The menu for Christmas dinner has finally been set. Usually I have this handled well before the holiday, but we weren't sure if we would be having guests or not so I decided to hold off pending settlement of that issue, since the potential guests consisted of a Hindu vegetarian family and two Muslim bachelors, which would have required a significant departure from our usual roast (either beef or pork). As it turns out, it'll just be the three of us so I'm going ahead with the roast (beef this year) and a selection of our roster of festive side dishes. We're having:


- Roast beef with gravy


- Potato dumplings ("little hooves" - a recipe from a Polish friend)


- Jalapeño creamed spinach (a la Laurie Colwin, who I think took it from someone else)


- Roasted carrots and beets


- Relishes (homemade pickled greenbeans and mushrooms, with the addition of roasted peppers and some nice olives)


- For dessert, a chocolate cake with chesnut filling and marzipan fruits atop the icing.




Such is the Christmas menu of a Polish-Anglo-American family.




The "little hooves" thing is turning into a tradition. I don't usually bother with mashed potatoes, but instead will serve pierogie which, after all, often have mashed spuds in them and are much less of a bother and mess to make. Plus, they taste great with gravy. The last couple years, though, I've turned to this other variation and find that, although they are a bit more trouble than the pierogie, they have the benefit of being somewhat more impressive and a better foil for all the other rich food that's on the table. To make them enough for about six people, make several cups of mashed potatoes (note: it's A-O-K to use "potato buds" for this - trust me - but not the granular kind of instant mashed. Homemade is good, too, if you're inclined and it's not too lumpy). Add to this an egg and enough potato starch (I use Manischevtiz) to make a tender, but firm dough. Roll handfulls of dough out into long snakes about an inch in diameter and cut out the hooves on the diagonal, each about two inches in length. Plop the hooves into a large pot of salted, boiling water a few at a time and them them cook until they rise to the surface (they're kind of like ravioli or gnocchi in this regard). Serve warm with gravy or some other kind of sauce.

Post Title

→

Post URL

→

https://beat-hairstyles.blogspot.com/2003/12/menu-for-christmas-dinner-has-finally.html

Visit Trend Wallpapers And Desktop Background for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

I'm in the midst of a conflict with my mother-in-law. No, this is not a story about that age old story of two generations of women fighting to be dominant in a man's heart and thoughts. I'm actually having the same battle with my own mother. It's strange to me that these two women, who actually don't care for each other very much, could each be pushing my buttons in exactly the same way. They both want me to nag my husband more. I'm refusing and my refusal is causing much angst.


My mother-in-law isn't happy with the amount of time or energy my husband expends on maintaining connections with her extended family. He doesn't call, doesn't write, doesn't visit (the ancestral home is nearly 1,000 miles away) and this royally pisses her off. Now, this is not to say that he doesn't pay attention to her, because he does - he always remembers her birthday and Mother's Day, calls on major (and minor) holidays and faithfully visits her several times per year. It's that he doesn't keep in good touch with his cousins, great-aunts, third cousins twice removed, and so on that annoys her. So what does she do? Well, 35 years of nagging him to do her bidding in this regard haven't helped, so now she nags me. She's decided that it's either my job to maintain these connections (to people I don't know well or haven't even met) or join her in nagging him to do it.


My mom, on the other hand, isn't happy that my husband isn't a neat-nick, as she is. In the 13 years that she has known him, she's nagged him to be better at noticing disorder and being more tidy. Since it hasn't helped she's decided that it's my job to nag him to do it. The thing is, he'll clean something if I ask him to do it - he won't notice it needs cleaning on his own, but he'll definitely respond if asked. Not good enough, in mom's book.


So now, I have two women nagging me to nag him. I simply will not do it. I believe that when you marry someone, you marry all the good and all the bad (really icky stuff like violence, addiction or philandering not included, of course) and it's really not fair after 8 years of being married to suddenly start turning on the heat about stuff you knew about when you agreed to get married in the first place. I knew that he isn't super clannish despite being faithful and steadfast to a fault when it comes to immediate and nuclear family and that he isn't the type to clean the miniblinds just because it's been six weeks.


