Sauteed Edamame & David Plays, Um...The Flute

Okay, I'm fine. Breathe, Kim.

So, David left on Saturday and I am enduring night number two without him. The first night, I had a major panic attack around 8 o'clock in the evening, after the kids were asleep, which involved all kinds of chest heaving and tears and freaking out(on the inside) and didn't really get better until I drank a half bottle of wine.

That did the trick.

Then, I cleaned the house top to bottom. Finally, I just fell into bed exhausted and pathetic. I didn't even have time to imagine ghosts moving the furniture around in the living room while I slept. Good thing.

Last night, I went to bed late and ended up watching Keith Urban concert footage on YouTube. I do this when David goes away. Maybe because Keith has long hair like my husbands or because he's Australian too, or because he sings all these great "love gone wrong" songs when I'm feeling all abandoned or maybe just because if David's home and he hears me listening to Keith Urban, he makes fun of me.

Better to do these shameful acts in the privacy of my vacant apartment.

David arrived safely in OZ and is right now visiting his mum and heading off to meetings. Okay, I wrote that last night. Right now, he's sleeping. It's night there. The kids are doing fine. I've packed their schedules with play dates, school and parties this week to keep them busy. Or, you know, to keep me busy. Lucy and I were cuddling while she was going of to sleep last night and talking about David and she looked at me and said, "He better miss us while he's in Australia."

And to this I say, um, yeah, he better.


So, to make myself feel better I'm going to show you a picture of my husband playing what I believe is the least manliest, least butch instrument on the planet - the flute. I had never heard him play before, but there are stories about his prowess in high school band. I got to see the legend in person last week.


Here we are at my friend Lara's house. Lucy is at the keyboard. Her friend Ruby is playing violin and David is wailing on the manly phallus known as "the flute". And there's me in the corner of the picture, hysterical. I'm sorry, but I couldn't stop.

Question: Were there any boys in your high school band who played the flute? Hot boys? Boys who didn't get their butts kicked by the football, uh, I mean cricket team in the locker room, I mean?


My point exactly.

My husband is, like, the hottest guy I know. Hands down. Watching him climb a sheer rock cliff, with assured-ness, strength and elegance, like he knows the rock, is one of the hottest, most manly things I've ever seen and it never grows old. Ever.

This is him hanging off the ceiling of rock at the gym. On the ceiling, like, horizontal in the air. How can that not be hot?


...But the flute?

I don't know why it seems so bizarre but every time I think of him playing I just dissolve into fits of laughter. Ah...brilliant.

So, tonight for dinner I'm throwing lamb chops in the cast iron for a quick dinner. The kids like to pick up the little chops and eat the meat right off the bone. This Sauteed Edamame dish from White on Rice Couple will be the side. I'm posting it here before I make it.

I've been looking for a new way to serve edamame and this looks promising. One thing - the appeal of edamame for little kids (or at least, mine) seems to be actually popping them out of their shells into their mouths. My kids will eat anything they can crack open with their hands. So I will give them the un-shelled soybeans and have them them shell the beans for me and make the dish with me in the kitchen. This will give them another project to keep us occupied and hopefully, if they get to help make it, they'll be open to eating it in its new incarnation. It works this way for us often.

If you make this dish, love to hear what you think...

xo YM
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The Children are Like Orphans Sauteed Edamame
Brazenly Stolen from White on Rice Couple

Quick and easy, this side dish takes only about 10 minutes. Especially if you buy the pre-shelled soybeans.

Ingredients

2 T Olive Oil
3 Shallots, roughly diced
3 Garlic cloves, mashed or finely diced
1/2 lb Soybeans (shelled, pre-cooked)
few sprigs Fresh Thyme
Sea salt
fresh cracked Black Pepper
1/2 T Soy Sauce

Preparation

1. Over med. high heat, warm saute pan. Add olive oil, then after it warms, add shallots. After shallots soften (@2 min.) lower heat to medium, add garlic and saute for another minute or two.
2. Add soybeans and thyme. Season with salt, pepper, and soy sauce, then continue to cook until soybeans are fully heated (@ 1 min.)
3. Serve warm or allow to cool and serve at room temp.

Continue Reading...

Fried Calamari & David Goes to Australia

I'm up at 4:30 writing you a blog post again.

Not because I planned it that way, but because I was having a small panic attack while laying in bed and I thought it would be more productive to go to the living room and have one. In front of all of you.

See, David is leaving Saturday for a business trip to Australia. For a week. Or "seven sleeps" as Lucy calls it. And I am a big fat wuss when he leaves. It's not that I need help with the kids or that I can't entertain myself alone, it's that, well, I feel trussed to him. He is the one, and perhaps only, really sane, not even remotely hysterical, sense-making person in my life. I think without him I might just fly away in the big hot air balloon of craziness and never be a sane, rational, earth-bound person again.

David holds me here and tethers me to something consistent, predictable and comforting. And that's all pretty nice.

