Night #5: What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger–Right?

Friday night, for my final night of the five-nights-o’-cooking challenge (TM) we ate the galumpki  I attempted to serve on Thursday after an unsuccessful attempt at blindly setting my broken crock pot. And at some point while I was reheating it (after it had also cooked for a couple extra hours in the crock pot on Thursday) Mark expressed some concern over “food safety.” As in, if it hadn’t fully cooked in the several-hour process, perhaps what was happening instead was bacteria was sprouting, explosively procreating in large cabbage-and-tomato-soup-based mushroom clouds of funk.

I shrugged it off. “Nah, I think it’s fine.”

And then I served it to two of the people I love most in this world.

It wasn’t until 3AM that, despite not feeling sick at all from the food, I developed a stomach ache over the thought that I could have recklessly caused serious harm to my family. But before my instinct to drag Mark and Kate out of bed and bring them to the hospital for voluntary stomach-pumping (or would that be Stomach Pumping by Proxy?), I fell back asleep and it turned out that everyone woke up alive in the morning (phew!) and as far as I know devoid of even any poo-related maladies.

So as it turns out, this whole getting dinner on the table for the family every evening thing has greater ramifications than just Mark not having to do it, and having the family all eat together. Talk about pressure.

This explains why growing up our mother’s overcooked the shit out of most everything they served us. Turns out they were trying to not kill us.

For my part, instead of letting fear of poisoning everyone interfere with ever making another meal, I should probably just not use the crock pot until I get it fixed.

The epilogue to my 5-Dinners-In-A-Row Challenge: I may have not managed to truly prepare five separate meals (due to failed Thursday and Friday’s Galumpki Redux), but I did come to the realization that  all it took for June Cleaver to have a hot meal on the table every night was some planning, some late-afternoon “Mama’s cookin’ and can’t braid the doll’s hair now”-type child neglect, and rebuffing the concept of gourmet for basic, balanced nutritious food. Which is to say, it’s doable.

Heck, at the end of it all I heard Kate utter the words, “I like galumpki!” That right there is incentive enough to not raise a child on chicken tenders alone.

But anyway, all this food stuff isn’t really all that’s been bouncing around in my psyche. What I’m really excited about is that His Holiness David Sedaris has a new book out. This generates in me the excitement that collectively all the fans of the Harry Potter books have ever felt about any of those books coming out. (And by “coming out” I don’t mean San Francisco-style coming out… I always feel like I need to make that clear.)

Despite my rabid enthusiasm I have yet to own this new book. So I’m going to hie me to the bookstore right now, seeing as Mark is home to hold down the sleepin’-kid fort. Yee-ha!

Failure!

Everyone whose ever cooked has a good failed meal story, right?

For my 94-year-old Godmother, Mimi–an amazing Italian cook who in her prime thought nothing of devoting days to preparing mouth-watering multi-course meals–it was the Thanksgiving turkey that never cooked. I think it happened back in the Seventies some time, but she’s still working through the horror of it all–a houseful of people and no matter how long she stalled everyone, the damn bird was still frozen in the middle.

Well, I don’t have 70-odd years of cooking to draw from, but tonight’s dinner was kind of a turkey for me. Apparently I was not able to adequately discern the proper slow cooker setting for galumpki cooking. (You’d think they’d just have a dial you turn towards “Galumpki.”) I lugged that damn huge hot and awkward (oh, and heavy) crock pot to Ellen’s, only for her to cut into one to reveal soft red meat. But here’s the thing. We love these little cabbage rolls so damn much, she and Maia each ate their way through one as we discussed the situation and came to grips with the fact that they were in fact raw.

Then there was some experimentation with the microwave to see if we could speedily finish the work that the slow cooker failed to do. But even after several blasts the meat was still freakishly red. I insisted they stop. It was just too painful for me.

I must have had it on the Warm setting all day instead of Cook. Or perhaps it was the Sicken Your Family with Raw Meat setting. At any rate, this only validates my hunch that having a functional legible digital screen which indicates what the hell is happening inside that pot all day is really quite necessary.

Ellen helpfully offered up that she had ravioli she could cook. Alas, not for me, Non Dairy Queen that I am. So everyone else ate that and I had some pot stickers. And finally some delicious strawberry rhubarb pie made by young urban derelicts at Mission Pie.

