More Abundance

I shook my head. I mumbled under my breath…mostly, “why.” I worried it around in my head for days and finally, (I’m not known for ‘not’ speaking my mind) wondered out loud about all the cabbage my husband was planting. We usually planted eight cabbages and had more than enough to eat and give, give, give away. Ours is a small garden. We try to maximize every inch. It seemed such a waste of ground.

Cabbage isn’t for everyone, right? Myself, I didn’t like it as a child or a teen either, except as coleslaw, and only after learning the secret to cooking it, did I learn to love it.

And then, I had homegrown. Homegrown, cooked just right, is sweet and yummy. Smothered with black pepper and butter—heaven, but still, what were we going to do with twelve cabbages the size of an overweight basketball, heavier than a medicine ball. Even sharing it with family, that’s a lot of cabbage.

The late cabbage came on just as everything else in the garden was at peak production. We had chard, spinach, lettuce, zucchini, beans and cabbage. I juggled different vegetables every night, shuffled extra to sons, brother-in-laws and neighbors and finally, tucked a nice tight, heavy head of cabbage to the fridge downstairs.

It’s a sad thing to pull up the dying tomato vines, the dried up, battered bean plants and know fresh vegetables are gone for the year. Little did I know about the sweet rewards coming in the form of apples. Sweet, crisp apples. A wonderful quid per quo.

A large sack of red and yellow Delicious given to us by a brother-in-law and more…the culls—imperfect bruised, blemished apples. When my kids were small, and the place was my father-in-law’s, he’d let me gather all the culled apples from under the trees. My mom and I would wash them, cut the blemishes and bruises off and make apple juice. We didn’t even peel them, just tossed them into the juicer. What that mix of yellow and red Delicious produced was the most beautiful pink apple juice, so sweet all on its own that all these years later I still remember it.

I’m really not up to that anymore, but the culls do make wonderful apple pie filling for the freezer, tasty fried apples or rustic apple pie. And those beautiful, perfect apples? They're just right for snacking at the computer, juice running down my arm and all.
So, tonight there will be sautéed cabbage and Rustic apple pie. Talk about abundance. Next year, I will not shake my head, mumble, question or complain. I’ll dream about apple pie and abundance.

Sautéed Cabbage: Strip off outer leaves, wash, then cut in fourths and rinse the inside well. Slice very fine and place in a frying pan. Have a cup of water or chicken broth on the counter by the pan. Sauté on medium-low, turning often, so not to let any of the leaves burn. At first, there is enough moisture. Make sure there is always moisture in the bottom of the pan, but just a teaspoon or two using the water or chicken broth as needed until the cabbage is to your desired doneness. I like it tender-crisp.

When I have it, I’ll start out with a few teaspoons of olive oil and butter and slices of onion. I cook the onion until it’s translucent, then follow the recipe for the cabbage. Serve with black pepper and butter. It doesn’t need much. If you are using store bought cabbage, add a pinch of sugar to the liquid you are adding.

Rustic Apple Pie: 1 refrigerated piecrust, 3 Tbsp. sugar (I use brown sugar), ¼ tsp. ground nutmeg or cinnamon, I prefer cinnamon and I use just a touch more than called for-I love cinnamon, 3 golden Delicious apples-about 3 cups, give or take, 1 Tbsp. butter, cut into pieces.

Heat oven to 450º. Use an ungreased baking sheet. I put aluminum foil on the baking sheet. Easier clean up. Unroll the piecrust on baking sheet.

Mix the sugar and cinnamon. Peel and core the apples. Slice them ½ inch thick. I like the imperfect, rustic cut, but here you can arrange the slices prettily, if you’d like and sprinkle with the sugar mixture. I prefer to mix it into the apples, stirring until the juices start to flow and then let it sit for just a few minutes. Then I pour the mixture into the middle of the crust and fold the edges of the pastry over the apples, crimping the dough to fit. I like it to be rustic looking.

Bake 15 minutes, then reduce oven to 375º and bake 25 more minutes. I brush the crust with milk and sprinkle sugar on it for a pretty look before baking. Serve with whipped cream or ice cream. My mother would serve with a slice of cheese, too.

Writing Is Enough. Except When It's Not

I tell myself: Less than one percent of material submitted is accepted. Only one can be the winner of a contest. Writing is subjective. Writing is enough. And it is.