David says it's not about any of that - he says I'm afraid of the dark. And I am. That's true. I have a box of 10 night lights that I'm ready to plug in in every area of the house as soon as he steps out into the hallway with his luggage. I also hear strange sounds a lot when he's gone and then, I imagine those sounds are ghosts and our house is like the one in the Amityville movie and we'll have to evacuate to the neighbor's apartment in the middle of the night as doors open and slam shut by themselves and a howling wind appears in our bedroom shaking our bed and people who haven't realized they're dead howl in agony at me as I try to flee with terrified children draped over me.

(If this has actually happened when your spouse has gone one a business trip, please don't write and tell me unless you are prepared to sleep here for a week. Thanks.)


I also made the exterminator come yesterday and give us a "just in case" once over. I did this because I'm convinced that the mice, cockroaches and waterbugs can "intuit" that David is going on a business trip and that they believe this is the perfect time to stage an infestation. The crazy Australian guy who could and has killed them with his bare hands is leaving. They sense this. It's some kind of pre-historic survival strategy. Truly, the only time we see mice or cockroaches is when David is more that 2,000 miles away from home.

When he's gone, I have to check all the closets obsessively just in case a mass murderer has broken into our apartment during the day and is hiding next to the vacuum cleaner, waiting for me to put the kids to bed and for me to doze off, before he leaps out and butchers us. I do this little ritual every night he's out of town and usually while on the phone, so that just in case I open the closet door and see a stranger hunkered down in there, I can scream and the person on the other end can call 911.

See, I have a plan.

And then, there's the plane. The real reason behind my panic attack. See, I'm okay if I'm on the plane because I think, "Well, we'll all die together." and that seems to make me feel better, but when David leaves without me and the kids and he doesn't take Qantas, which is like one of the super-safest airlines in the world and instead, takes a crap, nearly-bankrupted U.S. airline that has cheaper fares, but probably no mechanics to actually check the plane before take-off or I don't know, enough cash to actually put fuel in the plane for the 14 hour flight from LA to Sydney, well, I get antsy.

I start picturing how hard it will be to tell the kids about the terrible thing that happened to Daddy or how we will have to carry on without him and then, I start to imagine the whole scenario - single mom, children without a daddy, losing the love of my life, my partner, best friend...BLAH!

That's when I have a panic attack the size of Minnesota and end up writing to you at 4:30 in the morning.

So, the girls have been very aware that Daddy is leaving in a couple days and we've been talking about it a lot. Last night, we talked about the trip over a big warm plate of fried calamari, with tomato sauce on the side and a pile of lemon wedges. We sat around the girl's playroom table and without plates or forks, we just talked and dipped our fingers in for more crispy calamari while we chatted. We talked about Poppy and Granny Trish and Granny Ann and where Sydney was on the map and how Lucy rode a camel the last time she was in Australia. The idea of just reaching in and taking your fish without any kind of formality while we talked and told stories was exactly what we all needed.

For, like 2 minutes, I didn't even have a panic attack.

This dish is also super-economical. Squid is about $4 and change a lb. You could easily make a laid back supper or lunch of salad and fried calamari pretty cheaply or a great TV snack for 6 or 8 for under $10. And these days, that means something. This dish is also very easy and just as good as you can order at a restaurant.

Here you go - I'm going back to rocking back and forth in the corner and muttering to myself.

xo YM



Kim's Let's Hope The Plane Doesn't Go Down Fried Calamari Adapted from a recipe by Giada De Laurentiis

Ingredients

* Vegetable oil, for deep-frying
* 1 pound clean squid with tentacles, bodies cut into 1/3- to 1/2-inch-thick
rings (ask your fish monger to do this for you)
* 2 cups all-purpose flour
* 2 tablespoons dried parsley
* Salt and freshly ground black pepper
* 2 lemons, cut into wedges
* 1 cup simple tomato sauce (I make home-made sauce and always have some lying
around, but feel free to use jarred marinara to save time.)

Directions

Pour enough oil into a heavy large saucepan to reach the depth of 3 inches. Heat over medium heat to 350 degrees F. Mix the flour salt and pepper in a large bowl. Working in small batches, toss the squid into the flour mixture to coat.

Carefully add the squid to the oil and fry until crisp and very pale golden, about 1 minute per batch. Don't overcook the squid. It needs a very short period of time to cook before it starts getting tough.

Using tongs or a slotted spoon, transfer the fried calamari to a paper-towel lined plate to drain. Press out any remaining oil.

Place the fried calamari and lemon wedges on a clean plate. Sprinkle with salt, a few squirts of lemon and parsley. Serve with marinara sauce.
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The Angry Woman's Chicken With Cherry Tomatoes & Capers & Why Spatchcocking A Chicken Can Be Therapeutic

I should've written a blog post on Monday.

I also should've written one on Tuesday. But I didn't. Mainly, for two reasons:

1. David and I watched the Twilight movie and you know, my head was all up in the pre-pube kissing in the meadow and Edward's poorly-executed glistening, sparkling hairless body.

