Easter Eggs and Homemade Pasta

Tomorrow is Easter.  Swede and I are lazy agnostics, so poor Annika thinks Easter is all about colored eggs and the Eastser bunny.  Evidently that will endure for another year since we neglected to tell her that yesterday, Jesus died.  Without that crucial information, it wouldn't make sense to tell her tomorrow that he rose from the dead. 

As ambivalent as I am about religion, however, I hold very strong beliefs when it comes to food.  I think artificial food dyes are evil.  And that is why the Paas egg-dying kit had to go this year.  I was so excited to discover that you can dye eggs with natural ingredients. It takes a lot longer than the fake chemical dyes, but promised to make a fantastic mother-daughter project.  Annika almost ruined it this morning.  She told a lie (a really stupid lie, she lied about whether she had eaten a piece of licorice).  Lying has been an issue lately, so we really came down on her.  One of the punishments mentioned was taking away Easter.  The problem is, I really wanted to try these naturally-dyed eggs!  So I pleaded with Swede to let her earn egg-dying back.  She still has no TV or iPod all weekend.  But I get my eggs, so all is well.

On the way home from boxing class today, I went grocery shopping and picked up beets, red cabbage, and an extra jar of paprika because I was running low.  I also picked up some white eggs.  I usually buy the free range brown eggs, but I suspect they won't dye well.  While Annika napped, I shredded the beets and cabbage in the food processor (LOVE that thing!) and pre-measured two tablespoons each of paprika and turmeric.  When Annika woke up, everything was ready to go.  To dye Easter eggs, naturally, you need to boil the eggs in the dyed water.  So that Annika wouldn't have to hover on a stepstool over a hot stove, I set up an electric griddle at the dining room table. 

We started with two pans for efficiency.  Annika - suprise! - chose to start with pink (beets).  She placed four eggs in each pan (and by "placed" I mean "dropped," cracking two of them!).   I read online that changing the pH of the water affects color.  So in one pot we put two cups beets, 4 cups of water, and a tablespoon of vinegar.  In the other pot, we did the same thing except we used baking soda instead of vinegar.  Then we let them boil. 

After 10 minutes, the damn water was still not boiling on the electric griddle.  I became impatient and just transferred them to the stove,where they boiled over after I failed to watch them for four minutes.  Once I got the pots to an efficent, non-boiling over boil, I checked out the eggs.  The dye in the vinegar pot had turned into a brilliant pink and the eggs were slightly pink.  The dye in the baking soda pot had turned a very dark ugly pink and the eggs were starting to take on the hue of poo.  I immediately put the baking soda pot eggs into the pretty dye and put the ugly dye out of its misery by dumping it down the drain.  I let the eggs boil for 15 minutes, at which point they were still very white and hardly pink at all.  I strained the beets out of the liquid and transferred the eggs and liquid to a bowl to sit for awhile. 

Annika chose purple next, so we put four cups shredded red cabbage into a pan with 5-6 cups of water and a tablespoon of vinegar.  Having learned from the prior failure, I went straight to the stove with the pot and skipped the separate baking soda pot entirely.  Once I got those on the stove, we started another pot of turmeric-dyed eggs (yellow). 

The yellow vividly imparted itself on the eggs very quickly.  The cabbage?  Not so much.  And it was blue instead of purple.  I took both off the stove after 15 minutes, strained the liquid, and let them sit in the dye like the pink eggs.  Then we turned to our final hue, orange (paprika).  After 15 minutes, it was clear the paprika was a weak dye as well.  Those eggs also got to sit for awhile longer in the liquid. 

