this brief sojourn from normal life in the city, it’s been quite the experience. This Spring I got to help plant the garden and add some of my favorite things. Usually, an apartment gal, I settle for a few potted herbs indoors or out on a 4’X8′ balcony. The past few years I’ve branched out into tomatoes with just a bit of luck. Perhaps a tomato or two a day for several weeks.

I’m normally a Northerner as well, so there’s a very brief growing season, starting mid-May. In Texas some things were started, like potatoes, in January. Mid-March for many more but we had a highly unusual deep freeze in late March that killed a lot of stuff so we re-planted some.

That said the first to be ready to eat was asparagus. Then snap peas which are all but done. Green and yellow beans are mid-way done. Lettuces, beets and kale are abundant, and I even added my favorite Tuscan kale (cavolo nero, dinosaur kale) which is coming up nicely. Chard and peppers. New potatoes, one and only crop is up and nearly gone.

Cherry tomatoes are ripening, larger tomatoes and tomatillos to come. Onions are being picked daily and dried in the shade. Later crops like cantaloupe and watermelon will take a while yet.

It’s such a pleasure to cook with fresh herbs and greens. I can roll out of bed in the morning, walk the dog(s) and start picking lettuce and peas, and enough basil to make a quick pesto. Tried making gnocchi yesterday for the first time and it was somewhat successful and very tasty. Thinking about what’s for lunch and having it picked, created and ready in a half hour is terrific.

I resurrected Mom’s recipe for Boursin (2 pkg. cream cheese, 3T softened butter, seasoning) and the other day felt like singing Simon and Garfunkel so grabbed a handful of parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme and threw together Boursin.

I’ve made chimichurri sauce with cilantro (instead of parsley), which is trying to bolt now so I’m using it for marinades and salads. Snap peas cut on the diagonal, steamed and served crisp-tender with a spicy sesame vinaigrette.

Yesterday I blanched some chard and kale leaves. I’ll make a filling with ground beef, onion, garlic and tomato and cook it in a homemade tomato sauce for dinner tomorrow.

It’s a joy to see nature’s bounty, all from teeny tiny seeds. There’s no such thing as being in a cooking rut with all these good things around.

Plus, the little rescue dog is improving daily. It’s been nearly five months since her mauling and I’m letting her out of her full leg brace for at least part of the day to be out and about with just a sock and vet wrap to protect her right hind paw because when she’s tired she “knuckles” and scrapes the top of her paw raw. The past couple of days she’s started jumping a bit on her hind legs, and to see this 1.5 year-old pup be able to do “zoomies” again is heart-warming.

Aside from politically (anyone care to define habeas corpus?) and the state of the tech economy, all is fine. Cheers! Volunteer this summer, with your kids if possible! Dee

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Recipes

Posted on November 24, 2024 | Leave a comment

Got any good ones? I mean any good, badly written ones. Permit me to elaborate.

My m-i-l is known for her delicious potato rolls. She’s always baking five dozen or so at a time for church event or family get-together, no matter who’s the host. Could you bring your potato rolls, sandwiches for fifty guests? Please?

She first showed me a recipe for these refrigerator rolls a couple of decades ago. It gave a few steps then said “go to church. When you get back, they should be ready.” What?

She just shared with me the original, published in a local paper decades earlier. Not only does it call for shortening twice, the second time it appeared it was in place of sugar. Then it goes like this: “Work it up good and put in refrigerator to rise until light. Put a wet cloth over it, then work down, and fix out anyway you want to cook it.” Huh? To someone who’s never made bread before, it must be like reading ancient Greek.

I had the luxury of putting myself through cooking school so I know a lot about how food works. I’ve never been much of a baker because my mother and sisters were, and that’s more of a science with exact rules to make something rise, for instance. Many of my recipes are familial lore, oft-practiced creations or seat-of-the-pants creations. I’m loath to write them in a recipe for a friend because it’s so difficult to put a feel (of dough) or taste in writing and make it come through understandably.

When a recipe is printed in a newspaper, however, one would think it would have some vetting, editing for clarity’s sake at least. So, I’m not speaking to you as a recipe-writing expert. Here I’m just trying to show how not to write a recipe.

