Feeding people: it's a thing

I made a sunflower design with the top crust of this peach pie. 

I know I'm not alone in this. When I make food for people, it makes me happy. If I can bring someone a sweet treat or cook a meal for friends or family, my heart feels happy.
This is part of why I went to culinary school and it's part of why I work in a professional kitchen.
There is something nurturing about cooking for others, but it's also a spiritual gift. Bear with me ... I know how that sounds.
I can go to the store or bakery and buy a pie. I can bring that pie to a friend that I am visiting. My friend would be appreciative and likely very happy.
Or, I can make a pie. I can work the butter into the flour with my fingers, drip a tablespoon of cold water at a time into the mixture to bring it together. I can chill the dough for the perfect amount of time.
And I can pick over the fruit, add lemon juice and sugar and spices. From my drawer, I can pick out my favorite mixing spoon and stir the fruit mixture. My paring knife will cut perfect pieces of butter to dot the top of the fruit. I can then make a lovely design with my fingers as I seal the crusts together.
When the pie comes out of the oven and cools, I can tuck it into my pie basket with a pretty towel.
And when I bring that pie to a friend, it's a gift that comes from me ... my kitchen, my hands, my heart.
The time I put into a food gift is part making the gift and part planning the process. I love all of the parts.
There are many ways to show people how you feel: a hug, a kiss, a card, a phone call, an email, a kind gesture. The best way I know to show people how I feel is to feed them.

Imagine ...

My Christmas gift from my sister: fleecy pajama bottoms
with inspirational messages in the waistband.

My sister gave me a pair of fleecy and warm pajama pants for Christmas. Today when I pulled them out of the dryer, I noticed the messages on the drawstring at the waist: "Let yourself daydream," "Color outside the lines," "Laugh at the rules," and my favorite, "Agree with your imagination."
I wonder what life would be like if we did that, if we agreed with our imaginations. A world full of dreamers?
Today, I received my grade on the written final I took on Saturday for culinary school. It was an 84. It's not an A. But it's very, very okay with me. Our final was 17 pages long. It included essay questions, true and false, short definitions, and fill in the blanks. We also had to write two recipes and include techniques, cooking temperatures and times. It was brutal. We had 3 hours; I took 2 hours to finish it.
I knew I passed, but I wasn't sure how much over a passing grade I received.
So next up: graduation. And when I think about that, I look back to when I dreamed about culinary school. For people who love food, who love to cook, culinary school is often a dreamy, lofty goal. Culinary school isn't like other schools. Yes, it's academic and it's structured and there are tests and projects and credits to be earned. But ... you get to be in a kitchen for a lot of that time, learning how to perfect your craft. There are lectures and seminars and moments that are really dull. But then you get to gut a fish or make brioche or make veal stock. For me, culinary school was a dream come true. It was 'agreeing with my imagination.'
For years, in my 20s, I worked in the food industry. I moved on to media, working in radio and as a writer and editor. When that part of my work life shifted, I went back to the food industry.
So, I make a living as a cook and I teach cooking classes. But I knew that culinary school would enrich that part of my life and even as important, that it would enrich my soul.
Being a student again was rough. It was much harder to study, to stay focused, to sort out the dynamics of the other students, to set priorities. It was tough to juggle work, school and commuting with my family life. It was hard to get enough sleep. It was hard to sleep.
But it was so wonderful too. It was interesting and intense. I met really good people. I pushed through some very exhausting times when I went 3 or 4 weeks without a day off. There were beautiful desserts I made. I would walk down to Davis Square in Somerville after class and eat dinner with classmates. I would get texts on the weekends from my school chums with photos of food they'd made. I learned about butchering, food management, pate brisee, pate a choux and food safety.
My imagination wasn't just about being at school, but doing well. I wasn't an A student, although I did ace a few things. I'm a B student. But I did very well most of the time. I was engaged and listening and interested in everything.
Because of my time spent in restaurants in my 20s and the last couple of years working as a cook, I was prepared for a lot of the lessons I'd learn in culinary school. But my whole attitude about food and cooking changed at school. I learned so much and I am a better person today because of it. And I'm a better cook.
At my age, the decision to go back to school was difficult. It meant a big shift in our home because I wouldn't be around very much. And I started school 2 days after we got married. It also meant spending the money for tuition and such but also earning less, because I couldn't always put in a 40 hour week. And it cost money to commute and to park on the days I drove in.In addition to all of that, physically, the schedule was brutal some days. The commitment of school is a challenge at any age. Some days, though, I felt pretty old. And when I looked in the mirror, I looked it.
So, finals are done, portfolio is submitted, event credits accomplished and in two weeks, I graduate.
To get to this point, I had to have a lot of faith and work really hard. But it all started with imagining a different life for myself, a more enriched career, more opportunities and a feeling of accomplishment.
I highly recommend it.