Except, when it’s not.

Rejected. Winner-not. Two slap-downs to my writing ego within twenty-four hours. Again.
And I got past my allowed fifteen minutes of funk in good shape, I thought, but as I watched Maddie Rose smack-down Zoie with an ill-advised bid for play. I realized I was laughing so hard, I couldn’t stop crying. I’m relieved my husband was out of town. He doesn’t quite understand why I put myself through it. If I could stop, I would.

So, I took a bit longer feeling sorry for myself, than I usually allow. Maybe, a good half-hour longer, then I got busy. There is editing to do and I’ve signed up for another poetry class toward the middle of October. I need to do a bit of preparation for that because as I take the class I intend to continue with the edits as I am determined to finish this book to my satisfaction and send it out. I know it is taking on a lot, but I need this.

It’s that time of year. Oh, not of tangerine and burgundy leaves and slanted sunlight, not of fading gardens and harvest, although that is all true. Around this house, this time of year heralds a world gone mad, in my opinion. There is no account of why two people fall in love and autumn always brings this home.

End of September and first of October brings the loss of husband. Oh, he’s hanging around but mind, and attention, and brawn are all bent toward: HUNTING! Now, me? I’m on the deer and elk’s side, cheering for their team, making my own safety zone. If I’m recruited to beat the brush, I shoo anything I find in the opposite direction of the rifles. (You can see why I am no longer recruited. I am the odd one—That tree-hugger type.)

Hey, I make no sense, but I’m practical. I understand the theory behind hunting, I’ve eaten elk and venison, I love to shoot, but I can’t point a gun in the direction of anything living, except, on certain days, publishers, editors, and men in general, one specifically on certain days. That’s actually a lie. Four, on certain days. I raised three boys, but that’s another story all together, isn’t it? And am I wrong, don’t we women feel that way every once in a… all right…a lot?

Hunting in my husband’s family was the BIG EVENT, the traditional, the Christmas. It was planned for and reminisced about all year long. Male children (and later, female children) were pulled out of school, vacation days were used, gear was fixed, bought and packed. It was big. It is still big.

My contribution, then, is to help feed the bunch. Tradition now includes my mother’s chocolate chip cookies. These are one of the first things I cooked at home. The recipe originally was in a small Nestles Toll House recipe book that came with the chocolate chips many years ago. The book, the size of a recipe card is little more than a few pages bound together with two staples. It’s yellowed and stained but it makes me smile. My mother changed a few ingredients to please her tastes. She gave the recipe to her mother, who added cinnamon and cooked them a bit less, so they were softer. Both versions are childhood to me. I send these to the mountains with the guys.

Chocolate Chips with Oatmeal Cookies
4 eggs
3 cups flour
2 tsp. salt
2 cups shortening (must be Crisco)
11/2 cups brown sugar (dark)
11/2 cups sugar
2 tsp. soda
2 tsp. hot water
2 cups walnuts
1 lg. pkg. Nestles butterscotch chips (2 cups)
1 lg. pkg. Nestles semi-sweet chocolate chips (2 cups)
4 cups oats
2 tsp. vanilla
Sift together flour and salt. Cream shortening. Add sugars gradually, creaming until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition. Dissolve soda in hot water and add to creamed mixture alternately with sifted dry ingredients. Add nuts, chips and oats. Mix. Add vanilla. Drop by teaspoon onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 375º for 10 to 12 minutes. Note: You must use Crisco, the butter flavor is best. You, also, must use Nestles chips for this recipe to turn out right. (Try it with white choc instead of butterscotch)

Of course, they have to eat more than cookies. The guys each take a dish. This is a favorite of mine to fix, but I use this recipe a lot. It’s tasty and so easy. I love the lemony flavor. I serve it with rice and a green vegetable.

I got this recipe out of a magazine years ago and use it pretty much as is, except, I’ll use canned chicken broth instead of the water and bouillon cube as I have that on hand. I add about 1 teas. grated lemon rind to the flour mixture. I do not use salt. Adding the lemon rind compensates for that.

