Weekend Update,

I will do my best to be

honest and fair, 

friendly and helpful, 

considerate and caring, 

courageous and strong, and 

responsible for what I say and do,

and to

respect myself and others, 

respect authority, 

use resources wisely, 

make the world a better place, and 

be a sister to every Girl Scout.

The Girl Scout Law

The funny thing is, I nearly edited the Girl Scout Law. That is, in order to quote a Girl Scout's oath to use resources wisely, I nearly offered an abridged version of the 52 word law- because the Girl Scout Law is so wordy! Contrast it to the 16 words of the Boy Scout Law, which aside from the sisterhood bit, says pretty much the same thing:

A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, 

courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty,

brave, clean, and reverent.

Let's leave off wondering whether or not any of us have ever met anyone of any age who could abide or abide by either law, and let's leave off wondering what sort of jail girl or boy scout law breakers go to. 

Instead, let's delight in the fact that even when we're trying to come up with an easy-to-remember-and-stick-to code of behavior,

we still use more than three
times as many words!

 This is maybe why it's a good thing that God didn't bother to get in touch with His feminine side before issuing the Ten Commandments-  not only would they have been really hard to carry out, 

they would've been really, really hard to carry.

This week, our dinners did their best to make use of the food already on hand; they have been, in a single word, resourceful. 

"I", I thought, as I surveyed the menu line up, " am being resourceful. I would have made a great girl scout."

"If I hadn't dropped
out of Brownies"

Then, to find out whether indeed resourcefulness was a mark of a good Girl Scout, I read the Girl Scout law. And then the Boy Scout law. And then the dictionary. 

And resourceful may not be the right word. 

The right word might be frugal. Or thrifty. Or perhaps it's the sort of word that distinguishes the people who like you from the people who tolerate you: to the people who love you, you are resourceful. To those who merely tolerate you, 

you're a cheapskating miser.
(This is Hetty Green, who was once either
the most resourceful or the most
miserly woman in New York.)

Whether they were resourceful, or frugal, or thrifty, or cheap, there were a few dinners this week that were great, and  a few that were, well, maybe bad is not quite the right word.....

Here's what happened:

Stir fried rice was nothing unusual- a great stand-by idea for using leftover chicken  or shrimp or beef or, in this case, pork. the cool thing was finding a new way to like cabbage- this quick stir fried cabbage recipe would be great with Teriyaki chicken or ribs, or tempura anything, or...well, it's just good:

there it is, hiding behind the rice.

Next the risotto that set out to use up the tub of mascarpone that was wearing out its fridge time. It should have been fantastic, but you know what? 

It was just okay.
The mascarpone made the risotto creamier, but also
heavier.  Save the money on mascarpone and gruyere and risotto will
still feel like an indulgent treat.

the two nicest surprises?

This black-eyed pea salad- I had expected something like the once omnipresent Texas Caviar black-eyed pea salad, but this was much nicer- the chickpea dressing was fantastic! It's a substantial dressing that would be right at home on any kale or spinach salad. A great find! Here it is, made not with the canned black-eyed peas suggested in the recipe, but with peas from my (generous) mother's (generous) garden:

those are black-eyed pea fritters in the background.
I'm trying to forget those.
I think you should too.

And if you're a fan of butternut squash soup, and you wish there were something just as tasty and nutritious, but maybe easier and cheaper, here it is:\

carrot ginger soup
I am not kidding. This was great. Maybe even better
than butternut soup- and did I mention cheaper and easier?

Then the vast universe of great recipes available to all of us collided with my mind, which was (and is still ) pondering the shades of meaning that lie between the words resourceful and thrifty.
Cookies.
No matter what laws of character she may try to abide by, a girl scout, her friends and all her family abide by the laws of cookie. In fact, while I was considering the difference between being resourceful and using resources wisely, between thrift and frugality, a real girl scout in Oklahoma set a brand new Girl Scout Cookie selling record!  So, since in addition to an abundance of black eyed peas and carrots we had a surplus of butter and chocolate chips, I did the natural, frugal, resourceful, thrifty thing.

I made cookies

Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip cookies.   A very tasty way to use available resources. If next week you find yourself serendipitously faced with a half pound of butter, a bag of chocolate chips, and a bag of chocolate covered caramels, consider giving them a try.

