food and cooking | matching tracksuits

Slow Day

Monday 30 December 2019

The Boy had to go to the dentist to get some kind of protective covering over his molars. I don't remember ever doing that for the Girl, and I certainly didn't have it done to me. Then again, how would I know? That would have been almost 40 years ago.

K got some zurek going. Such a strangely wonderful soup -- only Eastern Europeans could think of something like that. Let rye flour ferment and then use that as a basis for soup. Genius.

The Boy did a little work on IXL. It's one of my favorite tools as a teacher -- one of the few things the district provides that I think is genuinely useful.

And then K and I made another baklava for tomorrow's New Year's Eve party. I think she and I have pretty much mastered it. The trick is not to follow the recipe: the syrup is only supposed to simmer as long as the pastry part bakes, but I found quite by accident that letting it cook twice as long makes it wonderfully gooey on the bottom. Then again, one has to thin it a bit before pouring it on the pastry. I used a little brandy this time. Again -- like life, don't follow that recipe too closely.

Big Monday

Monday 22 July 2019

The first order of the day: get the front end alignment done on the Paddy Wagon (or minivan as others might call it). The Boy, learning that I was going to take the car and ride my bike back, insisted on going with me.

Second, later in the day, a playdate with D, his best friend in kindergarten who changed schools for first grade. D's mother, R, was a Spanish teacher at my school, and it just so happened that our boys were in the same class, and it just so happened that they became great friends, independent of any intervention from parents. The playdate included almost everything the Boy loves, namely Legos and swimming.

Later, eat an enormous dinner: salmon, potatoes, and one of his absolute favorites, asparagus. (How many seven-year-olds love asparagus, mushrooms, and blood sausage?)

Finally, after a little rest to let the food settle, go on a seven-mile bike ride.

Any wonder he went to sleep almost immediately?

Thee Pictures for Sunday

Sunday 07 July 2019

Ice Cream, 1973

Wednesday 26 June 2019

More discoveries from the past. Haven't seen myself in baby pictures in years.

Thursday

Thursday 20 June 2019

Yesterday, we bought a new piece of furniture for Papa. He doesn't have a closet, so we bought him something like a wardrobe. And the door opened violently as we were taking it out of the house (owners moving -- everything must go!) and the door broke right at one of the joints. So first thing this morning: round up some clamps from a neighbor and get to gluing.

I added "fix cabinet door" to my summer to-do list just so I could check it off.

Next, the kitchen counters need resealing and repolishing. The Boy was eager to help. He chattered away the whole time about how important it was to take care of our granite ("Daddy, what's granite?") and how we were such good homeowners to be so conscientious about everything and how it's important to spray all the sealers and polishes evenly (shortly after I told him that -- he likes to do that as it makes him feel adult) and a thousand and one other things.

Late afternoon: K comes back and sets about making another cobbler from the blueberries that are now ripening like mad every day.

And the Boy had to get in on that as well.

Sunday

Sunday 16 June 2019

Morning

The Boy started the day with K on the back deck, working on something the Boy didn't really enjoy and also making a Father's Day card for me. I went out with a cup of coffee, and they resorted to whispers.

Afternoon

A 12.67km bike ride with the Boy. He tackled some climbs that he's never conquered before, and a couple of climbs that always kick his butt kicked his butt again. The one surprise: a climb he's never made it up kicked him. He stopped halfway up. It's a tricky climb: off-road, with a sharp left that also ramps up in steepness. He took a drink of water as he rested while I showed him how to take such a challenging turn.

"Hit it from the outside, then turn in sharply," I said. "Want to try it again?"

"Yes."

And he got it.

Evening

The buzz going around the Polish community lately: Aldi is selling kabanos, and all the Poles' opinion was unanimous -- surprisingly good. Today, I noticed them in Aldi. I showed a package to Kinga. Her eyes got big. "How many should we get?" I asked. "All of them," she said.

And of course, there was a bonfire.