Lemon Chicken
6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
¼ cup flour
½ teas. salt
1/8 teas. pepper
Butter
1 cup water
1 chicken flavored bouillon cube
2 small lemons

Mix flour, salt, lemon rind and pepper. Coat chicken. Reserve flour mixture. In skillet over medium high heat, melt 3 Tbls. butter. Cook chicken until lightly brown on both sides. Add more butter, if necessary. (Use Teflon pan to reduce fat.) Remove chicken to plate. Reduce heat to low. Stir remaining flour mixture into drippings. Add water, bouillon cube and juice of ½ lemon. Stir to loosen brown bits. Return chicken to skillet. Thinly sliced lemons and arrange on top of chicken. Cover. Simmer 5 minutes.

April's Books I Love

You may have noticed that I’ve stopped reviewing books. I struggled with that monthly blog and I’m certain it came across as borriing. There were problems with the whole thing. I hate to say anything bad about what I’ve read. Some of the writer’s are friends, some I’ve just always loved, but more importantly for me is the fact that writing a bad book is just as hard as writing a good book.

I know.

So, for several months I’ve been wrestling with the whole reviewing books thing. I mean, I don’t have a gun to my ribs, no one is telling me how to do this blog, right? It’s mine. That’s the joy of it and the healing power of it. Because, have no doubt, writing this blog several times a week has saved me in so many ways. Biggest being, it kept me writing when I barely could. That sounds so small, but it has been huge.

Why was I so intent on doing reviews on the books I read anyway? But, I seemed to be. I really had this need to do something about the books I read. For writers, I’ve always thought the books they read are as important as the books they write. And I love nothing more than to let others know about a great book. I think it is a responsibility for a reader to pass on to other readers books worth our time. And talking about books is part of the joy of reading them, don’t you think? And sharing them.

Finally, a decision came to me in the middle of the night, as so many things do. I will only write about the books I truly love. The others don’t matter. If a friend were to ask me about a good book that I’d read recently, what book would I mention? That’s what matters. That’s what I truly wanted to share on my blog.

Last month there were two such books: One Good Dog by Susan Wilson. This is about second chances and living a life worth living. I’ve always been a sucker for animal books and this book was intelligent and uplifting. Not quite as good as The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein, but darn close and with the same little kernels of wisdom.

And A Homemade Life: stories and recipes from my kitchen table, by Molly Wizenberg (the creator of Orangette). Another passion of mine is cookbooks. I love them. I read them like novels. My favorite cookbooks are wards or organizations spiral bound fund raiser type books filled with everyday recipes. It’s the one thing I can rarely pass up at yard sales, antique shops and flea markets. Best yet, are cookbooks with tons of personal notes in the margins. It’s like reading a secret memoir, a tiny window in someone’s life, a story. And I love story I find there.

In A Homemade Life, you get stories, wonderful, personal stories. Wide-open windows into Wizenberg’s life, like chucked full margins of notes. Even better are the luscious, yummy-sounding recipes. Most recipes sound gourmet and beyond the everyday, simple home-cooking I do, but intriguing.

I think I’ve mentioned in this blog before my love for cooking. I’ve always cooked even when I was young. As a busy mother and wife it often became only a necessary task, but there have always been huge aspects of cooking that speak to me. Baking, I’ve learned is a wonderful stress-reliever and I learned after I was sick, chopping vegetables was very therapeutic.

Wizenberg is a fine writer. Each recipe’s story so well written that you can almost smell and taste the food. Long after I finished the book I thought about the stories and the recipes. Many would be difficult to make or even talk my husband into trying, but oh, how I’d love to taste each recipe.

One particular has been put on my to-be-tried list: Slow-roasted Tomatoes with Coriander because come July and August I have no doubt there will be an abundance of tomatoes from my garden due to a kind of snafu.

The weather has been just beastly. No, that isn’t even accurate. The weather has been Heckle and Jeckle. One day spring, next day winter. Hard to do gardening in that sort of situation but my husband and I sallied forth and planted cabbage, broccoli, lettuce, spinach, chard, scallions, radish and tomatoes. Four tomatoes: two Juliettes' ( We love this variety of grape tomatoes. They look like little Romas. They’re so sweet and last forever on the counter) and two Early Girls. We carefully put hot caps on, too. But the poor things froze even under those hot caps, so back to the nursery I went. When we finally got around to replacing them in the ground, weeks later, the original tomatoes had developed tiny, new growth.

After all, that I couldn’t bear to kill the tough little things and tear them from the ground. I have eight tomatoes looking pretty healthy. I’m going to need to do some slow-roasting and freezing, don’t you think?

