An Evening Observation

I realized today why it is as if by magic that I have slipped into a very "bachelor" type of lifestyle, after starting to live alone again.  The most apparent of bachelor choices being the food I'm eating and the manner in which I prepare it.  On too many a night have I gorged on beer, Ramen and microwave eggrolls, not entirely understanding how in the known universe the eggrolls even made their way into my freezer in the first place and why I choose to devour them with such frequency.

I only realized today why this happens.

After taking a leisurely hour-and-a-half walk after work today (the sunshine is simply brilliant!), I came home to find I'd bought some groceries the night before, anticipating I would want something tasty for dinner tonight (that Pea, she knows me so well...) and, shockingly, I did want something tasty for dinner tonight.

I spent some wonderful time preparing delicious roasted broccoli, juicy savory turkey burgers, and a tangy spring mix salad with avocado, bell pepper, banana peppers, and an olive oil dressing.  Everything was done all at the same time, so the hot food was hot, the cold food was cold, and I was just beside myself with excitement.  (Food makes me very, very happy.)

I cleared a little edge on my round table that is piled (piled!) with stupid amounts of clutter.  By God, I am GOING to eat this beautiful dinner at my table tonight!  I put all the food on the table, opened my awesome windows, absorbed the gorgeous Spring air pouring in the back door, and dived in. 

Only...

An overwhelming sense of loneliness quickly set in.

This amazing meal, this spectacular breeze, a complete setting that is purely divine -- and nobody to enjoy it with.

Hmm.

And it dawned on me: putting a lot of energy into cooking a great meal isn't as fun as it could be, if you can't share it with anyone. 

Enter: frozen pot stickers, cans of tuna, and peanut butter sandwiches. 

It all makes sense now.

And while I recognize the mild inherent loneliness in eating a great meal alone, I do feel way better having eaten something healthy and homemade, rather than gross and fast-food.  Perhaps something on the Tube can be my companion for the meals to follow...

Solo Saturday: Part I

As my mother would say, it was a bloodless coup.  It didn't stand a chance, not one bit of chance against my ferocious kitchening skills.  What, you ask?  What didn't stand a chance?

DINNER.

I'm not one to toot my own horn, but tonight I'm feeling generous so I will make an exception.  I am a total badass in the kitchen.  .....sometimes.  Tonight happens to be one of those Sometimes.  I took that dinner and I wrangled it to the ground.  I took it by the neck and whirled it around until there was no pulp left to beat out of it.

It happened like this.  (Yes, for me to make a nice dinner, something does in fact have to happen.)

I went into the Wal in search of the face lotion I like.  Upon entering the store, I was very dismayed that a Demolition Durby was taking place and I did not have fair warning.  If you didn't already know, the new thing now is putting full grocery departments into Wal Marts and Targets, but to do so they have to demolish the part of the store that they're not replacing, keep it like that for just long enough so you get used to it, and then they change everything back when they put it back together again.  This means everything gets moved around, which really annoys me.

So the Cosmetics and Toothpaste sections are now at the far end where the Random Holiday Crap used to be, the Eyeballs and Pills sections are smashed up against a very strange wall that did not used to exist, and the Bicycle section is completely missing.  When I got all the way to the far end, it was dark and creepy.  Not the kind of place I want to shop for makeup or face lotion.  But I was willing to take the hit.  This lotion is THAT good.

When I couldn't find it I became unbelievably annoyed.  I know what the box looks like.  I know the brand.  Where is it?  WHERE. IS. IT?!?!?  I kept standing in the Face Stuff aisle, frantically searching for the lotion because sometimes I don't see things that are right in front of me, so I had to check every single bottle on the shelf just to make sure.  The lady stocking and straightening the bottles looked at me funny.  I looked at her funny back, and she put her head down and kept straightening the bottles.  My rage became exponentially worse as the minutes ticked on.  How can they not have this lotion??  Freddy's has it.  Target has it.  Why the hell doesn't Wal Mart have it?!  How am I supposed to get a good deal if it's not at Wal Mart?!?!?  RAAAAAAAAGE.

I know my story was originally about dinner.  Don't worry, I'm getting there.

I decided to walk off my anger attack in the soup aisle and got even more mad that the soups I like are a buck eighty-eight a can.  A buck eighty-eight!  Unacceptable!  What happened to soup being a buck a can?  Back in the day soup was less than a dollar a can.  When did that stop being the case?  Why are the prices of everything skyrocketing?  No, I will not pay four dollars a pound for chicken, either.  It only costs that much because now we're giving chickens beds and privacy and social lives and well-balanced, wholesome lives that don't have anything to do with the fact that that chicken will eventually end up in my belly no matter what.  That, my friends, is a little thing we call "extortion."