At that point, I started my pasta. The recipe was wickedly complicated - three eggs and two cups of flour.  Because my new pasta maker is actually an attachment to my Kitchen-Aid, I drug that clunkly mixer out of the bottom of my pantry and cleaned it.  Fortunately, I was able to do all my mixing in the Kitchen-Aid with hardly any kneading.  Sweet!  I ended up adding about 2 Tablespoons of water to get the consistency of the dough right.  I then wrapped it in plastic wrap and let it sit for 20 minutes while I read my pasta maker instructions.  I've been excited yet terrified to try my hand at pasta.  I've heard it's tedious, tricky, unrewarding, and time-consuming.  Egg noodles, as it turns out, are none of those things.  I made the dough into fettucini-style egg noodles with no issue.  Then I boiled the noodles in salted water for 3 minutes and tossed it with leftover  reheated spring chicken (a Nigella recipe)- minus the chicken and mixed with about a cup of heavy cream.  (Our spring chicken was made with turkey bacon rather than ham, of course.)

Because it was a lovely day, I had Swede set the patio table for dinner while I fed the baby. 

Dinner was so delicious.  I won't say perfect because there weren't enough vegetables.  But the pasta was damn good!  There really is a difference between homemade and store-bought.  My homemade was perfectly al dente and delicious (probably as a result of the salted water).  And Nigella's leftovers as sauce?  I never doubt Nigella.  She is a genius and a goddess.  Annika ejoyed the meal, but was quite distracted by all the outdoor wonders in our back yard.  "I see a lizard!  A baby lizard!  Oh, a fly!"  She did enjoy drinking her apple juice out of a "grown up glass" - a wine glass.  Could it be sending the wrong message?  Sure.  But it makes her feel like a sophisticated diner.  It therefore makes her more polite.  I'll take it.

Shortly before dinner was ready, I took the eggs out of their dye-baths.  Here is the result - not exactly Paas quality. 

But Annika was pleased.  I feel fortunate to have a daughter so easy to please.  And at least they are not bathed in chemicals. The only dye worth its salt appears to be the turmeric.  That yellow is very yellow.  But I am a little scared to try the deviled turmeric eggs tomorrow, particularly the cracked ones.  Those might just be a little spicy!  Maybe next year we'll do what Swede did as a child and paint the eggs with actual paint.  And mabye we'll tell Annika about Jesus then too.  I hope it doesn't ruin the Easter bunny for her.

Dim Sum

Today's post is the lunchtime edition of the family dinner.  My parents are visiting this week, so I decided it would be nice to broaden their cultural horizons and take them to dim sum.  I've already indoctrinated my Swedish mother in law, so she happily agreed to go.  My friend Erin, a fellow dim sum lover, joined us as well. 

I have to admit that I lured my parents there in a slightly less than honest way.  See, my parents - in particular my father - are good old Midwestern meat 'n' potatoes folk.  My mom is a little more adventurous than my dad (especially in the realm of vegetables), but dim sum would certainly be a new concept to them.  Knowing they would protest, I tried to approach it casually.  I mentioned we planned to take them to dim sum on Sunday.  I immediately got the suspicious look.  "What is dim sum?"  "Oh, it's Chinese food.  Yeah, but they serve it a la carte."  This is, of course, true, but not the whole truth.  Dim sum is full of textures and flavors unfamiliar to people whose Chinese food experience consists mostly of General Tso's chicken.  My half truths bought me skeptical acceptance. 

After a brutal kickboxing workout on Sunday morning, I collected the family and went to dim sum.  (The brutal workout is an important component of dim sum.  It allows me to consume massive quantities of grease without feeling guilty.)  Dim sum is perfect for dining with small children.  There is immediate gratification because the carts swarm your table as soon as you sit down.  And it is big and noisy, so nobody glares out you when the baby starts fussing . . . or outright screaming. 

We sat down and the dumpling cart made a beeline for our table.  Within about 30 seconds we had shrimp dumplings, scallop dumplings, spinach shrimp dumplings, and pork dumplings.  Annika helpfully pointed out that she and I don't eat pork, but they were fair game for the rest of the table.  As the gelatinous blobs of dumplings made their way around the lazy susan, my dad announced that if this was the only type of food available to him, he'd lose a lot of weight.  Funny, I'd weigh about 350 pounds and could live out my dream of being on The Biggest Loser. 

