walking, teething, touristing we

This food is so good that I have to go and blow my nose.

(silence, as the mama tries to parse this compliment. Muffled amusement, as Auntie A and the partner watch mama and Eldest.) Note: recipe is below

It's a grab bag kind of day, people. Here it is:

*the babes has two teeth coming in, as evinced by a delicate thread of drool working its way down his chin. The teeth are on the bottom, and angled just at the same angle as the Eldest's two front lower teeth. The alignment between the boys delights me.

*Auntie A, or as we call her 'Almost Auntie A' is in town for a week! a week! Such delights have not been mine in years, and she had to come during school vacation? Oy. We've been shuttling around to the MIT museum and Frank Gehry building, the local Butterfly Place (a surprisingly delightful find), and if it ever stops raining, to the duck boats. Such plans we had! The Garden in the Woods has a big rock exhibit (small boys and big rocks - seems perfect, no?), Land Sake farm in Weston has pick your own cherry tomatoes and raspberries, taking the babes to see the allergy nutritionist - okay, so that last plan will survive the rain, but the rest are taking a beating. If anyone has a suggestion for kids on rainy day activities that will delight the adults, I'm listening. And please don't suggest the Aquarium which is a pain to get to, and yes, we'll go to the Science Museum, although the idea of seeing dried dead bones and muscle and tendon gives me serious icks. Tonight, we escape to Pandemonium, a funky bookstore in Central Square, where we'll wander and I'll try not to spend money. Ya, right.

Hopefully, this long standing friendship will survive a week with my kids. And with me, being testy at my kids. Possibly that last is the trickier obstacle - I'm rather demanding of the eldest, and currently buried in enough work to be impatient with anyone who isn't falling into line. Luckily today was a day founded on flexibility, with three separate, possible plans in train, depending on the oh-so variable weather. With that mindset came a somewhat more patient Mama, a trick I really ought to remember. Of course it helps that Auntie A is here, and currently reading stories with the Eldest while I avoid writing his IHP (Individual Health Plan) for school...

*the partner man has decided to walk. A lot. But at least he decided to walk with a cause, covering the Boston Marathon route for the Jimmy Fund, come September. He's going into this blindly hoping to find the time to "train," a practice with which I am familiar, thanks to a marathon running father. In my humble opinion, I consider marathon runners to be exhibiting an obsessive form of behavior, in which momentum is used to blot out the rational thought that would keep one in bed at 5 am on a Sunday, avoiding the pulled muscles and pain of serious running, and so on. But who am I to judge? Anyone who has seen me working my way through a bag of Madhouse Munchies barbecue chips knows that I am not unfamiliar with the focus needed to get a job done.

Me, I strongly suspect that he's walking because someone's giving him an official-ish excuse to do so, but I trust that his choice will offer support and a sense of community to our friends whose daughter is battling leukemia. And some time for quiet solitude, always useful in the over-programmed. Here's the link to his post, describing his plan and giving folks a chance to donate to the Jimmy Fund. For those of you who don't know his real name, well, it's a decent cause anyway...and the name of our friends' 1 yr old daughter with leukemia is Amelia. When in doubt, a donation in honor is always welcome. Now, if we can only manage it such that the partner doesn't spend the next few weeks hobbling with sore, cramping muscles. And I am far too wise to refer him to the marathon-running crew, who'd doubtless know how to do this. (But hopeful that you'll offer him advice without my wifely, aka credit dampening, intervention?)

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The recipe that makes the Eldest blow his nose, adapted from Sole with Fresh Tomatoes,' Almost Vegetarian Entertaining.

Blow Your Nose Fish:
1.5 lb mild white fish
1 Tb olive oil, plus a drizzle
2 garlic cloves, smashed and chopped
coarse salt
fresh black pepper
2 Tb fresh chopped parsley
2 Tb fresh chopped oregano
(Note: I love having herbs growing! dried should be fine if you need to substitute for the fresh herbs)
zest of 1 lemon, or most of a lemon

Combine the herbs, garlic, salt and pepper, lemon zest in a bowl. Drizzle with a bit of olive oil, stir. Pour 1 Tb olive oil into baking dish, lay fish in dish, overlapping where necessary to make it fit. Spread herb-lemon mixture on top of fish, let sit (in refrigerator, covered) for a bit while you start the sauce. Bake in preheated oven at 425 F for 7 minutes, then broil for 4 minutes. Baking/broiling times may vary - check. Fish should flake easily with a fork.

Federle Sauce:
Courtesy of Redfire Farm and their tomato festival (to which I dragged the non-tomato eating Auntie A), I now have a new found love of the Federle tomato, a roma-style tomato that dissolved into a heavenly sauce. Here's the sauce that we ate with the fish:
2 garlic cloves, smashed and chopped
2 onions, sliced somewhat thinly
4 fresh sage leaves (or substitute dried), chopped
1 Tb cornstarch
1 cup dry white wine/mirin
8 chopped Federle tomatoes
salt and pepper
1 Tb olive oil
optional: 1/2 cup sour cream

Saute garlic, onion, sage in olive oil until onions start to brown a bit. Add cornstarch, stir until paste-like. Then add 1/4 c of the cooking wine, stir some more. Dump in tomatoes and the rest of the wine. (At this point, I'd shove the fish into the oven.) Stir and leave to cook, stirring occasionally, for 12-15 minutes on low. The tomatoes should break down into a wonderful texture, making it unecessary to puree.

Serve sauce with fish, on the side, to be added as desired. We also had a corn, peach, avocado green salad, and rice cakes to mop up extra sauce. Okay, so the babes had rice cakes and we all glommed on to the idea. Happy, happy, slightly over-full we.

live free or...who the hell chose that for a license plate?