And when the hell did I turn into an old codger, anyway?  There is a blog I follow by this young funny lady and one of her recent posts is about being an 80-year-old woman in a 22-year-old's body.  I think we might be twin sisters.

Moving on.  After I got mad about the soups I wandered around huffing and puffing for a while looking for any other overpriced items I might need for home and/or my stomach.  It occurred to me in the pasta aisle (I will note the pasta aisle in Wally World seemed particularly dismal today -- don't go there for pasta.  They only had four different kinds and none of them were whole wheat, so it's a BIG FAT WASTE OF TIME) that I should make a delicious dinner tonight.  And it also occurred to me that this dinner should be none other than: fettucini tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper, with a summer vegetable sautee and garlic lemon shrimp.  Why this particular meal?  I have no idea.  It popped in my head like a light, so I wasn't about to question it.  And, I discovered I was much less mad about the lotion after I decided to eat something delicious.  I'm not sure how that works because they are about as unrelated as stuff can get, but whatever.

I would not find such yummy ingredients at this awful place with bombs going off and piles of rubble everywhere, so I went to Freddy's for supplies.  I found everything quickly and efficiently and came home straight away to cook.  YAY!  Mission salvaged!

So the REASON I am such a badass is NOT ONLY because of this beautiful meal I just devoured maniacally

but because I cooked it expertly: everything was done all at the right times and all the parts were hot and delicious all at the same time.  If you don't cook, this is perhaps the most difficult part.  Well, for me anyway.  Most of the time the main dish is hot and awesome (that's what he said?) but the vegetables and whatever else sit around for a while and end up cold and impatient.  

But not today!  I was fantastic!  I was a savage!  I took that dinner and said BOOM, DINNER!  You're DONE!

Some things I learned:

• Shrimp is no longer mysterious to me.  If you buy frozen, buy it raw.  Defrost in cold water and sautee in butter and minced garlic with lemon juice.  And that's IT.  Easy peasy.  Way better than Red Lobster.
• I really did miss summer vegetables during the winter, no matter how much I tried to deny it.
• Having four arms really would be much better than two.

And this is what it amounted to:

• Yellow squash, zucchini, asparagus sauteed in olive oil, shallot, ground mustard and cider vinegar, topped with fresh cracked black pepper
• Whole wheat fettucini with olive oil, salt and pepper
• Jumbo shrimp, sauteed in butter, fresh minced garlic, lemon juice

If you make this, eat everything happily and with passion.  And be glad your kitchen skillz are almost as good as mine.  BOO-YAH.

Salad as Meditation: A How-To

My Friday nights have turned into a special thing.  I usually have a chiropractic adjustment and massage right after work, so I come home feeling like I’m on a cloud and the house is usually empty.  Just me, alone with my kitchen and lots of random ingredients, pondering life and things and stuff and why things are the way they are.  I started making really delicious salads and I’ve gotten so good at them my boyfriend said, “You make salads that I just want to keep eating.  Like, I’m not just eating it quickly to get to the good stuff.”  The process is really the best part, and I always end up having a blast of a time, more than one would expect from dinking around in the refrigerator and eating something haphazard and accidental.  I feel refreshed and a little bit drunk so cleansed when I’m done and stuffed with ruffage.  Like that dazed feeling you get when you step out of a movie theater on a bright day.  So, this is my Introductory Guide to Salad Meditation.

Start with a clean kitchen

Take everything you might consider putting into a salad out of the fridge and put it on the counter, including some manner of greenery (butter lettuce is divine)

Survey inventory

Have a big cutting board and big knife ready; set aside

Open a bottle of wine, pour a glass, and commence sipping (tonight, we have a lovely 2007 White Merlot)

Ponder what you’d like to include in your salad adventure.  Things to consider or you might already have:

• carrot
• corn
• avocado
• pea
• cucumber
• cheese
• stinky cheese
• garbanzo bean
• black bean
• pinto bean
• chicken
• shrimp
• sausage
• bacon
• pepperoncini
• onion
• pear
• apple
• salami
• tomato
• walnut
• cranberry
• asparagus
• cooked egg
• magic
• orange
• pickle

The more things you put into a salad, the tastier it is.