It’s nearly 9PM and we’re back home where for some reason I’m giving the crock pot a second chance and have it back on. This time at what I guess is a different setting.

I hang my head in shame.

Pink-Eyed Toddler, Wild-Eyed Mama

The next time you’re looking for a good way to express the concept of ‘nearly impossible’ you can say, “Why it’s just like giving a toddler eye drops!”

And for ‘utterly impossible’ tack onto that, “When you’ve only had 4 1/2 hours of sleep the night before!”

And for extra credit you can also say, “And the kid’s in a shopping cart in the Target parking lot because it’s there that you realize you should’ve given her the eye drops an hour ago!”

Fun! [She says while rifling through the medicine cabinet for any leftover C-section meds that might have mind-altering effects.]

What makes this ordeal truly Orwellian for me, is that with pink eye being as turbo-contagious as it is, I’m in solitary confinement with the Tasmanian Devil Patient. Well, me and wee Paigey, who I’ve been trying to keep out of Kate’s germ-infested “I-wanna-hug-my-sista” reach.

I mean, Paigey is already afflicted with a variety of her own wretched skin maladies. Despite all my dairy denial everything has flared up again in extremis. The last thing she needs is to add pink eye to the mix. Right now going cheek to cheek with Paige feels like cuddling up with a burlap sack. One that flakes on you. Hopefully the dermatologist tomorrow can proffer an easy, instant, non-steroidal cure.

See? Even when the going gets tough I’m a die-hard optimist.

That said, is it too late to get my old job back?

Nights 3 and 4: Polska Fiesta!

Come child. Touch the hem of my colorful striped dirndl skirt and I shall whisk you away to a land of Polish culinary delights! Come! Take hold of my hand or the cuff of my flowing peasant blouse, and let’s dance dance dance to the songs of Bobby Vinton, my long blond braids flying in the wind!

Okay so I’m not sure the dirndl skirt, peasant shirt and braids are really what those gals are rockin’ back in the old country, but I do think it’s what the Polish doll in my international dolls collection looked like. (Oh sure, my father tried to imbue his fervid obsession with collections onto me as a child. And if you don’t believe me come ’round on the next rainy day and I can show off not only my It’s a Small World-esque posse of dolls, but some old coins, stamps, and the business cards of Margaret Thatcher, Henry Winkler, and other long-deceased small-time Rhode Island dignitaries. I know, I know. Even more proof of my dazzling coolness that you knew nothing about.)

So, even though I was really wearing one of my two postpartum outfits yesterday (the shorts I think, not the jeans) picture me if you will dressed in the delightful garb of a Polish lass, cookin’ up some of the food of my people.

Our dinner last night:

• Kielbasa
• Sauerkraut
• Dairy-free mashed potatoes
• Mini carrots for Kate (I blew her mind mentioning they didn’t exist when Mark and I were kids)
• Red pepper for Kate (something she recently tasted and wanted to daringly try again)
• Sprite (Mark’s soda pairing)

Last night at 5:15PM I was still waiting at the pharmacy for Kate’s pink eye prescription to be filled. By the time we walked in the door it was just before 6PM, but I stepped up, people! I did not decide that gettin’ a hot meal on the table when my hubbie got home (at 6:15-ish) was not possible! Nooooo! I stood by that stove and made sparks fly–while poor Paigey sat in her carseat bucket in a saturated diaper and waiting patiently for me to get everything on the stove. Bless that little crusty baby.

Nothing terribly interesting to report on the success or failure of this meal. Mark seemed to like it but thought that mashed potatoes made with Rice Dream aren’t really up to par with those made with milk. And all I can say to that is, duh.

Since my sister Ellen and I had plans to get together at her house tonight, I was fearful my five-dinners-in-a-row would be in jeopardy. Instead I decided to make some galumpki–cabbage rolls stuffed with ground beef, pork, and rice, with Campbell’s tomato soup on top–to take over for dinner.

These are something my Mom used to make us. You eat them with excessive amounts of ketchup, and though they’re far from gourmet, in that weird way that some people actually like gefilte fish, Ellen and I adore galumpki. Every time I make them I jolt her into an intense taste and smell memory. (Similar to the smell “memory” your house gets after you’ve cooked cabbage in it all day.)

