3 Days of Food

~ Laura

The boys have no school today through Friday. Steve took off this Friday and next Monday. Last night, we greedily divided up that time and made plans.

Spaghetti and meatballs for new friends on Saturday night, pizza with old friends on Thursday. On Friday, I want a food adventure in New York City. I want to try something weird and ethnic and local and hand crafted and artisanal and made by a bearded man with disturbing facial tattoos. We’ll probably drive out to Brooklyn for that. As I’m writing this down, I’m realizing that a lot of my plans involve eating. Which also means that I’ll better fit in some time for raking leaves and running on the treadmill.

This pepper crusted tuna looks awesome. I haven’t made tuna at home, but I love it in restaurants. Need to change that.

I cooked a lot this summer, but I don’t think I blogged about it. My current kitchen has terrible light and dark 80’s cabinets, so it’s super hard to take good photographs of food. I’ve tried.

Thanks to my CSA, I learned how to cook about a dozen new vegetables and we have doubled the amount of vegetables in our diet. I sometimes make three or four different vegetable dishes in one night. Yes, it’s time-consuming. If you include clean up time, I might spend 3 hours in the kitchen. Am I insane? Did you know that it is socially acceptable to drink wine, while you’re cooking?

And thanks to having a large extended Italian-American family, I often cook large amounts of food. And thanks to being cheap, I can feed 20 people for $20. Honestly, I’m all set for the apocalypse or the collapse of the global economy.

What did I cook this summer? Delicata squash, acorn squash, butternut squash (roasted, steamed, pureed),  fish tacos, roasted cauliflower, curried cauliflower, steamed cauliflower, stuffed eggplant, grilled eggplant, fish with eggplant/tomatoes/capers , eggplant with tomatoes/feta, corn fritters, beets with goat cheese, and dozens of other dishes. I made up a few new ones. I made a ridiculous chicken and root vegetable pot roast last week. Ridiculous. I should take pictures and write it all down.

I need to write a blog post about yesterday’s elections, but I have two mewing children in the background who have been promised eggs and bacon at the diner. I may not have enough time. Yes, the Apt. 11D folks love food.

Published by Laura

9 thoughts on “3 Days of Food”

  1. for tuna you need a HOT pan and dry tuna. I prefer coconut oil so it doesn’t burn and then the tuna really needs to rest before serving. I prefer mine medium so I squirt some lemon in the pan and cover it to slightly steam. You won’t be able to feed 20 for 20 with tuna though!

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  2. Did you know that it is socially acceptable to drink wine, while you’re cooking?

    And heating water for instant oatmeal doesn’t count as “cooking” for that purpose, apparently.

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    1. My son will only eat one vegetable, but that vegetable is broccoli, so I call than a win. He’ll also eat tomato sauce, which I suppose should count.

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  7. The CSA is an awesome thing, but the sense of obligation to make something good out of everything leads to spending a ton of time in the kitchen. I recommend finding dishes that involve cooking a bunch of things at once (stews, curries, etc.) so you can just throw everything in. Some things save well, like kale and chard, so don’t cook them every week – I just cooked up three weeks’ worth at once and stuck some in the freezer. And figure out ways to throw vegetables in a pan you’re using for something else – last night I made fried tomatoes (the very last of the year, picked green and kept on the counter for a few weeks) along with a fried egg.

    The other awesome but cumbersome thing is sourdough starter, which I love having but boy has it sucked up some time. Good fresh bread, pancakes, English muffins, etc. every week is great but also a burden.

    Do your kids help cook? One of my friends has her 5 and 6 year olds “help” – they’re not much help yet, but she’s laying some groundwork for later.

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