Monday Night Dinner

So this has been a week.

Firstly, that cold, the one I was determined not to have this year, because I’m tired of going home for Christmas sounding like a consumptive? It caught up with me. I was doing so well too, I wasn’t sick, I didn’t know anyone who was sick, and then on Sunday evening I felt that tell tale tickle in the back of my throat. I spent Monday trying to will it into oblivion, but that failed, so on Tuesday I took advantage of the fact that my boss was out of town and called in sick and slept. Read the rest of this entry ?

I feel that the time has come for my annual Grinch-like declaration that it’s not frelling Christmas yet so could we stop with the performances of the Hallelujah chorus, the displays of Christmas candy, the lighting of Christmas trees, and the inflation of communist snowmen.

I know for a fact that it’s not time for Christmas related shenanigans yet, because I haven’t even had time to cook my Thanksgiving turkey.  We’re 12 days from leaving a shoe out for Sinterklaas, more than a fortnight from anyone setting wreaths of lighted candles on their head in honor of St. Lucia*, and nobody’s lighting the first candle for Hanukah early.  Also, not to put too fine a point on it, it’s still November and it won’t be December until the middle of next week. Read the rest of this entry ?

I go through cooking phases.  There are some weeks when nothing sounds appealing and menu planning is an exercise in whatever seems like it will be the least amount of work.  Then there are weeks when there are more recipes I want to try than there are meals in the day.  This is a week when everything is making my mouth water and my fingers itch to be at home in my kitchen cooking.  Read the rest of this entry ?

I admit it, I’m a snob, but I don’t get the point of cake mixes. I mean, okay I do. They’re cheap, convenient and simple enough that small children (or Sandra Lee) can make them without supervision. On the other hand, they also don’t taste particularly good. If I’m going to spend the calories on a piece of cake, I want it to be a really good piece of cake, and box mix and frosting from a can just doesn’t hack it for me. Read the rest of this entry ?

Last Friday I was having a conversation with a coworker in which he explained to me that the reason he could never move to suburbia was because he hated yuppies. I was relieved of the necessity of pointing out that as a commercial real estate broker who owned his own house and was married with an infant he was pretty much the definition of a yuppie by him waving his hand and saying, “Yes, yes I know I’m a yuppie, but that doesn’t mean I want to live near them.” Which okay, I can understand that. I make fun of the people who shop at Whole Foods even as I’m going up to Wilson Farms to buy organic free range eggs, organic milk in a glass bottle and opting for the locally sourced Macoun apples versus the Granny Smiths from Wisconsin. Hypocrisy and I are good friends. Read the rest of this entry ?