The man who founded a right-wing Catholic media mini-empire was forced to resign Tuesday, telling the public that he needs to work on the ugliness inside himself.
The stunning news that Michael Voris was pushed out from Church Militant, the media outlet he started almost 20 years ago, came out Tuesday when the Church Militant board issued a statement that Voris had breached its morality clause.
In a video he released on social media Tuesday evening, Voris said in a way he’s thankful for the “dark grace” of his fall, so that he can start healing.
“Sometimes it takes very horrible events, even at your own hand, to surface certain things that need to be faced,” Voris said.
Voris’s longtime on air sidekick, Christine Niles, released her own video on Tuesday, confirming she’s the one who alerted the board to problems at Church Militant. Niles resigned on Nov. 9 with a lengthy and detailed letter to the Church Militant board about what had been going on behind the scenes, she said.
“There were lots of troubling things over the past year, but especially over that past several months, about the direction Church Militant was heading, and some of the decisions Voris was making,” Niles said.
Niles is not saying what Voris did to be pushed out of the business he started, but said there has been a distinct personality change in Voris.
“He is not the man I came to work for in 2014,” Niles said.
The one red flag Niles would share is that Voris had stopped praying with staff in the last couple of years.
“Somewhere along the line over the past several years it became less and less of a priority,” she said.
Niles reminded people watching her video that Voris himself had said many times that a lack of prayer almost always came before someone had a public fall from grace.
Voris also did not want to discuss the “ugly actions” that lead to his resignation, but said it is due to “deep, deep, deep” wounds that were too terrible for him to even consider. With whatever he’d done out in the open, at least to Church Militant board members and staff, Voris said he’s seeking professional help.
“I need to conquer these demons,” Voris said.
Voris did offer his “deepest apologies” to the people he’s hurt with his behavior.
“There is nothing I can say to make it good,” Voris said.
Niles said Voris has hurt people in Church Militant, including herself.
“To say that I am heartbroken and furious is an understatement. There’s a lot of anger, there is a great deal of anger over this,” Niles said.
She won’t judge Voris, and said she’s ready to forgive him, but the harm he has caused is real.
“That doesn’t mean though that it hasn’t hurt a lot of people, that it hasn’t scandalized a lot of people, that it hasn’t hurt a lot of good people still at Church Militant,” she said.
While some commenters called his video “tremendously moving” and “humble,” others incredulously pointed out that Voris and Niles have made a living for almost two decades out of exposing and decrying the most private details of the lives of others, in the name of investigative journalism on a crusade to expose corruption in the church; but now that a scandal is in-house, they are asking for prayer, support, and privacy.
I reached out to Simon Rafe, Voris’ longtime Church Militant factotum, this afternoon, but was told he no longer had a phone on his desk. The media company went through a round of layoffs and expense cuts this year which saw employee phones removed, among other austerity measures.
Sources have said since that Rafe, too, is out at Church Militant.
Church Militant operates under the banner of St. Michael’s Media, the non-profit apostolate Voris started. According to tax returns, St. Michael’s media has been running major deficits for years, totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. Part of the problem has been Voris’ media strategy, which got him sued for defamation.
Voris saw his two original lawyers on the case quit this year. His replacement lawyer, Richard Lehmann, did not respond to a request for comment. If St. Michael’s Media, and its donors, are not longer footing the bill for the legal defense, it’s unclear what will happen next.
This summer, DeLaire’s attorneys accused Voris of hiding evidence and threatening a key witness in the case. He also reportedly claimed attorney-client privilege for his conversations with Niles. While Niles is a licensed attorney, she is not a lawyer for Voris or Church Militant, according to an affidavit she signed in the case.
Voris has been no stranger to strangeness. He was forced to change the name of his news outlet from Real Catholic TV to Church Militant in 2012 after the Archdiocese of Detroit told him he didn’t have permission to use “Catholic” in the name.
In 2016, Voris outed himself as having lived as a homosexual in his 20s and 30s. Voris is now 62. At the time of his previous disclosure, Voris claimed powerful enemies within the Church were about to use his past against him.
At the end of his video, Voris said he might return to Church Militant at some point in the future, once he’s dealt with whatever he is dealing with. He asked viewers for prayers, and to continue supporting Church Militant and its 40 or so employees. He also offered advice for anyone suffering.
“If you’ve got some ugliness in your past, don’t let it control you,” Voris said.
The giant Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro sparked chatter last week when it was fitted with a projected image of a Taylor Swift T-shirt, who launched the Brazil leg of her Eras Tour on Nov. 17. The 124-foot statue of Jesus, with outstretched arms that span 92 feet, can be seen from all over the city and beyond.
The archdiocese has offered the statue and its grounds and sanctuary for events and promotions for many years. The proceeds, including those from the recent Swift-inspired projection, go to charity—and the poor in Brazil are in great need of charity.
These considerations are why I’m still thinking about that T-shirt on Jesus. I don’t like it. (I also don’t like it when Catholic church facades are illuminated with images, a practice that is becoming more and more popular globally.) It disturbs me when we get too casual with sacred images.
When I brought the matter up with some friends, a few of them quickly called it “blasphemy.” This is an image of Jesus, who is God, and he surely loves Taylor Swift the human woman. But he’s not a Swiftie; he’s the Lord.
I don’t think it’s blasphemy. Blasphemy, strictly speaking, entails words that maliciously or carelessly insult God. As far as I know, nobody has paid to light up the statue to look like anything that the church condemns. The sanctuary’s website invites organizations to apply to use the statue for events or displays but reminds that proposals will be evaluated for whether the values expressed are appropriate.
During the pandemic, the sanctuary lit it up to make it appear as a doctor and included messages to remain hopeful and stay home. They have lit it up to support efforts against human trafficking. But not all displays are so lofty. They also lit it up to wear a soccer shirt in support of the Flamengo team. They lit it up in honor of the region getting connected to 5G service. They also projected the national colors of various countries during the World Cup, and again during the pandemic, so that at one point, Jesus was red with five yellow stars, wrapped in the Chinese flag.
Does this still seem fine to you?
But it’s for charity, some will say. Surely Jesus can handle being decorated. It’s not really Jesus; it’s just a statue; and anyway, there’s nothing wrong with soccer or pop music, and Jesus loves the poor, and he is the divine physician, and the goal is to bring hope and comfort to people who see it.
It still sets off alarm bells for me. This has been a century of great losses, and one of the greatest has been a loss of the sense of the sacred.
SHOPPING TIME, INNIT? As you can see, graphic design continues to be my passion. My other passion is sharing gift ideas for kids, and so here I present the 2023 list.
Use the little bitty Lego-like parts to build three different styles of robots, which you can then control. We did have a few missing pieces in our set, but the robots still worked without them. Good for a kid with patience!
Eye-catching, elegant sturdy polished wooden hair sticks with shiny metal flowers dangling from the ends. They come in several colors and styles, and the shop also has jewelry and other items. Sophisticated and a little bit punk.
If you have to go to school, make it better by being Boba Fett. I was afraid this would be flimsy and rinky-dink, but it’s actually quite sturdy, bigger than I expected, and full of lots of little pockets and compartments.
I honestly don’t know anything about Pathfinder, except that it’s the other role-playing game. This gift was well-received (because it was the exact item on a wish list).
A set of three walkie talkies so your fates or musketeers or stooges whatever you have three of at your house can keep in touch. These are real walkie talkies, not toys, and they are easy to use and clear, and they don’t gobble batteries. Very handy for people without phones, or just for fun.
I truly know nothing about banjos, but this one did the trick of helping a kid learn to play for the first time. Comes with a case and extra strings, pick, and polishing cloth.