 Frugality, as it turns out, is not about getting things on the cheap,but about being careful not to waste the good things that you have. To be resourceful, the dictionary says, has even less to do with with the spending or not spending of money-  a resourceful woman (or man)  is one who can deal "skillfully and promptly with new situations and difficulties".

And that's what I'm hoping for you this week-I'm hoping that your week is somehow filled with good thingsInside and out.I hope that you feel your wealth-all the way from the shoes on your feetto the food in your tummyto the love in your heartto the knowledge in your head.and that you use that wealth wiselyand thoughtfully make the most of your every natural resource.
So that even if your day crumbles your cookies

You'll gather the best of who you are and what you have

and deal with it.

Like the true scout you are.

                                           

Menus, March 26, 2014

"The greatest achievement of the human spirit

is to live up to one's opportunities 

and make the most of one's resources"

Marquis de Vauvenarques

Last week, there were an internal several of these-

that led to an internal one or two of these-

as a few beloved activities surrendered time to a few other just as beloved activities.

After a week of being immersed in innumerable bits of paper and tubes of paint, eating only when eating was more interesting than the project at hand, the need to resume a regular dinner schedule pulled me to the surface, blinking like a mole in the sun.

Just this blind and lost looking,
but probably not this cute.

Dinnertime?
I wasn't even sure it was daytime!

All at once, a dreadful certainty loomed: 

there was nothing in this house to eat.

Which, though it seemed true for a moment, was no more true in this kitchen that it is in most other American kitchens, and to prove it, I cleaned out the fridge and freezer....

and made a little inventory:

 Right off the proverbial bat, you can see two or three important things-
1. Blueberries are an awesome snack, the Sharpie was actually in drawer where it's supposed to be, my calendar is so cool that even the used page backs are fun to write on,  and
2. I did not have nothing to eat.
In fact, there is so much to eat that it may be possible to spend this week in places other than the grocery store. Nothing wrong with grocery stores, it's just that they're not often

as interesting as other places.

Although that could depend entirely on your grocery store.

This is a real grocery store in Moscow.
I am not making this up.

Here's the line up that (I hope) will make effective use of the resources on hand, giving me time to catch up on a few  things I've been neglecting.

Thursday:  Leftover pork fried rice and stirfried cabbage

Hiding in the freezer was a zip bag of cooked rice, a zip bag of leftover pork roast, and half a bag of frozen peas. Put that together with the broccoli and carrots that are in the fridge, and dinner's nearly done! 

There's a head of cabbage in the fridge too, and though the outside leaves have yellowed, but cabbage is pretty hard-headed, and I'll bet there's enough good stuff for a side dish side dish.

I wonder what to call a meal made of two side dishes...

I'll think of that while I slice up the leftover pork as thinly as I can- some for tonight's fried rice, and some for sandwiches tomorrow...

If you don't have leftover pork, think of using a couple of pork chops, or some rotisserie chicken or some shrimp.

Friday: Carrot ginger soup and Asian pork sandwiches

In this fridge, which at first glance held nothing dinner worthy, there are two very large bags of carrots. I do not know how or when this happened. But I do know that carrots deserve more main course roles than they're given- this soup looks like a good try for the last chilly days of spring. These sandwiches, which look so great, may not adapt well to cooked pork, but I'll be giving it a try anyway.

Saturday: Mascarpone Risotto and Pan fried Salmon

Pan fried salmon may seem pretty basic, but it's a thing I have yet to master, so we'll keep trying it until I do. The risotto will be the highlight of this meal though- risotto and mascarpone on their own are wonderful- the idea of combining them is very exciting. The mascarpone in the fridge was relatively inexpensive at Trader Joe's; if you want to try the recipe, and don't want to shop for affordable mascarpone, consider using ricotta or a mix of cream cheese and cream as a substitute. And since substitutions are almost always acceptable, I might use bacon instead of pancetta.

