Author Archives: kzmclain

Looking Back, Part I

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

Whew. We are looking at the final couple of days of 2013, and as always, it seems to have gone by quickly.

Bill and I left Denver on Christmas Day after spending the final few days before we left with three-fourths of our children (the other living in Vermont). We had a lovely Christmas Eve dinner with the oldest, Allen, at McCormick and Schmicks, and felt like real grown-ups as we didn’t eat until 7:30.

Christmas morning we got into our already-packed car and headed south. Bill’s engineering mind kicks into full gear when he packs a car. He utilizes every square inch of the trunk and the back seat, leaving just enough room for our goodie bag.

The roads Christmas Day were very quiet. We listened to Christmas music as we headed towards our first stop – Albuquerque. We checked into the hotel early evening where I’m pretty darn sure we were the only guests. (Thankfully I didn’t see Norman Bates.) We have this down to a science. We always pack one little bag for just those things that we need for overnight – pajamas, meds, toothbrush, and toothpaste. This time we also had a bag with our Christmas dinner.

I knew there would be no restaurants open Christmas night, so, at Bill’s suggestion, I packed a picnic reminiscent of those we had when we traveled through Europe a few years ago. I had salami and prosciutto, several cheeses, some vegetables, and of course, a bottle of wine. It made for a nice little dinner.

I’m always nostalgic at saying goodbye to one year and looking forward to the next. First of all, it means we are getting older and so are our kids and grandkids. That’s the cycle of life, of course. But I also always wonder if I accomplished anything important during the past year, or was I just a slug, using God’s resources and breathing God’s air and not contributing a single thing.

As I thought about 2013, I finally concluded that I didn’t accomplish anything in the finding-a-cure-for-cancer type of way, but I certainly feel like it was a good year, full of joy and family (which are really one in the same for me).

Here are a couple of things that were important to me in 2013:

Largely because of my job, I was able to travel around the United States a great deal. There really aren’t many major cities that I haven’t been able to visit. But my job (or my life in general) had never allowed me the opportunity to visit Savannah, Georgia, and that was definitely on my bucket list. This year Bill and I spent a week with my two sisters on Hilton Head Island, and we visited Savannah. What a beautiful city and what a lot of fun we had! We even had the chance to dine at Lady and Sons Restaurant, which was definitely a bucket list item (my bucket list is pretty simple, my friends).

I started this blog. I have always loved to write, but while my job involved a lot of writing, it was all business writing, and largely boring. Approximately 22,000 new widgets will be produced this year as a result of a stronger commitment to the environment, it was announced today by CEO Joe Schmoe at a press conference announcing new widget production. And so forth. I wanted to enjoy writing, and this blog provides that enjoyment. I hope to continue to grow and reach more people, and welcome any and all feedback.

This year at Thanksgiving, my whole family was together – a somewhat rare occurrence. Our daughter and family spent the week in Denver, and the visit was culminated by a joyous Thanksgiving dinner. I showed the family photo the other day to one of my nieces. She looked at it, shook her head in amazement and said, “Aunt Kris, I can’t believe you have that family when you just had one kid.” True, true, true. I am so blessed.

Today I am spending the day with my two sisters at a fancy, dancy spa (where I will likely have to unveil my bare, oh-so-white legs). This is a continuance of my birthday celebration, as it is a gift from my sister Bec. Fodder for my blog, no doubt.

I will reminisce about 2013 more tomorrow.

Last night we watched the Call the Midwife holiday special, and in its honor, I fixed Shepherd’s Pie – a British specialty. Here is the recipe from Simply Recipes.

Easy Shepherd’s Pie

Ingredients
1-1/2 lbs. ground beef
1 onion, chopped
1-2 c. vegetables (carrots, corn, peas)
1-1/2 – 2 lbs. potatoes (3 big ones)
8 T. butter
½ c. beef broth
1 t. Worcestershire sauce
Salt, pepper, seasonings of choice

Process
Peel and quarter potatoes, boil in salted water until tender (about 20 minutes). While potatoes are cooking, melt 4 T. butter in large frying pan. Sauté onions in butter until tender over medium heat, about 10 minutes. If you are adding vegetables, add them according to cooking time. Put any carrots in with the onions. Add corn or peas either at the end of the cooking of the onions, or after the meat has initially cooked.