A shift in perspective

It's the Sunday after Christmas. I have been fortunate enough to have some time off to spend with my husband, my family and my dogs. Today, I ran a few errands while Barry watched football.
When I returned home, I went to grab something to eat. Next thing I know, I'm getting a cramp in my arm from whisking mayonnaise.
We have mayo in the fridge. But homemade mayo is really delicious. And I bought some tiny little Persian cucumbers at the store. It made perfect sense to make the mayo to go with the cucumbers.
Santa brought me the pasta attachments to go with my Kitchenaid mixer. That means homemade pasta is in our future. And if you've ever had homemade pasta, you know that it's far better than boxed pasta. I could go on and tell you about the ice cream maker that Santa also brought me for Christmas or the smoked salt my sister gave me or the lovely cookbooks I unwrapped.
Suffice it to say, I am fully immersed in this culinary adventure I've been on.
Over the next 10 days, I'll be studying for my written finals but also spending a lot of time in the kitchen, practicing techniques I've learned. I'll be making sauces (the mother sauces, specifically), roasting meats, boning chickens, baking cakes. In addition to the written tests, we are given a practicum. We have to choose a card, write a recipe, including the techniques used, make the recipe and have it tested by three chefs. The cards can contain anything we've covered in the last 4 months (although it's not likely we'll be making anything that takes several hours to prepare.) We can prepare for that by studying, but the best preparation is in the kitchen.
Culinary school has changed my perspective on food in so many ways, which is a blog post for another day. But it sort of starts with making things like mayonnaise or a nice dessert to bring to a party. The good news is that I kill two birds with one stone when I'm doing that. I practice a technique and I have something good to eat or to share with someone.
I don't know yet if this will become a shift that will last a lifetime. I do know that this experience has changed me as a person, as a cook and as a consumer ... in good ways.

Almost famous? Nah ...

The not-so-winning dish.

The email came about a month ago. It was an invitation from the administrators at the school for students to participate in a cooking contest. One student would be chosen to represent the school in a regional competition and then, potentially, a national competition. Anyone from the school could enter and we got to choose from a list of ingredients to prepare.
I was interested at the time, but I knew that it was just one more thing on my plate, so to speak, that was already heaped full. I'm in school 20 hours a week, I'm working 32-40 hours a week and spending another 12-15 commuting everywhere. That kind of schedule doesn't leave much time for
extracurricular activities.
Then another email arrived. It was another invitation to participate in the contest. There was still time, still room, for anyone still interested.
I considered that a nudge. I threw my hat in the ring. Could I produce a dish in, say, 2 days? Sure. Could I come in and cook in time to present my dish at 9:15 am? Sure. Did I have a 12 hour day at school in between? Yep.
But ... can I cook lamb? Yes! Am I good under pressure? Pretty much. Can I be creative? Well ....
Sometimes.
Last Tuesday night, while I was at work, I said yes, I'd enter the contest. I told my chef at work what I wanted to prepare. He told me what he thought of my ideas and gave me good insight.
On Wednesday night, after I got home from school, I prepared a few things and wrote a list of stuff to pack. I left my house at 5:45 and arrived at the school at 7 am.
My dish: Roasted rack of lamb rubbed with mustard and rosemary, dusted with panko and served with a parsley and mint gremolata; a fingerling potato and brussel sprout hash topped with roasted yellow and orange peppers and a salad of arugula microgreens, olive oil, sea salt, pickled yellow beets and pickled shallots. It was fresh, interesting, flavorful and balanced.
The judges ate everything. They complimented my lamb, said it was cooked perfectly and nicely seasoned. They enjoyed the gremolata and the pickled vegetables. They said the potatoes were kind of dry and would have benefited from some kind of sauce. They asked me to tell them the story of my dish. I ... ah ... didn't have a story. I said that I love lamb and that my mom always cooked lamb. I thought the plate was rustic and interesting and that I had some nice, fresh elements on the plate. I was flying by the seat of my pants at that moment. I had no story about my plate. There wasn't a ... theme. There wasn't a common element to tie my ingredients together. I mean, I know what they were looking for ... sort of ... but I was completely unprepared for the question.
Listen, I was going on about 8 hours of sleep in a two-day stretch. I was bleary eyed. So I just spoke from my heart. I didn't try to sugarcoat things. I just told them what I cooked and why.
They said they'd let me know the next day.

As it turned out, they had a tough time choosing a winner. They didn't let us all know the results until the end of the day Tuesday. The winners (two will represent the school and the contest organizers will decide which one will compete) were more edgy with their plates, and stepped out of the box way more than I did. And that's what the judges were looking for -- well executed plates with some kind of originality .. something that sings.
But here's what happened in the meantime: I went to the website to check out the contest ... and look at past competitions, winning dishes, the chefs who competed. I was blown away. And I'll tell you what, I'm a very good cook, but I am not at all sure I've got the culinary chops for this kind of competition. I'm not saying that as a self deprecating sort of comment, truly. I know what I know and what I don't know in the kitchen.
I can't feel badly at all about not being chosen to compete. I stepped out (way out) of my comfort zone. I worked hard. I made very good food that was aesthetically appealing. The judges were very kind when they emailed me today and invited me to participate in an other sort of competition at school in a few weeks.
Culinary school has been such a gift, a blessing, a challenge, an education. I have absolutely nothing to feel badly about. In fact, I feel very happy ... and grateful.

And now I own a meat grinder.