Not to inflame and enrage all my readers who are fans of the movie, but I thought it was kind of lame. Not totally bad, just a slip of what book one was. It felt kind of Harlequin romance to me. Anyway, it's hard for a movie to ever be as good as the book. And I think this is an example of that.

2. Mostly, it's been a rough couple of days. Not rough like "These last two days of chemo were really rough," just challenging in the way that work can take you away from the kids and the kids can take you away from work. Monday was the worst day of being mom I think I ever had.


You should know, we don't have a babysitter anymore.

With the economy the way it is, David and I decided to go without babysitting and save the $1400 a month. This was a good decision for the family. I could see David get happier the moment we made the decision. That makes me feel good because he deserves a little financial break and this is my little part to play in being more economical. But it doesn't mean I'm no longer working. I still have clients, a blog and partially-written book. It means before i was struggling to get everything done and now, it's just maddening and nearly impossible. I'm writing in the mornings (I am writing this post at 4;30am)and blogging and Twittering and responding to e-mails in the evening (I'm behind - if you haven't heard from me, you will.)

So, here's the good part - I kind of love spending the day with the girls. I'm as surprised about this as as anyone, because even though I adore every little inch of them, I thought they might drive me a little bonkers with their hatred for all things hygiene-related and the way they like to hurl tomatoes at old ladies in the grocery aisle.

"This could be unnerving", I thought, "to do this all day, everyday."

But, no. I am enjoying spending the days with them. I love creating projects with them and organizing a chore chart with them and doing art and I love that every time I tell them we are going somewhere they ask, "Mommy too?" and when I say "Me, too." they beam and get all excited. This is all good. I think a gift, maybe.

But work doesn't always fit tightly and neatly into my allotted work times. Monday, changes came back from the publisher for a client's book. They needed to be reviewed and edited and sent back that same day. The client kept sending back new editions to the text and multiple voices were chiming in about what should be happening with the edits. I had to be present with the manuscript and my clients and that meant just letting the children run wild through the apartment, leaving a trail of debris through the apartment a foot thick, eating grapes for lunch, watching the cat lick milk off the floor from a dropped cereal bowl, letting three meals-worth of dirty dishes pile up in the sink and leaving the kids glued to the television set with full control of the remote, which is a little like letting them live in a chocolate factory, where they sat like pieces of catatonic broccoli on the couch and gazed hypnotically at the 30th incarnation of Dora The Explorer, while I hunched over the computer trying to focus and grunted at them occasionally.

By the time I sent the corrections in, Edie who has almost never had an accident, peed in her pants twice. Once on purpose, when she dropped her pants and stood in the kitchen and said "I have penis. I pee like Daddy" and let a stream of wee run out onto the kitchen floor, like some fountain in Barcelona. Frankly, I couldn't blame her. I was frustrated, too. I was pissed. And by the time David walked in the door, I needed a goblet of wine. And I needed to butcher something.

So, instead of roasting the chicken the very simple Thomas Keller way. I spatch-cocked the sucker, which I recommend for angry women everywhere.


But then I looked at it and the poor bird looked like a naked murder victim, so I cut down the chicken into pieces and made the recipe below.

It was good. And dismembering something made me feel better. But as I looked at my sleeping neglected children, with their unfortunate, grunting mother, and the milk and cereal from the morning all dried out and stuck to the floor, I laid in David's arms and cried. And that's why I didn't write a blog post.

xx YM


The Angry Woman's Chicken with Cherry Tomatoes and Capers
Serves 3-4 people

Ingredients

• A whole chicken cut down into parts
• salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 3 tablespoons finely chopped shallots (or onion will do just fine in a pinch)
• 1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic
• A dozen or so cherry tomatoes
• 4 tablespoons drained capers
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 1 can of good quality tomato puree
• 4 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves (or you can manage with the dried)
• You can add any herbs that you like (tarragon, oregano, basil, whatever,
I didn’t and the sauce was still lovely)

Preparation

Season the chicken well with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil and butter in a heavy-bottomed skillet. Add the chicken and sauté over high heat, turning the pieces often until lightly browned and crisping up, about 5 minutes. Remove from pan. Scrape the pan of brown particles but leave them in the pan. They will dissolve into your sauce.

Add more butter. Add the shallots (or onions) and garlic. Cook until onions soften slightly. Add the chicken back in and the tomatoes, capers, wine, and tomato puree. Add any herbs.

Bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked.

Sprinkle with parsley and serve.

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A Christmas Tree Sings "Patty Poopie"

Okay, so the best video of this is one that I did while holding the camera vertical, which was INSANE because apparently you have to know how to perform brain surgery and have a PhD in molecular biology and be a member of Mensa and be married to Bill Gates to understand the complex inner workings of turning a video on it's side.

Seriously Microsoft, make a button for heavens sake.

