The Cookbook Project

This is my cookbook shelf.



I counted them today, and I have 50 of them, plus a couple of years worth of Everyday Food and random other recipe magazines. I bought two of them yesterday. Out of the 50, I've cooked a recipe out of six.

Yeah, six. I buy cookbooks-I don't cook from them.

Until now.

This is my project for the summer: cook one thing from every cookbook I own. Correction: one good thing from every cookbook I own. If the recipe sucks, I have to try again. After all, if I can't find one decent recipe in a cookbook, it probably deserves to go.

My first attempt was from this book.



I haven't got a clue why I bought this in the first place. I assume that I bought it at a yard sale back when I was in the habit of buying every single cookbook I could possibly find. It was published in 1984, and it hasn't necessarily aged well. It's full of recipes for congealed salads and many other things that I have absolutely no interest in making. Because it's a cookbook written for family gatherings, all of the recipes are scaled to serve between 12 and 20 people, and I never cook for that big a crowd.

I was a little skeptical, I'll admit, but there are some really interesting recipes here. I've found several that I'd like to try, even though I'm going to have to pull out a calculator to scale them down to more reasonable quantities. The book is organized by different types of gatherings: a wedding breakfast, a bar mitzvah, a Greek New Year's dinner. One of the gatherings is for a (University of) Arkansas Tailgate Picnic. This gathering had a recipe called Razorback Roast Sandwiches, including a recipe for Brown Rice Bread. I wasn't particularly interested in making a pork roast, but the bread looked pretty good, so that's what I decided to try.

I've been looking for a good sandwich bread recipe for quite some time. The lovely Jenni sent me one that I've used quite a bit, but I've been having trouble getting it to rise the way it's supposed to (user error, I'm sure) so I wanted to try a different one.

This recipe was fantastic. The original one was for three loaves, so I cut it in half and made one slightly larger loaf.



I couldn't be happier. It was easy, it looks good, it tastes good...a perfect Sunday project.

I want to reprint the recipe here, but my little librarian heart won't let me break copyright. I've actually emailed Southern Living, who published the cookbook, to ask for permission. If they give it, I'll post an update.

Question and Answer

The first thing you need to know about my father is: If you have a question, he has an answer. The man does not know the words "I don't know." He's pretty famous for this among friends and family, which is why a few days ago as we were all in the car on the way back from my sister's girlfriend's concert, my aunt asked him why the Pigeon Hills were called the Pigeon Hills.

He immediately launched into an answer, and this is the second thing you need to know about my father: About 50% of the time, he is full of shit. If he doesn't know, he'll make it up, and he is good. On a long ago family trip, we passed a sign for a fort. Someone said "I wonder what happened at that fort." Dad launched into a five-minute lecture on the role of the fort in the Civil War and the definitive battle that was fought there, etc., etc., etc. When he was finished my mom asked "Did you see that on the History Channel?"

Dad's answer? "Nah, I just made it up."

That is the good thing-if you call him on it, he'll always admit when he's made something up. The problem is, you have to recognize that you need to call him on it-and when he's giving one of his bullshit answers, he's fairly indistinguishable from a history professor.

Years ago, when I had first started driving, I asked him why some traffic lights have those flashing lights inside the red light. He told me that it was to draw your attention, so you'd always see that the light was red. Years later, we were sitting in the car together, and Dad mused, "I wonder what those flashing lights are for." I stared at him for a moment, then gave him the same answer he'd given me. His response? "Oh, I must have been making that up. But it sounds plausible, doesn't it?" I still don't know if he was right.

So as we were in the car and Dad was giving his response to the Pigeon Hills question, I immediately challenged him. What possible reason could he have for knowing that piece of information? I was absolutely sure he was making it up. But that brings me to the final thing you need to know about my father, which is that if there is a sign or a plaque to be read, he has read it. Going to a museum with him is completely maddening, because he will read every single word that is posted anywhere. And he remembers it all. So on the one hand, when he gives an incredibly detailed answer to an obscure question, you want to think that he's making it up. Yet there's that other 50% of the time that he knows exactly what he's talking about...and he can almost always cite his source.

In this case, it was a historical plaque in Codorus State Park. Apparently passenger pigeons used to roost in the Pigeon Hills, and there were so many of them they'd block the sun when they all flew. Who knew?

My dad, apparently.

Walking Tour

This past weekend was the most relaxing one I've had in ages. I feel like I got a lot done, but in a very laid-back, unhurried way. And the best part-I walked or Metroed everywhere. My car stayed parked all weekend, except for a very brief early-morning trip to take a friend to the airport.