Culinary school is just like any other school; it's expensive. And in addition to tuition, we have to buy a knife kit, text books and uniforms.We don't have campus housing, so we all commute from somewhere. And if we have full time jobs, they have to be a little less full time so that we can go to school, so we are making less money.
But going in, we knew the deal. School was going to be a ton of work and it was going to cost a lot of money and it would often be a burden on our families, spouses and friendships.
Here's what they don't tell you. You will need an extra bucket of money for all the stuff you will want (you know, need) to buy because you used it in class. I'm referring to all of those gadgets that you have seen or read about but never knew how to use properly. Or the spoons/knives/zesters/spatulas/pans or ingredients you've never had but now cannot live without.
I'm telling you, there should be a separate section in our student handbook about this titled, "Stuff you'll want after taking these courses."
For example: We made gnocchi in class one day, a simple pasta made with leftover cooked potatoes. To get the potatoes nice and smooth, we used a potato ricer.
I now own a potato ricer.
During a class on pork, I made sausage. The next day, I bought the meat grinding attachment for my Kitchenaid mixer and ordered the sausage stuffer online.
After one of our chefs spoke lovingly about how wonderful freshly nutmeg is as opposed to the bottled kind, a few of us went on a culinary road trip to a spice store to buy our own.
There are other things, but I'm resisting (ice cream maker, gnocchi board, brioche pan).
I'm not alone. We are all doing a lot of kitchen store shopping. And we encourage each other "Go ahead, buy it! You'll use it all the time!"
And we have a list of culinary destinations: Armenian bakeries, restaurant supply stores, a huge produce market in Watertown.
I could go on. I could feel guilty. Or I could just look at it as part of the package. You know, the part they don't tell you about.
Did I mention the school sweatshirts?

I brought my mom to class today

I had such a good day today. I woke up at 5 a.m., drove to school and arrived in time to walk down to the coffee shop with a classmate and grab a coffee. Cafe Zing in Porter Square in Cambridge sells great coffee, coffee drinks and tea. I'm very fond of cold-brewed iced coffee and they make it there ... and it's lovely.
On the way back to school, we found a dozen red roses in a box on the street, clearly abandoned, and grabbed one to bring to our chef instructor.
Once in class, we made bread: cheddar cheese bread, challah, bagels, cinnamon swirl bread, white pullman, baguettes, herbed-olive rolls and a beer bread. We also made a butternut squash soup and zucchini-spinach salad, so that we had something to eat today besides bread. 
After class, a few of us went to visit Penzey's Spice Shop in Arlington, recommended by one of our chef instructors. We bought nutmeg, Vietnamese cinnamon, cardamom pods, vanilla beans and flavored salts.
On the way back to Cambridge we decided to stop for milkshakes and do some studying together. My new friends are bright and talented. We are from all walks of life. On paper, we don't have much in common. In the kitchen, we have everyone in common. We cheer each other on, we help each other out and we laugh a lot.
Today, I felt so much joy being in the kitchen. It wasn't all about my classmates or the sunshine outside. It wasn't just about the cute little baby who went by in a stroller and waved to me. And it wasn't just about the lovely loaves of bread we produced.
Today, I felt my mom's presence so strongly. My mother taught me to make bread. Her recipe made nine loaves, and that's what we made. It was a basic white bread recipe. We would take some bread to the neighbors, make one pan of dinner rolls, freeze some and eat the rest. I remember the big yellow bowl we used to let the bread rise. It had pink and blue rings around the outside. I remember the various pans we used to bake the bread. She would teach me how to shape the loaves, how to tuck them into the pans. I remember the smell of the kitchen, the warmth, the quiet.
But what came to me so magically today was the simple, sweet meditation of kneading the dough. I could hear her talking to me, showing me how to push the dough away with the heels of my hands, how to fold it over, how to sprinkle a little more flour on it, turn it and push it away again.
Many of the students today knew how to knead bread dough. It's not hard to learn, but it takes practice. It's not just about learning how to knead, but also about how to read the dough.
There were about 10 minutes today when I was kneading my dough and I just felt everything else fall away. It felt as if I was back in that little kitchen on Martin Street with my mom making bread, with the big yellow bowl and the sweet smell of the yeast filling the air.
When my mother taught me how to make bread she couldn't possibly have known what a loving, wonderful, magical gift it was. I know I didn't.

Soup class was hard

We likely all had the same thought heading into our class on soups and stocks last week, "How hard can this be?" After all, who can't make soup?
But there is making soup and making really good soup. And because I'm in culinary school, it's not just really good soup, it's nicely presented really good soup, layered with flavor, perfectly seasoned and plated with panache.
At 9:30 that night, I got a text from a classmate "Why am I so tired? Soup class was hard."
It all started out innocently enough. We were all present and accounted for when our chef instructor Erin came in and said the folks in the kitchen downstairs needed help with prepping stock. Since our class dovetailed nicely with that mission, we got down to business.
We rolled up our sleeves and cleaned chicken backs for about an hour. We chopped the vegetables to go in the stock (mirepoix - a combination of carrots, onions and celery) and threw in herbs. A few folks in class also roasted bones for veal stock and chopped up mirepoix for that.

My cream of mushroom soup, garnished with croutons,
crispy shallots and chopped sun dried tomatoes.

Then, class began.
Lecture was about the various kinds of soups, how they are made, what differentiates one from another. We then went over the recipes we'd be making and got to work.
The process isn't just getting together the ingredients and starting to cook. We all must mis-en-place before we do anything; we "put things in place." We grab a sheet pan. We get small bowls. We grab our knives and any other utensils we need. When the food is brought up from the downstairs kitchen, we measure and chop and pour and weigh our ingredients. It all has to be in place and checked by our chef or chef assistant before we proceed. And it isn't as simple as putting a potato on the tray. If the potato needs to be chopped, we have to chop it. If a carrot needs to be julienned, it must be presented that way ... down to a pinch of salt in a bowl.
So, you can imagine how long that part of the process takes when it comes to soup.
But also, we are learning the correct way to make soup, how to add layers of flavor and to season it correctly. We all had to bring our soup to our chef unseasoned with a bowl of lemon juice, one of butter, and some salt and pepper. We then tasted the soup and decided together how best to season it to bring out the flavor.
It's not exactly the way I cook at home. It actually doesn't resemble how I cook at home at all. Then again, my cream of mushroom soup was excellent. I used three kinds of mushrooms, shallots, sun dried tomatoes, cognac, fresh herbs, chicken stock and a little potato.
Other classmates made shrimp bisque, chicken chowder, borscht and an Italian soup, pomadoro, made with bread.
We all sat down and ate soup. Then we finished the dishes, cleaned the counters, swept and mopped the floors. We trudged out together and headed for home.
Soup class was hard.

