Debi: The Soup

You may think "The Soup" is a television show that wraps up the week's amusing entertainment news, but around here, it's an actual food. It's THE actual food, THE Soup, not just any soup, but THE soup, the soup to end all soups. It started as a recipe called "Chris' Aloo Chana Soup" in the cookbook called The Garden of Vegan, but at this point, I think I've tinkered with it enough to post my version without infringing on the intellectual property rights of the authors. (By the way: buy that cookbook. TONS of good stuff in it.)

Let me back up a little. I've always really loved soup, and when my youngest was just starting solid foods, several medical issues made swallowing difficult for her. Soup was a perfect food at that time: soft and liquidy, and it was easy to add extra nutrients and fat to her bowl without forcing the rest of us to eat heavy cream or, the granddaddy of all "supplements," virgin coconut oil (which, at room temperature, is the consistency of vaseline). In some other blog post, I'll write about the soup that got her from age 1 to 2 without her wasting away. But that's not The Soup.

I made The Soup for the first time about two years ago. It had looked daunting to me before then, since it has so many different herbs and spices in it. I thought surely it would be muddy-tasting, and if it didn't taste right, I wouldn't know what to add to make it better. One day, though, I had a hankering for Indian food but didn't want all the fire of curry. I decided to tackle this just once, promising that if it didn't turn out, we could always add it to some black beans or some rice to dilute the flavors.

Bite your tongue, naive Debi!!!

It was love at first sight. All those rich eastern colors pouring into the pot, resting on the sauteed vegetables before being swirled into the broth! The smells of someplace far away mixing with the familiar of onion and my own homemade stock! The luscious sharpness of the tomatoes adding the perfect amount of acid! This is truly the soup of the heavens.

You may have to shop for some of the ingredients. I have to send Garam Masala to Stori in Alaska every year, for example, but if you live near a major city, you should be able to find it reasonably cheaply. Here's my version of the original recipe from the cookbook. Take your time, and savor every moment.

Aloo Chana Soup
Original source: The Garden of Vegan (cookbook) with tinkering by Debi

Ingredients:
1 small onion, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp dried ginger
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 1/2 cups vegetable stock, ideally homemade to avoid the sodium
2 medium potatoes, cubed
1 large carrot, chopped
1 can chick peas
14 oz canned tomatoes, diced
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp cardamom
1/4 tsp garam masala
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp dried mint
1 cup steamed broccoli

Preparation:
In a large soup pot, saute the onion, and celery in oil until the onions are translucent. Add the ginger and garlic and saute for another minute. Add the stock, potatoes, carrot, chickpeas, tomatoes, and stir in the turmeric, cumin, cardamom, garam masala, salt, and cayenne. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low. Simmer for 20-30 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the mint and broccoli. Let stand covered for at least 5 minutes (or, in my case, all afternoon). Warm and serve. Mmm!

Debi: Trudge

For all our east coast readers: yes, you got more snow than Chicago. Conceded. But we did just get a nice hearty snowfall here in the midwest, over a foot in 24 hours here by the lake, and for folks like our family who use footpower as our main mode of transportation, this adds several layers of work to our day -- pun intended!

Because it wasn't very cold here, this winter storm was easier to handle for us. While we had to be protected from getting wet, the temperatures in the twenties made it possible to stay outside for a while at a time -- quite necessary for shoveling. And shoveling. And shoveling again. Living in an urban area as we do, it's very easy to stand on a street and declare "good neighbor" and "bad neighbor" just by looking around. The good neighbors are the ones who shovel their sidewalks, maybe even adding a few handfuls of road salt to keep the remaining snow from becoming ice in our standard cycles of snow-light thaw-freeze. The bad neighbors don't shovel, leaving the good neighbors to pluck the elderly and infirm out of their knee-deep piles on the sidewalks.

Yesterday, we woke up to a pretty notable snowstorm happening outside our windows. That meant the winter gear we wore on the way to school had to keep us warm and dry on top and bottom -- not just snowboots and snowpants for the snow we'd trudge through, but something waterproof on top to keep our heads protected from the snow falling on us from above. Ronni, my oldest, remembered seeing a friend of ours in a ski mask and asked if we had one she could wear under her hood. Sammi, ever-stubborn, insisted her hat was plenty. I wore a ski hat and hood, and (dumbly) decided to just layer long-johns under my jeans instead of putting on snowpants. My reward for that was damp pant cuffs all day.