This is either the cutest video you'll see today or the most annoying. If you don't like Patty Cake sung as "Patty Poopie" over and over again, in the high screeching voice of an overly-excited child, well, this version may not be for you.

This second video is not nearly as fun as the first, but you won't have to turn your computer on it's side or cock your head to the left like a cocker spaniel. And you'll get to the see the outfit - my daughter dressed as Christmas Tree. It took her an hour and a half to create, while raiding my Christmas bow box, but she wore it for two days straight. Finally, I made her take it off in the bath.

This marks my first foray into the world of video on my blog. Isn't this exactly the kind of diversion you needed on a Friday? I think so.

Have a great weekend.

xo YM



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The Vulcan Mind Melt on Arthur Avenue

I am no longer a crap mother. Thank you for your kind words and declarations to the contrary. You gave me a much-needed boost.

I am, however, a crap blogger because when I was spending all that quality time with my kids, I wasn't blogging or even thinking about blogging. I didn't even do the twitter, which is like my new secret obsession. Obviously, I must love the little rugrats.

I know this because I was in a Vulcan mind melt with my children, where we shared a single brain and frolicked with abandon in meadows inhabited by butterflies and bunnies, and I was completely focused on their every need. If they wanted juice, I knew it three seconds before they could open their mouths to scream it at me. I confounded them with my attentiveness.


And this was all good until this morning when Lucy begged me to go back to the Internet and my writing and leave her the hell alone. Apparently, they missed barking out orders until I looked up bleary-eyed from my laptop and paid attention to them.

The period of rainbows and unicorns is officially over.



But we had a blast - one of the places we went this weekend was up to Arthur Avenue in the Bronx. If you live in NYC, the surrounding area or are visiting, you'll want to take a little day trip there.

I describe it this way: A gigantic playground with a clean and serviceable restroom, surrounded by Italy with some of the best food, markets and specialty produce I've seen. And it's a 15 minute drive from our house - far enough away to make it feel like a treat, close enough to prevent episodes of high-pitched screaming in the car seat torture device invented by members of the Taliban.

We ate chocolate cannoli on the playground and bought freshy-baked bread.


And Lucy and Edie picked out their seeds to plant vegetables and zinnias this spring.


And we ate pizza at Zero Otto Nove and the kids learned to dip their bread in olive oil and we tried different meats and brought home sopressata, home-made mozarella and proscuitto.


And, much to our dismay, we realized that when left to her own devices, Lucy dresses like a sister wife in a polygamist cult.


David suggested we remove any clothes in her closet that she could use to look like a Mennonite.

And we played on the playground until Mr. Softee came around with his seductive music calling us to the truck like the Pied Piper's children and got ice cream cones and ate them on the drive home.

It was all pretty great.

xxoo YM
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The Crap Mother of the Week Award Goes to...

Uh, yeah, that would be me.

It was a longish week of work. We handed a client’s book into the publisher today. Lots of last minute edits and changes. And I think that my kids have spent enough of this week watching me stare into the computer screen and tapping frantically at the keys.

At one point, Lucy wanted me to help her put this pink hula skirt on her head so that it looked like she had a head full of long wild hair. She brought it over to me and asked me to put it on her head and when she saw that I was in some trance-like state, staring wild-eyed and dazed into the computer, she quietly gave up, turned around and set out to figure it out herself, cross-legged on the floor.

She didn’t fight for my attention or demand anything of me in a loud voice or crumble croissant crumbs all over the floor to get my attention. No, she knew I was gone somewhere and there was no retrieving me. She just resolved that I wasn’t there for her. And her big pink head of hair.

I saw her face as she turned to walk away. Uh, kill me.

I officially get the crap mother award this week.


I asked Lucy about it when I was putting her to bed. I asked if she was frustrated about me being on a deadline with a book. This is what she said: “Daddy should work and make the money. You should just love us…” And then, she added, “…and cook. You should be the cook”.

So, I’m writing this post Thursday night before bed and I’ll post it for Friday. But the whole day Friday will be for the kids. I won’t look at a post, call a client, read a blog, answer comments, respond to Twitters, IMs or even open this crazy sucker of a computer. Not until they are asleep. Then, I'm all yours.


We got big plans. We’re gonna poach some eggs in the morning, ride bikes out on the terrace, hit the playgrounds hard, read all the library books we took out today, eat shrimp and pasta for lunch, maybe Edie will nap a little and I’ll let Lucy watch a Pink Panther or two, while I just hold her on my lap and hug her a lot. And then, friends will come over and we’ll just shed all the rules and live it up. I’ll break out edamame and maybe make some Guacamole and chips. And it’ll be a regular party. That is, until Daddy gets home and we eat pot roast and all of us get reacquainted and make up for lost time.

That’s the order of the day, folks. No more crap mother, at least not for a little while. I can do better.

Hope you have a great weekend with your family and friends, too.

Xxoo YM


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Spring's Terrible Onion Tart

Dear Spring,

Dude, what the hell?