Sunday: Shepherd's pie

There's a zip bag of leftover lamb roast in the freezer that will combine with a few of the surplus carrots and the gotta-go potatoes in the pantry and make a pie. Ground beef or ground lamb would be a great substitute though- and isn't the idea of making shepherd's pie in serving size dishes fantastic? This is an Australian recipe, and so may require a little bit of translation- fir the purposes of this pie,

this is not tomato sauce.............................this is tomato sauce

Monday: Black eyed pea salad and blackeyed pea fritters

Thanks to my mother's generosity, and the prolific kindness of her garden, there are about 4 zip bags of frozen purple hull peas in the freezer. What a pity to have such an abundance, and cook them only one way! A wealth of resources makes for a freedom in experimentation, doesn't it? The salad looks like a sure winner- it's the fritters that are a bit of a gamble. And it may not be a good sign that the picture of them won't copy itself next to the picture of the salad. But fritters made from ground black-eyed peas are popular in lots of cultures and, well...crispy fried protein sounds like a good idea.

And a great way to use my available resources.

This week, I hope that if (and almost certainly when)

you find yourself up against 

a moment or a mountain you feel unequal to

you take a breath

and in the space of that breath

you make an inventory

of all the resources you hold.

Your strength, your soul, your heart, your mind.

The love within you and the love around you.

And I hope that as you exhale you know

 that what you have and who you are

right now
 is enough.

And just maybe, even more than enough.

weekend update March 23,2014

“You live and learn. At any rate, you live.” 

Douglas Adams

Last Tuesday, on a makeshift altar named after the gods of unfinished projects, 

I sacrificed my desire
 to perpetually try something new for dinner.

Because as we all know, though you may not be able to get everything you want, you can often get those things you want most.

Of course, you may have to work
extra hard if the things you want most
don't exist. Yet.

There are a few writing projects that have been simmering on the proverbial back burners of the mind for long enough; they'll never get a chance to cook up perfectly

until they get a chance at front of the mental stove.

And because this week, the desire to devote some concentrated energy to these projects was even greater than my desire to try out a new menu roster, I resurrected a week of menus and the post that lined them up-

and the recap in the subsequent update holds true: 

the honey-salt chicken brine remains my very favorite way to take 

something ordinary

and turn it into 

something uncommon

of all the things we tried during this week of salt, it's the lesson that I remain most grateful to have learned- 

here's a recap of its discovery, along with a few other things that will get a replay in the weeks ahead.

“The cure for anything is salt water - 

tears, sweat, or the sea.”

Isak Dinesen

Every family has it's legends; you're about to learn one of ours. It begins, as most legends do, with a journey. 

well, a family road trip.
Twenty something years later, I hold this photo,
 look deep into their angelic eyes
and wonder if perhaps they had secretly been mapping out a trip to crazytown for hours.

It was a journey that involved a small rental car, long unmarked roads curving queasily over an unfamiliar landscape and three travel-weary children who were becoming more cross and crabby with every mile, until turning around toward the back seat felt a little like facing, well 

(and really, I was perhaps a little crabby too)

And then, as if it had been hand lettered and nailed in place by a benevolent angel

 (wait. Is there any other kind of angel?)  

we saw a sign. 

It pointed toward the left, to an unpaved track which led (or so it promised) to a quiet beachy cove. And that's when I learned the magic math of salt water:

This mood.
This one went from peevish to perky in one 60 second dash to the beach,
stripping down to her skivvies as she ran. There was zero I could've (or would've) done
about the rapidity with which she abandoned her clothes.
I have, however, added an Ariel-style shell bikini in deference to her grown-up sensibilities. 
Sensibilities notably lacking in her childhood.

Saltwater. It can transform a shoreline, or a wound, or a mood- and this week it changed dinner.

Starting with the recipe that will forever change the way I cook chicken: Honey brined chicken. Here's what I learned- taking the leanest piece of a chicken and cutting it off of the bone and out of the skin is a great way to reduce fat and calories; it's also a great way to reduce flavor and moisture. This simple brine kapows both flavor and moisture into the meat in a very big way- without taking much time. Equal parts salt and honey are dissolved in a little hot water, then enough cold water is added to cover the chicken breasts. The chicken soaks for an hour or so, then gets cooked in any way you wish. 

I'd been given this beautiful tin of rosemary salt, so that's
what I used.  Amazing.  

  

It was unbelievable.  To put the brine to the test, I cooked the chicken as simply as I could- a quick pounding to an even thickness, then pan-fried in olive oil. So juicy, so incredibly flavorful- a big, big payoff for very little effort. 