So why on earth would I put that kind of pressure on my marriage by suddenly deciding that these traits aren't acceptable when for 8 years they've been, if not awesome, then liveable? Plus, if their nagging isn't changing the scene, why would I believe that any nagging that I'd do would somehow hold the key to changing these behaviors? I guess I should be flattered that they think I hold such sway over anyone. I still think nagging is a sick, sick habit and not one that's been known to produce much besides anger, frustration and resentment.


So here I am, being nagged and becoming angrier, more frustrated and more resentful by the conversation. How strange is it to be nagged to nag? And how sad that, since the original nagging has been so ineffectual that I'm being seen as fresh troops for the war? This is, however, a war in which I absolutely will not be engaging.

Post Title

→

Post URL

→

https://beat-hairstyles.blogspot.com/2003/12/im-in-midst-of-conflict-with-my-mother.html

Visit Trend Wallpapers And Desktop Background for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

My friend Rob hunts deer and is very good at it. I can only think of one year in the 15 that I've known him that he hasn't bagged at least one (depending upon whether or not extra tags are available). This is the meat that feeds his family - they pretty much use every part of the animal and, if you eat meat at their house, you can be sure that it's deer. Some years hunting season rolls around and last year's venison hasn't been depleted from his freezer so he and his wife gift us with 20 or 30 lbs. This was one of those years. (One year, Rob's wife Jennifer went ocean fishing with some colleagues and, despite never having fished before, managed to catch several bluefish. Since they don't love fish, she gave me the cleaned, wrapped and frozen fillets. These are seriously good people to know. In the past I've tried to return these favors with home grown produce - Jen loves a good tomato sandwich - but now we live too far away for that.)


So tonight's dinner will be venison steaks that are currently marinating in a mixture of dry white table wine and chicken broth, with some onions and garlic minced in. They'll be pan fried (sort of like a Swiss steak, I guess) and served with something kind of risotto-esque (love that creaminess on cold rainy nights) and probably some roasted carrots and beets. How's that for a nice winter's meal?


I'm still working on the gingerbread house pics. We used to have a really great Kodak digital camera, but we didn't treat it carefully and the pictures started coming out blurry. But it was very easy to use - downloading was a snap into our HP Photosmart printer - and now I really miss it. Our current camera is a Fuji that, while it has some cool features like the ability to take short "movies", is a pain in the butt. Nothing's intuitive or simple and it cost quite a bit more than the late, lamented Kodak. I guess this is what we get for not handling our belongings with care - spending more money for a more irritating product. So I'm working on it.

Post Title

→

Post URL

→

https://beat-hairstyles.blogspot.com/2003/12/my-friend-rob-hunts-deer-and-is-very.html

Visit Trend Wallpapers And Desktop Background for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

I'll have a picture of the gingerbread house up soon. To alleviate what I'm sure is your overwhelming curiousity, I'll say this for now: it looks as if I gave a three year old access to frosting and candy. No structural engineer would ever sanction the building itself, but it's sweet, colorful and charming and the boy is wonderfully proud of his achievement. Good enough for me.


Last night's advent dinner was kind of a cheater: stromboli and cheese fries from the local pizza place. It was fabulous! We're trying not to eat out as much in order to 1) save money and 2) save money, but sometimes you just really want a stromboli, you know. My mom makes a great one, but she's 500 miles away which seemed a little much for a Sunday evening's drive to dinner. I'm going to have to get her recipe, 'cause now I think I'm developing a stromboli thing. What's not to love - cheese, pepperoni, veggies, and sauce all wrapped up in a bread envelope. Oh man...might have to have another one for lunch tomorrow.