Yesterday, at an alt-family Thanksiving my m-i-l was hand-writing her potato roll recipe for yet another guest, a wife of twenty years who has raised a family and still doesn’t know how to cook, especially making bread, so the recipe had to be exact. Two recipes, one with ingredients and the other with each detailed step described. I felt for her, knowing that no matter what the recipient did with the recipe, it would never have the je ne sais crois that M’s has for the past fifty-plus years she’s been making them. I’ve been cooking with her for twenty years and I’d never try to make her potato rolls.

This weekend we tried my seat-of-the-pants version of a breakfast bread. One recipe of M’s potato rolls, rolled out and spread with my cranberry sauce (that I also used for my creation of a Cranberry-Orange Trifle for the gang), then rolled up, made into a ring and split partway into 1″ slices before baking. It was gorgeous and very tasty, topped with a sheen of leftover buttercream. Yum.

My version, a riff on a published lemon blueberry trifle, mixes lemon-orange (7-Up) cake, orange syrup, cranberry sauce (homemade), homemade orange curd and whipped cream/orange curd mix garnished with candied orange slices. It was a hit. No, I’m not giving you the recipe. A fun thing to do, however, when you know the basics for a simple English trifle, is riffing on flavors. My most recent starts with a Ghirardelli brownie mix substituting espresso for the water. sliced in half crosswise. Layer brownie half in a trifle bowl (c’mon, it’s the easiest dessert and looks difficult and presents magnificently so spend $30 for a proper trifle bowl), spread on raspberry pie filling from a can, add a layer of homemade whipped cream and repeat. Top the upper layer of whipped cream with cocoa powder or chocolate curls. If the brownie mix is stale, no problem, brush some simple syrup on each layer before the berries and cream. Voila. Looks and tastes great.

It was a good weekend until my transmission failed on the trip home As Scarlett O’Hara would say, “tomorrow is another day.” Indeed. Cheers and submit Oopsie Recipes to me if you wish. Dee

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Theme vs. Similarity

Posted on August 10, 2017 | Leave a comment

My brother has me hooked on lectins, learning about them lately. We both have diseases that could have been caused by them. Pretty much every food is prohibited on a lectin-free diet. My downfall is nightshades. Aside from tobacco, which I do not use, what would I do without tomatoes, potatoes, corn and squash, eggplant, garlic, hot peppers and others? I’ve built my culinary life around these ingredients.

If you read a book about lectin they’ll tell you very few fruits and veg, no meat, fish and no dairy, no wheat, no legumes. Come on, what can we eat?

Very early this morning I watched a cooking show where the star showed a meal with freshly-picked zucchini blossoms with a ricotta filling, asparagus with a mousseline, salmon with another hollandaise-based sauce and berries with sabayon. Death by cream and eggs.

Years ago our family used to go abroad for holidays and we went to one restaurant that served the same thing every year. They were crowded and had to make a lot of things in advance but to get soup in a bread bowl (so they didn’t have to do dishes) plus every course overpowered by bread was a bit much.

One year we did our own thing. I remember a photo as pseudo-cuz and we presented home-made whole chickens and fixings to the crowd. Now I remember Mom saying that we don’t need to go out to dinner in the middle of no-where as I can cook better than any restaurant in town.

By that time, she could do so. I live in a city and have traveled the world and still cook better than any restaurant in the neighborhood. Yes! Sometimes we like different flavors so taste what we like and sometimes leave town for convenience or the need to try other foods. I have itineraries but my husband will not take me anywhere until I can walk a certain distance without arthritic pain. Europe is the initial goal.

I like varied menus. No way on Thanksgiving with 60 of my husband’s folks watching “The Game” am I going to control that menu, but I can do mine for family and friends. Bread and dairy are ways to control costs.  When I cook for a small group at home I do not have those restaurant constraints. I spend time creating a menu that is appropriate for the people we will entertain. As a mentor Julia Child would say Bon Appetit! Dee

ps We have fancy dinner service for 18 and a table for four. We have a folding table and linens for everything. That’s me.

 

 

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Family Dinner

Posted on August 4, 2017 | Leave a comment

Tonight was an awful night. I lost my claddagh ring and feel naked without it. Love, friendship and loyalty. I’ll check my shirt and sweaters in sunlight because the crown nicks everything so it’ll probably be on the floor or carpet.

Years ago it was a rule, I was in college (on break) and my siblings were as young as seven, to have dinner together every night. I fear that families do not do that these days. It’s just my husband and me, and the dog, and my husband is usually on his cell phone or texting or on his laptop dealing with other people and not us. Even though he is here writing a book I see the old dog and now Snowflake Deux more than him.