Little portable moon lamp. It’s a bit smaller than the pictures in the Amazon ad make it look, but it’s still cool (and it does come in larger sizes). The remote that controls the color and settings (flash, fade, etc.) is small and maybe loseable for a young kid. Comes with a little wooden stand so it doesn’t roll off your night table, or you can carry it with you.
I was afraid these would be cheesy, but the (adult) kid who got them really enjoyed the calming, detailed activity of placing the little “diamonds” one by one with the provided tool. You stick on a corked back and they make nice coasters, or just decorations.
We’ve bought a couple of these. They really work. Gotta move your puzzle off the table for dinner time? Roll it up and put it away, and then pick up where you left off.
We got this at Walmart for $5 and my eight-year-old LOVES it. She puts it together several times a day and . . . now she knows the states. I think the list price is more like $10, so there are probably higher-quality map floor puzzles out there, but I’m including it more as an inspiration. I also adored floor puzzles at this age. Very satisfying.
Kind of a weird item, but neat. You turn it on and the satiny sand swirls around in the liquid inside the ball, making a mystical effect. You can set it so it goes continuously, or allegedly so it starts up in response to a sound, like a clap. We have not been able to get it to do the sound activation mode, but it’s still quite cool. Runs on batteries.
Everything you need to get going with little resin projects. It’s not a huge kit, but it’s handy to have everything together for beginners, and then you can buy more of what you need and branch out if the kid likes to use resin.
Pretty nonstick pan to make apple-shaped treats cakes, or you could use it for gummies or candies. I like how there are four different designs in one pan. Nordicware has tons and tons of designs.
Weird and captivating. Lots of detail in the illustrations, lots of thought went into the descriptions. Caveat emptor, some of the fairies are a little topless, but they’re not sexy or anything, they’re just fairies. We like Brian Froud! Probably not for young kids, as some of the illustrations can be a little creepy.
We did not actually get fifteen experiments out of this, but we got quite a few, and it really hit the spot for a kid who likes science. The seven-year-old did quite a few of them on her own, and she really cherishes the rock specimens. It has plenty of informational guides to explain what you’re doing with the experiments, but you can also just mess around with them.
Really nice quality, very impressive. Fold-out Dungeon Master screen so you can make your nefarious plans in privacy. It comes with pre-printed cheat sheets that are decent, or you can use your own, and slide them into the four clear plastic pockets, and you can make notes on them with dry erase marker.
The exact one we got is sold out, but this is pretty close. Walk into a room and instantly find out who the other Lord of the Rings fans are. Comes in two styles of shirt and many different colors, from TeePublic.
You’re gonna hate me, but your kid will love this thing. It gets tons of play. It’s basically Dance Dance Revolution in a self-contained mat you can unfold and start up, and there are three different modes of play: One where you follow the moves as they light up, a Simon Says-style game, or just free mode. You can use the preset tunes or use Bluetooth to play your own music. It does have a volume control and it’s not TOO loud, and it has held up really well under lots of use. Good for parties or just dancy kids.
This is another one of those things that I don’t know if other people’s kids want, or if it’s just my kids. It comes in several colors and has held up well all year. A spring or fall jacket, so not super warm, but not flimsy.
A little bundle I put together: Beginner chain mail jewelry
A neat little device that holds your project for you while you work on it, with the help of a magnifying glass. Not 100% necessary, but it’s not expensive and it really makes a kid feel like a serious artisan when they use it. Works as described once you figure out all the various joints and nuts.
Clear, straightforward, copiously illustrated instructions for the beginner. My 11-year-old opened it up and went right to work without help.
Tackle box organizer I highly recommend some kind of bin to keep everything together! We got one at Walmart, and I think it had more compartments than this, but it did have the fold-up trays, which my kid was very impressed by.
The famous portable water filter, for the person who is always wandering off into the hills and maybe forgot a water bottle. Just a little present, but thoughtful for the right person. Currently on sale for $9.99.
We usually buy costume dresses from The Little Dress-Up Shop, which has very well-made, non-itchy, machine-washable dresses with sparkles that don’t shed; but we had a hard time finding a Merida dress in a big enough size. Or maybe it was just that we needed the fast Prime shipping? Anyway this one did the trick and the kid was delighted. A decent quality costume.
The black one we got is sold out, but they still have this lovely little blue leather bat to gallantly hold your hair in place, or many other beautifully crafted leather items — barrettes, masks, key fobs, and more — from River Gypsy Arts, very reasonably priced for the workmanship.
This is more than I ever expected to spend on a beanbag chair, to be honest, (we got the four-foot one for $85) but the cheaper ones from other brands are really garbagy, so you get what you pay for. It’s huge and comfortable and hasn’t gone flat in a year, and it has a comfy microsuede cover and is filled with memory foam beads. It’s big enough for a teenage boy. They come in bigger and smaller sizes, and many colors, as well as sacks in other shapes and configurations.
Sadly these wooden parakeet earrings we got are sold out, but there are many, many other animal and other cute and beautifully-crafted wooden earring designs at The Odd Giraffe. Truly outstanding customer service, and the earrings are light and comfortable.
A jolly, ridiculous card game that truly takes about ninety seconds to play one round. It’s a truly family-friendly game designed to be played by people of all ages and/or a people of assorted ages, that just about anyone can learn instantly, and that doesn’t have a lot of pieces to lose. It would make a great cheerer-upper if people are gloomy, or an ice breaker at a party of shy folks. The actions are silly but not humiliating. It really strikes the perfect balance of simplicity and entertainment value.
And that’s it! I’ll add to this if I remember more stuff. Don’t forget to check out the monster list for hundreds of other present ideas, including lots for younger kids, such as we used to have. The list is organized by category:
Little guys’ toys (besides dolls) Games and puzzles Building and tactile toys Kitchen Sciencey stuff Electronics Art and journaling supplies Jewelry, pins, accessories (+makeup, sunglasses) Music and musical instruments Crafts, kits, knitting, sewing Dolls and stuffies Outdoor and active toys Weaponry and knives Costumes Hats and hair accessories Bags and wallets Miscellaneous
Friday has arriven! It’s about damn time. And may I just say, my food pictures are really pretty this week. I tried THREE new recipes. One (butternut squash soup with coconut and spinach) turned out great, one (Turkish flatbread) was pretty bad, and one (cranberry chicken) was fine. That’s how you find out!
Here’s what we had:
SATURDAY Caprese chicken burgers; veg and dip
Quick frozen meal for shopping day, with a little extry to make it nice. Aldi’s chicken burgers are actually pretty good, for processed chicken patties. They have a pleasant texture and the breading is crip. So I cooked those and put out tomatoes and basil, olive oil and balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper, and then got into a protracted argument with a kid about cheese. This particular kid, see, is PAID to put the groceries away every week, and so you’d think that when I ask a simple question like . .
you know what, never mind. If you have kids, you’ve heard enough. Anyway I found a little package of fresh mozzarella in the back of the fridge, and SOME of us had nice cheese on their sandwiches. Everyone else had pre-sliced whatevercheese.
I cut up a bunch of peppers and broccoli and set out a tray with French onion dip. No chips and no French fries! They said it couldn’t be done! But I’ve been snacking on leftover vegetables all week and only feel prey to clearance Halloween candy one time, so you tell me.
SUNDAY Omelets for kids; Chinese food for adults
Sunday, Moe and his girlfriend took me and Damien out to eat, just to be nice! Wasn’t that nice? We had an excellent Chinese meal at Cherry Garden in Keene. I had pork gyoza and a spicy coconut chicken curry. Splendid.
