An addiction

I have a confession to make.

I can't stop eating these.
I bought a "travel size" bag of Haribo "Goldbaren" at the airport in Germany, didn't crack it open until last week, and have been slowly subsisting on it since.

I had gummy bears for dinner last night. I swear it was an accident! Before I knew it was 8:30 and I wasn't hungry. Why not? I ate a few gummies after yoga (there goes that!) at 7.

Who wants to do an intervention? Do you still call it that if I'm completely aware of my problem?

Kids like sushi

Did you know that kids like sushi?

Growing up in a family of food-lovers, with a niece who counts liver and onions and garlic among her faves, I'm not shocked when I meet a kid who eats more than chicken nuggets and french fries. So I wasn't too surprised when I heard my 10-year old students talking about how much they love sushi. I've never attempted to make sushi, in any way, shape or form, but last week I made "fruit sushi" with my after-school cooking club (which is to say "non-cooking" club, because we have no stove or oven!).

First, we sliced strawberries, bananas and mango. Luckily, slicing fruit doesn't require anything more than a plastic knife, so I could relax a little knowing that my students would leave school with all 10 digits. We tried to slice long, narrow pieces, better to be rolled.

I didn't have any short-grain sushi rice, nor could I find it at my standard grocery store, so I used brown jasmine rice. It was not remotely sticky when it was finished, so I added some honey, but that didn't help much. Another omission was the bamboo mats that you're supposed to use to roll the seaweed over the filling. We just used wax paper, and it seemed fine to us! But I'm getting out of order here.

We spread rice on our sheets of Nori, leaving space at the top. Then we put a stripe of peanut butter or honey across the rice and layered some fruit across the stripe. The kids used a lot more fruit than me, and had some difficulty rolling and cutting later.Having only made one roll each, we really didn't perfect our rolling method, but using the wax paper proved helpful. We found that dipping our knife in water helped cut through the Nori when we were slicing the rolls.
It was pretty tasty, but the construction part was far more enjoyable than the eating part.

Trying things I already know I dislike

In case I haven't made this clear, I'm not a big fan of cauliflower. In fact, I'm such a hater of this Brassica oleracea species that I named my blog after it. (Obviously not in an admirable way: "cauliflower" + "socks" = unappetizing). But don't go thinkin' I'm some kind of picky-eater just because I cringe at the thought of those albino florets. I have a true admiration for a lot of other cruciferous vegetables: kale, broccoli, and brussels sprouts, to name a few. However, for as long as I can remember, cauliflower has been on my terse "Do Not Eat" list. I've been known to say that cauliflower tastes like sweaty socks. "Ick!" you're thinking. That's generally the reaction I get from my dining companions, too. So, I apologize to anyone who's had their appetite disrupted by my big mouth, but it's the truth! Socks! Ick!

Years ago, my dear sister told me I must be some kind of "super-taster" for feeling so strongly about a vegetable that is considered quite tasteless by many people. I don't think I quite deserve the honorable title, though it is true that I have never met anybody who feels as strongly about cauliflower as I do. I hear most cauliflower-averse folks don't care for its lack of flavor. Then there's me who, inexplicably, think it tastes like sweaty socks.

I ate some cauliflower last week. I was at a gathering of my book club, and our gracious host had made, among other delicious edibles, cauliflower casserole. I ate some. It tasted like cheese. And cauliflower, of the just-finished a 5-mile run variety. I didn't have seconds, but with a bunch of cheese, that stuff's not so bad. And though I did admit to all present that I don't like cauliflower, I didn't get into the whole "socks" bit!

Turkey Soup for the Stressed Holiday Soul

This holiday season is proving to be particularly stressful for me: travels, festivities, families, friends, finances ....deep breath...which is why I haven't been cooking or blogging. Luckily before things got crazy, my housemates and I hosted our annual Pre-Thanksgiving Potluck the week before Turkey Day. We had an enormous amount of food for our enormous amount of friends. There was very little leftover except....turkey! In the days following the potluck, I whipped up this tasty soup with a bunch of fresh and frozen veggies, thyme, and Chinese five spice.
Looking at this inviting bowl makes me feel even more disappointed about how little cooking I've done since making this soup, and subsequently, disappointed by how few truly satisfying meals I've had in the last few weeks. While food is always such an important part of the holidays in my family and to me personally, I have found myself eating poorly in these weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I don't mean eating lots of sweets and holiday foods. Restaurant-eating and processed and ready-made foods have seemed to invade my diet in the last few weeks. As much as I'm looking forward to my holiday plans (spending time in the kitchen and dining room of my sister and brother-in-law, who taught me what it meant to be a foodie), I'm also anxious for life to get back to normal so I can get back in my own kitchen.