Flour Tortillas and Painted Walls

What week is this? Eight? Nine? In some ways, it feels like just yesterday that we were going to the office, school, running errands and being out in the world.  In some ways it feels like all that is in the distant past.  It’s fair to say that we are used to it now, but also missing the way things used to be. Of course we miss our friends and the family members who we are not quarantined with. We miss our babysitter who really is a part of the family and as Emmett will tell you, seeing her is the very best part of his day. We miss our teachers and co-workers and talking to people without the internet or a cellphone. It’s amazing to me how even my three-year-old now, as if instinctively, stops and waits for us to cross the street when she sees other people on the sidewalk.  In some ways it feels like we are living out scenes from a bad sci-fi movie.  These are the things I don’t like about being quarantined. But there are so many things that I’m thoroughly enjoying. Really? Really. 

Not having to get outside-world ready in the mornings or wake the kids up and make sure they are dressed and ready to go, all within the time limits set by my commuter train schedule is AWESOME. 

Having a much better idea of what the kids’ academic capabilities are and getting to watch them interact with each other throughout the day is nice - even though it makes me feel like my pre-quarantine parenting was probably inadequate.

I love that I’m more active throughout the day without the hassle of squeezing in a workout.  Yes, I’m moving more because I’m constantly cleaning, doing dishes, laundry, cooking a million meals a day and taking the kids on walks and bike rides outside in between meetings. Not all of these activities are fun, but not feeling guilty, or gross for sitting in a chair all day feels great. 

My birthday was this week and one of my best friends sent me the sweetest video of her little family singing happy birthday to me. I love that I can play it over and over again and always relive the sweet memory of them at this (crazy) moment in time.  We can’t hug our friends, but they still know EXACTLY what we need.  

Masterpiece in progress.

 I love the “mural” my kids painted on our wall in the dining area.  It bought me 30 minutes of quiet and so many little kid smiles. Eve’s face in the photo above (PRIDE!!!) says all you need to know. The downside is that she wants to paint ALL OF THE WALLS now. Per a close friend of mine, “She might get her wish depending on how long this goes on.” Totally agree. Ha. 

Creative projects have provided me with an outlet for stress. While there is not a whole lot of time for this, I have been making fabric masks with the outsized goal of eventually making enough to donate to restaurants and local businesses that remain open. I haven’t gotten very far, but turn to it when I can. 

I’ve also been able to tackle a bunch of new recipes because cooking is easier when your kitchen is always just feet away. I prep meals when I have time and then I’m able to slip them in the oven whenever. As a result, I was able to make this incredible roast chicken on a weeknight, something I wouldn’t normally be able to get away with given its 3 hours cooking time. I’ve also made a ton of bread and even got out the tortilla press over the weekend. 

“La Isla Tortilla”

For the tortillas, I used a recipe from Anson Mills and made a double batch. You can find it here. I have their special flatbread flour so I used that, but I substituted regular all purpose flour for the pastry flour in the recipe.   I’m not sure how it would work with all purpose, or other types of flour.  I think if you are careful about not using all of the water at first, just incorporating it little by little until the dough comes together, you will be fine.  Like most Anson Mills recipes, this one is very detailed and has pictures of how things look along the way which I always find very helpful.  Also, you don’t need a tortilla press, it’s easy to just roll these out with a rolling pin.

Make a bunch of little balls of dough.

When your arms get tired, and they might, enlist whoever you are quarantined with to give it a go.

Wrap tortilla around a rolling pin to get it into the pan.

It only take a couple of minutes per side. The tortilla starts to puff up and get little air pockets.

Done. These were chewy in the best way and had SO much more flavor than store bought ones. Totally worth the effort. Not that we had anywhere to be.

I’m so glad I doubled the amounts listed in the recipe because these were pretty time consuming to make. But there was so much to enjoy about the process, I just turned on a little music and kneaded and pressed and griddled and let the world melt away for an hour or so. It was therapy in the form of carbs. Delicious carbs.  

These are best fresh off the griddle (drizzled with honey) but keep for several days. I froze a bunch of ours too. I’ve been eating them for breakfast with jam and cottage cheese and making my new obsession...egg quesadillas. Check out the video of how to make them here. So simple. So good. The snack equivalent of a warm hug. Big hugs to you and yours. Stay healthy and safe! xo

Creamy-ish Mushroom Soup

Soup always makes me feel better.

Is it just me, or does it feel like these weeks in quarantine are going by as fast as ever? Maybe it’s the fact that there is just so much to do. I know it’s vastly different for people who live alone, don’t work full time, or don’t have children, and there are positives and negatives for all.  For me, there’s always something, more like at least three or four somethings that I should be doing at once.  It’s sort of exhausting but it also keeps me going, keeps me from worrying too much, wasting time thinking about all of the possible ways this pandemic will shape our lives going forward when it’s impossible to know.  Amid impending mass layoffs at my company, I’m grateful that I don’t have the luxury of time to spend speculating as to whether or not I will lose my job, panicking over the possibility that I will. 