The kids at home opted to have omelets. Lucy is reigning omelet queen these days.
They also had some kind of waffle fries.
Look at us! One kid takes us out to eat, and one kid feeds all the rest! Amazing. It could happen to you too.
MONDAY Sausage, egg, and cheese bagel sandwiches; OJ
Monday I took a little drive to pick up something from Facebook marketplace for Corrie’s birthday, which is in February. Sometimes you have to snap up a good deal when it comes along, and then you drive around with a giant secret tortoise habitat in the back of your car for a few months, so what. So we had a quick meal. I didn’t burn the bagels or the eggs!
I must say, I’m looking forward to spring when the ducks start laying eggs again. They knocked off for the year several weeks ago, and we have to struggle along with these inferior chicken eggs.
TUESDAY Butternut squash soup with lentils and spinach; yufka; grilled cheese
Tuesday it really snowed for real. It only stuck around for a few hours, but as it fell, it whispered “soup,” so I was powerless. I was still thinking about that lovely coconut curry I had, so I found this recipe for lentil butternut squash soup with coconut and spinach. Very promising ingredients:
Pretty simple seasonings, just cayenne pepper and cumin along with the onion and garlic, which you cook up with some tomato paste
Add in the cubed butternut squash (from my garden!), chicken stock, and lentils, and let that cook.
I had brown lentils instead of red, but the next step was to blend it anyway, so I didn’t think it mattered much. Then you add the coconut milk and puree it all.
Another small triumph: I remembered before it was too late that hot liquid expands when you puree it, so I did it in batches in the blender
and there was no hot fountain of orange goo, not at all! Not this time.
Hey, this is a good time to make sure you have anything you might need to order for Thanksgiving, which is less than a week away. I finally got around to ordering a new bowl for my food processor. The blender actually did really well with this particular job, though. I like the pouring spout on top.
Then you return the puree to the pot and put the spinach in and let it cook down, and that’s it. I transferred it to the Instant Pot and set it on “keep warm” and just left it for the rest of the day. The IP’s “warm” button is not as hot as a crock pot, but if you have enough time, it’s fine.
I had been listening to Milk Street Radio and they were talking about this flaky Turkish bread, yufka, that you can make it no time – like 25 minutes, allegedly. It doesn’t have any leaven, and you just have to let the dough rest a few times before you fry it up.
Welp, I couldn’t access the recipe they mentioned, so I found a similar one, except you don’t let it rest as much. Then you roll the pieces out and cook it them a hot pan, and that’s it.
So, I’m not sure where I went wrong with this. I made the dough in the morning and let it rest at room temperature, and then I put it in the fridge, which it said you could do. Maybe I used too much olive oil? Maybe the pan wasn’t hot enough?
They were . . . okay. They looked okay.
But they were so rubbery! A few parts tasted more or less like I expected, but they were so dang dense. Oh well. The soup more than made up for it. The recipe suggest squeezing some fresh lime juice over the top, and I was skeptical about that, but it was AMAZING. Just a fabulous combination of creamy and piquant flavors. I also floated a few roasted pumpkin seeds over the top and that was a good idea as well.
Okay so the color of this soup is not necessarily the most elegant. It’s kind of orangey-yellowy-green. I think if I had used red lentils, it would have been a cheerier yellowy-orange. But the taste was superb. It was so warming and nourishing, but not heavy or muddy, like if pea soup went to finishing school, and it had a little sizzling spicy kick with the cayenne and cumin. So good. I had two bowls and had to stop myself from going back for more.
I also made grilled cheese, because I was pretty sure the soup would not be popular, and I was right.
WEDNESDAY Carnitas, guacamole
Good old pork butt still goes for 99 cents a pound pretty often. I got a couple of big hunks and off we went. This is such an easy recipe with tons of flavor.
You heavily season the pork chunks and then just chuck them in the pot with oil, Coke, cinnamon sticks, bay leaves, and some orange quarters (I had clementines).
Then you just cook it down for several hours until it gets dark and yummy
You can drain off the liquid and keep cooking it at this point, or you can do what I did and just pull the meat out, shred it, and brown it up under the broiler. I added back a little of the yummy citrusy pot juice along with the meat before putting it under the heat, to keep it from drying out.
I often make beans and rice with carnitas, but I just did guacamole this time. Boy, is it satisfying when you choose the perfect day to slice open the avocados. I forgot to buy tomatoes, so this guac just had avocados lightly mashed, jalapenos, cilantro, onion, garlic, lime juice, and salt and pepper.
I put out all the regular stuff for carnitas – tortillas, sour cream, salsa, and lime wedges – but I didn’t feel like putting together the whole thing. I heated up some frozen corn and I opted for pretzels instead of chips, and I enjoyed the heck out of this slightly peculiar plate, modified for those who want to lose weight but are choosing their battles.
And that’s my story. I am down ten pounds at last count, so there.
I was planning just some kind of sheet pan thing with chicken and vegetables, but I saw this recipe from a local supermarket chain, and I did have a bag of cranberries, so, again, powerless. It’s a very simple recipe. You season the chicken and brown up the skin side, then take it out of the pan
then add in some diced onion and cook that in the chickeny oil, then add in the cranberries, some brown sugar, and some oregano, and let it all bubble around a bit
and then you put the chicken back into the cranberry mixture and put the whole thing in the oven to finish cooking. I knew I was going to be out around dinner time (another Facebook Marketplace adventure for a different birthday kid. Here’s a tip: Raise your kids to understand that used is FINE), so I cooked this in the morning and moved it into a casserole dish; but technically that is a one-pan dish and can be made in a single skillet.
Pretty! I only had one bag of cranberries, but I had a bunch of chicken, so I just browned up the rest up with oil and salt and pepper, and also put that in a separate dish to finish cooking.
Then I went out and harvested my poor Brussels sprouts. They struggled early on in the growing season with a brassica-specific bacteria, and they never really bounced back; but I thought I had lost them altogether, so I was pretty happy to have even these little bitty sprouts.
I popped them all off their stems and washed them well (there was one worm stowaway) and beheld my mighty harvest.
Eh, that’s what supermarkets are for. I also had another butternut squash from the garden, and a few pounds of red potatoes. I spread it all in a pan and hit them with olive oil, cider vinegar because my wine vinegar looked weird, honey, and salt and pepper. So I roasted that up before dinner while heating up the chicken
So it was all . . . fine. Everything was a little too greasy. I think the chicken would have been quite good if I had just cooked it and served it right away. Cooking it in the morning and heating it up in the evening turned the cranberries into mush, sadly.
Live and learn! At least I finally did something with those dumb brussels sprouts and I can stop thinking about them. Next year, I’ll remember to pull the leaves off the plants so I get more sprouts. Somebody enjoyed the leaves, though.
THE ASSASSIN, that’s who.
Who, meeee? Me-MEOWWWWW?
Oh gosh, that reminds me. Tell your kids, “SOMEBODY in this house is possessed by an owl.” Then when they say “Who?” you just stare at them.
Anyway, I might make this cranberry dish again when I can do it properly. It was so easy, and people weren’t fully against it.
FRIDAY Pasta with Marcella Hazan’s magic 3-ingredient sauce
We haven’t had this savory, stupid-easy sauce for a while. Seriously, three ingredients. You will be tempted to add garlic or basil or so forth, but it really doesn’t need it. It’s simple and perfect, and truly absurdly easy.
Very easy recipe transforms pork into something heavenly. Carnitas are basically pulled pork tacos with the meat crisped up. Serve with whatever you like.