Begin washing and peeling vegetables and chopping into desired shapes

Stop every so often to take a nibble and observe how it interacts with a sip of your preferred alcoholic beverage

Repeat as necessary

Begin adding vegetables and other items to a big bowl filled with lettuce until everything is in

Sit back for a minute, have another sip, and admire your handiwork

Now, make a dressing from scratch.  I discovered recently I much prefer an easy scratch dressing to anything bottled or jarred.  I like light dressings that do not interfere with the taste of the vegetables.  This one is my favorite:

• hefty splash olive oil
• small splash cider vinegar
• big dollop mayonnaise
• big dash garlic powder
• lots of dill weed
• small sprinkle salt
• small sprinkle rosemary
• lots of fresh-cracked pepper
• splash of pickle juice (if you’re feeling frisky)
• mix passionately
• pour over salad and toss

Improvise dressing as necessary.  Other ingredients to consider:

• sour cream
• lemon juice
• lime juice
• mustard
• barbecue sauce
• honey
• white vinegar
• tarragon
• soy sauce
• sesame oil

Eat the salad.

Drink the wine.

Think about why you like your house, spouse, dog, whatever.  Read something, write something, doodle or sing or talk to yourself.  Revel in this nice moment.

Continue eating and meditating as long as you like.

The end.

Last Saturday

I boarded a very small airplane, so small it was necessary to duck when entering.  We took off in a terrible rain that I watched pelt the propellers in the darkness of the sky.  A few mermaid sketches and two cups of coffee later, the horizon slowly revealed the blazing sun and lit up the ocean of clouds below.

We descended over Oakland and I'd hoped I could see the Occupy Oakland movement from the sky.  (I couldn't.)  I enjoyed the postcard-like view of the Golden Gate Bridge, downtown San Francisco, and the entirety of The Bay.  For some reason, Oakland smelled like rotting garbage. I couldn't remember if this is how California always smelled and I'd just never noticed before.

My bestest friend J Chanandler Bing, her husband B, and her eight-month old baby Bambino picked me up at the airport in a small white car I'd never seen before.  We went immediately to breakfast because J knows that's all I ever really think about on any given day.  She also knows I must eat precisely every two hours to maintain mood equilibrium.

I enjoyed a third cup of coffee, something called Eggs Michael (which B inadvertently nicknamed my three-month old nephew), and watched Baby Bambino munch happily on his very first pancake and also on a spoon.

I feel confident Bambino and I bonded sufficiently.  He was skeptical at first, I could tell, but I think he realized we get along well because we're both Water signs.

My first night there, J made spicy pork chops, zucchini, and purple mashed potatoes with mushroom gravy.  I was genuinely impressed with her mad kitchen skillz and heartily devoured my dinner, plus some extra.

The next morning she impressed me even more by whipping up some sourdough French Toast with cream cheese and homemade jam-like syrup, which they call "jyrup."  

French Toast shown at actual size.

Mmmmmmm JYRUP MONSTERRRRRRR

After that, J and I made felt mustaches and glued them on sticks.  We made templates for several different styles and then modeled them for each other.

Fetch me my cigar.

We even tried one on Baby.  He liked it for a minute, but then decided it didn't coordinate very well with his nighttime onesie and would be better suited to a tuxedo or suit and tie.

Later, our lovely friend Flamingo came over and the three of us (well, three and a half, including the Wee One) spent the rest of Sunday acting fancy and nibbling on delicious snacks, including a nice Brie, edamame (please note: there is no "n" in "edamame"), and some manner of pink wine in beautiful crystal glasses.  Bambino decided he would pass on the wine, as he was saving his taste buds for homemade pureed prunes.

After the pink stuff I felt so happy I drank some of the sweet white stuff (that's what she said?) and ate way too many snap peas. Monstrous gas ensued.

We sapped that bottle dry before we knew what happened (whoops) so the next day it was necessary to pick up two more bottles at Trader Joe's.  (Those were gone pretty fast, too.)

The next morning we woke up, drank coffee, and packed up the Little One for a special trip to Santa Cruz, where J and I met in college on the first day of Art 60 in 2006.  We planned to head up to campus and pop in on our old painting teacher, but popped in on our favorite Mediterranean food restaurant first.  We reminisced about how eating there in college was really spendy, and forking out $7 for a meal would really set back our budgets.  I used to "splurge" sometimes and get an iced tea to go with it.

OMFG FALAFEL

The air, the sky, the trees -- completely unreal.  Being there reminded me of my old Self.  Being there made my soul ache.

We participated as Guest Critics at a critique in our painting teacher's Intermediate class.  Our critiquing skills were really out of practice, so I offered the standard suggestions that helped me when I was in school:  Go bigger.  Get texture.  Stop thinking so much.