First, a somewhat overdue snippet of the Eldest, from a conversation about the fish:

Eldest: (holding a plastic baggie with some worried looking fish) I'm worried about the fish.
Mama: why?
Eldest: I'm worried they'll get scared out of the dickens
Mama: (glancing at the fish, sloshing in their baggie) Oh, they've already had the dickens scared out of them. But the question is, what happens next?
pause
Eldest: (hopefully) They'll get the other dickens scared out of them!


The fish, by the way, survived. Dicken-less.

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We are freshly returned from New Hampshire, our second visit this summer to the granite state. I happen to adore New Hampshire. I'm also rather fond of Maine, but I do like the big, chunky rocks that litter New Hampshire - thus the name, I suppose. Ah. I offer here a composite blog, of snippets, trip review and finally a recipe.

Here are some short impressions of the state:

*Whither art thou, Starbucks? Hast been ousted by Dunkin? Better coffee, then…but no good chai.
*Who let the vanity plates loose?
*Oh, good gracious. Motorcycles at 2 am? I’ll give ‘em all leather wedgies!
*The family homestead survives, in ramshackle houses with addition after addition.
*Hurrah for the local supermarket, with it’s wonderful array of gluten-free foods!
*I must be seeing an odd cross-section of the population here, because I see mostly very heavy or very thin women. Being neither, I feel somewhat left out. And the collection of local Barbie-types is impressive.
* “Shriners Live Bait” on a sign. Is that all one sentence? Local customs confuse me.
*happy crowded sleeping people, and no basement ‘ick’ to keep us awake! Just small, wriggly, sleeping bodies. Hm.


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Wild Rice and Chicken Salad, slightly adapted from epicurious.com

1 cup uncooked wild rice (I like the Lundberg wild rice mix)
rinse and cook according to instructions.

1 package chicken thighs, cooked. (I roasted mine, then sliced off pieces. I recommend using a wok on some dead bird, preferably boneless breasts. I suspect this would be faster, if more expensive.)
Most of a bunch of scallions, sliced.
1 pineapple, ripe, cut into chunks. Any juice that runs off the board is good - save and add with pineapple, if you can. If not, don't sweat it.

Dressing:
1/3 cup vegetable oil
4-5 Tb lemon juice
2 tsp honey
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper, freshly ground (if you can)
2 tsp fresh tarragon leaves (or more to taste)

Mix dressing, toss with rice and chicken. It's best to add the dressing while the rice is still warm. Taste to check flavor, adjust spices as necessary. Let sit in fridge for at least 2 hours. Add pineapple before serving.

Serve at room temp.
Optional: add green pepper, almonds, dried cranberries, pine nuts/pignola, sumac.

gimme, gimme, gimme

According to Business 2.0, I should reelly, realy lern to spell chek this blog before publishig it. Because if I do, I could get people to read it, then sell ad space and earn buckets and buckets and buckets...

pardon me, we now take a break from our regularly scheduled blogging while the Mama goes and drools over her poor, battered budget. We appreciate your readership. Your readership is important to us. Thank you for waiting.

...of cash. Enough to send the kids to the Waldorf (thought I was going to say Montessori, did'ja?) religious school of choice. Hell, enough to fund a school that works according to my philosophies of religious and pedagogical practice. While I go and get a facial. And a massage. While a chef - no, wait - a landscaper - ah, no I kind of like doing those parts. Call me unfeminist, but there it is.

Here, according to the wisdom of Business 2.0, (the September 2006 issue, list by Saheli S.R. Datta) are the 7 habits of highly effective bloggers [sic].

* focus on a narrow niche.
Okay, anyone out there interested in kids, hemophilia and enough allergies to field a cricket team? To humble Jamie Oliver and Alton Brown? Do I hear crickets? Right, then. Moving on to

*set up your own blog, complete with permalinks.
Um, right. I'll just pop out and learn HTML, Dreamweaver and perhaps a wee bit o Java, shall I? (Extremely obscure Douglas Adams reference there, people. Anyone? This would be part of that niche thing, I think.) Or I could set the Eldest loose. He's been singing in his own language lately, perhaps he programs in it, too?

*Think of the blog as a database. Cite authors and publications by name, use tags, keywords, categories.
Tags? What's a tag? I do like me organization, though. Can there be nice, matching containers with pretty lids on?

* Blog frequently and regularly, if possible at least half a dozen posts before lunchtime on weekdays.
Apparently, you lot read things at lunch. Who knew? And who the hell has time to post that much? Read that much? I'm not boing boing, people. Not even one fourth of the boing boing. Of course, if I let the Eldest post, now...but he'd need to learn to spell better first. Or would he?

* Use striking images.
Naugahyde. In 98 degree heat. With dog hair. That do ya? (Again, anyone for the reference?)

*Enable comments and interact with your readers.
Hey, how you doin'? (Anyone? Anyone at all? Sigh.)

*Make friends with other bloggers.
Yup. And then we can all read each other, like one big happy fambily...hey there, jgfellow, how you doin' there, darlin'? Yup, that does seem to work.

And yet the budget is still battered. Well, jg-man, I can hear you pointing out that perhaps, perhaps, were I not to insist on getting the big hunks of broken glass out of the backyard, we'd have a slightly healthier budget.

And nowhere for the kiddo to play with that monstrous kiddie basketball hoop you hauled home, dear. And who the hell decided that a newly gut rehabbed building would be made pretty with landfill? I know it was the seventies, but still. Landfill!!? I've been picking chunks of glass out of the garden for the past two years.

Maybe I should reread that list, then, eh?