You blow in for a single weekend, give me all kinds of delirious hopes about balmy nights and warm, sun-kissed days. You even go so far as to do your little daylight savings dance and bring us all your evening light, so that we can no longer convince the kids that 6 o'clock is like a "super-late" time to go to bed.

I even thought about putting away the winter clothes. That's right. I'm a sucka. I thought, for one unbelievably incredible moment, that I could ditch that big, bulky winter coat, the one I wear to keep me warm even though it makes me look like the Michelin Tire guy.

But no.

There will be no flip flops in March for me, my friend. I will still have to drag thirty pounds of coats, gloves, hats and boots with me every time I leave the house with my kids, which means it will still take me precisely two hours to get anywhere because as soon as we get bundled up, someone has to pee and then, while one is peeing the other is peeling off her clothes, or crying or setting her clothes on fire with my creme brulee torch, or whatever and the process starts all over again.

We are the most immobile people on the planet.

No, maybe Natalie Suhleman is more immobile that me, but just barely.



So, Spring, thanks for that. Thanks for getting my hopes up and then pulling the rug out from under me. I feel played. And the next time you come around with your early blossoming daffodils, promising you'll stay, seducing me with your soft gentle breezes and dewy green grass, I won't be fooled. I know you'll be pulling out of town, like a trucker who found a dead hooker in your hotel room.

Best,
The Yummy Mummy

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So, I'm pissed. Guess you can tell. But this tart will make you feel better. It is basically carmelized onions sitting on melty hot cheddar cheese in a supple dough and just heated until it is warm and sweet in the oven. This is a dish that looks ahead to Spring with it's gorgeous new onions and still, feels cozy and comfortable, for a blustery night.

I originally adapted this recipe from both Nigella Lawson and again from Matthew Amster-Burton, and the scone dough crust is lovely, but if you don't have time to ignore your kids, or sit them in front of 20 Max and Ruby's, you can totally buy sheets of Pilsbury pie crust dough and use those. If you use two sheets, the dough comes out thick and gorgeous. Unless, Ruth Reichl is coming for dinner to eat your tart, no one will ever know.

I named this tart "Spring's Terrible Onion Tart" because it sat on a cutting board in the kitchen and David picked at it all evening until it was gone and then, got up the next morning, proclaiming he was fat and had gained at least two pounds and blaming it all on my "terrible tart". But really, it's only terrible, folks, if you EAT THE WHOLE THING.

But it will be hard to control yourself. Here's the recipe:

Spring's Terrible Onion Tart


Filling

1½ lb. yellow onions, halved and sliced ½-inch thick
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. butter
2 tsp. minced fresh thyme or ½ teaspoon dried thyme
~ Salt and pepper to taste
5 oz. sharp cheddar, shredded

Dough - For Over achievers

9 oz. (1⅔ cups) flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
~ Scant ½ cup milk
3 Tbsp. butter, melted
1 tsp. dry mustard
1 large egg, beaten

Dough for people who have a life outside the kitchen

1 Box of Pilsbury Pie Crust, 2 sheets


Steps

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Heat the oil and butter in a skillet over medium heat and add the onions. Cook, stirring occasionally, until golden brown and softened, about 35 minutes. Stir in the thyme and salt and pepper to taste. Don't cook the onions on high heat. You aren't frying them. This process will take about 30 minutes. You can make/prepare the dough while the onions cook.

2. To make the dough from scratch, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and remaining cheese in a mixing bowl. Combine the milk, butter, mustard, and egg in a measuring cup. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until they come together into a dry, shaggy dough. Let the dough rest for a couple of minutes to hydrate, then turn it out onto a work surface. Knead a few turns and press the dough into a pie pan.

3. If you are using Pilsbury, put one sheet, then the other loosely into a pie pan.

4. Place cheddar cheese in the bottom of the pie pan on top of the dough. You should cover the bottom of the dough with cheese.

5. When onions are brown, creamy and sweet, take them out of the pan and put them right into the dough on top of the cheese. Pull the outer ends of the dough around the onion cheese mixture to form a rustic tart or shape it to form a pizza-like crust around the outside of the onions.

6. For the scratch dough, bake 15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 degrees and continue baking about 10 minutes or until bubbly and golden brown. For the Pilsbury, just follow the package directions.

Let stand for five minutes, then pop it out onto a serving dish or cutting board. It is a great snack and can be served alone or with a tangy brown sauce, such as A1 and some nicely fried bacon on the side.

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On Being a Daughter-In-Law

I am, I’m afraid, a lame daughter-in-law.

I don’t mean to be. Mostly because I have the most wonderful in-laws. They all live in Australia - Ann, David’s mum lives in Sydney and David’s dad, John and his wife Trish, live a life of tropical paradise in Noosa. They are all kind, loving and wonderful to us. Still, I’m mucking it up.

