Happy Friday! It has been AGES since I’ve done a What’s For Supper. Sorry! First it was the day after Thanksgiving, and I just couldn’t bear to talk about food; then the next Friday I had hernia surgery so I wrote myself a doctor’s note to skip it; and then it was a week after surgery, and I hadn’t cooked anything, so didn’t have anything to say; and now it is two weeks after, and I have been so successful at allowing myself to rest and recover, I have sadly forgotten how to do that wording thing. The writing. Not to mention the cooking.
HOWEVER, it is Friday! Happy Friday from behind a pile of Amazon and Etsy boxes. I ordered almost everything online this year (frequently reminding the children that, as they open their presents, they should keep in mind that, while their mother was shopping, she went through a whole bottle of opioids). Last night, Damien and I unboxed everything and checked it against my list.
Result: I only seem to have ordered one present twice, and accidentally thrown away a different one. This is pretty good, considering the volume! So I reordered the lost one with priority shipping and a pleading note to the seller, and Damien is going out this afternoon and filling in the gaps (because once we saw everything all piled up, it became evident that — oh, you know. We needed to rectify certain inequities. He is also buying presents for the dog and the cat, who will absolutely notice and be very hurt if they don’t get presents. And yes, he ordered special Christmas treat worms for the turtle, who will not notice if he doesn’t get a treat, but we still feel that the Incarnation is for turtles, too, in some way. Anyway, he’s getting worms.
Sophia put up the Christmas lights inside and out, Elijah did the grocery shopping, and the older kids took turns picking kids up from school, and everyone has been cooking and cleaning and keeping the household ticking along very nicely while I just lolled. And truly, just as important and doing all the huge amount of work he did, Damien has also been tirelessly reminding me that I have to rest and I’m not being lazy or making a big deal out of nothing, and that nobody is mad at me for recuperating. I only needed to hear it 46,000 times. Maybe a couple more.
So I mostly just lurked about and showed up for meals that other people made. One such meal was Benny’s birthday, and she requested Damien’s magnificent lasagna from the Deadspin recipe
and a “dirt and worms” dessert, which she made herself, for her actual birthday. Then next week we had her party with friends, which featured a fire and hot chocolate bar outside, lots of giggling, and a parakeet cake.
I did look up tutorials on how to make parakeets out of gum paste, and then Benny and I made some very serviceable parakeet shapes, with their beady little eyes and weird little lumpy beaks and puffy necks and everything. Then we started decorating them with melted candy melts, and this is where things went a little off the rails.
Still clearly parakeets, but with a little dash of “you poor dear, what happened?”
I also decided it would be fun and easy to do one of those moves where you melt chocolate and use a piping bag to swirl it around on an acetate cake collar, and then just wrap it around the cake and peel the collar away, and voila, you have
look, first you downgrade your mental image from an airy filigreed bird cage encircling the two birds, to a just sort of fancy maybe sort of bramble-like backdrop design. Then you walk away for a little bit, take some deep breaths, face reality, and get to work salvaging all the bits that broke off, and sticking them into the cake randomly so it looks like a couple of parakeets are . . . I don’t know what they’re doing. They’re being on a cake, with things sticking out. Benny made a bunch of green hearts and added sprinkles and she was happy, which is what matters. We had fun making weird birds together.
The next day was my birthday, my FIFTIETH, when it turned out my heart’s desire was for Damien to bring home McDonald’s. Most of the adult kids came over, and Clara made some lovely key lime pies, and it was absolutely swell.
The last couple of days, I have been actually hoisting myself out of bed in the morning, and even cooking a bit. Yesterday we had pork spiedies
which were a little bland, but fine. While I was hacking up pork, I went ahead and made a second dinner: Carnitas and beans and rice. Looks promising.
I wrapped that up and we’ll have it on Saturday, which promises to be a bustling busy day, so it will be nice to have dinner squared away. I absolutely loathe cleaning raw meat off cutting boards and knives, so only having to do it once for two meals was irresistible.
Today I’m going to make sabanekh bil hummus (spinach and chickpea stew) from this Saveur recipe, and serve it with store-bought pita.
It’s easy and so savory and tasty. Damien likes it, too, and he’s not generally a big chickpea fan.