Being quarantined with little kids has its moments, for sure, but it also has THIS! And no, Emmett does not call me “micchelle”!

There are so many immediate needs I need to attend to here. I’ve got to just keep going. Roll with the punches, and remember that while my worries and fears are real, they are also trivial compared to those that so many others are facing at this time. Also, the weather is finally getting better and we are still healthy and safe with so much to be thankful for. This week we got a huge box of toys from our cousins in England and it was like Christmas! Better than Christmas! The kids were so excited and have been having a blast with all of their new toys over the last few days. Isla learned how to ride her bike without training wheels and Eve learned how to ride a bike with them. Both are SO proud. Even though, admittedly, being a 24-7 parent instead of a “working” parent can test my patience, this extra time with the kids is such a blessing.  They are so funny, so full of joy, so quick to adapt to even these crazy circumstances. I’m striving to be more like them.  

Not to toot my own horn, but it seems that others were inspired by my recently organized pantry and decided to follow suit.

One small success was lunch today. I love cooking but it’s not easy to keep up the enthusiasm when you are cooking multiple meals a day and don’t necessarily have the time or resources to plan or prepare them the way you would like. Still, I’ve been trying to find new recipes so that I can expand my repertoire and continue to enjoy the process. I don’t know about you, but I think most people who cook get excited when they find a recipe they want to try and realize that they already have all of the ingredients on hand.  That is probably especially true right now. This was that and then some. It’s from Bon Appetit, where I have been getting a lot of good recipes lately. The recipe is vegan, usually not a selling point for me, but right now, a recipe that doesn’t require me to use up any of my precious stash of chicken stock is more than welcome. This one was simple. Mushrooms, cashews, thyme, garlic, onions, shallots, miso and olive oil. And the reviews! This recipe got rave reviews on bonappetit.com! I always read the reviews before I invest in a recipe. This time, I was a little incredulous, but I’m a believer. This soup makes my “dinner party list” and not just for vegans or vegetarians (but if you happen to be one, MAKE THIS). Even I didn’t miss the meat or dairy one bit. It is insanely good. And that’s without the garlic oil, which just puts it over the top (and makes it fancy). I’m generally not a fan of recipes with sub recipes. No one is a fan of recipes with sub-recipes, am I right? But the garlic oil only took three minutes to make and was definitely worth the lift.

Garlic oil. This would be great drizzled on pasta, pizza, or as a dipping oil for fresh bread.

Of course, I didn’t follow the recipe exactly. I added some dried porcini mushrooms that I found in the back of the cupboard which I soaked (along with the cashews) while I was cooking the fresh mushrooms, onions and shallots. After adding the wine, I added the porcini-cashew mixture and soaking liquid to the soup, along with a little less than the suggested volume of water. Then, after simmering the onion-shallot mixture with the porinis and cashews, I blended them with the miso until the soup was completely pureed. Finally, I added the sauteed fresh mushrooms back in for texture and let it simmer for a few minutes. Final result? Yum. I cannot believe something so easy and dairy free could be so creamy and full of flavor.

Step one. Saute your fresh mushrooms.

They cook down a lot, this is how they should look before you remove them from the pan.

Puree (cashew-porcini mixture + shallot-onion mixture and water) before adding the sauteed mushrooms back in.

Garlic oil ingredients in the pan (added red pepper flakes - we like things spicy).

Three minutes later…

I won’t have any leftovers but if you do, pasta sauce would be a great option. Just reduce it over the stove by simmering it for 30 minutes or so until it thickens up a little more. Toss with pasta, top with garlic oil and parmesan. Pour yourself a big glass of wine and call it self-care. Call yourself a genius. Have seconds.

Here’s to happy surprises in uncertain times.

Pandemic Pantry - Crispy Fish Cakes

Cooking during a pandemic is interesting. It has its upsides - there’s always someone home to check the oven, and downsides, like not being able to get certain things when you want them.  I’ve been waiting until we have no produce left, then placing a large grocery order online so that we’ll be set for several days. When the food first arrives, I organize it all, freezing some proteins and staples like butter. At first, the fridge is overflowing but before I know it, we are completely out. I never realized how much we eat! Usually, we all eat our lunches and snacks outside of the house and go out to eat as a family from time to time.  Eating everything at home makes a huge difference in how much we need to buy and how fast it goes. So it’s been strange. There are periods of having TONS of food and then periods when almost everything is gone and I have to be creative with pantry items just to keep us going. Today was a pantry day.  This week I cleaned and organized our pantry.  Paul thought I was losing it, but staying home ALL THE TIME means that the messes that I’m normally not around long enough to let bother me are driving me nuts. And given the changes in how we’re cooking and eating these days, I feel like it’s more important to know what we have and make use of items that have been pushed to the back of the pantry. Also, having a clean and organized pantry makes me want to cook from it.  Motivation is so important, especially right now.