I do bumbling things like fail to write them e-mails enough or call them enough or leave their Christmas presents sitting on my bureau and never sending them out to Australia in November, which is when they should be sent out, so that they’ll have Christmas presents to open on Christmas day. Before we had kids I used to have long lazy phone conversations with David’s mom, where we would talk about David as a boy and all kinds of things going on in each other’s lives.

Now, I can barely call the super to fix the toilet and so, I make many fewer calls than I should. We talk to them all on Sundays, back-to-back and we often video-conference so the kids can sing them their latest song or tell them about and what animal project they did in school, and there are sporadic e-mails during the week about this or that. But I rarely call them up and surprise them anymore.

Truth is, most days I can barely comb my hair. Yesterday, I forgot to brush my teeth. And I haven’t had an uninterrupted conversation with another adult in nearly 4 years, so this limits my spontaneity a bit.

But this doesn’t mean that I don’t think of Ann and John and Trish often. Because I do. We all do.


Let me tell you a little about them, just so you have an idea about their coolness. Ann or “Granny Ann” as we call her, lets me completely take over her kitchen when we visit. She lets me do the shopping and plan the menu and do all the cooking. She’ll say “Oop, there’s nothing in the kitchen,” and then, marvel as I make something from very little. This makes me feel like a chef. She makes me feel good. I see that there are perks in this cooking thing for her, but for me, it makes me feel like home at her house. I am delighted to be in her hot little Australian kitchen even on vacation.

And Ann lets the girls wander around her house touching, moving and playing with her collection of cat figurines. She doesn't worry when Lucy wipes her Mulberry stained fingers on the carpet. "Uh, it's dirty anyway," she says, laughing. And everyone's at ease.

She has hundreds and hundreds of cat figurines and she doesn’t wince one little bit when the girls carry them around the house or drop them or play pretend with them. She doesn’t wonder if they’ll get broken or lost. She doesn't wander around after them making sure they don't do something egregious with them. The girls love that she has cat pictures hanging all over her bathroom.


She just lets the girls be and because of this, they love being in her house with her. It’s like Disney World for them. Well, Cat Disney World but still, fun.

David is turning into Ann. He has been yelling at the TV a lot lately and telling the characters what to do and throwing his hands up in the air when the plot takes an ugly turn. The next step is for him to start writing e-mails to the networks and asking them to bring back a favorite character that was killed. Neither one of them can help it, it’s in their genes.


My other mother-in law, Trish, also known as “Granny Trish” is also pretty high on the coolness meter. First, let me say that she used to belly dance. Not, like when she was 20. Like, last year. That alone sends her off the coolness chart in my book. She wore a cute belly dancing skirt with all the dangly, clanky medallions things hanging off it and swirled her hips around like a teenager. I didn't see it, exactly but I heard about it and I have the image in my head and she looks great.


As soon as I found out about her mysterious hobby, I decided right then and there I wanted to be like Trish when I grew up. Adventurous, open-to-life, loving, warm, curious. I wanted to be belly dancing or sky diving or swimming in a shark cage or juggling chainsaws or something. But not now, mind you, when I’m 65. When I have the Chutzpah to catch up with her.

John, David’s dad, or “Poppy” as the girls call him, is quite possibly the second most handsome man in the universe. My husband is the first, of course. But if you saw John lounging on the beach with a book, in his long, white, gauzy shirt and beach hat, you’d say “Wow. This guy is ridiculously cool.”


I have a secret hope that when David and I retire, we’ll move to Noosa and I can spend my golden years watching my husband walking along the still-hot beach at sunset, talking on the cell to a grown-up Lucy or Edie off in some corner of the globe, having one adventure or another, in his long, white, gauzy shirt and straw beach hat. His hair still long and thick, only now gray. In my spare time, I will be belly dancing. I could die happy doing that.

David and John have the same spirit. I feel it whenever I am with them – both of them are gentle, forgiving of other people’s frailty, kind, generous, thinking the best and nicest things of everything around them. Lucy felt it too from the minute she was in Poppy's arms, that sameness between her father and her grandfather.

See, Lucy was a particular child. She preferred David and I and her Godmother Bubba, but no one else, really. She never climbed into other people's laps or took to acquaintances. Except for Poppy.

When they came to visit us in NYC when we got married, John would put Lucy in the Baby Bjorn and he and Trish would take her for long walks in Central Park. She dozed on his chest like she had seen him every day of her life. There was a comfort there. It was beautiful to watch. That, too, is in the genes.


Even yesterday, I washed up in the kitchen and listened to David showing Lucy the picture at the top of this post, the one of David and John running a race together when David was a boy. The two of them, Lucy and David, have ruminated over that picture so many times, with Lucy moving into David's lap and asking him question after question about being a boy and how they look a lot alike and why he wore those shorts and why Poppy looks so different and why they were wearing sweatbands on their heads. (Really, what's up with those, guys?)

And then, Lucy and Edie put hair bands around their heads and pretended to be running in a marathon. Or Olivia Newton John in "Physical". Not sure which.