I haven't spent a whole lot of time just walking around my neighborhood. I'm not really big on hot OR cold weather, and I'm really likely to retreat into a climate-controlled car when temperatures are extreme. But I always feel so freaking virtuous when I walk somewhere, and I don't know why I don't do it more often.

On Saturday I walked to the library to return some books. From there I walked up to the Brookland Cafe for lunch, then over to the Franciscan monastery for their plant and herb sale. (Aside: WTF do you do with French Sorrel? I don't have a clue, and I'd better figure it out because I'm currently growing some.) On the way home, I dropped in to the organic market for some milk. All told, I was out for about 2 1/2 hours and walked about three miles, and I felt awesome afterward.

Why don't I do that more often? Now that the weather is nice, I should be taking the bus to work and walking the mile from the bus stop. I should be out enjoying spring while it lasts, and I should be getting to know the neighborhood. I have a slightly half-baked plan to leave my car at my parents' house for part of the summer to force myself to get around without it.

I'm going to try setting my alarm early enough to take the bus to work tomorrow. Getting up early is going to suck, but I know I'll feel better for doing it.

Skill Set

This afternoon, as I maneuvered my car out of a parking lot that looked like a badly played game of Tetris, I reflected on the fact that the one good thing to come out of a miserable summer working for my Dad at a car dealership is that I can get a car out of almost any tight spot. At work we have a tiny parking lot with only about half the number of spaces we need for all of our staff, and street parking is by residential parking permit only. Since the people in the neighborhood will call parking enforcement on your ass, people pack into the lot like sardines, which makes getting out of your space difficult. Somehow I can almost always do it, which is hilarious because I’m notoriously bad at backing up. My parents have actually on occasion come outside when I’m leaving their house, for the express purpose of laughing at me as I back up their (not very long) driveway and almost take out the mailbox. But somehow it works when I’m trying to get out of a tight spot.

That made me think about all the other jobs I’ve had in my life, and the extremely random skills I’ve learned from them.

Radio Shack
I worked at Radio Shack for one year in college, and I wasn’t great at it. I could sell you a TV, but if you were coming in looking for a tiny little part to fix something, you were SOL if you got me as your salesperson.

But.

I can hook up an AV system like nobody’s business.

It all goes back to something my manager told me. He said that when he was trying to connect something, he would pretend he was the TV signal. Stay with me here.

“So I’m the signal, and I’m hanging out in the wire in the wall,” he said. “But that’s pretty boring, so I go out through the coaxial cable…”

It’s crazy, but it makes me think about it linearly so it works. So when I’m hooking up a DVD player, what I’m really doing is thinking, “So I’m a TV signal…”

Waiting Tables
Until this year of teaching, I waited tables longer than I’d ever done anything else in my life. As a job, it had its up and downs, but I definitely learned a lot. I learned to deal with complete f&$@ing idiots on a regular basis. I learned that people are happiest when they can feel superior to someone else. I learned that you really never know who can overhear you, which is a lesson the mayor of Laurel could have used as he sat at a table talking about someone I know very well.

And I learned how to carry three or more glasses at a time without a tray. This is incredibly useful when you’re out at a bar with friends. I can also carry three or four full plates at a time, which is less useful but still comes in handy sometimes.

I can calculate a tip in about four seconds.

I can mix pretty damn good drinks, even though I have to look up the more complicated ones.

Public Relations
I did PR for a bunch of different organizations, in a bunch of different venues. While I didn’t much care for the work, the lessons are invaluable.

I can put a positive spin on anything.

I can translate tech-speak into something an average person can understand.

I can write 3000 words on a concept I don’t really understand myself.

I can speak at length on just about any topic, with no preparation, whether I know anything about the subject at hand or not.

I can be diplomatic even if what I really want to do is hit a person with a shovel.

Plus, it’s uncanny how many skills translate directly from working with high-level executives to working with kindergarteners.

Librarian
I feel like all I do is learn, honestly. But if there’s one thing this job has taught me, it’s that I could actually do the whole parenting thing.

Frightening, huh?

Excuse me, your sign is dumb.

DC instituted early voting this year, and I voted today for the first time as a District of Columbia resident. I'm not going to launch a political discussion here, and anyone who I've talked to for thirty seconds about the DC mayoral race probably knows who I voted for anyway, but let me tell you who I did NOT vote for.

Carlos Allen.

