The weekend was pretty awesome in that way weekends should be. I think it helped to have had my car detailed on Friday, which I did on my way to work. Getting all the sand and kid detritus vacuumed off the floor and seats did wonders for improving my outlook.
Friday night: John’s coworker Jessica stayed with us. I tried making one of Bittman’s 10- minute meals—#97, so-called fettucine alfredo—and it was a disaster. Such a simple dish shouldn’t require a recipe. My friend Steve told me how to make alfredo sauce: heat in a saucepan butter in any amount, milk in any amount, and cheese in any amount. I should have listened to him instead of Bittman. These are basically Bittman’s instructions, too, but he suggests using a skillet rather than a sauce pan. With so much surface space, the sauce heated too quickly and started boiling. When I added the pasta to the skillet, the sauce separated. It was ugly and not very tasty. We saved face by ordering a pizza from Davanni's. I drank too much wine before I’d had any real food. Silly.
Saturday: John and Jessica left for the F1 overnight web challenge (described best by host Sierra Bravo—one part nerd Olympics, one part community service project and one part race-against-the-clock) in the neighborhood of 6:45 a.m. A few hours later, I woke to the sounds of cartoons drifting down to my bedroom from the den. The kids and I had a lovely breakfast together. Then I made chicken stock by putting a whole chicken in my huge stock pot (Christmas gift), adding carrots, celery, and onions that had been cut into large pieces; an herb bundle (Christmas stocking stuffer); and a handful of kosher salt and peppercorns. I covered the bird with water, brought to a boil, then simmered for nearly four hours.
Friend Caryl and her daughter Charon came over for lunch. We made pizzas from balls of dough and sauce that I had purchased at Cossetta's. Charon treated us to Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies. Yum! While the kids engaged themselves in play and a few episodes of Scooby Doo, Caryl and I made soup—caldo verde, a Portuguese kale and sausage soup, from The Soup Peddler's Slow and Difficult Soups. David Ansel is the Soup Peddler and he delivers soup—on his bike—to the eclectic folk who populate Bouldin Creek in Austin, Texas. Caryl sourced the sausage—linguiça—from Kramarczuk's, the Nordeast Minneapolis restaurant that specializes in sausage. And, she brought lacinato kale, which, as opposed to the extremely curly kale, is like a thick spinach leaf. Basically, we browned the sausage links, in their casings, in olive oil, and removed them when they were cooked (about 10 minutes). Then we sweated onion (1) slices and sliced garlic (6 cloves) in the remaining olive oil, densely permeated with the linguiça's salty, smoky juices. After 5 minutes we added the homemade chicken stock and diced potatoes (enough small red potatoes to equal four normal sized potatoes) and simmered for 20 minutes. The sausages, which had since been cut into coins, were returned to the soup with a bunch of finely chopped kale and simmered for another 5 minutes. Caryl took her soup home.
Handsome husband aside, I have only ever cooked with one other friend (Thanksgiving 01 or 02 with Steve C.), but it's something I've always wanted to do. I'm so glad that Caryl suggested it. We had a wonderful time chatting as we sliced and diced our ingredients, comparing notes as we tended to the soup, and documenting the process (thanks Caryl!!). And, I had a great time anticipating future kitchen sessions. I hope that one of these will culminate with a meal we can share with our families.
At some point during the afternoon, my parents arrived for a quick visit. We took the little boys out for dinner at Brasa's, where we had the 12-hour roasted pork and the chicken, collard greens, garnet yams with chorizo, barley-chickpea salad, and fried plantains, all washed down with Negro Modelo's.
Around 10:30 p.m., I checked in on John. He informed me that his team was working hard and well together, but that they wouldn't win the web challenge because they lacked the sizzle that other teams had.
Sunday: My parents left by 10 a.m. so they could have breakfast with Nik. Boy, is it ever nice to have a sibling in the same city so as to share the parental love. The boys and I were a little at loose ends. I desparately needed to get out of the house, but neither wanted to get dressed and leave. I even promised a Target run, but they preferred to play a board game. Two hours of Dragonology ensued, which isn't a horrible way to spend time when you can't think of anything better to do. I won, then soothed disappointed kids with a trip to Target where the boys bought crappy plastic stuff (to be fair, Winston selected a LEGO Indiana Jones something or other—go Indy!). Later we called John to learn that IB had won the F1 web challenge. Yay!! I'm married to a gold medalist from the nerd olympics!! By the time John got home, he had been awake for over 32 hours. So I left him to sleep while I helped Jeff H. celebrate his 40th birthday with drinks and nibbles at Dixie's, which was fun because I hadn't been there in ages.
I'm having my house professionally cleaned tomorrow, for the first time since I fired our last cleaner way back in October. Spot cleaning just isn't cutting it any more and I'm totally grossed out by cleaning bathrooms used by three boys. Let's just leave it at that.
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