David's dad is the kind of guy who wouldn't say even a bad word after I suffered some kind of feeding frenzy at their house and shamefully devoured his ENTIRE tub of delicious Queensland yogurt - I still have never had better yogurt, ever. He's the kind of guy who turned me on to Kylie Kwong and sends me DVD's with obscure and frankly, down-right weird but fascinating, Australian cooking shows.

He and Trish also keep the cleanest house on the planet. It's so clean you actually have to take your garbage out to the trash container in the garage. I couldn't find a rubbish bin in the house the entire time I was there. Needless to say, we won't be able to go back there until we can completely cover the children in bubble wrap.


So, today is John's birthday and I did the lame thing again. I did not get to Macy's and pick him up a lovely new shirt for the beach and wrap it and box it and mail it off to him three weeks ago, so he'd get it today. Frankly, I'm not even sure you can buy a beach shirt at Macy's.

But David told me something important last night. "It's not about sending our parents presents," he said, "it's about staying connected to them and having them be a part of our lives and the girl's lives."

And this is why I love this man. Because he's right. And maybe I'm not so lame. I mean, there isn't day that goes by that we aren't telling Lucy the story of how she rode the camel with Daddy at the Eumundi Markets or how she knocked a cup of coffee all over Poppy and Granny Trish's perfectly clean beige living room rug, so they had to go out and buy a new rug or how she ate the Mulberries in Granny Ann's yard and I thought she might be poisoned, but really her face was just temporarily stained with berry juice. And don't even get me started on how my baby was just a couple of inches away from a Redback Spider. She loves hearing about it all.


All of it makes her laugh. And then, Edie wants us to tell funny stories about her. And we do. And see more pictures and hear more stories. We remind them that Sheep was a gift from Poppy and that Lucy's new party dress, the one that makes her feel like a princess, was picked out by Poppy himself. And she knows that people at all the far ends of the earth love her and are sending her their love all the time.

Everyday, we try to weave all the grandparents into our lives, even though they aren't here. I guess that's the best gift we can give them. Although I will try to be less lame and write more. I will try to send more pictures. Maybe one day, I'll learn to put our videos up on Youtube so they can see their grand kids doing cute things. And someday, when the kids are off to college, I will master this Christmas thing.

But if it takes awhile, John, just know there are a bunch of people across the world who think of you, love you and are so grateful to have you as a part of our lives. Especially our girl's lives. Look out for the pictures the girl's drew for you. We e-mailed them. We'll blow a candle out on a cupcake for you tonight!

Happy Birthday, Poppy. We love you!

xxoo
Kim, David, Lucy & Edie

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Venus Basile & Fish En Papillote

I went to a very rough school.

It was in a small town in upstate New York, called Corinth. It was home to one traffic light, a paper mill, two gas stations, two markets, a bunch of dive bars and a funeral home. If it was fall, there was always deer hanging in garages all over town and apparently someone gave us the title of "Snowshoe Capitol of the World", which basically meant we got a lot of snow.

There were 86 kids in my class. It was a small school, but a tough one. There weren't a lot of places to hide. I used to get the crap kicked out of me on a regular basis at my school - Marlene Shippie hit me in the face while wearing her boyfriend's class ring and gave me a black eye and my parents had her arrested. (Having a classmate arrested really ups your cool factor.) The "Let's Beat Up Kim Game" was on. Marlene and her gang of giant girls did things like stand outside my bedroom window and taunt me and threaten to dismember me and then, they'd wait for me while I was walking home and follow me home, talking about me like I wasn't there.


Marlene wasn't the only one. Carol Plummer, Thawn Baker, they all kicked my butt. Carol also had the distinction of dating the boy I was madly in love with, so she had a special place in my heart. She could beat me up and then, smile at me sweetly while she heavy-petted the love of my life in the hallway.

I was beaten up mostly in gym class, where I spent most of my time wishing I would get my period and then, when I had my period, wishing people couldn't see my big thick super maxi pads hanging out of my orange gym shorts. Needless to say, the gym was a place I was very vulnerable. I hated gym the most.

But I was not the only kid who got beat up. In fact, I was just a fun diversion. There were other girls who were the main attraction. Venus Basile was one. Venus, who had the terrible distinction of having a name that wasn't Mary or Margaret or Maxine or anything even remotely familiar to us, was also not pretty or tall or well-dressed or coordinated or smart or charismatic or thin or pale white or even without glasses. And her voice was sort of nasally and high-pitched.

As I remember her in 5th grade, she was unique and a mess and everything we hoped we wouldn't be. And she paid the price for it. She got cornered in bathrooms by girl giants and called cruel names until she cried or a teacher rescued her, but sometimes she would fight. It wasn't pretty - she would do this crazy, flapping thing with her hands, like a dog paddling wildly in the deep end as it was drowning. The giant girls found it so funny. They loved getting her worked up so she would do it over and over again. Then, they would sit back and watch her flail around the bathroom trying to connect her fists to a person.

