Yesterday, our morning began with every school district in the area (except mine) running on a two-hour delay because we had this crazy, big, wet March snow that clung to trees and power lines, making everything look like a beautiful cartoon. It covered the playground at 10:00, but was completely gone by 11:30. Ben hates…
Category: Chef Ben Cooks!
Pepper Jack of All Trades
Ben’s cheese of choice is always pepper jack, these days. He’ll settle for shredder (as he calls shredded cheddar), but his heart belongs to pepper jack. I love it too, so I don’t attempt to tamper with his cheese compass. For weeks, Ben has been asking for “branding meat” for Ben’s Day Wednesday. As our…
It was an Itsy Bitsy, Teeny-Weeny Apple Salad with Tahini
Some weeks, it feels like we are swimming in jello. Everything is so much harder than it has to be. To start, our Ben’s Day Wednesday meal was delayed a day. Was Ben happy? He was not. He kept his powder dry, however, so he could demand 3 dishes with various moving parts, by which…
Cutting Corners
This week, high off our Reuben sandwich win from last week, we decided to do another toasted sandwich. We switched up every possible element with Benwich counterparts. The marble rye bread became sourdough. The thousand island was swapped for ranch. The pastrami made way for shredded chicken. The bacon appeared because, well, it’s bacon. The…
You Little Punk!
In our house, we have so many obscure quotes that we laugh at uproariously, that sometimes, a subtle one slips past, forgotten — for awhile — but when it resurfaces and we latch on? Forget about it. We can, and will, go the distance. One such quote, which we find endlessly amusing, is “You little…
Shopping Carts with One Bad Wheel
Phil is an avid reader of the local paper, in addition to several newspapers with national circulation. When we still got print copies of everything, Phil occasionally clipped something out (a well-established family tradition) and posted it on the fridge. There were two such clips that were there for so many years that they are…
A Date With Bacon
Ben and bacon. Can you think of a better match? I can’t! This week, Ben suggested breakfast for dinner: biscuits with sausage gravy, and scrambled eggs. To his great delight, I beat him to the bacon punch, and suggested we add bacon-wrapped dates to the menu. On Christmas, his cousins made dozens of these for…
just make the boy happy
Ben was adamant this week that we make steak. I know, I know, I have started a dozen posts this way, but this week was different because he developed a new tactic in achieving his aim. By the way, for every time that we do have steak, there have been at least four rejections, lest…
Slant-Faced Sausage Eater
As my parents age, I increasingly ask about their early days, and a new story surfaced this Christmas. My parents both grew up Amish, my mom in Iowa and my dad in Kansas. My dad passed what I thought was a family trait to me, but I just learned it was a characteristic common to…
The Ramen Approximation
When Sophia struck off on her own adult life after college, I made her a cookbook including recipes I knew she loved. One of the recipes I included was something I called “The Ramen Approximation,” and it included notes for a new cook about the most efficient way to produce something ramen-ish that tastes way…