In former years we had to do a “how was your day” routine. One day someone introduced “let’s rate Mom’s meals!” She was devastated. Dad hated her orange chicken and beef stew. They were not things he grew up with in a Teutonic household where he spoke German all his childhood and Grandma taught Mom how to cook. Then a certain someone got her a lifelong subscription to Gourmet magazine and she started making things called “health soup.” And a chicken salad with peaches that she served an honored man known for a geodesic dome for his 86th birthday and their 62nd wedding anniversary.

Dad said afterward that he didn’t like fruit with his meat. Whoops!

Mom’s gone nearly nine years and Dad died over the holiday season last year. I barely knew grandma except she used to sing me Bye, Bye, Blackbird as a lullaby before she passed when I was one year old. Dad was a musician and much more, I’ll have to teach myself that song . I just need the lyrics. Maybe not. I just learned it was a Nazi song.

Don’t worry, even though Mom’s mother died earlier than Dad’s and I do not remember her at all, I’ve another grandmother, my husband’s dear Nanny. Yes, she interviewed me before I married her eldest grandson and she made me an honorary “grand.” It is a pleasure to be the sixth and to watch her “great grands” grow up and marry.

We share food with about 60 people every Thanksgiving at Nanny’s and my m-i-l and everyone cooks and we have good and much food. And now the “greats” provide music as well from time to time, that is when football is not on the television.

I’ve made Orange Chicken twice in two weeks. My husband is a Texas beef and potato guy so it’s taken me years to get him to eat chicken. Mom used to use orange juice concentrate. Here’s my version.

Orange Chicken a Deux (for two)

Two chicken breast cutlets, pounded thin and seasoned

Flour, seasoned with salt and pepper, and zest of an orange from which you will use its’ juice for sauce

Olive oil to  sautee the chicken

When chicken is just cooked remove it to a plate. Add the juice of 1-3 seeded oranges to the pan and reduce. Add a pat of butter, taste for seasoning and place the chicken back in to warm.

I serve it over warm Israeli couscous cooked in chicken broth, and a veg. Last night he made a jicama salad with fresh orange juice and I ate a few heirloom cherry tomatoes. He’s brilliant but not that great in the kitchen in any manner, especially the knife department, I call it “log salad.”

That’s the way it goes in Dee-Land. Nearly 16 years and I got him to eat chicken, Israeli couscous, and jicama? He’s even a cheese snob now, asking whether for day-to-day use on a cracker or toast is three-year or five-year better? Once a year I go back to my childhood taste memories and buy individually wrapped American processed cheese slices. Mom would never allow us individually wrapped. I make grilled cheese on hearty whole wheat bread. I also have ginger ale on hand, for tummy issues and because it was the only soda we were allowed to have as kids.

Never, ever rate your parents’ meals. It is a recipe for disaster. To Orange Chicken and my beef stew (later). Bye, bye blackbird, Dee

 

 

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What Not To Eat

Posted on June 29, 2016 | Leave a comment

on a date? First date at age 16, my parents made fun of me for years saying whomever it was would show up in an old red pickup truck. Guess what? Yep.

He had to come in and meet the family. He was 18 and I was 16 so my parents scoured the newspaper to find a PG movie. They settled on Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, a great movie I still recall. Then, the roads had frozen and Main Street was an icy mess so he did “donuts,” taking me home, 360 degree spinouts because all the smart people stayed home and didn’t drive in this kind of weather.

The next weekend I was asked out, same guy, to a nice restaurant. I didn’t want to get anything with tomato sauce because it could get on my outfit, whatever it was. Seventies, probably horrible. I loved salmon fillets so I got the salmon steak. I didn’t know where the bones were or how to extricate them or the skin. Ask me years later and I can skin and bone a salmon steak in no-time, place it yin and yang, toothpick together, season and pop on the grill. At sixteen, I had no clue. Cute guy went to Florida for Easter break and went out with a cheerleader for two years before coming back to me, for years. He married another cheerleader after I called off our engagement years later.

Don’t eat anything too spicy. If you’re going to an event or business meeting don’t get sunny side up eggs. Choose scrambled, they’ll brush off your suit if you accidentally spill a drop of yolk.

No tomato sauce. Steak and baked potato are OK but watch out for pot roasts and stews. Do not ever eat shell-on crab or lobster on a date unless you’re in the terroir, dressed for it and know what you’re doing. Example: shorts and t-shirt on the beach in Maine.