Then on Friday, we found a new way to love fish. Really! We used Mario Batali's whole fish in a salt crust. Well, we used it...mostly.  I decided to forego the $15 a pound snapper in favor of $4 a pound trout.

It went like this:

They've just swum in from costco       and  having lost their heads (and scales and fins)      they lay down in a salty bed.

And now the fun part (well, not for the fish).  The juicy goodness is revealed,        and lands on the plate, with roast veg and gnocchi. Dinnertime!!!!

There are recipes for salt crusted fish that are a little easier than this one, and since this went so, err.... swimmingly, I'm looking forward to trying them. 

Because we both ate seconds! On unfried, inexpensive fish! Any cooking method that can accomplish that gets a big upvote and further tries from me.

The only relative disappointment of the week was my fault, and not the fault of the recipe.

I used Alton Brown's salt crusted tenderloin, which probably would've been nicer if I'd been willing to actually pop the big bucks for a tenderloin. But really- $14.00 a pound ain't gonna happen around here. Well. Not for food. I've probably paid more than $14 a pound  for, you know, shoes. Makeup. Books. Music. But not for food. One must hold fast to one's priorities.

So, I used a bottom round roast and a little time and here it is, getting ready to go in the oven:

You know what's funny? Even though the meat wasn't exactly melt in the mouth tender, it was mighty tasty, and taking it out of the salt dough crust was so cool and so fun that we totally forgot to take pictures. I did however, get a pic of the potatoes that roasted along with the meat:

unexpected fun part? the hardened shell-like pockets left behind as each spud
was lifted from the salt. Or, as the home audience named them, tater craters.

That little girl in the shell bikini- the one who grew up to be my brilliant, beautiful, cancer-kicking, life-living daughter? She once tacked this to her bedroom wall:

"One can always trust to time. Insert a wedge of time and nearly everything works itself out."

I think Isak Dinesen's quote could've been scrawled right underneath it. 

Because time and salt water can sort out a great many things.

This week, as I've been ladling out one cup of salt after another (and learning so much in the ladling!!!!) I've been thinking about the necessity of salt- the dangers of too much-

Alice, after all, nearly drowned in her own tears.
What- you thought I was going to mention
something about blood pressure?

And the importance of just enough. 

And that's what I hope. I hope for a week that's properly salted.

A week of piquancy, of work that breaks a creative sweat, a week of healing.

And I hope that this week, if there must be salt tears, instead of swamping you, they bear you up.

And float you safely toward home.

Menus, March 18,2014

“Those who don't learn from history 
are doomed to repeat it.” 

Edmund Burke

The thing is, sometimes what you learn from history is so pleasant that it bears repeating- for instance-

once you learn how good one cookie is,
you keep wanting to repeat the lesson, don't you?

For the next two weeks, I'll be delving into dinner history, reworking and retrying menus from last spring and summer, while I devote some concentrated time to a few writing projects that are just nearly as much fun as this little blog- 

let's start with the post that introduced me to what has become my go-to way to cook chicken breast, the glorious, ever-reliable honey and salt brine.

Happy history, from March 2013-

I love you like meat loves salt.

folktale type 923

Cozy up and pour yourself a warm beverage- I have an old and unoriginal story to tell you. A story so old, so unoriginal, that it has it's own section in the codex of  fairytales and folklore. A story so old and unoriginal that if I only knew how, I could tell it as it was told in old English, Shakespearean English, German, French, Italian, the languages of ancient India and Pakistan....I could even tell as it's been told on the breezy porches of Appalachia a century ago.....

Once upon a time, there was a king who was flattered and coddled for so long that he became stupid and foolish

as evidenced in part by his tolerance of  the royal barber's
practice of  the "courtier cut".
.

One Saturday (Saturday being the day his ego most often needed reinflating) he gathered his lovely daughters to his side, and in front of an audience, asked each one to tell him how much they loved him.
The two eldest heaped the praised high and deep- each loving him more than the other until the king their father was loved more than air or water or wealth or their even own husbands.

and the crowd went wild.
No, really-  people love emotional overload.

Then came the turn of the king's youngest daughter,

a slightly more thoughtful sort.