The next morning J dropped me off at the airport.  Both her and Bambino cried upon my departure and I couldn't remember the last time anyone had cried about me before.  Hugs hugs hugs and I was gone, sitting at a Starbucks in the terminal, thinking about how cleansed I felt, how much fun I had, and how wonderful things are.  I wrote some stuff in the little sketchbook J gave me and drank some terrible coffee.

Truly bittersweet.

Roasting 101?

First off, I don’t often buy magazines.   I like to read the fronts while standing in line, but rarely do I nab one.  However, because this one leapt off the shelf and refused to go on living without coming home with me, I simply could not say No.  You can almost always get me to do something by either  a) bribing with promises of food and beverage, or  b) threats of suicide.  So I ended up buying the darned thing and it’s turning out to be one of the best mags I’ve ever purchased.  Who knew things could be so simple?!

I can’t vouch for other issues, but this one is chock FULL of fantastic ideas and recipes.  And my favorite part?

Revolutionizing Dinner (One Table at a Time)

Seriously.  Seriously this is one of the most useful articles I’ve ever read.  They have four (ish) families all with different setbacks to cooking more regularly and healthily (BTW, “healthful”  is a word we invented to sound more scholarly in health and nutrition articles.  The words “healthy” and “healthily” have since been replaced with suspiciously similar terms “healthful” and “healthfully” which have proliferated to such a degree that the red squiggly line no longer shows up underneath them in my draft. Nice going, ENGLISH) and they send their “team” in or whatever and give them cooking and organizational tips and lots of cool stuff.  This article, I am realizing now at this moment, might have changed my life.  It’s gotten me so pumped to cook more and be active about it, hence the stupidly easy dinner I made tonight with virtually nothing in my fridge:

Rosemary chicken legs and thighs with carrots (BOO-YAH, MARTHA)

This chicken turned out *SO* DELICIOUS, and I’m not just saying that because I made it and I’m the only one here.  I’m pretty hard on myself when it comes to cooking.  But this?  Easy peasy, man.

Mix in a bowl:

Olive oil

Minced garlic or fresh cloves, chopped

Salt & pepper

Ground rosemary

Toss carrots and chicken pieces in mixture, put on a baking sheet and bake at 425 degrees for 30 minutes.

BAM.  DONE.  STUPID EASY.

This Week's Accomplishments, in Order of Appearance

• Executed Mom’s Famous Chili Recipe with flair and excellence.  On only the second attempt in my life I successfully combined the savory, hearty flavors of blow-your-top-off meat chili with bonafide sex appeal.  AND, as Brother so wisely informed, the gastrointestinal effects of chili become compounded over time.  I only wish I had some warning — between Bear and myself, sterilizing with flame thrower and a bucket of acid became imminent in the W.C.

BAM.

• Successfully — and by “successfully” I mean “without mishap, disaster, or crying babies” — baked corn muffins to go with hot chili.  I ate three, the Boy devoured four or five (I lost count), and the warm butter and honey were *the* perfect accompaniment.  Eat that, June Cleaver.

WOMP.

• Found The Zone for a quick minute getting lost in this pretty tree.  The first of those around my “office” building to succumb to the dipping nighttime temperatures.  I was rather swept away!

• Conquered this morning’s breakfast like a true champ, only breaking one yolk of six.  Those are much better than my previous odds.  Luckily, I was feeding barbarians who don’t eat, but merely initiate shoveling.  Plus, everything tasted so damn good one broke yolk didn’t make much difference.  Nobody cried, nobody went for the jugular, no feelings got hurt.  Just warm full bellies and an endless stream of rich roasty coffee with a gallon of half and half.  Is there anything better?  MmmmYeahNo.

<Insert gratuitous yolk joke>

• Lastly, with not aforementioned ferocious spacial reasoning skills, I wrangled my shitty computer desk into submission.  If I’ve never talked about it before, sitting — anywhere, any time, in any fashion for longer than fifteen minutes — is murdering me slowly with plaguing determination.  I was in a car accident in late March and ever since, my neck, back, and shoulders have been an utter wreck (no pun intended), and sitting sets off all forms of pain, sharp and dull, in one or all of these areas.  I’m working on getting a standing desk for work — the guy in the shop next door is building me one out of an old door — but my home desk, if you’d even call it a desk, has been an additional problem.  But voila!  A genius new setup where I can stand and blog and not regret every bit it of when I’m done.  Now THAT’S an effing victory, Son.