Annika, sandwiched between my parents, was quite the pusher.  "Oh, did you try these shrimp dumplings?  I LOVE shrimp dumplings!"  "You HAVE to try these green beans, they are SOOOO good!"  Annika is a dim sum pro.  As the carts come around, Annika will listen to what they have and either say yes for the table or squish up her face and say "eeeeew!  I don't eat that!"  The latter is reserved for dishes made of beef or pork.  So far, none of the servers have seemed offended from her reaction.  Sometimes she's not sure, so she'll yell across the table to ask me "mom do we eat lobster?"  Like I said, dim sum is nice and noisy.  Perfect for children.

To further encourage my parents, I mentioned that they actually eat much more on the menu than I do.  (Seriously, why is pork in everything?)  My dad protested "yeah, but I don't recognize any of it.  Where's the rice?  Do they just have rice?"  I threatened to take them next door for sushi.  I am proud my parents.  In spite of their significant hesitation, they managed to eat a full meal each.  Although I never thought I'd see my dad so happy to lay eyes on a plate of stir-fried noodles (he recognized them and was able to order them himself). 

Annika probably ate more than anybody at the table.  After enthusiastically sampling  everything that came her way, she - while gulping apple juice - proclaimed that she was so full her tummy hurt.  That lasted all of three minutes until the dessert cart came by.  Miraculously, her stomach healed itself so that she could eat half a mochi ball and a quarter of a cream-filled bun. 

All in all, I think it was a success.  I waited until we got home before I told my parents about chicken feet and shark's fin.  I doubt my parents will ever voluntarily go to dim sum again, but at least they have a fun cultural story to tell their friends.  And at least it wasn't sushi.

Chaos!

Admittedly, "chaos" could be the title for every post.  It is the one word that most accurately describes the lives of all the working parents I know.  (Actually, this could easily extend to many working non-parents I know as well.)  It seemed particularly appropriate tonight, however.  Maybe it's a Monday thing.

On the menu tonight were red wine risotto with garlic and rosemary and asparagus with lemon shallot vinaigrette.  They are both from The Complete Italian Vegetarian Cookbook by Jack Bishop.  Everything I've ever made from this book has been great.  But a lot of the recipes are very complex and time consuming.  Perfect for a Monday, right?  Oh, yeah, and it was my first attempt at risotto. 

I've heard that risotto can be tricky and you have to get everything just right.  This was not, then, a good recipe for my normal technique of haphazardly prepping the ingredients at the same time I'm cooking other ingredients.  At around 5:00, I started.  Swede was at Target, so it was just me and the girls.  I plopped Astrid into her Jumperoo, where she happily hung out.  This was a good sign since in the evenings I have about a 50-50 chance of being able to put her down without loud protests. 

5:05 - I grab the scissors and head outside to cut sprigs of rosemary and pick a lemon from our tree.  As I open the door I hear a loud crash followed by crying.  Setting the scissors down, I head to Annika's room.  She tearfully explained that she walked backward into her book case.  It made no sense, but I really wanted to make good use of the time Astrid was willingly seated in the Jumperoo.  So I examined her scrape (it was a decent one) and handed her an ice pack without further inquiry.

5:10 - I cut two sprigs of rosemary and picked my lemon.  Once inside, I chop the rosemary until I have two teaspoons.  Then I heated 6 cups of vegetable broth in a sauce pan.  While it was reaching a good simmer, I measured out the other ingredients - 3 tablespoons of butter, 2 cups arborio rice, 4 minced cloves of garlic, a half cup of red wine, and a half cup Parmesan cheese.

5:25 - The broth now simmering, I melted 2 tablespoons of butter in another large sauce pan. 

5:27 - I add the rosemary and garlic to the butter and start sauteing. 

5:29 - I add the rice to the butter and continue stirring.  Swede comes home from the store.  Astrid starts to fuss.  Swede realizes that nobody's checked the mail, so he goes back outside.

5:30 - I add the red wine, Swede returns with the mail.  Astrid is fussing and I am stirring.