New chapters

When I started this blog, it was an effort to stay in touch with readers of my newspaper food column. I'd include stories I didn't have room for and recipes I wanted to share.
After leaving the newspaper, the blog morphed into a place for me to share more specific food stories but again, recipes and observations.
But last summer, I started feeling as if I ... well, I wasn't a writer anymore. I had a lot to say but I found myself struggling to find the time and the desire to post much of anything.
A month went by, then a few months. Lo and behold, a year went by and I hadn't written anything on this blog.
Of course, lots of things were happening: I started a new job. My father got sick. I got engaged. My father died. I got married. And two days after my wedding, I started culinary school.
It's easy to say that I had a lot of reasons for not blogging, because I did. But more than that, I didn't have a place to focus. I didn't have a specific thing to write about ... other than food.
And so, rather than posting photos of every single thing I make at school on Facebook or sending mass emails out to my family members,  I'm turning this blog into a diary of sorts about my culinary school experiences.
I haven't been in an educational setting in decades. It's challenging, exhilarating, fun, intense, exhausting and one of the coolest things I've ever done.
I'm in school full time, which is roughly 20 hours a week, at The Cambridge School of Culinary Arts. I'm also working full time, but less than I was, about 32 hours a week. I work as a cook so I'm in kitchens pretty much all the time, when I'm not in my car or on the commuter train.
The 'ah-ha' moments started the first day I was in school. From the very beginning, I remember thinking "Wow. I never knew that."
My program combines savory cooking (food basics) with pastry. I leave my house at 6 a.m. to either drive in or catch a train; class starts at 8:30 with a lecture followed by time in the kitchen. The first lecture I had was four hours on vegetables. That isn't typical, but most lectures are about 2 hours at the very least.
Each week there is also a seminar we must attend; knife skills, food safety, plating and tasting.
I carry a backpack that weighs 16 pounds. It has my school binder, my knife kit and other cooking utensils. I wear a uniform - white chef coat, checked chef pants, white school t-shirt, white apron, white chef hat, black non-skid shoes. I keep a big safety pin inside my pants pocket and attach my wedding rings to it when I'm at school because we can't wear any jewelry. Or nail polish. Or piercings.
The program I'm in is a 16-week certificate program; graduation is at the end of January. There is also a professional chef's program, which is an additional 16 weeks (and an additional $15,000).
So, that's the skinny, pretty much.
I'm tired a lot of the time, but energized too. I find myself way, way out of my comfort zone, which is a good thing. Most of the students are much younger than I am but there are a few that grew up without a cell phone.
I love the way my life is today ... busy and challenging and creative and happy. 

Obsession: Iced coffee

Implements of destruction: Coffee, Nespresso machine, coffee maker, $20 take out cup, ice cube try. 

So yes, I'm a New Englander and yes, I love coffee. But somewhere along the line, the happy train has veered off the tracks and I've become one of those nutty people when it comes to iced coffee. Specifically, I've become one of those people who has to have the iced coffee made a certain way or I'm not interested. As I write this, I'm sitting in my living room at 8:20 a.m. without a coffee. Why? Because I don't have half and half. I have milk, but I can't drink coffee with milk, only half and half.
Here's the way it goes: I make a big pot of coffee using twice as much coffee as I would for hot coffee. I freeze some of the coffee into ice cubes and put the rest in a pitcher in the refrigerator. I then make several shots of espresso to add to the pitcher. This, in itself, was a bit of obsession. I tried a few different ways to make espresso before finally breaking down and buying a Nespresso, which makes us very happy. Nine seconds, and you have a cup of espresso.
In the morning when I go to have my coffee, I put some of the ice cubes in a glass, add the iced coffee and stir in some half and half. Oh, wait, I forgot ... it's not just any glass, it's a take out cup from Starbucks that I bought a little while ago. It's a $20 take out cup. Trust me, that's too much to pay. I thought it said $12.95. When I got to the register, I found out I was wrong. I bought it anyway. Turns out it was worth it. It keeps my iced coffee chilled for hours. 
To get my perfect cup of iced coffee every day, I need coffee, the coffee maker, the espresso maker, a pitcher, a take out mug, half and half and ice cubes made from coffee.
It's ridiculous.
And delicious.

Vegetarian, schmegitarian?

This Roasted Vegetable Pie features
a crust made from rice
and filled with vegetables, 
kalamata olives and fontina cheese.