Ingredients
pork butt/shoulder, cut into chunks
salt and pepper
oregano
oranges, quartered
cinnamon sticks
bay leaves
1canCoke or Mexican Coke
1cup or lessvegetable oil
Instructions
Sprinkle the chunks of pork with salt, pepper, and oregano.
Put them in a heavy pot with the oil and Coke, oranges, cinnamon sticks, and bay leaves. Bring to a simmer.
Simmer, uncovered, for at least two hours. The oranges will start to get mushy and the liquid will begin to thicken.
When the meat is tender, remove the oranges, bay leaves, and cinnamon sticks. Turn the heat up and continue cooking, stirring often, until the meat has a dark crust. Be careful not to let it burn.
Remove the meat and drain off any remaining liquid. Shred the meat. It it's not as crisp as you like, you can brown it under the oven broiler, or return it to the pot without the liquid and fry it up a bit.
You guys know I’m not any kind of doctor. This is just advice from a mom who knows how to Google stuff and type. So:
Vitamin D deficiency is incredibly common worldwide. Vitamin D is a hormone your body produces when it’s exposed to sunlight. If you don’t get enough sun, because you’re indoors a lot, or because you wear sunblock and protective clothing outdoors, or if you live north of the Mason-Dixon line, or you’re overweight, or you have dark skin, or you’re old — so, most people I know — your body is almost certainly not making enough Vitamin D, and you may be feeling a little or a lot garbagey because of it.
The best thing to do is ask your doctor to get tested. The second best thing (assuming you don’t have kidney problems, or other health problems! Ask your doctor!) is to do is to just buy a bottle of vitamin D3 and start taking some, and see what happens. I got a giant vat of D3 50 mcg (2,000 IU) gummies from Walmart and I started taking 3 of them (so 6,000 IU) with dinner. This is kind of a lot, and is more than is recommended, so I’ll ask to be tested next time I go to the doctor, and I’m keeping an eye out for negative symptoms like nausea and constipation.
But my story is: In about a week, I started feeling better. I feel more alert and less brain-foggy than I have in a long time. I don’t have to struggle against falling asleep every afternoon. I’m feeling more energetic and upbeat in general. And I have been sleeping SO WELL. Like, my nighttime is not made up of series of confused, unhappy memories of getting up and lying down again and struggling with my sheets. I’m just unconscious.
This is not the only thing I’ve been doing to try to have a different kind of winter. I really struggle in the cold months, and I also have various moderate but intractable health problems that get discouraging. I have PMDD and a little bit of arthritis and chronic migraines, and my birthright is a heaping helping of gloom. So I’ve been doing yoga, which helps a lot; I’ve been taking Prozac, which helps a lot, especially with the PMDD; and I’ve been working on resetting the way I eat, which helps a lot. I also have committed to making a morning offering before I check my phone, and that helps a lot. I’ve been using those nose opening sticky strips, which helps a bit. And I stopped drinking, and I don’t want to talk about it. But anyway, I have been trying to feel better, so I can do better, and I was starting to think, “Welp, I guess I’m just old, and this is how it is.”
Turns out you can just eat a few gummies in the evening, and it helps a lot! I have bought vitamin D pills in the past, but I’m so burnt out on taking pills and keeping them straight, I just wasn’t motivated enough to add more. It’s a little silly, but gummies are sweet and easy, so it turns out that was enough to actually make me eat them every day. It’s not dumb if it works, right? Or even if it is dumb, it still works.
I’m making a whole big post out of this because I know (a) how much information there is out there about fixing yourself, and how overwhelming it can be and (b) how helpful it can be to get specific advice from someone you already sorta know and (c) how hard it is to make even one tiny little easy change when you feel like crap all the time. It’s probably true that it’s a combination of things that is helping me; but it’s so rare that something this easy makes a difference.
What kind of improvement am I talking about? I got up this morning, flicked on the overhead bedroom light, saw the bulb had blown, and just . . . went and got a new bulb, climbed up on my bed, and put it in. I also cleaned off the light fixture, and while I was up there, I went around and wiped away all the cobwebs and dust on the ceiling and wall corners. Then I put the wipes away and threw out the used one, threw out the old lightbulb, and put the empty box in recycling. And I’m on my period right now.
So no, I’m not running marathons suddenly! Let the reader understand. Some of us struggle with everyday stuff, especially in the dark months. If that sounds like you, maybe get some Vitamin D gummies. Put the bottle next to something you are definitely already going to do every day, so it’s easy to remember. Just try it. If you start feeling better in about a week, you’re probably taking the right level. If you do get tested, your levels may be VERY low, and your doctor may recommend taking high doses by prescription for a while, and then backing down to a maintenance dose. Do ask your doctor! Do not take mega doses without asking your doctor! It is possible to take too much Vitamin D and that will hurt you!
Again, me no doctor, so check with your doctor, especially if you have any kidney issues. (I asked a pharmacist to check for me and make sure it was compatible with all the other meds I take.) Take the vitamin with a little food or milk or something with fat for best absorption. Some people think it interferes with sleep, so maybe take it in the morning. (I don’t have this issue, so it works to take it in the evening.) And yes, I’m encouraging the rest of the family to take it, too.
Good luck! Winter is hard. Life is hard. This might help.
Happy Friday! Happy Veteran’s Day, sort of! My kids have the day off and they are celebrating by standing around in the kitchen, shouting. HOWEVER, my trip to the neurologist last week was very fruitful, at least potentially. He took me off one of my “feel terrible” drugs, confirmed that another “feel terrible” drug was stupid and useless and I was right to stop taking it, and gave me a prescription for monthly injections I can do at home. The insurance company is still consulting their in-office oracle to see if I’m worthy, but SOON I should be able to start. So I’m excited! I also started using those no-snore nose strips at night, so Damien and I are both sleeping a little better, and I finished Alba Avella’s thirty day yoga for flexibility challenge, and it only took me like ninety days. And I went to confession and I bought a giant bottle of Vitamin D and I’m actually taking it this time, and basically I’m kicking November’s ass. Potentially.
The cold weather has started in earnest, brr. We’ve had some frost and snow, but I managed to get some last final bulbs in the ground and get my perennial beds prepped for winter before the ground froze, which makes me feel amazing. I trimmed my strawberries and asparagus and covered them with straw and secured it with plastic fencing and bricks, and I made a lovely compost ring around my baby rhubarb.
This is my first time digging into my compost heap, and I didn’t know what I was going to find. I didn’t do anything you’re supposed to do – no turning, no mixing, no careful layering. I just dumped soil and kitchen scraps and duck bedding on it, and sometimes drained the duck water into it.
So, inside toward the bottom, it is SO RICH. I was afraid it would be, like, just some banana peels and eggshells just hanging out undisturbed, looking at me, like “What?” But everything has decomposed really nicely, and the soil is like chocolate. Amazing. What a world.
I also gathered up the last of the marigold, cosmos, and sunflower seeds. I’ve been saving, drying, and storing flower and vegetable seeds for a few months, and it feels better than money in the bank.
Which is good, because there is no money in the bank. But I’m going to have a wonderful garden!
Anyway! Back to food. I did make a lot of yummy cold-weather food this week. Here’s what we had:
SATURDAY Pork ribs, rolls, green beans
Church basement ass kinda meal, but I got home super late from shopping, so we get credit for putting hot food on the table. I thought I was buying frozen peas, but they turned out to be green beans, oh well.
Ribs just seasoned with salt and pepper and roasted quickly under the broiler. The green beans were delicately flavored with salt. No complaints.