5:32 - I begin adding the simmering broth a half cup at a time, stirring until it is absorbed into the rice.  Though I am supposed to stir constantly, I can't help but sift through the mail.  Astrid is expressing great displeasure at being trapped in her Jumperoo.

5:33 - I find a collection notice!  The hospital where I gave birth is excellent at providing medical care, but really really bad at billing.  In the eight months since I had Astrid, they still haven't billed my insurance properly - despite several phone calls.  The last time I spoke with them, they agreed to put my account on hold while they sorted out their incompetence.  Clearly that was a losing battle because now there is a debt collection agency involved. 

5:34 - Swede comes to rescue Astrid from her baby toy prison.  I tell him about the scrape on Annika's back. He goes off to investigate.

5:35 - I stir more broth into the rice.  I am also seething.  I want to call the billing department of the hospital, but I have about 20 more minutes of constant stirring in my immediate future.  The anger wins out and I decide to call them on speaker phone while I stir.

5:40 - I continue to stir while on hold.  I hear shouting down the hallway.  Swede tells me that Annika has lied about breaking a hanger.  She broke the hanger while trying to pull down a dress from her closet.  There is also a large exercise ball in her room.  Suddenly her scrape starts to make more sense. 

5:45 - Still on hold. Still stirring.  Annika wanders out.  The dress she had been trying to get down was her butterfly Halloween costume. She is now wearing it.  I confront her about how she really hurt herself.  She gives me some vague story about walking backward into the bookcase.  It is now abundantly clear she is lying and I tell her so.  She admits that she stood on the exercise ball to get a dress from her closet, fell off, broke the hanger, and hit her back on her bed frame.  Aha!  This is like the third lie in a week, so I lecture her and send her to her room (she also loses all forms of TV and iPod).  It is hard to be stern with a butterfly. 

5:47 - I have about a cup of simmering liquid left.  I continue to add it slowly while stirring the rice.  I am still on hold.

5:48 - Eureka!  A live person answers the phone.  I pick up the phone, pinching it between my shoulder and ear and continuing to stir and pour. 

5:51 - The representative sympathizes with me, but can't help me.  I have to call back to a different number in the morning.  Yeah, right, by tomorrow there will be a strongly worded letter heading their way.  Fortunately, I am more competent than the hospital billing department and have managed to not ruin the rice during the conversation.  And they say there's no such thing as multi-tasking!

5:55 - I remove the rice from heat and "vigorously" stir in the last tablespoon of butter and the Parmesan cheese.  I set it aside. 

5:55 to 6:05 - I blanch the asparagus in salted water and whisk together the vinaigrette (juice and zest of one lemon, one minced shallot, a quarter cup of olive oil, and a pinch of coarse sea salt).

6:06 - I toss the asparagus in the vinaigrette and make Annika set the table. 

Annika gladly set the table because she knows it means she gets to assign the seats.  She made a very dramatic presentation of "eeny meeny miney moe" and selected me to sit next to her.   According to Annika, it was because she loves me.  As I serve the food and Swede puts Astrid in her high chair.  Annika cannot not resist sampling the asparagus. 

Annika:  "You can not eat until everybody is at the table!  Unless you just want to try a little bite.  It's okay to try a little bite.  Mmmm . . . these beans are good."

Me:  "That's asparagus."

Annika: "Yeah, okay, but the beans are good!  And lemony."

Me:  "The green stuff is asparagus, Annika"

Annika:  "Whatever, they're good."

When we were all seated, Annika announced "this dinner wasn't bad after all!"  Well, thanks, I guess.  I thought it was much better than "not bad."  The risotto consistency was pretty darn close to perfect, not too mushy, but sufficiently creamy. (According to Swede, his grandfather made risotto all the time and it looked nothing like mine.  I'm glad I have my husband and daughter to keep me humble.) The red wine and rosemary gave the risotto a nice savory flavor that was not overpowering.  Good thing I like it, because there is plenty left over.  Annika might have incorrectly called the asparagus "beans," but she got the "lemony" part right.  The shallot and lemon were a great match for the pungent asparagus, which was nice and tender. 