A Mess

Thursday 13 June 2019

I've been working to clean out our basement this week. Because of some shoddy renovation work -- well, shoddy cleanup -- we had a fair amount of concrete dust coating many things as well as the usual chaos that comes with leaving your basement to grow its on labyrinth of apathetic misplacement of tools and storage bins for four years.

Monday and Tuesday I worked on the metal and wood storage shelves that hold our plastic storage bins filled with camping items, old photographs, clothes the Boy has not yet grown into, and mysterious "why do we still have that?" items. Wednesday was the work bench as well as a few more shelves. (Everything takes so long because each item -- every single one -- needs to be wiped down, and the shelves took a long time because I moved them to one location temporarily to clean them and then had to move them back.)

Today, I began working on the other half of the room and final touches to the work bench. The after picture, as a result of not having time to put everything back in its place, looks worse than the before picture above.

In order to clean a mess, we often have to make one first. It's truism for most things in life, I think, but I often forget it. I want things to move ahead without ever moving back; I want lesson plans to come out perfect the first time; I want first drafts to be good enough to be final drafts; I want our kids to perfect things instantly. It's in the mess that we figure things out, though, and making a masterpiece always involves a mess beforehand.

I forget that when I come into the kitchen as K is cooking, though. I tend to clean things as I go along; K, not so much. The kitchen is a complete wreck when she's done cooking. Yet out of that mess comes little slices and ladles-full of perfection.

Thanksgiving 2018

Thursday 22 November 2018

The day began with the relatively new Thanksgiving tradition: K and L went to Mass at the church we used to attend (which we still attend once a month for Polish mass, said now for a couple of years in English by a Columbian priest) for the parish's special Thanksgiving Mass. The choir sings portions of the Mass in English, portions in Spanish, portions in Polish, and portions in Tagalog. As they do for any special Mass, the girls dressed in traditional Polish Highlander clothes.

While the girls were gone, the Boy continued with his help.

We prepared the turkey, made the requisite casserole, made the dressing, cooked the giblet gravy, and then baked it all. Except for the gravy.

We packed everything up and headed over to Nana's and Papa's for a quiet late lunch/early dinner. Everyone said it was delicious, but I wasn't entirely satisfied with what I delivered.

The dressing was a disaster: too much liquid. I forgot to figure the fact that I'd added orange wedges and cranberries, which released a ridiculous amount of liquid.
The cranberry sauce was a bit too sour for my taste. I'd cut the recipe's sugar requirement by about 30%, thinking, "American recipes are always too sweet." Perhaps not. It wasn't as much of a failure as the dressing, but I've made better.
The turkey probably could have cooked a bit longer. It was done, but it clung to the bone just a bit too much. A half an hour more would have made it better, I think, without overdoing it.
The syrup for the baklava was just a touch too thick. It didn't entirely absorb into the fillo dough -- at least not like I like it. It wasn't bad, perse, but it could have been just a little better.

Still, we're always a little too hard on ourselves. K pointed out that we could simply bake the dressing a little longer tomorrow. The cranberry sauce was perfect for her. The kids devoured the turkey. And even I can't really complain about the baklava. I just wanted a fourth bullet point for that list for some reason.

Dinner

Saturday 06 October 2018

Baking for the Kids

Sunday 28 January 2018

Theodor Seuss Geisel said it best:

The sun did not shine.
It was too wet to play.
So we sat in the house
All [this] cold, cold, wet day.

We were stuck in the house all day. Rain, rain, rain. The Boy entertained himself with making fans through most of the afternoon.

In the evening, the Girl made molassas cookies. The recipe came from a book about the Great Depression she's reading in class, and she's been keen on making them all week. Of course E wanted to help, but what is true for many things is doubly true for baking: his help doesn't.

The Girl, though, has reached a point that she needs little to no help when baking. With experience comes confidence.

"Maybe I could take some to school tomorrow," she chimed in the midst of the baking. K emailed her teacher quickly, and L got the go-ahead.

So tomorrow she'll be taking one cookie each -- twenty-four total -- for her classmates.

The thoughtfulness of that gesture -- a proud little moment for us.

Matching Tracksuits

fun in fours