Chops

Extra cabbage my mom gave me from her Corned Beef dish will do nicely!

Years ago my boyfriend's sister (then live-in boyfriend I didn't want, then fiancé, and also including soon-to-be annulled tricky disaster of a faux first marriage) went to Le Cordon Bleu in Ottawa, financed yet again by his desperate parents looking for a rock star in their two kid rubble of a messy family. Never happened, but I learned a thing or two, just like I honed my innate business acumen and musicianship on the side: I don't have time for more art forms than the many ones that I already practice at an expert level daily, but I do love to dabble, with the understanding that my dabbling is also at the maestro level. 
It doesn't go away simply because my brain is solving other types of problems, even when I may want amateur status. I like the newness of anonymity, like any other careful observer does.

Voilà! My homemade cole slaw.

And so it is with cooking, too. I cook almost every single day of my life, out of habit and enjoyment, or from necessity and want, so now I cook at the master level. I don't ever want to be a professional chef who runs a kitchen (Oh, good! Another job for me that's hard, low-paying and takes years to pay out), but I like listening. My brief "sister-in-law" did the wacky school stuff like deboning quail and many mindless hours of repetitive chopping, but she did tell me some useful stuff from her classes like: 1) pairing wines with food is a matter of preference that serves the customer well above any other snobby food rule, because a pro kitchen exists to show people a good time, not embarrass them with their ignorance. Want a nice red with chicken or fish? Have it! The "correct" choice is whatever you want and/or what beverage you think tastes good, not what anyone else says about it, unless you specifically ask a Sommelier for advice sur la table. Nothing blows the deal of a deep-pocketed repeat customer than humiliating some bourgeois "Nouveau-Riche" type looking to impress people with their freely thrown cash, so don't do it. Skills!

At the stove every damn day, people!

Same with cookbooks: 2) they can't teach you how to cook because it's about flawless timing, countless hours of practice, and the spills and mistakes that come with real trial and error mixed with ingenuity and bravery, the hard-won experience of a daily habit. That's what I have, whether I wanted it or not, because if I want to eat really good food, I often have to make it myself. And so it was with cookbooks, too. I asked her what her best recommendation was, and she told me the truth, as told to her by one of her professors: 3) it's "The Joy of Cooking", any edition and any version, from any year. The author doesn't tell you how to do it; she gives you a basic template to follow, with versions and iterations based on your choices, preferences, budget, and/or or pantry ingredients on hand. She can't think for you. You have to do that. So that's what I do, in a nutshell, every single day of my life, and maybe some day you can, too, because I don't want to be single forever, people!

Enjoy the fresh new Springtime produce that's hitting our shelves soon. We've earned it.

Perfectly cooked medium/medium-rare lamb chop, a total Spring dish.

Another perfect chop: this one a pork "Scallopine" cut in brown butter.

Perfect sticky rice with sprig of fresh thyme.

One perfect (and tiny) leaf of thyme on a bed of fluffy white rice.

Food: Creamy Pasta

Penne and sausage and zucchini and cream. Oh, my!

We have a bounty of perfectly beautiful, succulent green squash from New Jersey pouring into the store with a rich profusion that screams "Cook with me!" Yeah!! I've waited months for this kind of produce. 

Sometimes I treat my kitchen and pantry items like an episode from the cooking show Chopped: What can I make from what I have on hand? It's actually really fun, without the intense on-camera pressure, berating, viciously competitive saboteurs, and the brutal, insanely quick time line.

A bowlful of pasta perfection!

I decided to combine the squash sitting so perkily and prettily on the refrigerator shelf with some leftover penne, pecorino romano, a little light cream, all natural sausage flavored with spices, sea salt, and natural flavorings, tossed into garlic and onion fried in coconut oil, all items I bought on sale and in season. Mmm, mmm, mmm!
Take a look for yourself, and see.

Welcome to summer, readers! Today is the first day.

Toothpaste, and Other Acts of Kindness

Simply organic, with no bullshit added.

When the last of my so-called "natural", big, name-brand toothpaste ran out, I went back to the shelves of the truly hardcore section of my local grocery store, the ones holding actual organic products, for a replacement. You see, that "Uncle Tom" of a brand has Sodium lauryl sulfate in it (http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/07/13/sodium-lauryl-sulfate.aspx), along with a host of other chemical baddies, which directly conflicts with its supposedly wholesome brand. Huh. A company that lies to the consumer? No. Can't be!

Well, the actual healthy brands are priced so far out of reach of the average consumer (in the $8-10 range, a complete joke for working families struggling to make ends meet), that I knew I had to find a better solution. Like any good herbalist, I trusted my instincts to guide me in the right direction. And there it was online; the solution presented itself to me under me deft fingertips: a recipe for making my own toothpaste at home, and here it is: http://www.crunchybetty.com/homemade-toothpaste-want-to-ditch-the-fluoride?printthis=1&printsect=1.

I had some mint leaves that were turning quickly, so I cut some up and put it in the first batch that I made. Unfortunately, without a bunch of preservatives, real food spoils quickly. Yuck! The next batch was truer to the recipe: coconut oil, baking soda, peppermint oil, and some organic Stevia to take the edge off of the extreme saltiness that comes with baking soda. At first my gums tingled a bit and then ached lightly (not in a bad way, more like the itch that comes with a small cut healing), but, you know what? When I brush my teeth now, I see no blood in the sink, and I brush a couple of times in a row with my homemade toothpaste to get that clean feeling I like.

I was told years ago that I had the early onset of periodontal disease by a dentist, and that I needed really expensive planing (a intense type of cleaning, done in sectors, over a couple of visits) of my teeth to remove plaque, for which there is no cure, according to the slick, hip, Brooklyn dentist I saw. Truth be told, I have always seen blood in the sink from my gums when I brush my teeth, even as a small child. Some dentist or other always told me just to continue brushing my gums, and that they would "toughen up" over time. But, it never happened. Until now.

You're welcome.

p.s.- I took the remaining mint leaves and some of the organic peppermint oil to the bath with me this morning, and I feel quite moisturized. Expensive spa treatments, indeed.