When I found a can of salmon and one of tuna in the back of the pantry this morning, I knew immediately what I would make. Fish cakes! These would also rid me of the bag of crusts saved from the kids’ sandwiches that has been sitting on my counter for days. Yippee. Nothing I love more than reclaiming my counter space. I threw the crusts in my blender until they were crumbs, toasted them in the oven, and finely chopped the vegetables I had in the crisper. After sauteing those for a few minutes, I combined them with the tuna and salmon, a couple of eggs, some Worcestershire sauce, old bay seasoning, salt and shaped them into cakes. Then I threw together a scallion-garlic-yogurt sauce to go with them (make extra, it stuff goes with everything) and left it all in the fridge so that I could quickly put together a home-cooked lunch in between the day’s work and homeschool obligations. #makingitwork

It was a treat to have a real lunch and it felt good to use up some of my “incidental” food stash. I know it’s hard to follow a recipe these days. I happen to have lots of eggs at the moment but I know that they have been hard to find for some. I pan-fried these cakes in bacon fat, because I’m out of butter. Turned out just fine. Delicious in fact. So we’re all tweaking recipes and doing the best we can with what we have. It’s like we are all on some crazy episode of “Chopped”, making meals with whatever is around, multiple times a day. Sometimes frustrating, other times a fun challenge.

Nope. I did not bother to make them uniform in size and shape. I don’t think it matters much as long as they are around the same thickness.

I’m trying to view this entire quarantine as more fun and challenging than as a source of anxiety. Some days that works better than others. We are all human. My kids, all of the kids, everywhere, are showing so much resilience. They miss their family, friends, teachers, babysitters, school, the park, being able to do ANY of the things they usually do, but they take it in stride, even the ones that are too young to understand why it has to be this way. They are amazing. I’m learning so much from them and from being home with them more. I’m watching them grow in ways that I didn’t see or notice before. Having more real conversations with them. Listening to their conversations with each other. I’m honored to witness how they are coping with this situation in positive ways, like building closer bonds with each other as playmates and confidants. Emmett and Isla are so much more excited about going to the same school together next year (fingers crossed) than they were before.

I’m learning about myself too. Until now, I never knew that, apparently, I hoard sponges, and have unopened bulk packages of sponges in all of my cabinets. Also powdered sugar. So send over your powdered sugar sponge craft ideas! No seriously, I’m thinking more about what I really want my life to look like than ever before and how I can take the best parts of this quarantine and incorporate them into my new normal. I know I want things to slow down. I want to have more time with my children. I don’t know how I plan to do that but it looks like I will have at least another month of stay-at-home time to figure it out. Where’s your head right now? What are you enjoying about all this time at home? What are you excited about doing once things start to open back up?

How did I never know that you could just stick the ends of your scallions in a jar with some water and grow more? At least I won’t run out of these!

Ingredients

For fish cakes:

10 ounces canned fish

1 cup bread crumbs

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce 

⅓ cup mayo

1 tablespoon dijon mustard

2 large eggs

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 rib of celery, finely chopped

1 carrot, finely chopped

½ large or 1 small onion, diced

1 clove garlic, minced

1-2 scallions, finely chopped

1 tablespoon capers

Old bay and salt to taste

Oil or butter (I used bacon fat!) for frying

For scallion-garlic yogurt sauce:

⅔ cup plain yogurt

1 tablespoon mayo

1 teaspoon dijon mustard 

1 tablespoon capers

2 scallions, finely chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon lemon zest

Salt to taste

Directions

1. Make the sauce.  Combine all sauce ingredients and stir until fully combined. Place in the fridge to let flavors come together. 

2. Turn the oven up to 400F.  Toast bread crumbs in the oven for about 5 minutes. 

3. Combine fish, Worcestershire sauce, mayo, mustard, scallions, capers and toasted bread crumbs in a large bowl and mix with a spoon.

4. Heat oil in a large frying pan, add veggies and garlic and saute until softened. 

5. Add veggies to the bread crumb mixture and season with salt and Old Bay. Crack eggs into the bowl and mix everything well.  I do this with my hands. If the mixture seems dry, add a little bit of milk or yogurt to hold the mixture together. It shouldn’t be wet but it shouldn’t be so dry that it falls apart when you try to form it into a disc. 

6. Allow mixture to rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes. 

7. When you are ready to eat. Heat oven to 400F. Remove mixture from oven and form into patties.

8. Heat oil, butter or bacon fat over medium-high heat in the same pan you used to saute the vegetables.

9. Add patties to pan and cook until browned on one side, about 4 minutes.  Flip and cook about 3 minutes more.

10. Place the pan in the oven and cook until the patties are cooked through, about 7 more minutes. 

11. Serve with yogurt sauce.