Add ground beef and sauté until no longer pink. Add salt and pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and half a cup of beef broth. Cook uncovered over low heat for 10 minutes.

Mash the potatoes in bowl with remainder of butter; season to taste.

Place beef and vegetable mix into a baking dish. Spread mashed potatoes over the top. Bake in 400 degree oven until bubbling and brown (about 30 minutes). Broil for last few minute if necessary to brown.

Nana’s Notes: I did not make mashed potatoes; instead, I bought the already packaged kind. Very easy. I used fresh carrots that I diced and frozen corn. The Call the Midwife special was awesome!

A Savior is Born

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Now there were shepherds in that region living in the fields and keeping the night watch over their flock. The angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were struck with great fear. The angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For today in the city of David a savior has been born for you who is Messiah and Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. And suddenly there was a multitude of the heavenly host with the angel, praising God and saying:

Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.

Luke 2:8-14 New American Bible

I will spend the next few days driving and celebrating the holiday with my family. See you in a few days.

Merry Christmas from my family to yours.

Grinch

Posted in Recipes, Side Dishes by

Then he slithered and slunk, with a smile most unpleasant
Around the whole room, and he took every present!
Pop guns! And bicycles! Roller skates! Drums!
Checkerboards! Tricycles! Popcorn! And plums!
And he stuffed them in bags. Then the Grinch, very nimbly,
Stuffed all the bags, one by one, up the chimney!
Then he slunk to the icebox. He took the Whos’ feast!
He took the Who-pudding! He took the roast beast!
He cleaned out that icebox as quick as a flash.
Why, that Grinch even took their last can of Who-hash!
Then he stuffed all the food up the chimney with glee.
“And NOW!” grinned the Grinch, “I will stuff up the tree!” – From How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss

Well, today is Christmas Eve Day, and I feel like the Grinch. I’m going to spend much of the day taking down Christmas.

I am undecorating the house, of course, because we are leaving very early tomorrow for our drive to Arizona for the winter. I will start the day by cleaning out the refrigerator, throwing out every last thing that won’t last until we get back. Just like the Grinch. Then I will remove the ornaments and stuff the tree up into the attic (again, similar to the actions of the Grinch).

The winter of 2013 was the first in which we spent the entire first four months of the year in Arizona. Up until then, we had spent a few weeks here and there. Last year we committed. So taking down decorations Christmas Eve, packing up the car, and leaving Christmas Day is our new tradition. As long as the weather cooperates. This year it will.

As I approached Christmas Eve this year, I recalled a funny Christmas Eve tradition we had when I was a child. For some years, Santa came Christmas Eve night while we slept, just as tradition dictates. But at some point my mom and dad, for reasons unclear, decided Santa should come Christmas Eve before we went to bed. So, around 5 o’clock, we would pile into our car to drive around town and look at the Christmas light displays. Every year, Dad would have a reason to go back into our house, where he would spend a bit of time taking all of the presents that he and Mom had hidden in their bedroom and putting them under the Christmas tree. He would come out looking very innocent, and we equally innocently never suspected a thing. We would spend about an hour looking at lights, and would return to find that Santa had come to our house when we were gone!

I asked Bill yesterday if he remembers the feeling of coming into the living room and seeing that Santa had come. Despite his 71 years of life, he admitted that he remembers that feeling as if it were yesterday. What magic. He also shared that he remembers being 30-something and putting together bikes or game tables or scooters in his pajamas at 2 o’clock in the morning. “And there were always screws missing,” he recalled. No magic there.

Last night I made my own version of a Who Feast and our son and his family came for dinner and gift-opening. And a feast it was. Racks of lamb, shredded brussel sprouts with pine nuts and bacon, mashed potatoes, cream puffs for dessert. Yum. Sent the Who Feast leftovers home with the kids.

And gifts – dolls and pjs and sock monkeys and ornaments – lots of happy faces. Then goodbye to more grandchildren until we see them again.

Bill and I will be busy packing up our things today for our time in Arizona. Sad to say goodbye to this home, but happy to say hello to our other home.

Hope Santa finds his way to your house, and here is my recipe for the delicious brussel sprouts. Try them even if you think you don’t like brussel sprouts. They’re delicious.

Shredded Brussel Sprouts (from allrecipes)

Ingredients
½ lb. sliced bacon
¼ c. butter
2/3 c. pine nuts
2 lbs. Brussels sprouts, cored and shredded
3 green onions, minced
1/2 t. seasoning salt
Pepper to taste

Process
Place bacon in a large, deep skillet. Cook over medium-high heat until crisp. Drain, reserving 3 t. grease, crumble and set aside.

In the same skillet, melt butter in with reserved bacon grease over medium heat. Add pine nuts and cook, stirring, until browned. Add Brussels sprouts and green onions to the pan, and season with seasoning salt and pepper. Cook over medium heat until sprouts are wilted and tender, 10 – 15 min. Stir in crumbled bacon just before serving.

Bake me a Christmas memory

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I have mentioned on very many occasions that my father (and my grandfather before him) was a baker. He owned a bakery for many years – 20-some years in Nebraska and then five more years in Leadville, Colorado. Because of all the holiday baking I have been doing, I have been thinking about the bakery and what we had to offer in the way of holiday treats at Gloor’s Bakery.

As I thought about it, what I came to realize is that in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, at least in Columbus, Nebraska, it wasn’t “Everything-Christmas” in the same way that it is nowadays in the retail world. My dad definitely had a few things that he only offered at Christmastime – almond bark and peppermint bark come immediately to my mind – but he didn’t even sprinkle red and green sugar on top of a cake donut for heaven’s sake. And apparently no one expected him to.

I do recall that he made a butter cookie – were they spritz cookies? He put the dough in a pastry bag with a flower tip and squirted them out onto the pan, where they were sprinkled with sugar. I’m pretty sure that was it as far as Christmas cookies went.

But having blabbered on and on about all of this, I have to say that there was one thing that he made that was totally associated with Christmas – to his family and to his customers. It was a braided loaf of bread that we called Butter Braid. For years I have been obsessed with trying to find the recipe for this bread. However, if I Googled “Butter Braid”, what always came up is the sweet pastry similar to a coffee cake. Delicious, but not what we called Butter Braid. What we called Butter Braid wasn’t particularly sweet.

Finally, the other day, I was playing around again trying to find a recipe and stumbled across something called Swiss Braided Bread. Hey! My grandparents came from Switzerland. They made a braided loaf of bread. Eureka!

Now that I had something to call it, I learned that in Switzerland it is called Zopf. I would be willing to bet that if my father was alive and I asked him about Zopf, he would say, “Oh, you mean the Butter Braid we always made at Christmas?” (Kids, ask your parents all your questions now because some day it will be too late or they will be too old and crotchety to answer your question.) Anyhoo, according to what I’ve read, in Switzerland, Zopf isn’t a traditional holiday bread; instead, it is something they bake and eat on Sunday mornings, perhaps toasted and smeared with homemade jam. In our bakery world, there wasn’t enough time to braid a hundred loaves of bread every day all year long. Thus, it was something special for Christmas.

We sold very many loaves of Butter Braid every Christmas season, more than I could begin to remember. I do remember, however, that my mother would wrap the bread in cellophane, using a hot iron to seal it. She would then wrap that crinkly ribbon around each loaf of bread and use a scissors to curl the ribbon. Later, when plastic bags became more common, I assume she used them for our Butter Braid and closed the bag using the ribbon.

In memory of my dad, here is a recipe for Butter Cookies (from Taste of Home) and Zopf (from Allrecipes).

Butter Cookies

Ingredients
1 c. butter, softened
1-1/4 c. confectioners’ sugar
1 egg
1 t. vanilla
½ t. almond extract
2-1/2 c. all-purpose flour
½ t. salt
Colored sugar and decorating candies, optional

Process
In a large bowl, cream butter and confectioners’ sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in egg and extracts. Combine flour and salt. Gradually add to creamed mixture; mix well.

Using a cookie press fitted with the disk of your choice, press dough two inches apart onto ungreased baking sheets. Decorate as desired. Bake at 375 for 6-8 minutes or until set (do not brown). Remove to wire racks to cool. Yield 7-1/2 dozen.

Swiss Braided Bread (Zopf)
Ingredients
1 (.25 oz) package active dry yeast
1-1/3 c. warm milk
1 egg yolk
2 T. butter, softened
3-1/2 c. bread flour
1 egg white
1 T. water

Process
In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm milk. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes. Add the egg yolk, butter and 2 c. of bread flour; stir well to combine. Stir in the remaining flour, one-half cup at a time, beating well after each addition. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, about 8 min.

Divide the dough into 3 equal pieces and roll each piece into a 14-in. long cylinder. Braid the pieces together and place on a lightly greased baking sheet. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 425 degrees.

In a small bowl, beat together egg white and water. Brush risen loaf with egg wash and bake in preheated oven for 20-25 min, until golden.

Nana’s Notes: I didn’t bake the loaf of bread in the photo, I’m sorry to say. Are you kidding? I’m trying to get ready for a move to Arizona day after tomorrow? But I definitely will give it a try when I get there. Plus, My-Brother-the-Baker will be there to hold my hand. I struggle with bread.

Christmas Present

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Bill and I have been given a wonderful Christmas present of sorts.

When Bill had his semiannual checkup at his neurologist’s office for his Parkinson’s, they added a new medication to his repertoire. They said this particular medication should significantly help his symptoms, something his other meds didn’t seem particularly good at doing. He began taking the medication, very low dose at first and working up to what is his full dose for now (it can and likely will be changed later).

Parkinson’s can have many symptoms. Someone with Parkinson’s can have any or all, no rhyme or reason. For Bill, his primary symptoms have always been slowness and loss of fine motor skills. He has others, but those are the two that are most evident and troublesome. There isn’t a thing he can’t do by himself, but lots of things take much longer – buttoning his shirts, buckling his seatbelt, cutting food, and so forth. Sometimes he has me help, but often he does it himself. He never complains. Not one single time.

I have been noticing his symptoms decreasing over the past weeks, but I’m not sure it has been as apparent to him. But at dinner the other night, he was eating chicken parmigiana with a side of spaghetti. All of the sudden, Bill says to me, “Kris, look at my spaghetti.” He was entirely able to eat spaghetti by rolling it on his fork, just as he used to eat it. He had the biggest grin on his face.

I tend to look at the negative side of things. When it comes to Bill’s PD, I often focus on myself and how his disease has impacted me. But suddenly it became clear just how tired he must get of always being slow and having to struggle with tasks. His smile opened my eyes to how much joy he must feel to be able to do simple things again.

This medication is tricky. While miraculous, as time goes on, it could take a higher and higher dose to work effectively. But this is where I have to nip my reflex to concentrate on what-ifs and just be ever-so-jubilant at the what-ares! Up to this point, his progression has been slow. He hasn’t had any of the potential side effects of any of his medications. There is every reason to hope that this medication will work for a very long time. And he is still on a really low dose, we have room to grow. God is good.

I have one funny grandkid story, as I often do. And, as usual, it involves Mylee.

I took Kaiya and Mylee to Lollypop Park yesterday afternoon, after a meal at McDonald’s. Lollypop Park is an indoor amusement park designed for little kids. They have a little ferris wheel, spinning teacups, swings that go around in a circle, a carousel, a train, and a little roller coaster. On the way there, I explained to the girls that Nana would NOT be accompanying them on the teacups this time as they made me really dizzy and sick the last time.

When we got there, they both immediately ran to the teacups and climbed into one. I watched them spin and spin and took a couple of photos. I was deleting some of the more blurry photos (they are in motion, after all) when they got off. I saw that Mylee was covered in vomit, but with a grin on her face. Yes, friends, she had tossed her cookies (well really, her McDonald’s cheeseburger) on the teacup. I washed her off in the bathroom the best I could, and she was raring to go. No more teacups, I instructed firmly.

This photo must have been taken immediately before Project Throw up. The look on her face tells it all.

Little girlfriend did not smell like a rose the rest of the afternoon.

Have a great weekend!

Santa Claus is Coming to Town

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Since Bill’s divorce a million years ago, he “got the kids” Christmas Eve. So for years, we drove up to Empire, Colorado – about an hour drive from here – to celebrate Christmas with a fine meal at The Peck House. Eventually, as the kids began having serious relationships and eventually marriages, our numbers outgrew what they could accommodate.

I spent the next few years finding different places where we would dine. Finally, as grandkids came along, we began simply having Christmas Eve dinner and gift opening at our house. I always knew that the day would come when the kids would be unable to join us on Christmas Eve. They might go elsewhere for the holiday. They might want to begin their unique traditions in their own home. Last year was the first year that everyone wasn’t with us on Christmas Eve. I was a bit sad, but I also understood. And it wasn’t like we didn’t see them. We had dinner with one son and his family on December 23, and that worked out just fine.

This year another son and his family will be in Mexico for the holidays. We had dinner at their house last night, and we kicked Christmas off good and right.

I don’t go overboard for Christmas. Our families are blessed with so much, and if there are 20 more toys from Nana and Papa, Mom and Dad’s head might explode. So I have a tradition of each child getting a Christmas ornament, a pair of new pajamas, and two things picked out especially for them. Still, when you multiply that times four kids, we walked into their house last night with what appeared to be an unbelievable number of gifts. The kids nearly jumped out of their skin in anticipation of opening them. They were required to wait until after dinner.

Remember that feeling of joy and excitement when you look at unopened gifts? That package could be anything. I always loved the surprise, so I rarely picked up a present to shake it and study it and try and figure out what it was. Three of the four grandkids last night were more like me, but Alastair (who has a disciplined engineering type of brain anyway), studied each of his presents, gave them a shake, and proceeded to tell me what each present was. He was, of course, correct. To be fair to me, however, two of the gifts are always the same (ornament and pjs), and it’s hard to disguise the contents of a box of Legos when you give it a shake.

Once dinner was finished, gift-opening began. It was a calm operation, choreographed by first-borned Addie. “Oldest to youngest,” proclaimed Addie, to youngest Maggie’s dismay. “Last year we did youngest to oldest,” she added. I’m certain she’s right. She isn’t likely to forget things such as that.

There was noise and proclamations of joy and tossing of wrapping paper as the kids opened their gifts. Each one stopped only to put on their new pajamas, which, I’m happy to say, all fit perfectly. Delightful Dagny proclaimed hers to be the “most comfortable pajamas I’ve ever had.”

The remainder of the night was spent getting started on building the White House out of Legos and making bracelets out of little rubber loops, using the Rainbow Loom. Addie took all of the things out of her old and broken backpack that she’s had since Kindergarten and put them in her new LL Bean backpack. Maggie played with her doll until bedtime.

I kissed them all as they went up to bed, and did the same to Dave and Jll as we left for home, knowing we wouldn’t see them for a long time. I was pretty good until we got into the car, and then I blubbered all the way home. “You can come back here anytime,” Bill kept saying.

And as I said yesterday, thank goodness for modern technology, because there is also Facetime and email.

I have one quick story about something that happened yesterday and gave me pause for thought.

I stopped at a very nice restaurant near our house to buy my very last Christmas gift – a gift card. The bartender who took care of my business was very nice, but our interaction was fairly quick. Later, after I was home a bit, I received a telephone call from my credit card company telling me that they had received a call from Rob at an unnamed restaurant, who was calling to report that he had my credit card, and could they contact me and let me know. Sure enough, Rob was the nice young bartender who had helped me with my purchase.

Here’s the thing. I frequently purchase gift cards from restaurants, and when I do, I always struggle with the blank line for the tip. I’m a generous tipper when it comes to restaurant servers because I have worked in the restaurant business and many of my children, nieces and nephews have served or do serve food for a living. But when it comes to leaving a tip for something like a gift card purchase, I am never sure what to do. Sometimes I do and sometimes I don’t. But yesterday the bartender seemed nice enough, and it is close enough to Christmas that I thought, what the heck. I added a generous tip and thought nothing more about it.

When I picked up my card from Rob-the-Bartender, I thanked him heartily for going over and above what he needed to do to get my card back to me. After all, he could have just given it to the manager to hold until such time as I realized my card was missing. He accepted my thanks graciously, and added, “You were nice enough to tip me when most people don’t, so I thought I could be helpful back to you.”

What goes around, comes around.

Birthday Hangover

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So, it’s December 18. My birthday is over. My sister flew back to AZ yesterday. The house is very quiet with just Bill and me wordlessly falling back into our uneventful routines. This morning I put the three coffee cups that I hadn’t even gotten around to removing from our kitchen table after yesterday morning’s coffee into the dishwasher, thinking, well, today we only need two cups.

And then I told myself, “Get a grip. You’ll see her again in a week-and-a-half.”

I’m always sad to see visiting family leave. But the world is really small these days. I remind myself of the days when I would visit my sister when she lived in Washington D.C. and we didn’t have email, cell phones, or social media. I would know I probably wouldn’t see her for months and months. Now I talk to her almost every day, sometimes a couple of times. We can talk face-to-face via Facetime. I see pictures of her kids and grandkids on Facebook.

Having a December birthday always sort of split up the holiday season for me. Granted, as I have grown older, my birthday has been less of an event. This year, of course, was an exception. When I was younger, people often asked me if I hated having a December birthday. I would always tell them that I loved having a birthday in mid-December as a child because people would be out buying Christmas presents and would buy me a little something extra for my birthday. My brother David’s birthday is a bit different. His birthday is December 28, and his birthday was always a letdown. People were exhausted from Christmas shopping and celebrating and barely remembered his special day. Once Mom even forgot to make him a birthday cake and, in its place, brought home from the bakery a cake that someone hadn’t remembered to pick up. It said Happy Birthday Frank from Friends. Poor David.

As a random and meaningless side note, I distinctly remember my two favorite birthday gifts of all time. The first: My Aunt Cork, who was also my godmother, always got me a birthday present, and it was invariably something fun. When I was probably 6 or 7, she got me a set of three plastic wigs – blonde, brunette, and auburn. No artificial fiber; just a molded piece of plastic that you placed on your head. Oh. My. Goodness. Did I ever love those wigs! I was the happiest child alive. Now they are in some landfill somewhere, where they will never break down.

Second: After my divorce, I bought a small house in an old, established Denver neighborhood in which my son and I lived for four or five years. They were very happy years. We loved that house. Anyhoo, it sat on an alley, and had a garage right by the alleyway, unattached to the house. We would drive up to the door of the garage and my son would get out and manually open the door for me to drive in. One year, when Bill and I were dating, I was out of town on business sometime near my birthday. He picked me up at the airport and brought me home to my little house. As we pulled up to the garage, to my surprise, the door began to open. While I was gone, Bill had installed an automatic door opener. I was in seventh heaven, and so was my son.

Now that the house is quiet and the birthday festivities are over, we can move towards Christmas celebrations. For us, they begin tonight as we will celebrate Christmas with our son and daughter-in-law and the grandkids who will be leaving Friday for Mexico where they will spend a week with her mother and sister. Christmas with palm trees. Now that doesn’t stink.

And now…..

Unbaked Peanut Butter Cookies, via Bec B., via her mother-in-law

Ingredients
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. corn syrup, light or dark
3/4 c creamy peanut butter
1 t. vanilla
2 c. Special K cereal

Process
Bring sugar and corn syrup to hard rolling boil. Then add peanut butter, vanilla, and cereal. Roll them into balls and let harden.

Bec’s notes: I used 2 c. Rice Crispies and added 1/2 C almonds. We think they taste like a salted nut roll. Make a double batch; they’ll go fast. On the back of the card it says: Remember it is a hard rolling boil, not a hard boil stage.

Birthday Festivities, Part II

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My sister and daughter-in-law gave considerable thought to just what my 60th birthday party should look like. Jen said she knew she wanted something interactive. They considered a pottery painting party. She said (and I think she was serious) they even spent a few minutes discussing ziplining. Thank you God for that being a short-lived consideration.

The driving force in their decision-making is that they knew that what would make me happiest is if the grandkids could be involved in a major way. My daughter-in-law’s sister told her she had used Mark and Susan and their cooking lessons for a team-building day for her staff to great success. Pasta-making was involved. Kids can make pasta. Voila!

I am sorry to say that I don’t know much about Mark and Susan (except that they are excellent chefs). My suspicion, however, is that they spend most of their time working with groups exactly as described above – in team-building exercises or holiday functions for adults. I would guess they don’t often work with children – much less six children between the ages of 3 and 10. They were amazing. I can’t emphasize that enough. They never got impatient. They stayed calm as flour was flying. They didn’t appear to get worried when a 5-year-old was seasoning the meat. And they got every single child involved in a way that was fun for everyone.