Basically, know what you’re doing. If you’re in Italy have your Bolognese. In Greece, eat the eel and octopus (I have textural and familial issues with both so I do not partake). When in France, traditional French cooks remove everything then place it back as garnish. It’s like Mom cutting up your meat.

In Scotland stay away from burgers. They look and taste like hockey pucks and are bloody expensive. Go for the salmon and mussels. Their pizza is great as well.

I should not have named this what I did. Try any kind of meal you’d like, in any city or country. I have, and it’s part of how I learned how to cook, and eat. There are just certain things, like tomato sauce, that can ruin your suit for a meeting, or a salmon steak you don’t understand that leaves you starving, to think about. Cheers and good eating! I just finished a toasted sesame bagel with cream cheese and smoked salmon! Dee

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I Bought Him Flowers

Posted on March 28, 2016 | Leave a comment

My husband, a small bunch of pink and yellow tulips in vase overlooking the lake. He flew in Saturday afternoon for a steak and baked potato dinner.

Easter Sunday we took it easy, I’d gotten a rack of lamb the day before and marinated it in olive oil, salt and pepper, sprigs of fresh thyme and leaves of rosemary all day. I forgot the garlic, the entire head was in a bowl elsewhere.

Simple roasted rack of lamb, boiled red potatoes with butter and seasonings, and a salad with his favorite vinaigrette, no, not mine from a half dozen acids including several vinegars and fresh lemon and extra virgin olive oil, he wants bottled ranch dressing so he got that one.

It was a good weekend. Perhaps Texas Chili and my Ten-Minute Lasagne (on the site) next weekend. As a young girl or young adult you could always see me reading cookbooks and helping out if I was allowed to do so.

Thanks to all who helped me learn how to cook, from a very young age to caterers to college (I cooked for all my roommates) to work, work, work, then cooking schools. I thank everyone for contributing to my education.

Recently unable to sleep or really read because of an eye issue I’ve been up at night watching/listening to The Mind of a Chef, brainchild of Anthony Bourdain, and Michael Pollan’s concise and interesting distillation of his book Cooked.

It is fascinating to learn more about cultures, flavors, icky things I may never like to eat (not on the show but I never had haggis in Scotland) but Chef Pollan brought something to light. Many folks I know never cook a thing. I cook three meals a day plus feed and take my dog out, another thing people hire out.

Yes, my sink nearly fell below because the glue that held it together was not strong enough. Why? It’s a double sink and I use it many times a day and do hand-wash certain special dishes, large pots and pans and wash my hands. In the years we’ve been here no-one has seen this happen, because no-one cooks.

Dear Michael Pollan,

I like the way you pull people in instead of push them to feed their family healthy, home-cooked foods. For nearly thirty years I’ve shopped the outer aisles of the grocery store. I barely know my produce folks because they change out all the time but I bring my Texas Chili (Pedernales riff, of course no beans) to my butchers. Yes, I’ve a meat grinder on my 28 year Kitchenaid and at my age move it across the kitchen to put on the grinder.

I graduated PKU, Peter Kump’s which is now ICE.

I pick out all my 4# of hand-chosen meat (sale days are great) and take it down and do a Texas grind. The rest of it is up to the onions, garlic and spices. You may want to look up Lady Bird Johnson’s Pedernales River Chili that was served in 1962 for 5,000 guests at the Ranch west of Austin. The guest list included JFK. If you look up the Lyndon Johnson Presidential Museum it’s on the site, or just Google it.

It’s very generic as a recipe because they don’t have what we do today and I’ll never use “chili powder,” so make my own from Penzey’s. This recipe was the most requested White House document in 1962 before JFK was killed.

Sharing this information is important to our future. Cooking made us human. Shopping at a grocery store for microwave or ready-made foods is ok a day or two a week but it probably means you’re at the TV and spouse is online and the kiddos never got to have dinner with their family.

Caring for one’s family is most important. Don’t tell your kids how many hours you had to work this week.  Tell them you’re having what I’ve done for kids, MYOP night. I make pizza dough in advance but if they’re not my kids (we don’t have kids) I always have them make a ball of dough before they get tired to take home and rise in the frig for tomorrow.

Kids roll out their own dough and top their own pizzas with anything from caramelized onions and anchovies, tomato and plain mozz, pepperoni and it runs the gamut from sauteed spinach, roasted garlic………

 

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