I submit that being best known for being that other White House party crasher probably isn't going to help your campaign, but that's not why I'm bringing him up. One of his signs is on the corner near my condo, and every time I walk past it, it irks the hell out of me, because one of his slogans is "The First Afro-Latino in history." For one thing, what the hell does THAT have to do with anything? And for another, it doesn't even make sense. He may be the first Afro-Latino candidate for mayor, but that's not what it says. And I think the many citizens of the Dominican Republic, among others, may take issue with the idea that he is the first person in all of recorded human history to be both of African and Latino descent.

On the one hand, I can take solace in the fact that his crazy ass got bounced off of the Democratic ballot. On the other hand, he's apparently now planning to run as an Independent in November, and while he still doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell it means that I'm going to have to look at his stupid signs for another two months.

In other DC politics news, the most annoying person I've ever encountered on the Internet was caught on tape stealing campaign signs, and I rejoiced. I have never met this woman in person, nor do I care to, but every time one of her emails comes over a community listserv, I gag a little. And because I am a bitchy, vindictive person, I thoroughly enjoy seeing hypocrites exposed.

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday, or How waiting tables saved my sanity

The Ruby Tuesday in Laurel closed last Monday, very suddenly. My understanding is that they called the staff together Sunday night and told them, and that was it. (That's fairly typical of chain restaurants, I understand.) While I never intended to work there again, I have to admit I was a little sad. I spent three and a half years of my life working in that restaurant. That's longer than I've ever worked ANYWHERE else. And if I have to point to the part of my life that changed me the most--and the part for which I have the most dynamic memories--that would be it.

I was always the good girl. I always did exactly what I was supposed to do. I graduated from high school and went right to college. I did college in four years with a fairly minimal amount of partying, and I went right out and got a "good job." And I was miserable.

Partly, it was a poor career choice. Partly it was just a general desire to rid myself of responsibilities. When I was laid off in January of 2004, I said a great big fuck you to all of that. I'd already been working at Ruby Tuesday for a year and a half, part-time. I looked half-heartedly for a new job for a month or two, and then I just stopped trying. I waited tables and bartended exclusively for two years, and in the beginning it made me happy.

It's hard to describe to someone who's never worked in a restaurant, but the atmosphere there is completely different from any other workplace I've ever had. Go rent Waiting. The writers of that movie clearly worked in a chain restaurant for awhile, because that movie is the most true-to-life depiction I've ever seen of those three years of my life. (The one exception: Messing with the food. I never saw that, really. But you'd probably be disgusted by the number of people who touch your food before it gets to you.) I was totally Naomi, the angry girl who would be as sweet as pie to her tables and then turn around and bitch about them at the top of her lungs. It was an atmosphere in which I could be completely irresponsible, and there were very few consequences.

It was exactly what I needed.

Going to work was like going to hang out with all of my friends for awhile. We'd slog through the shift, leave at around 11:30 at night, and go to the bar. We'd close the bar down at 2 a.m., and then often as not we'd go back to someone's house and sit around drinking and playing games until 4 or 5 in the morning.

I have tons of stories from this time in my life, but the best of them are a little too good to put out there onto the Interwebs. Some of the tamer ones include...

...the time I opened the storage room door to get the vacuum cleaner and immediately did the girlie dance of screaming as roaches scattered everywhere. I thought the cook was going to pee himself, he was laughing so hard.

...the look on D.'s face every time I went into the office around that time. She'd look at me, sigh "Another one?" and then go out to buy my table's check because they'd just seen a roach.

...the karaoke parties at C.'s apartment every week. The cops broke up just about every single one...I can't imagine why. I mean, a group of 15 drunk people singing karaoke at midnight on a weeknight in an apartment couldn't possibly be a problem...

...the time we definitively did NOT graffiti the wall behind the beer cooler during a late-night bar clean. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

I wouldn't go back to this point in my life if I could; two things I'm really not cut out for include dealing with stupid people (customers) all day and living in poverty, and I definitely did both of those things during that period of my life. But I am so, so glad that I did have these experiences, because they changed me for the better.

At least until the end. Then I was really, really bitter. But I've gotten over that now, I swear.

Family Ties

A few weekends ago, I spent Saturday night hanging out with my aunts M & K and my cousins A & E. E was in town checking out grad schools, and since I usually see her once a year or less, I ran up to Baltimore for dinner. I'm glad I did, because the evening led me to a couple of conclusions.

First, A has got be the most laid back person I've ever met. He left to go hang out with some friends, and M (his mom) wanted to show us some old family movies. We couldn't get the DVD player to work, so we called A, who tried (unsuccessfully) to talk me through it over the phone. Highlight:

A: Look, is the DVD player turned on?
Me: ...no.