After I walked the kids from school, I had to run right home and get my car to meet a client in Chicago. That's a 30 minute drive in good weather, so I had no time to shovel before I left. I felt really guilty, but promised myself it would be the first thing I did when I got home. I parked my car outside our meeting place, and when I came out a few hours later, I had several inches of snow to brush off of it. When I arrived home, those inches covered our sidewalk and the path from our house to garage. Shoveling it took at least forty minutes.

I worked in the afternoon, made time for a quick run, and then raced to pick Ronni up from her after-school dance class and Sammi up from her extended-day at preschool. By the time I got home and realized that we had to be back at Ronni's school for parent-teacher conferences in an hour, AND that I'd offered to bring dinner for the teacher too, AND that I needed to shovel (again), it was clear that dinner had to be easy and fast. And portable! We brought Ronni's teacher the beans & corn in a little plastic container, with a separate container of salsa, a plastic bag with two tostados, and a package of tic-tacs once I realized how garlicky the beans had turned out.

Snowy-Day Hearty Fast Dinner!
1 can refried black beans
1 can whole black beans
2 cloves garlic
1 package hard tostados
shredded cheese
salsa
1 batch Sweet-n-Salty Corn, recipe below

Empty can of whole black beans into a pot and just cover with water. Cook until the beans are soft, then drain water and partially mash beans, leaving some whole pieces. Add can of refried black beans, and squeeze garlic cloves in your garlic press into the pot. Mix thoroughly and heat until hot.

Spread bean mixture on tostados, sprinkle cheese on top, and add a dollop of salsa. Serve with a side of Sweet & Salty Corn

Sweet & Salty Corn
1/2 bag of frozen corn
2 tbsp margarine
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp salt

Cook corn in microwave, melting margarine on top. Add cumin and salt and mix well.

Debi: Shabbos

Friday nights are lovely, when I can get my act together to make them so!

Our family is Jewish, and while we're not very observant or religious, having a traditional sabbath meal on Friday nights is something that reminds the grownups of our own childhoods, our grandparents and parents, and the warm feeling of family at home for an evening together. We could eat anything for dinner, but it seems wrong somehow to make our Sabbath meal something exotic or experimental. What feels right is comfort food.

Last night, I decided to be a little ambitious, given the fact that the kids were underfoot and David wouldn't be home until dinner was ready. I made seitan cutlets (a faux-meat-like thing made from vital wheat gluten, broth, oil, tehini, and seasonings), which require several elaborate steps to develop the right consistency; homemade mushroom gravy (which, unlike Stori and her perfected pan-gravy methodology, I always struggle to keep lump-free); a nice big bowl of bright peas; homemade rice pudding; and challah.

Challah, a braided egg bread, is absolutely essential for a Shabbos table. After years of using my mother's recipe, several years ago I tried a recipe from my friend Hilary. Hers was far better, and so that is the one I use, with my own addition of eggs (how did she have a challah recipe with no eggs?!?). Here it is -- this recipe makes two loaves, so plan to give one to a friend:

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Challah

2 cups warm (not hot) water
½-3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
1 envelop or 1 tbsp yeast
1/3 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs, beaten
6 cups flour + 1-2 cups for flouring surface & hands during kneading.

Preparation:
Put water in a large bowl. Dump in sugar, but don’t mix. Add salt. Add yeast, then mix, using only a quick once or twice around with a large spoon.

Dump in oil and add the 6 cups of flour to the same bowl. Add the eggs. Mix with spoon.

Remove from bowl and place on floured surface. Knead 15 minutes, or to the right texture plus 10 minutes more.

Place in lightly oiled bowl (using the 1/3 cup vegetable oil). Roll it around so it’s coated. Cover the bowl with a dishtowel and let rise until doubled (about 75 minutes).

Punch down and knead 3 minutes.

Let rise again 45-60 minutes.