SUNDAY Quiche, challah, onion soup, pomegranates
Sunday, nobody had to GO anywhere, and Damien and Moe were working on Moe’s car, and the kids were yakking about challah, so I offered to show Sophia how to make it. We each made one batch of dough, and we did a little John Henry thing and I made mine with the dough hook in the standing mixer, and she mixed and kneaded hers by hand. Here’s the recipe:
I ended up using more flour in mine to get it to the elastic texture I wanted, so my loaf turned out a little bigger. I’m not sure if that was the only reason it was bigger, or if it also rose differently? Anyway they both turned out good!
Sophia put sesame seeds on hers
Isn’t it lovely? Not bad for her first challah!
and I just left mine plain
Like I said, it was a little bigger, and I wish I had let it bake longer because it was a little damp inside.
So hers actually turned out better! I do love challah. I’m not about to start kneading stuff by hand, though. Gotta save my wrists for Crow Pose.
I also made a couple of quiches. I used to make quiche all the time, and people got pretty burnt out on it, but it’s been years, so I figured it was time. I bought premade pie shells, which I blind baked. Then in one I put baby spinach, crisp bacon and . . . some kind of cheese, which I tragically cannot remember the name of. It was flavored with rosemary.
In the other quiche, I put crumbled hot sausage and sauteed mushrooms, and more cheese.
I basically followed this recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction, except it calls for half milk and half cream, so I used .. . half and half? I’m no mathemagician, but I think that makes sense.
They did turn out lovely.
The bacon and spinach one was vastly more popular than the mushroom and sausage one, because bacon. Next time, I’ll just make two bacon.
Then I decided it was cold enough that we really needed soup, so I made some simple onion soup.
So we had the soup, the quiches, and lots of challah, and it was a cozy, cheerful meal for a cold day.
As you can see, I had a few pomegranates to serve, as well. Pomegranates have many good qualities, not least how you can frighten people who wander into the kitchen and not instantly realize you’re just prepping dinner, and not settling scores
Moe and Eliora came over, and Benny and Corrie made appetizers out of a Halloween kit I bought on clearance.
Very chic:
I’ll tell you, I got invited to some kind of fancy salon dinner thingy in NY, and if they’re not serving sticky clearance ghost pops, I’m leaving.
The key is using fresh ginger and garlic, and you can make these with beef, but I vastly prefer the lighter texture of turkey or chicken. This is a great, easy dish to prep in the morning and then quickly cook before dinner.
So I made meatballs, and then used the leftover pork to make pork fried rice, which I don’t really have a recipe for. I just chop up whatever aromatics and vegetables I’m using and saute them in sesame oil, then dump on some brown sugar and let it get bubbly and dark. This time I threw in some shredded cabbage and carrot and some leftover diced red onion from something or other
Then the diced up meat, then you add your cooked rice, slosh on a lot of oyster sauce, a medium amount of soy sauce, and a little fish sauce, and then I stir in the scrambled eggs.
Is this how you make fried rice? It’s how EYE make fried rice, and it was pretty popular. I thought it was to sweet, but people liked it.
I cut up some kiwis and put out some sweet chili sauce for the meatballs, and it was a great little meal, and I used up a lot of leftovers.
TUESDAY Salad with beef, pears, and goat cheese
Tuesday’s meal was a bit of a disappointment. I had a big hunk of roast beef and I meant to cook it rare and slice it up to serve over salad. I started off okay, by seasoning it heavily and searing it in hot oil, but then I got confused and, rather than roasting it in the oven in red wine where I could keep an eye on it, I chucked it in the Instant Pot and let it cook for way too long. I forget why I did this. Original sin, no doubt.
So it came out kinda stewed, which is not what I was going for at all. Oh well. So the salad was just mixed greens, your choice of feta or goat cheese and sliced pears, plus some buttery croutons I made with the leftover challah.
It wasn’t a bad meal, but I grieved over what could have been. I adore rare roast beef with greens and pears and cheese.
WEDNESDAY Batter fried fish sandwiches, coleslaw, chips
Wednesday I had to face the tilapia again. They keep having this insanely cheap tilapia at Walmart, and I keep trying to find a way that the kids will like it. I figured everyone likes batter fried food, so even though it was a bit of a hassle, I made batter fried tilapia using this recipe . It’s quite simple and if you don’t crowd the pan, it comes out crisp and golden
I even got nice brioche buns to sweeten the deal, and I served the sandwiches with coleslaw and chips, with lemon and mayo for the fish
I think four people ate it. OH WELL.
I had a lot of leftover batter, so I decided to fry it up as a wad,
and one child who shall remain anonymous sat there eating the fried batter wad despite all warnings that human tummies were not made for such things, and then said child did indeed throw up. On the stairs. This is honestly my fault, because why would I fry a wad so nice and golden and crisp, and then tell people not to eat half of it? Anyway I cleaned the stairs.
The good news is, I still have plenty of tilapia in the freezer!
THURSDAY Nachos, beans and rice with collards
Thursday was just plain old nachos. I made one pan with chips, unseasoned beef, and cheddar cheese, and one pan with chips, seasoned beef (I think salt, pepper, garlic powder, cumin, chili powder, and paprika), cheddar cheese, pepper jack cheese, jalapenos, scallions, and a little chili powder on top.
I noticed we had some leftover plain cooked rice from the fried rice, so I decided to make beans and rice
Just very quickly, but I thought it was tasty. I just used the Instant Pot to saute some chopped onions in oil with salt, pepper, garlic powder, some chili powder and lots of cumin, and then I threw in the rice, a can of black beans, and a can of tomatoes with chili peppers. Then I remembered I still had some collard greens in the garden, so I chopped up a bunch of those and threw them in as well, along with a little liquid smoke, and just let it mingle for a while. Not bad at all.
I’m not crazy about nachos, at least not the way I make them. They’re kind of “neither fish nor fowl” food. I like either having a readily identifiable portion of food, like a chicken thigh or a stuffed shell or something; or else if it’s going to be just a sort of food area that you can scoop from, I want it to be the same all the way through, like soup or casserole. But nachos are so disorganized and variable. They’re just a mess. I’d rather have a taco, and I don’t even like tacos that much. I did like that beans and rice with collards, though. I’m totally sold on liquid smoke. I used to feel like it was cheating somehow, but now I just feel like I like liquid smoke.
FRIDAY LOBSTAR?
LOBSTAR INDEED. Dora is the manager of the fish counter at the supermarket, and she’s been promising anniversary lobsters, but her roommate got covid, so it got postponed. But this morning, she delivered! They’re scrabbling around in the fridge right now. The kids will have tuna boats and potato puffs, and Damien and I will have steamed lobsters and let’s face it, potato puffs. Potato puffs with drawn butter and fresh lemon, how bow dah.
Oh, so I gathered up the last of my butternut squash.
We do like it mashed, and we do like it roasted with other vegetables (maybe brussels sprouts, which is the very last thing left in my garden still to be harvested). I haven’t made butternut risotto in a while, but that’s good stuff. Maybe this year is the year I’ll finally make butternut bisque. But I would love to hear your suggestions!
poppy seeds or "everything bagel" topping(optional)
corn meal (or flour) for pan, to keep loaf from sticking
Instructions
In a small bowl, dissolve a bit of the sugar into the water, and sprinkle the yeast over it. Stir gently, and let sit for five minutes or more, until it foams.
In the bowl of standing mixer, put the flour (starting with six cups), salt, remaining sugar, oil, and eggs, mix slightly, then add the yeast liquid. Mix with dough hook until the dough doesn't stick to the sides of the bowl, adding flour as needed. It's good if it has a slightly scaly appearance on the outside.
(If you're kneading by hand, knead until it feels soft and giving. It will take quite a lot of kneading!)
Put the dough in a greased bowl and lightly cover with a damp cloth or plastic wrap. Let it rise in a warm place for at least an hour, until it's double in size.