The other night while describing what I was making for dinner, my boyfriend Barry said, "Is there any meat in it?" I made a roasted vegetable pie with a rice crust. But no, it doesn't contain any meat. You see, for the most part, if a meal doesn't contain meat, to Barry, it's not a real meal. He's a carnivore, as am I. But I can eat a meal without meat; it's more of a challenge for him. I had anticipated this and made some pork cutlets to go with the pie.
I did ask him if he could try to do "meatless Mondays" with me. He said that yes, he'd do it, no problem. I suspect it won't be a problem, but it might be a challenge ... for both of us. For him, it will probably be about embracing change. For me, it will likely be about finding good vegetarian options other than the usual suspects: vegetarian chili, quiche, pasta with some kind of sauce.
So, if it's such a challenge, why do it? Mostly because I'd like to eat less meat for health reasons. But I'd also like to stretch my culinary wings and learn to make more meatless meals.
It's an experiment. It may turn into a lifestyle change for us. Then again, Barry may be making himself a ham sandwich to go with our Monday dinners. 
I'll keep you posted.
In the meantime, here's the recipe for the roasted vegetable pie. It's delicious. The recipe is from a Cooking Light magazine many years ago.

 

Roasted Vegetable Pie 

2 cups cooked jasmine, basmati, or long-grain rice
2 large egg whites, lightly beaten
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Cooking spray
1 1/2 cups sliced zucchini
1 1/2 cups sliced yellow squash
1/2 cup (2 ounces) fontina cheese, divided
1 cup thinly sliced onion
1 cup thinly sliced fennel bulb (about 1 small bulb)
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1/4 cup chopped pitted kalamata olives
1 tomato, sliced

Preparation

Preheat oven to 400°.
Combine first three ingredients. Press evenly into a 9-inch pie plate coated with cooking spray. Bake at 400° for 10 minutes. Remove from oven. Increase oven temperature to 450°.
Combine zucchini and next 8 ingredients (zucchini through garlic) in a medium bowl; stir to coat. Place vegetable mixture on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Bake at 450° for 15 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Remove vegetable mixture from oven. Add olives and tomato; toss gently.
Reduce oven temperature to 375°.

The vegetables are roasted
with a little olive oil.

The rice crust is held together
with egg whites
and Parmesan ch
Fontina cheese
before the vegetables go in.

Sprinkle 1/4 cup fontina cheese over rice crust. Top with vegetable mixture. Sprinkle with 1/4 cup fontina cheese. Bake at 375° for 30 minutes.

Hot days, cool food

I'm not one to tout the health benefits of packaged food. I am, however, one who detests being overheated and will become very grumpy when the sweating begins. Therefore, on those days when the heat soars past 90, I know how to prioritize. First, any food that does not have to be cooked -- by me -- is fair game. This means take out food, tuna fish and ready to eat meals from the grocery store. Second, all fashion rules go out the window. That means that if whatever I want to wear ... or not wear ... is fine. The priority is staying cool.
So, on those sweltering days, you might find me in my kitchen wearing a sleeveless, low cut sundress stirring up some macaroni salad and slicing a rotisserie chicken from Hannaford. Yes, yes, I know those things are chockful of ... stuff .. that make them taste good, principally salt, I imagine. And I am fine with that. And the macaroni salad? It's cold. Period.
Sometimes on days like this (when it's not only hot, but it's also really humid) I'll make a big salad and we'll have some cooked chicken in it. Or I'll throw something in the crockpot so that I can avoid turning on any burners.
Here's the thing: It's summer. Even if you don't have a vacation planned or any time off, it really is a more relaxing time. It's warmer, so it takes a little less energy to get ready for the day ... no shoveling, no scraping of the car, no layers of wool. And people's moods certainly feel a little bit lighter when there's more daylight and no snow.
So let go of those dinnertime rules. Order a pizza. Go out for Chinese food. Get a bucket of peel and eat shrimp. Make some sandwiches. 
Take it easy.

I ran out of ... popcorn?

SO, it's Sunday night and my sister is visiting from New Jersey. We are supposed to attend a Rihanna concert in Boston but it was cancelled.
We had a lovely day nonetheless: massages at the mall, shopping at the mall, laughing at the same things, trying on clothes in the same dressing room. I adore my sister, and we have a blast together.
At the end of the day, we hit Il Camino in Leominster for dinner with Barry, the best boyfriend ever. We had chicken picatta, a big antipasto, homemade pasta and salads. This is one of our favorite places in the area. The food is wonderful, the prices are reasonable and the service is always very good. The sauce on the chicken picatta is spoon worthy.
We came back to our house after dinner and settled in to watch a movie ("The Giant Mechanical Man" ... and it was a lovely film.) About a half our into the movie, I got up to make popcorn. And I was out of popcorn. I looked everywhere. I was sure I had some, somewhere. But there was none. Well, there was a package of Jiffy Pop that Barry had given to me when we first started dating, but I felt reasonably sure that it would be a mistake to eat that.
I don't normally have microwave popcorn in the cabinet, I use regular popcorn in a microwave popper. Unable to find any popcorn, I just sat down to watch the move. We debated taking a trip to the convenience store down the street, but it was 10 pm at that point and really cold out.
I surveyed other options in the cabinets while my sister remarked that Jenna Fischer's character in the  film did nothing but eat through the whole movie.
We had about a half a bag of animal crackers, a half a jar of Bischoff Spread, 15 jelly beans and some raspberry frozen yogurt. I wanted popcorn, preferrably caramel corn. But a nice soft peanut butter cookie would do. Or a piece of white chocolate. Or kettle corn.
I found a half a bag of mini marshmallows in the cabinet and at some of those. I offered them to my sister and told her they were delicous. She said, "When did marshmallows become delicious?" She ate some though, and we got a little sugar fix. It wasn't the sugar fix we wanted, but we made it through the night.
First stop this morning? The grocery store to buy popcorn. I vow to never be caught in the no popcorn zone again. It was hell.