Divide into two lumps, and divide each lump into three strands. Braid the strands to make two braided loaves, and brush each loaf with beaten egg. Sprinkle with coarse salt and bake 40-45 minutes at 350.
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The photo above is of a round challah that we made this fall for the Jewish high-holy days. Last night, our challah was still braided, but we left it long. It's easier to slice that way, anyway. Of all the delicious foods on our table last night, the kids (and secretly, the grownups) like the challah best. It's a soft, slightly sweet bread, chewy and moist and, since it takes so long to make, last night's challah was still warm when we gathered around our lit sabbath candles, put our arms around our children, and blessed it.

Debi: It's THAT Kind of Day

Yesterday morning, I woke up with a cold. I had gone to bed suspicious of the tickle in my nose and throat, and woke up with a confirmation of the drippy days to come. Since my string band, The Lopsiders, is playing a long-awaited gig on Thursday night, I wanted very much to nip this cold in the bud.

So, my solution was to hit my system with as much immunity-boosting power as possible. I downed my usual multivitamin, followed by an extra dose of zinc and a dose of astragalus, an herb known for its immune support. Since I'd dozed later than usual, it took all my attention to pack a lunch for my oldest, feed the two of them breakfast, stuff their backpacks, dress them and myself for the weather, and get out the door to school.

On the way from my younger daughter's preschool to my older daughter's elementary school, I started feeling woozy. The world looked a little wavy and too bright, and my stomach began rolling. By the time I got her to the door, I felt downright nauseous. Since she had been playing on Sunday at the house of a friend whose father had the stomach flu, I started to worry that I'd be singing on Thursday night through more than just the sniffles.

I had planned to walk from Ronni's school to the coffeeshop for a serious day of work, but decided to go home and get the car instead. It's a mile to the cafe, but if I really did have the flu, I wouldn't want to walk home. Once I got there, the nausea increased, and though I had just paid for and ordered my coffee, I decided quickly that I could not drink it. I left it there, shouting, "Free soy mocha for anyone who wants it!" as I ran out the door, sweating and breathing in big gulps of the cold air.

I went home and collapsed on the couch in sweatpants and a sweatshirt. I waited and waited for what I thought was the inevitable...but it never came. I nibbled the plain scone I'd bought, and felt a little better. Nibbled more, felt a little better. Suddenly it hit me: the vitamins. No breakfast. Oh boy.

I had an upset stomach from taking too many vitamins with no food.

I spent the rest of the day on the couch, working on my laptop and watching bad tv, until it was time to pick up the kids -- the younger one from her extended day at preschool; the older one from a creative movement class at the local park district. I had little appetite and no interest in cooking, so I called my husband and announced my abdication of the Kitchen Queen throne. His response, stereotypically, was "That's fine. Let's order in."

"Order in" means delivery food from a restaurant. Our default -- the one we chose last night -- is Siam Pasta, a thai restaurant that delivers reasonably priced noodle dishes. Thank heavens. By the time it arrived, my appetite had returned, and we enjoyed:

• Pad Thai with tofu: Thin noodles stir-fried with scrambled egg, bean sprouts, onions & tofu topped with carrots, green onions & peanuts.
• Pad See Eiw: Stir-fried wide noodles in a brown sauce with tofu, scrambled egg, Chinese broccoli & bean sprouts.
• Pad Woon Sen: Stir-fried tiny glass noodles with tofu, scrambled egg, baby corn, mushrooms, carrots & green onions in a mild thin broth.

Thank heavens for Siam Pasta and the abundant leftovers in my fridge!

Back inside!

Dare we slink back onto our blog and try to pretend it hasn't been six months since we wrote?

We are both sorry. We want to try again. We got distracted by being outside, by our hobbies and our families and the things that brought us together as friends in the first place: the beauty we both find in the every-day, our attempts to make the mundane meaningful, and our occasional struggles to find inspiration in what looks quiet and unassuming. Does anyone want to read about what they already know and do every day?

The answer to that, we both realize, is yes. Otherwise dooce.com and Erma Bombeck and Mothering Magazine and the Roseanne show would never have made it. So, here's our plan:

Twice a week, each of us will attempt to write a post about the most mundane of all motherly pursuits, the one that is the ubiquitous task of housewifery all over the world: dinner. We'll tell you what we're making, and why, and how it went, and what our home was like while we were making it. Sometimes it will be a recipe and a nice dinner. In my case, sometimes it will be what I call "subsistence food" on the way to or from some sort of activity. Either way, it will give you a taste (pun intended!) of life at home, here in the city or there in the country.

Wish us luck.