Grease a large baking sheet and sprinkle it with flour or corn meal. Divide the dough into four equal pieces. Roll three into "snakes" and make a large braid, pinching the ends to keep them together. Divide the fourth piece into three and make a smaller braid, and lay this over the larger braid. Lay the braided loaf on the pan.
Cover again and let rise again for at least an hour. Preheat the oven to 350.
Before baking, make an egg wash out of egg yolks and a little water. Brush the egg wash all over the loaf, and sprinkle with poppy seeds or "everything" topping.
Bake 25 minutes or more until the loaf is a deep golden color.
Serve with a piece of toasted baguette at the bottom of each bowl. Finish with cheese on top.
Ingredients
4Tbspbutter
4cupsonion, thinly sliced
1Tbspflour
1tspwhite sugar
4-6cupsbeef broth(can also use chicken broth or a combination of water and white wine)
pepper
parmesan or mozzarella cheese
Instructions
In a heavy pot, melt the butter and then add the onions. Cook very slowly over a low heat for about an hour, stirring occasionally, until the onions are very soft and somewhat darkened.
Stir in the sugar until dissolved. Stir in the flour and mix to coat.
Add the broth (or water and wine). Add pepper to taste and simmer for at least 30 minutes, preferably longer.
Serve with a hunk of toasted bread in the bottom of each bowl. Sprinkle cheese on top, and if you have oven-safe dishes, brown under the broiler to form a skin on top of the soup.
Very simple meatballs with a vaguely Korean flavor. These are mild enough that kids will eat them happily, but if you want to kick up the Korean taste, you can serve them with dipping sauces and pickled vegetables. Serve with rice.
Servings30large meatballs
Ingredients
2.5lbsground beef
1sleeveRitz crackers, crushed finely
1/3cupsoy sauce
1/2 headgarlic, minced
1bunchscallions, chopped (save out a bit for a garnish)
1 tspkosher salt
1Tbspground white pepper
For dipping sauce:
mirin or rice vinegar
soy sauce
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 425.
Mix together the meat and all the meatball ingredients with your hands until they are well combined. Form large balls and lay them on a baking pan with a rim.
Bake for about 15 minutes.
Serve over rice with dipping sauce and a sprinkle of scallions.
Last week, we heard that our college philosophy professor, Brian Shea, had died. He was an immensely powerful man, in his mind, in his body, and even in his voice. One time, I was in the kitchen and someone commented that some water had hit the grill, and Mr. Shea said, “Yes; you can hear it, sizzling.”
It took me several minutes to realize that this was a normal, mundane comment to make. His voice was so deep and penetrating, and he said everything with such profound assuredness, it came across like a pronouncement for the ages. And lo, 27 years later, I remember him saying it.
I wish I remembered more of the more important things he said. My fault, not his. I took several of his classes, including the philosophy units of Humanities, and also Ancient Greek and possibly Metaphysics; but even students who were more academically suited for those subjects were bowled over by his incredible intellectual prowess. He would hustle to the lectern, smile and say good morning, open his notes, pause for a moment with a fixed expression, like a raptor over its prey, and then he would begin to speak; and the ideas he wanted to impart would unfurl smoothly from his brain for the next fifty minutes like shining steel ingots rolling off a factory line. No stumbling, no backtracking, no scrambling to express what he meant. He always knew exactly what he wanted to say, and he always said exactly that. I have never since met a more articulate human being. And he was passionate about it, and sincere. He loved what he taught, and he loved teaching.
One day, he came into a seminar room when he was sick, and he opened his notes as usual and began to teach. Several minutes passed by before one of the students gathered the courage to tell him he was speaking in German. He apologized, got up, and went back to bed.
He was, to be honest, terrifying. You did not want to be on the wrong end of his scorn. My memories of him are from when I was nineteen or twenty, very skittish and foolish; but I think even the students who made their way to his inner circle remember how intimidating he could be.
He was physically tremendous. Not tall, I don’t think, and he was immensely fat, but mostly he was just huge. His body was huge, his head was huge, his eyes behind thick glasses were huge, and when he grinned, as he often did, his mouth was huge. And he was strong. A student once saw him encounter a small fire on campus, and he grabbed the fire extinguisher, and, apparently forgetting to pull out the safety pin, he simply squeezed the nozzle hard and made it work.
He seemed to have a special gift for witnessing students at their dopiest moments. If you were going to do something stupid, chances were good you’d turn around to see Mr. Shea in his chair, watching you and grinning from across the caf’, Dunhill cigarette smoke curling around his head like the vapors of an oracle; and if you were unlucky, he would make a pronouncement about your fate. Nobody was safe from his terrible wit, and so when you did become a target, there was no shame in it. It was almost a mark of honor: You’ve joined the club. You got noticed, and extinguished, by Mr. Shea.
For all this, he was kind. Most people figured this out sooner or later, despite his best efforts. One hapless freshman showed up for the semester with only one pair of pants to his name, and Mr. Shea quietly went out and bought him some pants. One unpopular girl was homesick and friendless in Rome, where every sophomore class spent a semester, and he — a man who prized his routine and his privacy more than most — invited her out to dinner and treated her like a sought-after guest. There are dozens of stories like this. He spent hours in the caf’, smoking endlessly and gossiping with Chef Pat and laughing his resounding, smoke-pickled laugh, and coughing like thunder, telling stories, and watching. You could hear his voice, and his laugh, and his cough, rise up through the floorboards when you went to the chapel, which was built over the caf. His voice penetrated everything.
He was the Director of Student Life as well as a professor, and he seemed to know about everything that happened on campus (and in the nearby woods). I remember him saying how apt it was when students described getting drunk as “getting wasted.” He deplored waste, wasted time, wasted effort, wasted intellect. It grieved him to see people being foolish with their lives.
Miscellaneous other stories are coming back to me, like how someone called him because there was a bat in the dorm, and without hesitation he said to my then-boyfriend, with menacing sang froid, “Damien, get the rake.” Nobody ever questioned his directions! Mr. Shea always knew what to do! Now I’m almost fifty years old and a few months ago, a bat got into our house, and the first thing I thought was, “Damien, get the rake.”
I remember a Mardi Gras party when the students had a traditional pancake fight, which was all fun and games until somebody (me) fired off an errant pancake, and watched in frozen horror as it missed its target and smacked Mr. Shea square on the side of his head and knocked his glasses off. I died that day. My heart stopped and didn’t start again for several seconds. I literally fell to the floor and scuttled away across the room before he would know the assassin was me.
But another student, who often played chess with him, said that he played like he lived: He started off with a huge amount of bluster and intimidation, attacking on several fronts at once; but if you put up even the slightest bit of offense, his strategy would collapse and fall apart. I didn’t see this side of him often, but I believe it. I know he was gentle when he needed to be. I know that, for all his prodigious intellect and encyclopedic knowledge of many subjects and his master’s from Oxford, he was Mr. Shea, and not Dr. Shea; and I know he lived in a room or two upstairs in the creaky, drafty “White House” nestled in the trees on campus, apparently surrounded by shelves with hundreds of video cassettes of every kind of movie, which he would lend out to students if they promised to clean out their VCRs first. He only rarely left the little college grounds. He didn’t like travel (and got testy when anyone in Rome spoke to him in Italian!). I don’t know what he spent his money on, besides Dunhills.
Every once in a while, he would startle people by making reference to how fat he was. I remember him complaining about how hard it was to find shirts in his size that didn’t have Winnie the Pooh or Donald Duck on them, as if being fat meant you were a child. Just one of the many indignities endured by the long-suffering Brian Shea.