I can still smell the bathroom, industrial soap and urine cakes.

I had forgotten all of this. Until the other day, Lucy and Edie were tumbling around and laughing and kind of flapping their hands at each other, play fighting and I said, "OMG! That's just like Venus Basile!" It came out of some old, dusty fold in my brain.

Well, they loved this Venus Basile thing. I'm not sure what it was about her name , how it is nearly like poetry, but now, everyday they say, "Let's do Venus Basile" and then they flap their hands at each other and fall down laughing. Lucy asked me yesterday if Venus could come to our house. She thinks she might be a princess. Apparently, she likes to wear pink and crowns. David told me tonight they made up a song about Venus.

"Who is Venus Basile?" He had no idea what they were talking about.

Here's what I hope - that somewhere in the world, Venus Basile had the last laugh. I hope she has a really happy life. I hope she has kids and a great partner and a career that fulfills her and that she is loved and healthy and feels cherished everyday of her life. I hope she has gotten the ultimate retribution. God knows, I have.

What I know is that I don't remember the giant girls, but I do remember Venus. Still to this day. Some 30 odd years after the fact, I could still pull her image right out of my head. And that's sayin' something.

I'm going to think of her every time my kids do a Venus Basile. I think she might actually be a princess.

xxoo YM
____________________________________________________________________________


So, I give you a recipe that is gentle and kind and simple and I dedicate it to Venus Basile...It is Fish En Papillote.

Sounds exotic, like Venus, but really this is just fish and vegetables tightly sealed in either parchment paper or foil. The fish and the vegetables gently steam in the little pouches and come out succulent, moist and without a spot of mess. This is a great week night meal, especially if you can make the pouches ahead, pop them in the fridge and then get them in the oven 20 minutes before you sit down for dinner.

My favorite thing about this dish is that the kid's love opening their own pouches and seeing what's inside, like a little gift. They always eat all their fish and most of the vegetables when we serve these. I like that there is almost no mess. I did this one in aluminum foil, which is as good as paper (although not as sexy), and you can use many different kinds of white, flaky fish - cod, halibut, flounder, catfish, haddock, snapper and sea bass are all fine. I use basically whatever vegetables I have in the hopper.

Venus Basile's Fish Baked in Foil With Vegetables

2 medium carrots, peeled and cut into matchsticks
2 medium leeks, cut into matchsticks
A handful of broccoli, cut into florets
12 small cherry tomatoes
2 medium stalks of celery, cut into matchsticks
4 tbsp. olive oil
4 tbsp dry white wine
4 skinless fish fillets
4 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
1 lemon cut into wedges
2 medium garlic cloves, minced or pressed through garlic press
1 tsp minced fresh thyme leaves
Table salt and ground black pepper
2 tbsp minced fresh parsley leaves

Preparation

Heat oven to 450 degrees. Cut four large sheets of foil. Divide vegetable mixture among foil sheets, mounding in center. Pour wine and a drizzle of oil over mound of vegetables. Season with salt and pepper.

Pat fish dry with paper towels. Season with salt and pepper and place one fillet on top of each vegetable mound. Squirt a little lemon juice over the fish and vegetables, season with thyme and put pat of butter on top of fillet. Throw a few of the lemon wedges right on top of the fillet and crimp edges of foil together to form a tight seal and forming a pouch. Place pouches on rimmed baking sheet.

Bake pouches 15 minutes. When done, open them carefully as the steam will escape. Use a thin metal spatula and gently slide fish and vegetables onto plate with any accumulated juices and sprinkle with parsley. Or serve the pouches closed and let the kids open them, squeeze their own lemons and sprinkle parsley over the top. Serves 4.

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On this Snowy Monday Morning, I Give You...

Tampon & Overnight Maxi Pad Art.


An installation done in multi-media. Please note the artist's (Lucy) attention to detail. The use of multiple shades of glitter, several sparkly balls, the egregious over-use of sticky tape, probably illustrating society's consumptive state, a drawing in crayon, the mashing together of different elements, symbolizing the decay and ultimate fall of the US banking system and for the final touch, the bulb of a tampon, hanging just precariously off the edge of the canvas and pointing toward hell, where the artist, quite obviously, suspects we are going.

But since she uses a pink bulb, and the artist is well into her much lauded "pink period", critics suspect she believes hell isn't all that bad. Perhaps, Hello Kitty lives there.

When asked what she is calling this new piece, the artist replied, "Bell", and then went back to sipping her latte and reading "The Huffington Post".

You can see the artist's installation currently on exhibit, where it is hanging from a shelf in our living room. We have been under strict instructions not to remove it. So, we haven't. Because we are serious patrons of the arts.

xxoo YM


Just a note: I had nothing to do with this. Every time I have my period, there is a storming of the feminine products and children are breaking open tampons and pads like they are boxes of candy and making projects out of them. Frankly, I can't think of a better use for the things.



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