Speaking of slow cooking, the galumpki [Bruno family spelling] will be a bit of an experiment. Last time I made them I put them in this fancy crock pot we got from Williams Sonoma with a wedding present gift certificate. At that time the digital read out was starting to fail, but I was able to discern using educated guesses and my keen powers of telepathy what setting I was putting it on.

This morning I realized that in the few months it’s been resting in the basement the remaining functionality of the digital screen has gone to hell. So I pressed a few of the extraordinarily un-intuitive buttons on the thing, genuflected, and walked away hoping that some sort of cooking was taking place.

I can say that my house is starting to smell like the cabbagey-smelling hallway of an old boarding house. So I think I did it right. In a couple hours after Kate wakes up from her nap and I’ve managed to lug her, Paige, and the forty-pound steaming hot crock pot over to Ellen’s, I’ll know for sure.

Cuteness

This morning Kate was shuffling through a stack of family photos my sister-in-law Lori recently sent.

Kate: “Cute cute cute!”

Me: [seeing that she's looking at a picture of John holding Gavin] “Who?”

Kate: “Uncle John! He is sooooo cute!”

Apparently she digs a man in uniform. And really, who can blame her?

Night #2: Le Menu

Okay so no gourmet feast tonight, but there were actually four children under the age of five here up until about a half hour before Mark got home. And I was the only person over age five.

• Spicy Tomato Burgers on Potato Buns
• Ore Ida Crinkle Cut French Fries
• Left Over Green Beans (Mark made these Sunday night)
• Left Over Orzo (Kate only–while waiting for her burger to cook)

Not to besmirch the merits of a burger, since a great burger is a great thing. But I feel the need to defend this dinner offering based on the fact that there are so many other things I could cook, but the damn dairy restriction seems to significantly whittle down my options. Just needed to make that disclaimer.

My round-up of tonight’s meal:

Prep stress level: Not bad considering at any moment toddlers could have been starting the curtains on fire in the other room.

Percentage of meal I did all by myself: Like last night 98%, since I asked Mark if he thought the burgers were cooked enough. (I needed to give them another 30 seconds.)

Orchestration of all elements: Good! I fretted a bit that the fries wouldn’t be ready with the burgers, but my project management skills must have somehow kicked in. I hit my deadlines, nailed my milestones, and took the critical path to getting everything on the table at once.

Taste: Mark rated it as “very good.” (Aw shucks.) He liked the little horseradish kick in the burgers, as did I, and said they had “excellent color.” I hadn’t even thought that was something the judges were looking at. Kate also seemed pleased with her un-spicy burger, and enjoyed making herself little sliders by sticking her cut-up meat between a bun she tore pieces off of. All this said, I should point out that neither Mark nor I touched the green beans that I reheated from the other night. I guess I don’t get points for trying to make a balanced meal if we eat an imbalanced one. The fact that they were leftovers made them more easy to ignore, I think. Plus Mark had a multi-course work lunch.

Familial groove from all eating together: Excellent! We sit there and talk about what we all did during the day just like the Cleavers! Just two nights into this new eating together routine–versus our previous one of feeding Kate, putting the kids to sleep, Mark cooking, us eating, me trying to pry myself off the couch to clean up but more often than not just falling asleep and Mark doing it even though he also cooked…. Wait, where am I? Let me put it this way: It’s 8:30PM now and instead of Mark and I just sitting down to eat, we’re already digesting! The kitchen is sparkling! And Mark is now using the living room rug as a work shop for a bunch of greasy bike parts. Uh, progress, right?

A solid dinner overall. But now watching Hillary Clinton speak on CNN is giving me indigestion. Oy.

Can She Do It?

Guess what? I made dinner tonight like a big girl!

It’s true. My dirty little secret is that Mark is our dinner-maker night after night. I know. I’m not working and there is really no excuse for this. Though the story that I have constructed around the situation is that “Mark likes to cook dinner” and “it helps him unwind after work” and “comparatively my food sucks.” The reality is that really only that last statement is consistently true.

After hearing me say “Mark likes the in-the-trenches daily dinner prep and I much prefer cooking for dinner parties (when I also don’t have children to tend to)”–hearing me say this perhaps a zillion times in different social situations where some small indication of our domestic set-up was revealed to someone–well, it’s really a wonder that I’m still here typing today and that Mark hasn’t strangled me.