Another: One Thanksgiving or Christmas Vacation, he had the task of calling every single student who had just arrived home, and telling them that one of the kittens on campus (there were not supposed to be kittens on campus) turned out to have rabies, and so everyone who came into contact with it (which was everyone) must get a rabies shot. I thought of him making the rule against kittens, knowing there were kittens anyway, and then grimly making his way alphabetically through the list of students, informing them one by one that now we’re all going to die unless we get our shots. I think probably all he wanted to do was sit in a sunbeam, smoke, and talk about philosophy, but somehow he was also very good at doing all the other things he was responsible for.
I just remembered one more story. After I graduated and got married and started having kids, I took a temporary job doing some work for the school admissions office. When I was at school, I was incompetent in a thousand ways, and hadn’t yet learned how to drive; so when I was leaving the grounds years later, I spotted him on the porch of the White House, sitting and smoking as usual. My great chance to show him that I did grow up after all! I rolled down my window and shouted, “Mr. Shea, look! I finally got my license!” He smiled and nodded. Then I drove directly into a tree.
Someone told me he said that, after students graduated, he forgot about them. Fair enough; there were so many of us. I don’t think anyone who ever met him forgot him, though. A powerful, gracious, frightening, practical, strangely humble man with a great heart and a white hot intellect like no other I’ve ever encountered. You can still hear it, sizzling.
When my family used to homeschool, I used to interrogate myself about which was be worse: The horrible knowledge that I was in charge of everything they would learn that day? Or (if we switched to someone else teaching) the horrible knowledge I wasn’t in charge of anything they would learn that day?
It was very hard to get used to sending my kids off for six or seven hours a day, and not really know what they were learning. Now that I’m used to it, I can see that some of it is great, some of it is fine, some of it is terrible, and some of it is just baffling. The thing is, I never really know how much I know. All I know is what the kids choose to tell me, or what I can figure out.
This is true for every parent who is not physically sitting on top of their child twenty-four hours a day. All you know about what your kids are learning is what you are allowed to know, by the people your kids come into contact with, and by your kids. That is the nature of kids growing up.
Right now, there is a case working its way through the courts about whether or not parents should be able to get their kids to opt out of learning with books with LGBTQ+ themes. The problem with stories like this is that, reading it, I don’t really know what these books are. The article says the parents who are suing object to “LGBTQ+ inclusive books.”
It mentions, “Some of the books at the center of the clash include Pride Puppy, geared toward preschoolers and Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, geared toward students in kindergarten through 5th grade.”
You get the general impression from reporting on such stories that the parents are opposed to these books solely because they include LGBT people. This may be the case, but I have read numerous stories phrased identically to this one that, when you drill down into the facts, are revealed to deliberately mention one title but not another, or excerpt one page but not another. It’s hard not to conclude that the goal is to make the parents appear foolish and bigoted. It’s hard not to conclude that the article is complicit in hiding something from the general public.
Dan Finaldi doesn’t have a studio. His house in New Jersey doesn’t have space, and that might become a problem when he retires from teaching to spend more time painting, which he plans to do in the next few years. He’s been a high school teacher for 23 years, and as much as he enjoys teaching teenagers, at age 62, he’s finding it harder to match their energy.
But he’s still teaching now, and when the weather’s too bad to go outside, he often stays after school to paint. More often than not, he ends up painting his students. “They’re posing or eating, and I’m painting them. They talk, they share. They tell me their life stories,” he said.
“I just want to paint them. Sometimes, people will come to me and say, ‘Can I pose?’ and I say, ‘Sure.’ I’m fascinated by looking at people. There are so many different things to look at in a face. I love looking at their faces,” he said.
Finaldi teaches at a public high school that welcomes lots of Indigenous students, many with complex or traumatic histories.
“Last year I painted two double portraits, sisters from Mexico. They told me their grandmother speaks an Indigenous language, not Spanish, some ancient language that has perdured,” he says.
The Southern and Central American migrant students often speak of their families, and Finaldi said they also seem to bring a heightened sense of color and design to their work, as well as an apparently innate talent for working with pottery and clay.
Awakening a dormant ability
All students have a “dormant ability in drawing,” he said, and he sees it as his job to teach them the skills to wake up that dormant ability. But it helps when some of the students also supply enthusiasm and inspiration.
“When you’re in a class of 25 kids, it does lift all boats, when you have kids that are not on their phones, and they’re looking at other kids’ artwork,” he said. “Their work improves aesthetically. They see the line work and the color, and they try to imitate it.”
Finaldi is just inspired to paint the kids themselves, though.
“They’re such beautiful, interesting-looking people; I just want to paint them. I’m fascinated by looking at people,” he said.
The natural world
But when the weather is fine, Finaldi will be outside, using oil paint or watercolor to capture his other great love: The natural world. He’s learned to harness the power of Instagram and will share a video panning slowly past a busy playground where he’s set up his easel, his unfinished canvas blending into the rosy sun and shadows of a late summer afternoon.
The loose, light-filled strokes of color are typical of Finaldi’s work, which presents fluid, unpretentious scenes of daily life: the rusty glow of autumn leaves under a cerulean sky; a moody moonlit nocturne with power lines; teenagers just hanging out…Read the rest of my latest artist profile for Our Sunday Visitor.
If you know of (or are) a Catholic or Catholic-friendly artist you think should be featured, please drop me a line! simchafisher at gmail dot com. I’m not always excellent about responding, but I always check out every suggestion. Thanks!
Happy Friday! Gevalt, what a week. Today, in just a little bit, I am going to a REAL NEUROLOGIST. I am very excited. And we had a busy little week, full of candy and screaming! Here’s what we ate this week:
SATURDAY Tacos for kids, Indian food for adults
Saturday was the last installment in our rolling 26th anniversary celebration. Damien and I took the kayaks out on the Ashuelot River down by one of the covered bridges. We paddled upstream as far as we could until an uprooted tree blocked the way, and then we floated gently back down again among the yellow leaves.
We took a little detour into — I don’t know what you’d call it, the equivalent of a cul-de-sac for a river. It was SO QUIET in there, and the buggies were jumping around on top of the water because no one would bother them, and a giant blue heron lifted off and flapped away. By the time we got back where we started, it was getting chilly and a little dark, and it really was time to go, but we didn’t want to leave quite yet, so we paddled under the covered bridge. I howled a little bit, because of the acoustics, and then as soon as we popped out the other side, I SAW AN EAGLE. I’ve never seen one before. Absolutely unmistakable. What a wonderful trip.
We stopped off home to change out of our damp clothes, and make sure the kids tore themselves away from that new Mario whatnot to get some tacos started, and we went to Royal Spice in Troy. We got an appetizer of assorted vegetable thingies, and then Damien got lamb saag and I got lamb biryani. Very, very fine.
I also had a laugh because the waitress (who was very nice) asked us if we wanted “Naan? Nyaaaayn? Bread?” We had all three, thank you very much. Also papadum.
SUNDAY Grilled ham and cheese, tomato bacon bisque
Sunday the plan was grilled ham and cheese, but it was so gray and drizzly, and there was this stray pound of bacon in the fridge, so I got the idea of tomato bisque in my head, and couldn’t get it out even after I looked up the recipe and discovered I was missing, like, five ingredients.
Not that it’s a complicated recipe, but it does have more than bacon and a can of tomatoes in it. But I realized if I had to run to the store, that would be an excuse to go pick up Clara and bring her to the house for pumpkin carving. So that was nice.
And dinner was very nice indeed! Perfect for a chilly, rainy day.
I also realized it really was getting cold, and this was a trend that wasn’t likely to reverse itself soon, so if I was gonna pick some mint for the winter, then today was probably the day. So that’s what I did.