That was not, thankfully, the only problem. So the following sequence of events occurred.

1. A left his friends to come back and fix the problem.
2. He fiddled (unsuccessfully) with the DVD player.
3. He brought his Playstation up from his bedroom and hooked that up to the TV. No luck.
4. He brought his TV upstairs (not a small TV, and not a flat panel) and hooked the Playstation up to it.
5. Sat with us while we watched home movies of the variety that are adorable if they're not of you and embarrassing if they ARE of you (they were of him) and only protested once.
6. Did not kill anyone when M said "Maybe it was on VHS?"
7. Brought in a THIRD TV so that we could watch VHS tapes.

When I was 19, I would have gotten no further than step 2 before I shrugged, said "Fix it yourself" and slammed the door on the way out. More likely, I wouldn't have even gotten to step 2, because I would have hung up the phone in frustration. (When I talked to my Mom about this, she said "Yeah, no kidding.")

My second conclusion was not a new one: My family is completely nuts, in a completely endearing way. As proof, I offer the following anecdotes:

Easter
For a large portion of my young life, I thought it was totally normal to hunt for liquor on Easter. Each Easter, the kids would do the traditional Easter egg hunt, searching for plastic eggs containing chocolate, $1 bills and the like. Then the kids would hide miniature liquor bottles for the adults. Seriously, I thought that all families did this.

Rope the Dogie
This involved us kids, my uncle P and a lasso. Enough said. For what it's worth, I think that we'd all vote P the most normal member of the family by a fairly wide margin.

Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve is always spent with my Dad's side of the family. This tradition goes back to when they were kids, and opened all of their presents on Christmas Eve so they could go to early Mass on Christmas morning. It made scheduling easy, because we'd always spend Christmas Eve at my Dad's parents' house, go home to our house for Christmas morning, then go to my Mom's parents' house for breakfast.

I have a lot of great memories of Christmas Eve, but two stand out in particular. Grandma had a tradition of always buying the seven girl cousins matching nightgowns. It made for a lot of really cute pictures when we were little, but the tradition kind of went off the rails by the time I was sixteen and K was six. I had a collection of absolutely hideous nightgowns that Grandma picked (I assume) based on her ability to find such a wide selection of sizes.

And then there was Santa Claus. I stopped believing in Santa at a pretty early age, which was probably for the best because every year, my uncle D would tell us that he had a trap on his roof to catch Santa, and we could all come over the next morning to play with his new toys. Somewhere in there was (I think) the implication that Santa wouldn't live through the experience. He did the same thing with the Easter Bunny.

My cousin J was going to see Santa at the mall, and at this particular mall they had an animatronic reindeer. Kids could talk to the reindeer, and some teenager hidden out of sight would talk back. I wasn't there, but I'm told that J went rushing up to the reindeer and spilled the whole plot. I guarantee you that wherever that kid on the other end of the mic is today, he's still telling that story.

The S. Sisters
Remember this dress?



Now picture your grandmother's head up there instead of J.Lo. I don't have to picture it. Thanks to some really evil Photoshopping, I can picture not only my grandmother but also my aunts M, S and K. About the time that she wore that dress down the red carpet, my cousin M got married. The joke was that he could save money on the entertainment and hire my aunts (The S. Sisters) to sing at the wedding. The reason it's such a joke is that we can't sing. None of us. I have one cousin who's a musician, and he clearly got every ounce of musical talent from our family. Happy Birthday is painful. So, before cousin M's wedding, aunt M mocked up a concert poster using the infamous green dress. This joke, by the way? Will. Not. Die.

Cousin's Sleepovers
Before M had A, she would have the oldest girls over once a year for a cousin's sleepover. We did stereotypical sleepover activities: we watched the Miss America pageant, we gorged ourselves on pizza, M made us all look like we should have been working the corner on Baltimore Street... Somewhere around here, I have pictures of our "makeovers" and I briefly considered looking for them, but between the five of us we have three teachers, a lawyer and a dietician and I don't think any of us want those pictures coming up the next time a boss Googles us.

Seriously, though, M put a ton of work into making sure that we all had a blast. And that's what I love about my family. We're odd, there's no doubt, but put all of us into a room together and we have a lot of fun. I have this huge network of people who I know I could call out of the blue and could depend on. We talk, periodically, about trying to write down all of these crazy family stories, but inevitably whoever tries realizes that it's not that simple. The beauty in these stories comes from all of us sitting around a table, and someone starts the story, and someone else jumps in and adds details, and a third person says, no, what really happened was this... Putting it down on paper makes it flat.

We're nuts, but we're not flat.