I can’t believe it took him as long as it did to finally set the record straight over pillow talk one night and say, “Uh, I don’t always LOVE cooking dinner every night, you know. Sometimes I’d like to just come home and relax too. I mean, if you wanted to do it some time that would be great.”

At least, that’s what I think he said. I was too busy sticking my fingers in my ears and repeating “la la la la” loudly.

Sure one of my wedding vows was to always appreciate Mark’s dinner-cookin’. And I think I’ve upheld that, and without much effort or prodding. I do appreciate having a personal chef as I often refer to him. (My God, it’s a wonder I’m still alive.) I mean, my level of appreciation can’t rival my brother-in-law Roland’s who between bites nearly moans with grateful gastronomic delight. Me, I lick my fingertips, sop up gravy off my plate with my bread, and say at least once per meal how awesome the [INSERT ONE] [pork tenderloin with peach salsa] [pasta with homemade meat sauce] [chicken parm] [flank steak and baked potatoes] [chicken and corn chowder] [ziti bake] or myriad other meals are.

And he’s not only about dinner. At lunchtime Mark makes a world-class tuna salad, a mean grilled cheese (with tomato soup, bien sur), and other fabulous sandwiches, quesadillas and left-over reincarnations with a twist.

I won’t bore you with his mouth-watering breakfast and brunch offerings, mostly just because I don’t want to run the risk of someone breaking into our house to steal him. Suffice it to say his skills in the kitchen have little to no boundaries.

So last night, after preparing another knock-out meal for childhood friend Sydney and hubbie Tere, we cleaned up, hung out, went to bed, and halfway through the night when Paige woke up to nurse Mark could not manage to get back to sleep. Just kinda tossed and turned and watched the hours on the clock tick by until of course he fell fast asleep mere minutes before needing to wake up.

Inspired by his measly 4-hours of shut-eye, I went to the grocery store with a fierce determination to do right by my man and to wrangle us up some dinner tonight.

For the record, it’s not that I can’t cook. I mean, I used to have a somewhat limited but solid repertoire. But somewhere between us dating, moving in together, and getting hitched those skills, well, atrophied. I can bake with the best of them, but always found savory foods more challenging. First there’s timing everything to finish all at once, then there’s the nasty handling raw chicken or having your fingertips smell like garlic the next day. (I’m such a princess.)

And frankly I just don’t seem to have the basics of seasoning and discerning meat done-ness down pat. I’m a dyed in the wool recipe follower, which is why the precision of baking suits me to a T. To me hearing that you cook something “until it’s done” and not for, say, 11 minutes, is arcane and maddening. My brain doesn’t understand what to do with that directive, so before it short circuits I tend to flee and ask Mark to take over.

And that did happen a little bit tonight too, but I think I still get 98% credit for cooking this:

• Roasted chicken
• Oven roasted potatoes and carrots
• Corn on the cob
• Sippy cup of milk or beer (age dependent)

Not bad, eh? And the thing was, it WASN’T bad! Mark complimented me on it, though at this rate he’s likely choking down raw chicken just to reinforce this behavior in me.

Kate even said twice, “Thanks for cooking this, Mama!” (Though maybe it was Mark throwing his voice.) She asked for more chicken a few times too, but did turn her nose at the roasted carrots in lieu of “crunchy baby carrots.” The roasted carrots had “brown on them.”

At any rate, the culinary merit of the meal aside, the whole dinner experience was, as Mark and I would say, exceedingly pleasant. I gave Kate a refresher course on table-setting, served everything up hot not long after Mark got home, and we all talked about our days like a nice little nuclear family as we ate. For her part, Paige happily did judo kicks in her bouncy seat while waiting for my breasts to be freed up for her dining pleasure.

So here’s the thing. Even if I can’t dice mirepoix in perfectly symmetrical micro cubes like Mark, and wouldn’t likely take on anything that required mirepoix in the first place, I decided tonight I want to humbly try to bang out some dinners around here. Five nights in a row of me-cooked dinners is my self-imposed challenge. At the end of the week I’ll either determine that I can contribute more regularly to our dinner-makin’, take it over altogether (not my hypothesis), or just really amp up on my appreciation of all Mark’s hard work.

No promises of gastronomic rapture. The goal is to make some healthy balanced meals that both Mark and Kate would be willing to eat. And that don’t use Hamburger Helper.

Can I do it? Tune in to hear tomorrow’s menu, and Mark and Kate’s review.