I still haven’t fixed my food processor, so I made do with the Ninja blender, and blended it up as best I could with a little olive oil. My best wasn’t very good, and I lost a little enthusiasm for the project at this point, and then squunched the kind of uneven results into an ice cube tray,
and lost at least another 20% of enthusiasm when I saw what I had done. I dunno. I just wrapped it up and chucked it in the freezer, and next time I want some mint for a marinade or something, let’s see if I remember it’s in there.
I also have these ghost peppers in my garden. I don’t know what to do with them.
Why did I grow them? I don’t know.
I spent the rest of the evening putting the next-to-last last touches on the Halloween costumes. And I remembered to take the pizza dough out of the freezer!
MONDAY Under-over pizza
My pride at remembering to defrost the pizza evaporated when I realized I had forgotten that the oven was still broken. So I did what any red-blooded American would do (?): I broiled the pizzas until the top was bubbly, and then put them on the stovetop, carefully rotating them over the hot burner, in an attempt to firm up the underside of the crust.
It . . . didn’t completely not work.
Good effort, edible pizza. And anyway, we had Halloween costumes to finish.
TUESDAY Hot dogs, popcorn
Tuesday was, of course, Halloween, so we had our traditional quickie meal, at a table graciously decorated appropriately for the day:
and then we were off trick or treating! Here’s some photos from the evening:
A successful night, and boy am I old and tired. Got home, lit the jack-o’- lanterns just to see them lit (nobody comes to our house because we don’t have sidewalks), and put on Army of Darkness, which I slept through.
I had just snuggled in under the covers of my bed when I suddenly remembered I was planning bo ssam the next day. And that means getting the meat going the night before. SO I DID. Hero! I’m a dinner hero.
WEDNESDAY Bo ssam, rice, kiwi
Wednesday was All Saint’s Day and we let the kids stay home from school because, not because of the saints at all, we were just tired. So tired! And there was a real hard frost. The nerve. We made it to the noon Mass with just a little screaming.
Wednesday I did remember the oven situations and was prepared to make the bo ssam in the Instant Pot and finish it up under the broiler, but Damien, who is the other hero around here, fixed the oven in the morning. I was so excited about it being fixed that I put the pork in right away, so it was done cooking at like 4 PM. So then I moved it to the slow cooker (not the Instant Pot, because I needed that to make rice) so it would stay warm but not dry out, and then back to the oven about ten minutes before supper with the little finishing glaze of brown sugar, sea salt, and cider vinegar that gives it that opulent caramelized crust. I use the My Korean Kitchen recipe, but I just do the salt and pepper overnight part, and then the brown sugar glaze part at the end. Very basic and easy, big return.
Everybody likes bo ssam! We had lettuce to wrap up the rice and shreds of meat it, and I added some sweet chili sauce to mine, which was tasty.
I also cut up a bunch of kiwis because I like to have something cool and juicy with this meal, because the meat is so outrageously salty.
A very fine meal.
THURSDAY Shakshuka (eggs in purgatory), soul cakes, pomegranates, pumpkin seeds
Thursday was All Soul’s Day and I must have my little joke and serve eggs in purgatory, which is basically shakshuka, and soul cakes.
In the morning, I dropped off all the kids and spotted a ton of free fencing on the side of the road, but got a text from Moe that his battery was dead. So I started stuffing fencing into the car as fast as I could, sincerely wishing I had remembered to take the Dalek out of the back. A crusty old Yankee stopped to help, and we fit all but two rolls of fencing. I explained that I have a little duck problem , and that’s my story. He understood. The Dalek goes in front. I drive into town, locate Moe’s car, annnd discover my jumper cables are missing a clamp. So we decide to drive to Harbor Freight, but first we have to put the Dalek into Moe’s car so there’s room in my car for Moe.
I can’t just go into the store myself because I am wearing bright pink pajamas.
So he buys the cables, I Google instructions, we fearfully hook it up, wait five minutes, and it works! Moe goes off, I go home with the alarm
going off the whole time because the back door is slightly open, and unload the fence, which I’m 80% sure is terrible fence and useless, and all is well. I may need a tetanus shot from getting poked with fence wires. I forgot the Dalek.
I sat there for a few minutes on the couch trying to figure out if I was an idiot or not. Then I just had some coffee and wrote two essays and made some dough.
and prepped a bunch of pumpkin seeds, and then it was time to go again, and I had to stop at Walmart, and then I went to the school, and GUESS WHAT?
There was still some free fence on the side of the road! And there was no Dalek in my car anymore, due to me having forgotten. So this time, there was plenty of room. Sort of.
So then we got home, and the kids cut out the soul cakes. This year we did skulls, ghosts, and angels. There’s some silly little theological allegory there but we’ll just skip it
I added some detail with this weird dried fruit I had in the cabinet, that I got on clearance at the International Market a while back, and then I sifted some powdered sugar over them when they came out of the oven.
The fruit is called Tutti Frutti Mix, which implies in not one but two ways that there are two or three kinds of fruit in there. Right? “Tutti” and “Mix,” not to mention that “Frutti” is surely plural.
It turns out it’s just papaya!
It tasted fine, and the texture was pleasant. I was expecting a kind of gummy consistency, like those red and green cherries that go in one of those yucky fruitcakes, but it was chewy with a little edge, almost nutty. So there you go. I have a lot more of it (IT WAS ON SALE).
So first I made the pumpkin seeds
and I remembered to save a few dozen out to dry, rather than roasting them, so we can plant some nice big pumpkins in the spring. (I just tossed them with olive oil and sprinkled them with kosher salt and spread them in two shallow pans in a 350 oven, stirring them up every twenty minutes or so, for maybe forty minutes or an hour.)
When those were done, I baked the soul cakes, and when those were almost done, I started poaching the eggs in the shakshuka sauce
You’re supposed to have parmesan or feta, and parsley, for the top; but I didn’t have either. It was a nice sauce, though, with plenty of vegetables, and rather spicy.
I cut up the pomegranates I’d been withholding all week
and we had ourselves a weird little meal for All Soul’s Day
Fry the bacon until crisp. Remove from pan, chop it up, and drain out all but a a few teaspoons of grease.
Add the diced onion and minced garlic to the grease and sauté until soft.
Add tomatoes (including juices), bay leaves, rosemary, and tomato juice, and simmer for 20 minutes. Save some rosemary for a garnish if you like.
With a slotted spoon, fish out the bay leaf, the tomatoes, and most of the rosemary, leaving some rosemary leaves in. Discard most of the rosemary and bay leaf. Put the rest of the rosemary and the tomatoes in a food processor with the 8 oz of cream cheese until it's as smooth as you want it.
Return pureed tomato mixture to pot. Salt and pepper to taste.
Heat through. Add chopped bacon right before serving, or add to individual servings; and top with crispy fried onions if you like. Garnish with more rosemary if you're a fancy man.
raisins, currants, nuts, candied citrus peels, etc.
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350
Put the flour in a large bowl. Grate the chilled butter on a vegetable grater and incorporate it lightly into the flour.
Stir in the sugar and spices until evenly distributed.
In a smaller bowl, beat together the eggs, vinegar and milk. Stir this into the flour mixture until it forms a stiff dough.
Knead for several minutes until smooth and roll out to 1/4 thick.
Grease a baking pan. Cut the dough into rounds (or other shapes if you like) and lay them on the pan, leaving a bit of room in between (they puff up a bit, but not a lot). If you're adding raisins or other toppings, poke them into the top of the cakes, in a cross shape if you like. Prick cakes with fork.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until very lightly browned on top.