Dinner tonight is a roasted chicken stuffed with preserved lemons and garlic. I wish I could transmit how amazing this smells to you (coming soon to a kitchen PC near you: the Smeller-Net, by Al Gore). It has got to be one of the most amazing scents in the world. Anyway, it came about because I was poking around the basement and saw a box that hadn't been opened from our move back in March. Inside were three pints of applesauce, two quarts of the lemons and some mango jam. Yay! I felt like I had won the lottery. Don't know how these got mis-packed in the first place or mis-laid in the basement in the second, but who cares, really? So I ran right out to buy myself a chicken to roast. To go with: a potato gratin (another thing I'm big on these days) and crusted carrots.


My mom taught me about crusted carrots - they are a great side dish because they retain a carrot's natural sweetness, but make it also richer (and they taste great sprinkled with the lemony-garlicky cooking juices from the chicken). Plus, they're super easy to make - much more so than a pudding or even glazing. To make them, peel and julienne however many carrots you want. Dip them into a raw egg that has been lightly beaten and then in seasoned flour (I season with salt and pepper, and usually an herb or two: finely chopped rosemary is great, as is thyme). Place into a buttered or sprayed shallow baking dish and dot with butter. Cook at oh, say, 350 or so for about half an hour, until the carrots are heated through and the flour mixture is golden. Some of the coating will fall off, revealing the deep orange underneath.


Newsflash: I have just been alerted that we have lost our mailbox to what looks like a game of mailbox baseball. Looks like another trip to Lowes is in the offing.

Post Title

→

Post URL

→

https://beat-hairstyles.blogspot.com/2003/12/ill-have-picture-of-gingerbread-house.html

Visit Trend Wallpapers And Desktop Background for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

We're expecting another snow and ice storm here in Cville. As someone who grew up near the Canadian border outside of Buffalo, this amuses me. Yes, you have to take the ice seriously and, yes, it's not good to drive in this kind of weather if you don't have the skills to do it. But seriously, folks, is it really necessary to clean the Kroger out of bottled water and toilet paper every time the flakes fly? My husband and son ran a quick errand to Lowes, which is right next door to a Kroger and thought he might pick up some soda while he was in the neighborhood (I'd also asked him to get some Christmas scratch off lottery tickets for stocking stuffers, if he could). Couldn't get near the place - he said it was total panic. Granted, we are south of the Mason-Dixon line but this seems like a little bit of an over-reaction, even for sort-of southerners.


Granted, this is all through the prism of my upbringing. Come mid-October, many Buffalonians outfit their cars with extra blankets, gloves, and hats, along with granola bars, dehydrated fruit or some similar long-keeping snack. After the Blizzard of '77 (immortalized in the book "White Death" by Erno Rossi), killed more than two dozen people - primarily stranded drivers - and caused a week's worth of utter disruption and mayhem, most of the population of Western New York "got religion" and began taking storm prep seriously so there are very seldom panics on the order of what we're seeing here. And, I should point out, that despite Buffalo's very poor reputation weather-wise, there's a reason that these kind of events live on in everyone's memory - they're just not that common. So there.


Here in our house, we're ready to go. We've always got water and canned goods and took a delivery of firewood just last week. There's plenty of animal food and the candles and matches are always at the ready. My big worry at the moment is that my husband and I both have big things we absolutely have to get done tomorrow (me a deadline, him a final exam) and it looks like pre-school will be cancelled. So we're in active negotiation mode to see how we're going to get all our studying and working done, while not shortchanging the boy.


For my part, I'm going to introduce the child to the joys of making a ginger-bread house. I cheated a bit this year and got a pre-fab kit (but one of the nice ones, in a tin with lots of candy). I have a lovely gingerbread house mold but I figured that making one with a three year old required some more immediate gratification. So after breakfast (waffles left over from yesterday spread with some homemade pumpkin butter) we're going to get to work. Watch this space for photos of what I'm sure will be an interesting, if not ready for Martha, result.

Post Title

→

Post URL

→

https://beat-hairstyles.blogspot.com/2003/12/were-expecting-another-snow-and-ice.html

Visit Trend Wallpapers And Desktop Background for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection