Slump

Now is the season of our discontent. I don’t know why. It doesn’t make sense! We are all vaccinated and we have begun, cautiously, with baby steps, to enjoy some of the things we used to take for granted, like restaurant dining. The weather is tempestuous – hot, cold, rainy, dry, windy, windy, windy – but, on balance, pretty nice. Why, then, am I in a slump? I don’t know. I think I just need this school year to end, and it, seemingly, never will.

I am convinced that Phil copes by not crowding his head with unnecessary content. For instance, he remains completely untroubled by the particulars of how one makes a bed. When it got cold one night, and I asked him to pull up the bedspread on his way into bed, he failed miserably, proclaiming with conviction, “Someone short-sheeted our bed!” Yes, Phil. Someone slipped into our 1950’s dorm room in the middle of the night and short-sheeted our bed.

Last week, I had high hopes pinned to my first haircut in a year and a half, thinking it could help me shake my pandemic blues, but it failed to meet expectations (unless the expectation was to look like Roseanne Roseannadanna.) I can live with the haircut, and the frizziness it unleashed, but the fact that nobody noticed that I got a haircut means that I either walk the halls of the school in a cloak of invisibility, or I always have Roseanne Roseannadanna hair. I don’t know which one to root for.

As for Ben, he continually adjusts his internal calibration of what constitutes a “good thing,” and is never disappointed. A flyer of Burger King coupons arrives, addressed to Resident, and he can’t believe his good fortune. He reads over each one carefully, finds just the one to use, and cuts it out with the precision of a surgeon. After Phil takes him to the dentist in the convertible, they go through the drive-through, and Ben, sitting on the left (Remember? Quirky British car?) deploys the breakfast sandwich coupon at the window, and just like that, it is the best morning ever.

He also recognizes how lucky he is to have his sister around more often. Yes, he loves her company, but there’s more than that behind his strategic seating at the dinner table.

Ben: “Can I have some of your fries? We’re sharing. We’re great friends.” 

Sophia, dispassionately forking over a handful of fries: “We’re more than friends. I’ve been giving you my food for 20 years.”

This week I put rhubarb slump on the menu because it is rhubarb season, and I love rhubarb. What could be more therapeutic than making a dessert called slump? We have nowhere to go, but up. Eventually, I intend to try all cooked fruit dessert variations. Maybe a pandemic pandowdy is next?

Rhubarb Slump

4 cups rhubarb, chopped into 3/4” pieces

2/3 to 3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup water

1 teaspoon orange zest (optional)

1 cup flour

1 tablespoon sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup milk

Whipped cream, vanilla ice cream, or milk, to serve

1. In a saucepan with a tight-fitting lid, combine rhubarb, 2/3 to 3/4 cup sugar, and water. Cook 10 minutes (or 20 minutes, if frozen,) stirring occasionally, over medium heat. Add zest.
2. Meanwhile, in a bowl, stir together the flour, 1 tablespoon sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut in the butter with a pastry knife, without overworking, until pieces are the size of peas. Add the milk and quickly combine. Drop the batter by spoonfuls onto the surface of the slightly simmering fruit. Cook for 10 minutes uncovered over medium to low heat, then place a lid on and cook another 10 minutes.
3. Serve warm, topped with whipped cream, ice cream, or milk*.

*Topping this with milk is a very old-fashioned technique, and literally, the only way Phil consumes straight-up milk. Tuck that into your file of weird facts you’ve learned about our family!

Lazy lasagna seemed like the perfect thing to make this week; easy enough for Ben to make fairly independently, but still pretty tasty.

Lazy Lasagna

1 pound sausage

1 1/2 pounds frozen cheese ravioli

2  24-ounce jars of tomato sauce

1 pound of mozzarella cheese, grated

Brown the sausage. Spray a 9X13 inch casserole dish with cooking spray and distribute 2 cups of sauce across the bottom. Place half the frozen ravioli on the sauce in a single layer. The sausage goes next. Then top with a cup of cheese and 2 cups of sauce. Add the rest of the ravioli in a single layer, and top with remaining sauce. Because the ravioli isn’t cooked, you may want more liquid. I usually rinse each sauce jar with about 1/2 cup of water each, and then I drizzle in this saucy water over the edges of the “lasagna”. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top, cover tightly with foil, and bake at 400º for about an hour. Remove foil for last 15 minutes or so, until cheese is golden and bubbly. Let your family serve themselves. It’s called lazy lasagna. You’ve done enough.