And that’s just fine, too, because nothing’s better than a pint of roasted tomatoes added to the spaghetti sauce recipe I had to develop because of my low-sodium restriction.

Toni’s Spaghetti Sauce
1 onion, chopped
1-2 garlic cloves, minced
2 (8oz.) cans tomato sauce
1 (6oz.) can tomato paste
1 pint of frozen roasted tomatoes (or fresh roasted tomatoes)
1 teaspoon of sugar or 1 carrot
¾ teaspoon of Italian seasoning or your favorite combination of oregano, basil, rosemary, thyme, sage, marjoram (If you use fresh herbs and that wonderful, use about twice that amount or to suit your taste)
1 tablespoon parsley flakes or 2 chopped fresh
1 lb. lean ground beef or chicken or turkey

Brown ground meat over medium heat until all red is gone. You can salt and pepper the meat while it’s cooking, but I only use pepper. Drain. Add onion and garlic and cook until transparent. Add tomato sauce, tomato paste, roasted tomatoes. Stir in seasoning and reduce heat. Simmer for 30 minutes. Cook pasta while simmering. 4-6 servings.

Food/Recipes

Everyone has to eat, even writers locked away in their garret, attic, loft, office. Some writers cook for husbands, wives, kids or families, too. On those days when a writer is in the middle of the white heat of a good writing session cooking is the last thing on their mind.

Often, the idea of planning (the part of the job that haunts me), preparing, and cleaning up a meal is the most dreaded part of the day. Yet…Strangely, last summer when I was sickest—flat on the couch, barely able to get to the bathroom, all I thought about was cooking. It haunted my sleep, nagged at my days.

The most I could do was lie on the couch and watch Rachael Ray. Her no-nonsense way of cooking, the sound of chopping, sizzling grabbed me. I dreamed of chopping vegetables, putting together meals. The dreams, the thoughts, the cooking shows soothed me in the strangest, most elemental way. It almost felt like healing. And as I got better and could string more than two thoughts together, I got hooked on Cooking Mama on my DS. It was the best I could do for the time being.

Married for thirty-eight years, I’ve done the majority of the cooking, other than grilling. My husband can cope with just about anything, but in all the years we'd been married he rarely cooked other than breakfast, or while camping. While I was sick, though, he was stuck with it. It was the strangest, worst, funniest couple of weeks, watching him struggle. All those years, secretly wishing for a hand in the kitchen and—I hated that he had to do it. Hated him in my kitchen, using my stove, my tools. I could hardly wait to pushing him out and just do what I usually did.

Hey, I’ve always loved to cook. As a girl I watched Julia Child and the Galloping Gourmet religiously and imagined myself as someone like that. Yeah, right. Anyway I've cooked for a family of five since I was in the sixth grade, but even with that, there have been days I longed for someone else to do that daily job. It seemed that that longing turned around and bit me in the stretch pants last year.

I would say it was a case of being careful what you wish for—you just might get it.

Over the years I’ve collected some tricks and recipes that help with the daily grind of planning and executing meals. I have been lucky, too, because I’ve had a lot of friends and family with great recipes and talent, with tricks to make good meals fast and easily.

Here, I include a recipe I got when I was in seventh grade cooking class. At the time, Utah Power and Light Company went around to the schools and demonstrated a meal for the girls in cooking class. The two things I remember was this meal and the white aprons, trimmed in blue gingham we had to wear, embroidered names on the right shoulder and all.

The meal: Beef Stroganoff, green beans, herb rolls and peanut cookies with kisses

Beef Stroganoff

¼ cup butter
¼ cup chopped onion
1 minced garlic clove
1 lb. hamburger
1 6oz can mushrooms
3 Tbles. lemon juice
1 can consommé
1 teas. salt
¼ teas pepper
2 cups wide egg noodles
1 cup sour cream

Sauté onion, garlic until golden. Add meat, cooking and stirring until red color disappears. Stir in mushrooms, lemon juice, consommé. Add salt and pepper, then simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in noodles and cook covered for 10 or 12 minutes. Mix in sour cream. Garnish with parsley.
I still serve this with green beans. Also because I am on a salt restricted diet I don’t add the teaspoon of salt, then those who want can add salt to their serving. Serves 5.

This was the first meal my husband fixed while I was recuperating and managed great. It’s simple and quick.