BOO-YAH sucker!!!

It Was Inevitable

I can't believe it took me so long to get one of these.

I am so beside myself.  And Ma's gonna freak out -- She's gonna be like, "I can't believe

it took you so long to get one of those!" and I'll be like, "I know!  How is it even possible!" 

and she'll be like, "I don't know how it's even possible!"  

I knew it was inevitable when the Boy said, "Oooo you know what sounds good?  Some mashed 

Who's the Bomb?

THIS girl.

.  Fresh mozzarella balls in olive oil and herbs
.  Garlic stuffed olives
.  Olives soaked in Italian herbs
.  Seasoned sweet tomates
.  Dolmas
.  Sweet and spicy cherry peppers
.  Swiss cheese slices, Amish
.  Fresh made spinach dip
.  Sliced fresh cucumber, striped
.  Pita bread, quartered
.  Concannon 2009 Pinot Noir
.  Fresh peach, room temperature, sliced

It Seems My Best Meals

are those made when nobody else is around.

Confession: I'm Not Just the Operator

Tart Grass Delight
1 bunch Wheat Grass
1/2 can chunked pineapple

Pulverize, let drain into a cup
Stir with spoon to mix

*Very energizing, so be careful


Mary's Twin Sister
Canned tomatoes
2 carrots
2 celery stalks
1/4 cuke

Pulverize, let drain into a big cup
Stir with spoon to mix
Add fat splash Tabasco
Dash salt
Dash pepper

*This one just about blew my nuts off

My Mother Has Since Disowned Me

Mom:  All I can say is this: First, she moves to Treehuggerville . . . Then lands a job with a biofuel company . . . And now THIS.  Every Republican mother's nightmare . . . a juicer.  A JUICER?  That's bad enough, but WHEAT GRASS?  There's the frosting on THAT heartbreak cake.  Say it isn't so, Pea!  What next?  An effin' Smart Car?????

Me:  If it's any consolation, both the juicer and the wheat grass are Will's . . . I'm just the operator.

Mom:  Yes, but YOU allowed it in your domicile.  GUILTY!  And, you kiss the lips that DRINK wheat grass juice.  Me?  I'd rather eat puke cookies.

Yep. It's One of Those Nights.

My nightly smorgasbord of delectable treats.

Tonight's winners:

TJ's Sweet Basil Pesto smoked sausages, sugar snap peas, carrots, cuke, and Version II of Dill Dip.

Oh, and wine -- the most important part!

Cheers!

Time To Be Serious About Happy

My coworker asked me the other day if I'm a vegetarian.  I laughed.  I'm a true Omnivore at its finest (and I'm convinced a Meat-O-Saur in a past life).

"No.  Are you?"

"No.  Just wondering.  You always have lots of vegetables in the fridge."

I told him that I just really like vegetables, and my low blood sugar is more stable if I eat well.  In truth, I was tickled he asked such a question.  Not normally the type to ask people about life things.  He nodded and agreed and busied himself further on his computer.  And that was that.

Though I don't consider myself a health nut by any means.  But, sometimes all I want to do in the whole entire world (times ten) is be in my kitchen and chop a bunch of vegetables and drink a glass of wine and munch on crisp tasty roughage and mix up a yummy Dill Dip and nibble on a polska and some hummus and get happy from the wine and the involvement of it all.  That can be so deeply satisfying, there ends up being nothing else I really want out of my day.  It's accomplishment.

And maybe it's mostly the wine, but I am perfectly okay with that.  I tell you what, I can't think of a time when wine doesn't make me giddy and elated, and I am sure my friends who partake passionately in the vino feel the same way.  I've started to question why I don't incorporate this into my daily life.  Besides work, and, well, driving a car.  But other than that, I think I need to take getting buzzed on a regular basis much more seriously.

The Grand MoMare Adventure

         A (painfully)  

Short Story

<ahem>

She arrived.

We ate heartily

nom

and drank (very dramatic) cups of coffee.

We lazed about and chit-chatted

 boop

and sat on sidewalks drinking tea

and swilling beer.

 We got to peruse many a-menu

 because that's what happens

when you eat a lot and are daunted

by giant flatware.

 RAWWRRR

We had fantastic hair

and gesticulated wildly

and made funny faces in public places

  until we nearly peed from laughter.

And even though we felt exhausted at times

oy

that didn't stop us from admiring the flowers

 I think those are weeds

eating radishes the size of baseballs

womp

and flaunting our fantastic bosoms.

yowza

The End.