First, let me apologize for not posting more often. Sure, the holidays were hectic, but there were lots of food things going on that I should have written about. But the problem wasn't just my busyness. I couldn't access my blogger account. The website made a change and all of the sudden, I couldn't log in, post, change photos, etc. And if you've ever dealt with a big website such as ... Google, you know how challenging it can be to get answers.
Anyhoo, I figured things out and am back in action.
I did get caught up in the craziness of the holidays, but had a nice, relaxing visit to Florida for a week to visit Barry's family. For those of you married to the idea that Christmas has to involve freezing temperatures and snow, I beg to differ. Christmas is perfectly fine in warm temperatures. Eating appetizers poolside before Christmas dinner is lovely. Going for a swim on Christmas Eve is wonderful -- rejuvenating. And wearing sandals for a week in December works for me.
Okay, back to food.
We arrived in Florida on Christmas Eve (yes, we flew out of Boston and into Miami on one of the busiest travel days of the year ... and it was seamless!) and went to Barry's mom's house, where we stayed for the week. Viola is 93 and doing pretty well. She doesn't cook like she used to but she has certainly done her share: a lifetime of eggplant parmigiana, lasagna, spaghetti, meatballs and the like. Viola is a wonderful cook. Shortly after we arrived, she handed me a recipe and asked me if I would make pizzelles. In case you don't know, pizzelles are thin cookies that are made using a press, kind of like a waffle iron, flavored with anise. I had only made them once before, for a friend's wedding. And that experience was old school. My friend, her mother, her aunts and her sister all got together to make 500 pizzelles and various other Italian cookies for the reception. And we used the family pizzelle irons, which made one cookie at a time.
So when Viola handed me the recipe, I blanched a bit. I'd just gotten off a plane, I was aching to go out to the pool for a swim and I wasn't sure I had the wherewithal to use a hot iron to make cookies for the next day. But then (cue the angels singing), I found the pizzelle maker. Viola had upgraded to a Cuisinart pizzelle maker. This new gadget makes two cookies at a time, really fast.
I set out to make some pizzelles while Barry and his mom visited. I brought the first batch into the dining room and they loved them. In fact, they loved them so much, I had to make another batch so we had enough to bring to Barry's sister's house the next day. And I made more before we left to head home so that Viola had some to enjoy.
Perhaps it was serendipity that I had a $50 Visa gift card in the mail when we arrived home, a rebate from buying a phone. It was exactly enough to buy my own pizzelle maker. 

Breakfast is ....

Sage Derby cheese and an apple for breakfast.
 

... the most important meal of the day, right? I have mixed feelings. Often, when I eat breakfast, I'm hungry all day. If I don't have breakfast, I don't eat anything until after lunch. I'm not sure it matters just what I eat, either.
What I do know is that once I changed my thinking about what constitutes breakfast, I became more likely to eat something. Back when I was a kid, breakfast was cereal, toast, eggs or pancakes. Today, breakfast usually doesn't mean any of those things (unless it's a big weekend kind of breakfast). Today, breakfast is yogurt, cheese, fruit, smoothies -- even leftovers from last night's dinner.
I bring this all up because I was having the discussion the other day I was having a discussion about pie for breakfast. One of my coworkers was taking a break and she had eggs, toast, hot cereal and a piece of pie on her plate. I love the enthusiasm she has for food and she makes no apologies for what she eats. She is also about a size 4 .. so ... go figure.
Anyhoo, my understanding is that pie for breakfast was an old farm tradition. Fruit pies kept well without refrigeration so they were often served in the morning to the farmhands.
I haven't had pie for breakfast lately but I have a bunch of other stuff I like. This morning I'm having some cheese -- Sage Derby -- with a fresh apple. I love peanut butter smeared on a banana washed down with a cup of coffee.  I used to eat bananas and peanut butter on a rice cake for breakfast almost every day. I enjoy Greek yogurt, plain, mixed with a little jam. Sometimes I throw some fruit in a blender along with an instant breakfast drink. We like what we call "fake" sausage, the Morningstar Farms soy-based sausage patties and I always have hard-boiled eggs in the refrigerator. Yesterday I had hummus and pita chips for breakfast.
Rather than worrying about whether or not it's a "breakfast" food, today I concentrate on what is healthy and appealing to me in the morning. Sometimes I get both in, like today. Other days, pie for breakfast sounds perfect.

The (other) thing I would do for free

This apple pie, topped with a crumbly granola topping,
is one of the recipes  I'm  using in a pie class next month
at Your Kitchen Store in Keene.