All and all it was a tasty dinner; pleasant, even.  Well, up until the point our geriatric dog got stuck under the table and had to be lifted up and carried away from the table.  Yep, we're just like the Cleavers.

Holy Garlic, Batman!

It has become a Sunday tradition for Annika to choose a recipe from her kids' cookbook to make.  After that, we make ice cream.  Today, Annika chose angel hair pasta with herbs, garlic, and shrimp. Okay, she actually chose mac and cheese, but I made her choose something else and THEN she chose angel hair pasta. 

Annika then "chose" cherry ice cream.  See, cherry is the flavor I wanted to make, so I gave her the following "choices":  spiced ice cream, coffee ice cream, mint ice cream, and cherry ice cream.  Cherry it was!  (As long as kids have the illusion of choice, they're good - she didn't even question why chocolate wasn't on the list.) 

Finally, I had Annika chose a vegetable to make as a side dish.  She chose broccoli . . . again.  It is the child's favorite veggie.  She even told me the other day that her farts smell like "yummy broccoli"!  Wow.  Annika specified that she wanted the broccoli with lemon and garlic, like we'd had last week.  Okay, I can't argue with that.

I typically like the Williams-Sonoma kids' cookbook that I bought for Annika.  The pictures are great and the recipes are grown-up friendly too.  But you have to use common sense.  For instance, the lasagna she made two weeks ago called for an entire pound of mozzarella and almost two pounds of ricotta.  Um, no.  We halved that and it was perfectly fine.  That brings me to the pasta.  It called for eight cloves of garlic.  Eight!  I should have remembered the lasagna, but I figured hey, it's garlic, garlic is good.  Why not?  Annika and I dutifully mixed 8 oz. of quinoa pasta (cooked in salted water) with the sauce.  We easily made the sauce out of eight cloves of garlic sauteed in 2 teaspoons of olive oil.  Then we added a pound of peeled shrimp (Annika peeled them), a quarter cup of chopped parsley, and the zest of one lemon.  (On a side note, can somebody please create an easy zest?  Like a jar of zest?  Or "easy zest" lemons?)  Then we tossed the sauce with the pasta.  I say "we," but it was really me.  It was at this point Annika decided she was done cooking.  I fought every instinct to push her to continue.  After all, I want her to enjoy cooking, not dread it.  I did manage to cajole her into stirring the pasta and sauce together after she dumped in a quarter cup of Parmesan cheese.

While Annika  was off not stirring the pasta, I made the broccoli.  Yet another Peter Berley recipe.  First., I blanched one head of broccoli (cut into bite-sized florets) in very salty water.  Then I sauteed 2 cloves of garlic in hot olive oil for 30 seconds and added the broccoli and sauteed it all for 3 minutes.  Serve it with a lemon wedge for squeezing.

If you are keeping score at home, that is a ten garlic clove meal.  Don't get me wrong, it tasted good, but my  breath is likely still a weapon of mass destruction.  The garlic absolutely eclipsed the rest of the pasta.  Next time I'll probably use four.  The broccoli was perfect, tangy and garlicky.  On its own, the broccoli would have been great.  With the pasta, it was adding insult to injury.  That, of course, didn't stop me from bringing both leftovers for lunch today.  Sorry, coworkers. 

The ice cream was a delicious treat.  Really, can you ever screw up ice cream so badly that it isn't?  But this was particularly good.  It tasted more like cherries than cream, which is awesome if you love cherries and I do!  Here's the recipe:  http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cherry-Ice-Cream/Detail.aspx  An ice cream maker is a great investment.  It is pretty cheap and - as long as you remember to freeze the canister in advance - it is nearly instant gratification.  You just mix a handful of ingredients and pour them into the canister and wait for about 15 minutes.  And then you have delicious, homemade ice cream (in our case, organic) as a reward!