"Father", she said simply, "I love you as meat loves salt".
A statement so honest simple that it took everyone by surprise, and disappointed her father the king, who preferred his lovin' on the flashy flowery side.
No, she did not love him more than life, or more than her husband; she loved him exactly as a daughter ought to love a father. 

It was a statement for which she was banished from her father's sight and kingdom.

Because contrary to popular opinion,
honesty is a rather dicey policy.

Not to worry- although in Shakespeare's King Lear the whole mess ends badly, in most versions our young heroine sneaks into the castle's kitchen on the night of a great feast and persuades the cook to prepare the entire meal without salt. In a flash of rare and remorseful insight the king realizes the depth of his daughter's love and, well...

hugs and happiness ensue

 I heard a version of this story for the first time back when the earth was cooling, and this-

was fancy salt.
(it was fancy because it wasn't the store brand)

  But now! well! First came this prezzie, all the way from Denver CO:

A gift that smells and tastes so yummy- but how best to use it?

And what's up with all the different salts available now? 

These and other questions sent me to the information streams of the internet, and the nearest Central Market. I gathered more questions from the internet, and from the market, I gathered these:

And I set myself to learn the  differences between finishing salt, brining salt, kosher salt.....I want to taste it all

So I did what any curious salt and carb loving woman would do. I started a Buffy marathon, popped a pot of popcorn, and didn't stop munching till I'd tried all the salts.

The things I do in my relentless pursuit of knowledge.
Remarkable.

You can learn more than I could ever tell you about salts from these articles at Food 52, Real Simple and Rachael Ray. Or, you could combine your love of history with your passion for food and read this uber interesting looking book about the way salt has shaped the world we live in. Me? 

I can tell you that a pinch of smoked salt on an omelette or a sandwich boosts it into realms of stratospheric awesomeness, and that fluer de sel has the punchiest taste and the the most wonderful texture of all the salts that I tried. And I can also tell you that dinner this week is not for those under rigid sodium restrictions, because I'm playing in the kitchen with my new best friend, salt.

Wednesday:Honey Brined Chicken breast

Once the chicken breasts are brined, I'll pound them and pan fry them in a little olive oil. I'll be pan roasting a few beets that are in the fridge,  and warming up some lefover Cheesy Polenta. I'll be making enough chicken for a stir fry on Saturday.

Thursday:Salted beef tenderloin and salted baked potatoes

Alton Brown, I'm putting several dollars worth of beef, some time, my blood pressure and dinner into your capable hands. If you say it's good, I'm ready to believe you. I'll be using the leftovers later for beef burritos

The internet loves these baked potatoes! I'll be sure to update you on whether or not they're worth the extra step.

Friday:chicken and asparagus stir fry
I'll use the chicken leftover from Wednesday here, along with some
asparagus that's on sale at Kroger (asparagus is on sale pretty much everywhere right now). I know that cashews are an expensive addition, but I super duper love them in stirfrys, so I'm doin' it.








Saturday: Whole fish baked in a salt crust 
always a chance here that I may find a new way to like fish. Hope so! Depending on how cold it is outside, I'll either put this together with a box of grape tomatoes pan roasted in some olive oil and balsamic vinegar, or a simple salad.

Sunday: Beef Fajitas and salsa
 I'm jonesing a little for the salsa at Tin Star, so I may try this recipe with any leftover tomatoes from last night. And I'll probably stir up a little Rodrigo style sauce too.










You've realized what the king realized, haven't you, on the night of the tasteless feast? That in seven simple words, his daughter had told her father that she savored her life more because of he was a part of it.
I wonder what it is that you love the way that meat loves salt.
What it is that adds flavor and zest and color to your life.
Maybe that stack of books by your bed.
Maybe the that puppy that spins in happy circles every time you come home.
Maybe (if you're lucky) there are a few people on that list too
And I hope that this week you get a moment or two to gaze quietly at those who are near and hold clearly in your imagination those who are far and think about how flavorless your life would be without them.
I hope you have a moment to think about the laughter and wonder  and astonishment with which they season your days.
And I hope that you can hug them close, and smile into their eyes as they smile into yours and hear yourself saying

i love ya like salt.
And i hope you hear it back.