The first task they undertook was the meatballs. Susan brought over the ground meat, eggs, cheese, breadcrumbs and seasonings to the table.

She gave each of the smaller kids an egg, and allowed them to crack their egg into the meat mixture (after which she spent a bit of time removing eggshells!). Then each child put in a handful of cheese. Finally Susan passed around the pepper shaker, allowing each child to grind a bit of pepper into the mix. The meatballs were mostly made by the smaller kids, with Addie helping with supervision.

But the real fun came a bit later in the evening, after all of the sauces were almost finished. The kids were called to the table to make the pasta. There were two Kitchen Aid mixers with pasta-makers attached. If you have ever made fresh pasta, you know that you roll out the pasta, sprinkle it with flour, make the rolling mechanism one click thinner, and continue in this manner until your dough is nearly transparent. Then you cut the pasta in the shape you desire.

Addie’s job was to roll the pasta. She would lay a piece of rolled pasta onto the table. Dagny, Magnolia and Kaiya added flour. (Mylee was happily playing downstairs by herself where she apparently realized at long last she wouldn’t have to fight bigger kids for the toys she wanted. In her mind, her work was done with the meatballs!)

I can’t even begin to describe the amount of flour that was coursing through the air, onto the table, under the table, and into the pasta at the hands of a 7-year-old, and two 5-year-olds. There were literally mounds of flour on the table, of which they would take handfuls and begin rubbing it into the pasta (and onto their faces and clothes in the process). Mark assured us that you really couldn’t have too much flour, and that was a very good thing. Flour everywhere.

Once a piece of dough was thin enough, Addie would hand it to 8-year-old Alastair, who did the cutting. He was masterful at it. He really did figure out how to carefully hold the cut pasta and lay it carefully in a mound on the table sprinkled with flour (not that it needed a lot more flour).

It was quite an assembly line, and the pasta turned out delicious.

I have watched my grandkids in school performances. I have attended dance recitals and piano recitals. I’m always happy to be there and proud of them. But I don’t think I will ever enjoy watching them more than Saturday night as I watched them prepare the meatballs and the pasta for my birthday dinner.

And now…..

Last week I gave you my recipe for caramel corn. My daughter-in-law sent me this recipe for the caramel corn she makes every year. It is, my friends, infinitely better. It is from orangette.blogspot.com.

Caramel Corn, via Lauren H.

Ingredients
1 (3½-ounce) package plain (unbuttered natural flavor) microwave popcorn, or about 10 cups fresh popcorn popped by any method, lightly salted
1 cup packed light brown sugar
¼ cup light corn syrup
6 Tbsp. unsalted butter, melted
¼ tsp. salt
½ tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup lightly salted peanuts, roughly chopped

Process
Preheat the oven to 250°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.

If using microwave popcorn, pop the popcorn according to the package instructions. Coat a large mixing bowl with nonstick cooking spray, and dump the popcorn into the bowl, taking care to pick out and discard any unpopped kernels.

In a medium saucepan, whisk together the brown sugar, corn syrup, butter, salt, and 2 tablespoons of water. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Continue to simmer, whisking often, until the mixture reads 250°F on a candy thermometer, about 3 to 4 minutes. Immediately remove the pan from the heat, and whisk in the baking soda and vanilla. Quickly pour the hot caramel over the popcorn. Use a rubber spatula to gently fold the caramel into the popcorn, taking care to distribute it as evenly as you can. Stir in the peanuts, and transfer the mixture to the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 1 hour, stirring and turning the popcorn with a spatula every 20 minutes. Remove from the oven, and place on a cooling rack for 20 minutes. Gently break up the popcorn, and serve.

Store in an airtight container for up to 5 days (or thereabouts).

Yield: about 10 cups

Nana’s Note: I didn’t use a candy thermometer because the boiling temperature at high altitude is different than at sea level and I didn’t have time to figure out the difference. So the candy thermometer would have been useless. So I just boiled the sugar mixture for 4 minutes as my other caramel corn recipe proscribes. Also, I didn’t happen to have peanuts on hand, but that would be a delicious addition — the salty and sweet would be yummy.