You may have heard this before: When we are trying to figure out a career, we should try and find something to do that we would do for free. The idea is that it will never feel like work.
After losing my job as a columnist earlier this year, I had to figure out what it was that I would do for free. But, truthfully, my job as a columnist was that thing. It was a little challenging to figure out something else ... other than sleep. I love to sleep; I'd do that for free. But I imagine it would be hard to make a living at it.
As it turns out, there is something else I would do for free: teach people to cook. Last fall, I had an opportunity to teach a few classes through the Keene Community Education program. I offered a course titled "Cooking for Scaredy Cats," designed for people who lacked confidence in the kitchen. We made appetizers, entrees and desserts. After those three classes, I was invited to teach a few more. And then last spring, the folks at Your Kitchen Store in Keene, asked me to teach a few classes there.
I'm a social person. And I'm not a shy person. And I love cooking and being in the kitchen. But mostly, I like to share that passion with others. For me, cooking is the easiest thing in the world. For others, it's a struggle. I like having the opportunity to bridge that gap.
I remember hearing a long time ago that if you can read, you can cook. I don't really believe that. I believe cooking requires a certain rhythm in the kitchen which is born of confidence. Gathering people together to share recipes, techniques and shortcuts is a way of boosting that confidence. And during the class, we always sample the food we are making. This "breaking bread" ritual is bonding for all of us; once you've shared food with someone, you have a connection.
In the next few months I'm teaching classes about pie making, using pumpkin in cooking, holiday gifts from the kitchen and several others. I am honored that so many folks want to come out and spend an evening in the kitchen with me. It is always fun. And I always learn something. I've made new friends, made a few mistakes here and there and had many of those lovely moments where strangers become friends through food and fellowship.
Today, I don't call this the thing I'd do for free anymore. Now I have a different (albeit cliched) name for it: following my bliss.

Okay, so maybe I'm a little obsessive about this ...

Nirvana!
 

Farm stand after farm stand, I heard two things: "No, not yet ... " or "Oh, we don't have that ..." Silver Queen corn was what I sought. It's white corn ... and it's harvested late in the summer. One friend said that's because they save the best for last.Silver Queen isn't always the sweetest corn and the kernels aren't the most plump. But to me, it's the most flavorful. And each year I go through the challenge of finding a stash of it before it's too late. My search reminds me of trying to swim in the ocean in New Hampshire in the summer. There's a very short span of time when you can actually swim without seeing ice cubes floating by. It's as if there is one day in mid-August, between the hours of 1 and 3 p.m. when everything lines up to make that swim tolerable. But if you attempt that same swim the very next day, your limbs will go numb and fall off.
Last year, I went out to find Silver Queen and heard several times "It's too early. Next week." But then the following week, they were all out.
Blink and you miss it.
Well this year, I swam in the ocean in New Hampshire (and I still have all of my limbs intact) and I found Silver Queen corn.


At last ...

I went to three farm stands to find it, a total of about six visits before I found the corn. And when I finally saw it, sitting in the corner of a farm stand in Harvard, Mass., I'm pretty sure I saw a light shining down from above and heard the angels singing.
I bought 18 ears of corn. We had some for dinner that night. I made corn chowder salad the next night (bacon, potatoes, red bell pepper, onion) and put the rest in the freezer ... sliced off of the cob, blanched and packed in freezer bags.
 I'm a very happy girl.

A summer dinner

Sliced cukes, steamed corn on the cob and fresh tomatoes
make up the perfect summer dinner.

Last night after a concert in Boston, I had a piece of pizza that was perfection in its simplicity. It had a thin crust, a light slather of red sauce and enough cheese to make things interesting. I was really hungry and the pizza was hot and fresh. I folded it over and ate it standing on Yawkey way right outside of Fenway Park. It was the perfect late night food.
Tonight I had another perfect meal, the quintessential summertime dinner: corn on the cob, sliced cucumbers and chunks of tomatoes. My neighbor provided the cukes and tomatoes and I bought the corn from a farm stand this afternoon.
The times I eat a vegetarian dinner are few: when I choose to have cereal for dinner, for example, or when I have popcorn for dinner because I'm too lazy to even have cereal. Yes, I am that lazy sometimes.
But the summertime dinner isn't about vegetarian or organic or healthy, it's about summer right on your plate, right on your fork.
I like fresh tomatoes sliced with chopped fresh basil, some garlic and a drizzle of olive oil. And I enjoy cukes dipped in mayonnaise. The corn is delicious with unsalted, melted butter and some chopped dill or fresh chives. But all of those things are just accessories. Summer vegetables fresh out of the garden don't need to be all dressed up.
Summer is waning. I'm going to eat all the corn, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, summer squash and zucchini that I can. When I'm sitting around this winter, I want to dream about summer: swimming, walking on the beach, wearing flip flops every day, riding in my car with the sunroof open and eating fresh, lovely summer dinners.

This is what I do now.

