Menus, February 26,2012

May God give you the grace to never

sell yourself short.

William Sloane Coffin

These are 11 of the 87 words that form one of the loveliest and most intriguing benedictions I've ever had the good fortune to hear. The other 76 words are here - read them sometime, and see if you find them as worthy of pondering as I do. 

It's the short line about shortness that most often catches my imagination- because, well. Hmm. Well, actually it's because of the word short. 

  Once upon a walk my son put his arm over my shoulder, pointed to a storefront and said "Mum, look! A home decor shop perfect for you!" 

Not the first or last short joke we've shared,
but maybe one of the funniest.

It's true. I posses a few genuine attributes, yet I lack a certain... personal altitude. I'm more a part of this abbreviated assemblage 

 than this grandiose group:

But there are still those who have no choice but to look up to me; those whom I can still dominate by sheer force of personality; those upon whom I still look down from my lofty height:

at least until they're, you know, eight or nine.

And since I have the inexpressible delight of playing on my own with the shorter-than-thou set this week, I thought to ask them for a little dinner inspiration. They will, after all, comprise 60% of the appetites gathered at the table. I sought advice first from the short stack most likely to speak in complete sentences, and was so excited by her menu suggestions that I decided to ask no further. 

Before I tell you what we're having for dinner, the department of useful warnings would like me to issue the following explanation: meals this week have been planned with the aid of a girl who believes that there is only one truly, most supremely and sublimely beautiful color in the world, and that color is....

well, why don't you guess? 

Here's what team pink has planned for dinner:

Wednesday:   Easy Chicken Parmesan

 This recipe is easy peasy, and even easier if you skip breading the chicken or (shock horror) use breaded frozen chicken cutlets.                                                      

Thursday:  poached salmon, roasted beets, pink noodles and strawberries

Let the festival of pink begin! Roasted beets next to a lovely pink piece of salmon.

Those egg noodles under the salmon in the pic are a great idea, but I'm pretty sure that if I slice a beet into a pot of water, bring it to a boil, and tip in some pasta, I might get...

PINK NOODLES!!!!!!!!!

Friday:  French Toast, strawberries and cauliflower

I'll be using Alton Brown's recipe,and if the beet water trick works on noodles, you'd better be believin' that I'm going to try it on cauliflower. (This pink dinner thing is pretty much the best game in a long time)

Saturday:  heart shaped pizza, strawberries and red bell pepper strips.

The dough recipe I've linked to will give us lots of doughy fun, especially since it uses beet puree to tint the pizza crust, you guessed it, pink. 

I'm going to look for pureed beets in the baby food aisle and if I can't find them there, we'll settle for plain old crust colored crust.

(You may by now have surmised that there was a shy little whispered wish for strawberries at every meal.

"It is so ordered", was my answering thought, "and so shall it be.")

Sunday: Salmon salad nicoise and.....strawberries

Any leftover salmon will swim over for salad, and I'll use tiny red potatoes. I'm certain that before Sunday, I'll have decided which elements of this salad can surrender to pink. I'll let you know.

Short ribs, short circuit, shortcake, shortbread, short sell, all of these I can understand. 

Selling yourself short? That took a little more thought. 

A little thought, and 11 short little words.

And here's what I hope:

I hope this week that you see how deeply this little world needs what you have to offer,

 and that you see the stunning strength and beauty of your offering.

I hope you live in the truth that stature does not determine signifigance. 

 I hope you meet the world this week with your soul, mind and hands wide open

and know yourself equal to its challenges.

And I hope that you never,ever underestimate the value of the love you can bring to the table.