I have not done one single speck of Christmas baking, except for a bake sale back in November. I might get ingredients for buckeyes, which are no-bake treats (it’s just basically peanut butter, butter, and powdered sugar mushed into dough and then rolled into little balls, then dipped in melted chocolate). Most definitely something the kids can do basically on their own, as you can see from this pic from a few years ago
and maybe some more sugar cookies to decorate, because after school today the kids will finally be on vacation. Here is my recipe for dough that you don’t have to chill, and that keeps its shape when you bake it.
Jump to RecipeWe have a set of star cookie cutters in graduated sizes, which you can double up (I mean make two of each size), ice them, and then stack them to make a tree, IF YOU WANT.
If you want to pose like this for every single photo, there is not much I can do about that, apparently.
I don’t honestly have a lot of Christmas baking specialties — just pretty standard stuff. On Christmas morning, we have cinnamon buns, bacon, OJ, egg nog, and fruit, and on Christmas evening, we get Chinese takeout (except for one kid whose relationship with Chinese food was permanently tainted by a stomach bug, so she gets a sandwich from Jersey Mike’s).
I think I settled on Alton Brown’s recipe for cinnamon rolls, because they’re meant to be made the night before and then baked in the morning. But I’m not locked in, if anyone has a suggestion for a better recipe!
And then Hanukkah starts on Christmas evening! So at some point I will probably make potato latkes, maybe sufganiyot, maybe rugelach!
If I don’t manage to post anything in time, I wish you all, every last one of you, even the mean Russian bots, but especially people who need someone to care for them, and people who have been wearing themselves out caring for other people, a warm and good and holy last days of Advent, and a Christmas day of peace and joy with our favorite baby boy. I love yez all.
pork spiedies (can use marinade for shish kebob)
Ingredients
- 1 cup veg or olive oil
- 1/4 cup lemon juice
- 1/2 cup red or white wine vinegar
- 4 tsp red pepper flakes
- 2 Tbsp sugar
- 1 cup fresh mint, chopped
- 8-10 cloves garlic, crushed
- 4-5 lbs boneless pork, cubed
- peppers, onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, cut into chunks
Instructions
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Mix together all marinade ingredients.
Mix up with cubed pork, cover, and marinate for several hours or overnight.
Best cooked over hot coals on the grill on skewers with vegetables. Can also spread in a shallow pan with veg and broil under a hot broiler.
Serve in sandwiches or with rice.
Carnitas (very slightly altered from John Herreid's recipe)
Ingredients
- large hunk pork (butt or shoulder, but can get away with loin)
- 2 oranges, quartered
- 2-3 cinnamon sticks
- 4-5 bay leaves
- salt, pepper, oregano
- 1 cup oil
- 1 can Coke
Instructions
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Cut the pork into chunks and season them heavily with salt, pepper, and oregano.
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Put them in a heavy pot with the cup of oil, the Coke, the quartered orange, cinnamon sticks, and bay leaves
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Simmer, uncovered, for at least two hours
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Remove the orange peels, cinnamon sticks, and bay leaves
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Turn up the heat and continue cooking the meat until it darkens and becomes very tender and crisp on the outside
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Remove the meat and shred it. Serve on tortillas.
No-fail no-chill sugar cookies
Basic "blank canvas"sugar cookies that hold their shape for cutting and decorating. No refrigeration necessary. They don't puff up when you bake them, and they stay soft under the icing. You can ice them with a very basic icing of confectioner's sugar and milk. Let decorated cookies dry for several hours, and they will be firm enough to stack.
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter
- 1 cup white sugar
- 1-2 tsp vanilla and/or almond extract. (You could also make these into lemon cookies)
- 1 egg
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 3 cups flour
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 350.
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Cream together butter and sugar in mixer until smooth.
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Add egg and extracts.
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In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, and baking powder.
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Gradually add the dry ingredients to the butter and sugar and mix until smooth.
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Roll the dough out on a floured surface to about 1/4 inch. Cut cookies.
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Bake on ungreased baking sheets for 6-8 minutes. Don't let them brown. They may look slightly underbaked, but they firm up after you take them out of the oven, so let them sit in the pan for a bit before transferring to a cooling rack.
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Let them cool completely before decorating!