A friend in Michigan started a blog titled "I Used To Get Paid For This" after being laid off from her journalism job. She would write about all of the things she wrote about professionally in her blog each week. I'm not sure if there was a snarky factor in naming the blog but my guess? There was.
When the bottom dropped out of my professional life in March, I spent a great deal of time feeling intense sadness, loss and shock. I was one of those lucky people; I got to do what I loved for a living. When people would ask if I liked my job, I got to say yes. I said yes pretty much every day for 18 years. And truth be told, many people don't ever get to say that ... not even for one day.
So with a grateful heart for all of those years, I started trying to figure out what the next chapter of my life would look like. My professional life has been in media for more than 20 years; I worked in radio for several years before I went to work at a newspaper. But both radio and newspaper jobs  are scarce. Journalism is alive and well but print media is seriously challenged and live radio has been shrinking for more than a decade.
But before all of that, I had (yet another) career, in the restaurant business. I worked in a bunch of restaurants as a bartender, server, manager, and for a large family restaurant chain as a corporate trainer. And one of the most rewarding things I did in journalism was to write about food.
It's been said that if you find something to do for a living that you would do for free, it will never feel like work. The things I would do for free? Feed people. Write about food. Teach people to cook.
As of last week, I am doing all three and getting paid to do two out of the three.
The very first job that I applied for back in May is the job I started last week. I didn't get a call for an interview for that job for more than a month, and frankly, that's the norm. In fact, if you hear anything at all, it is surprising. I will avoid going on and on about what it's like to be unemployed and to be out there trying to find employment principally because you've heard it all before. Suffice it to say, it can be very disheartening. The whole process sucks your ego dry. And yet, in order to get anywhere in that process, you have to stay strong, believe in yourself and be positive. It's beyond tough. 
I now work at a small nursing-rehabilitation facility near Boston. I am a cook and I prepare meals for about 90 residents. I really like my boss, who is a cool guy who plays in a band and drives a Mini Cooper. And I love feeding people and this week I made all kinds of good food: meatloaf, muffins, pork roast, salads and garlic mashed potatoes.
Teaching cooking has brought great joy to my life. I have classes scheduled at two locations (Your Kitchen Store and the Community Education Program, both in Keene) through the end of the year. During the classes, I get to spend a few hours in a great kitchen surrounded by people who love to cook or want to learn how. That, to me, is bliss.
I'm doing a bit of catering too; at the end of the month, I'm making a small wedding cake and 60 cupcakes for a wedding in Jaffrey.
And I continue to write about food, here on my blog, on my Facebook page and hopefully, other places somewhere down the road.
So, this is my life now. I no longer feel such great sadness or loss. I miss the readers who used to call or write to me and comment about the stories I'd written. I miss some of the folks I worked with and was close to over the years.
Once again, I feel useful, engaged and as if I am contributing ... to my community and my family. It's not how I pictured my life unfolding. But in all honesty, that's a good thing.

One, one, one plus a little.

The recipe for this blueberry galette with lemon zest is easy. And it's easy to remember.

I'm a big fan of the Beekman Boys, who you may know from their show "The Fabulous Beekman Boys" on Planet Green. Well, there's no more Planet Green channel but the show will be on the Cooking Channel starting later this summer.
Anyhoo, these two guys raise a lot of the food they eat at their farm in Sharon Springs, NY. They also market a whole line of products they make using goat milk (cheese, soap, etc.) and other cool stuff that they sell online and at their mercantile in Sharon Springs.
I watched a video not long ago of Josh making a galette (a free form pie) that was wicked easy, I had to make it. And frankly, I wasn't sure it was that easy. Turns out I was wrong.
I've made several of these easy desserts and they all come out beautifully. And here's another bonus: The recipe is easy to remember: one, one, one plus a little.
One stick of butter, chilled and cut up
One heaping cup of flour
One handful of sugar
A little salt.
Cut the butter into the other ingredients. When the butter is the size of peas, start adding a little cold milk or water. When the dough starts coming together, take it out of the bowl, throw it on a floured surface, add some more flour to the top and roll it out, into an oblong shape.
Put the dough onto a rimmed cookie sheet (jelly roll pan) --  I line mine with parchment but you don't have to. Add a pint of berries (approximately) and some kind of herb or citrus -- strawberries with basil, blueberries with lemon zest, raspberries with orange zest, etc., and throw on another handful of sugar.
Pull the dough up around the berries and bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees. The galette should be golden when it's done.
That's it.
The berries may leak, but that's fine. You may want to serve this with ice cream or whipped cream ... but  you don't have to.
A friend told me this week that she used this recipe to make an apple galette for her family for breakfast. And I've made several this summer using fruit from the farm stand or fruit that I picked.
Oh, and the crust recipe can be doubled for a double-crusted traditional pie.
Bonus!

I've got that joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart ...

Find something to do that you would do for free.
That is often the advice given to people looking for jobs or trying to figure out a career path. It's a great thing to say, but sometimes not as easy in practice. It would be hard to make a living if what you love the most is ... sleeping, for example.
Over the years, I've found a couple of those things that I would do for free. One of them is feeding people. The other is teaching people to cook. Clearly, the whole food thing works for me.
I love it all: shopping, chopping, cleaning, preparing, serving. I am happy when I am in a kitchen, especially when I'm surrounded by other people who feel the same way I do about cooking.

Fresh berries were the main ingredient of my
"Easy Peasy Berry Desserts" class
at Your Kitchen Store this week.

I started teaching cooking classes in Keene last year throught the Community Education program at Keene High School. I taught five classes there and each one was a blast. We made all sorts of food and laughed a lot during class.
To me, food is always going to be better if you have some role in the preparation process. In other words, get your hands in there. So during classes, I try and get people to let go of the fear and embrace the process of preparing food. Some folks grow up in homes where the mom didn't want anyone in the kitchen. Other folks just didn't have any interest in learning to cook.
In my family, we all helped out in the kitchen and we all love to cook.
This week, I taught a class at Your Kitchen Store. First of all, the staff there is wonderful and helped make the class really easy. And, there are a gazillion gadgets to use during the class. But also, there is this amazingly lovely, well stocked kitchen there. It's a dreamy kitchen.
And then, I had a dreamy group of students come for the class: fun, interested, excited to be there.
We had a ball making a fresh strawberry-basil galette and a vanilla panna cotta with a berry coulis.
This is the thing I would do for free. I love preaching the gospel of good food to a group of people to go to that same food-loving church.
I've been invited to teach more classes and we have four more scheduled. The next class is on Wednesday, July 11, from noon-2 and it's all about salads and homemade dressing. It's time to step out of the bottled dressing thrown on a bagged salad mix zone.
Go to the website for more info or message me and I'll get you the details.
When you come to class, I'll be the one with a big smile on my face.