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October 31, 2008
Happy Halloween!
Yay! It's Halloween!
Have a happy and safe one all!
Posted by april at 3:59 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 30, 2008
Still Somehow Thrives This Love
Just a random K. D. Lang reference for all you fans out there.
MR says, "She's Canadian, ya know!"
Feeling madly in love with my work, excited about the election, working out like a maniac, meditating every day, drinking my genmai cha, and happy sharing my life with the Orange One.
It doesn't get much better than this. I mean, except when it does. You'll see what I mean soon enough.
Posted by april at 4:43 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 29, 2008
Not A Parsnip Person
Went to lunch with Edward today. Place that has incredible soups. Today they had a fall root vegetable puree: squash, parsnip, carrot, with a garnish of apple. No cream, no butter. Wow!
"I'll have the French Onion," said Edward.
Yeah. Not into root veggies, eh?
"I'm just don't love parsnips. I'm not a..."
"Let me guess," I said, "You're not a parsnip person?"
He laughed.
"No, I guess I'm just not a parsnip person," he said.
You have to be a union organizer to get the joke, but substitute "union" for "parsnip" and recognize the parsnip is the blog code name for my union and you'll understand why it's funny.
Anyhow, the soup was delicious, and then I had a salad with tons of veggies including radishes, peppers, tomato, onion, baby lima beans, all sorts of yummies with grilled chicken and just vinegar for dressing. A good lunch. Jeannie, Susie and I worked out after work, then I made MR a dinner of curried cauliflower and squash with mozzarella (fat free) and eggwhites topped with flax oil, with a lemon sage turnip dish on the side. That was topped with olive oil. Hazelnuts and red wine to finish off.
It's not nine yet but I'm already tired... been up since just before 4 am, took a yoga class at 7, did a hard cardio workout and worked all day. I love early nights. Time to go to bed.
Posted by april at 5:17 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 26, 2008
Quick and Easy Potluck Dish
A bag of tail off, pre-cooked shrimp, boiled up again but not overcooked.
A bag of frozen mango.
about a half cup or so of some kind of fruity salsa, can be peach, pineapple, mango, whatever. Could also be a chiplotle salsa.
Mix. Serve. Can be served hot or cold.
Everybody likes it. It looks fancy but took about five minutes to prepare. My favorite kind of cooking!
Posted by april at 7:16 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
October 25, 2008
Quick Updates
I still have giant bruises on my arms and they hurt, but I've been feeling okay. I was back at the gym on Thursday, doing treadmill with Susie, and I took Pilates on Friday.
MR did some research and the chances of me catching anything at all from the needle I stepped on are almost zero. Yay!
I stuffed an eggplant last night. How many eggplants will this woman stuff, you may ask. A lot. I stuffed this one with portabella mushrooms and fat free mozzarella.
I have yoga tomorrow, groceries, some work, house cleaning, and an event with some friends tomorrow night with a potluck, so I am bringing mango shrimp salad. It's just shirmp, mango (thawed chunks is fine) and fruity salsa, peach pineapple in this case. Great, easy potluck dish.
More serious thoughts soon...
Posted by april at 2:06 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 23, 2008
Pin Cushion
Ouch.
When I was little, my mom had a pin cushion in the shape of a tomato. It was very cute. I love to stick pins into it.
Well, now I know how it feels.
Yesterday after lunch my friends and I went to the shopping center up the block to grab coffees at Starbucks. I picked up some cat food for the hungry beasts at the grocery store. As I was about to get into the car, I felt a sharp prick on my toe.
Sure enough, an insulin needle that some idiot had left on the ground had made its way through the hole in my open toed shoe and pricked me.
Yikes! I work with nurses! Needle sticks scare me to death.
Quick, what do we do? Susie said call Edward. Why? I don't know, he's a dad, he's know what to do.
Asparagus-phobe had a better idea. He called one of his nurse leaders, a homecare nurse with about thirty years experience. One of the side benefits of organizing nurses is that you always have someone to run to with medical questions.
The nurse said to go to the doctor, get a tetanus shot. So I called my doctor and she agreed to see me at 2:30, no problem.
We went back to the office and I called Jeannie, my new organizer, who is awesome by the way and comes to us with seven years of experience. We were planning to spend the afternoon together doing training stuff but now I needed her to take me to the doctor.
"Grab your jacket and your keys. Your job is about to get weird."
So we went to the doctor (just a few blocks away) and waited. Got to talk about a lot of organizing stuff while we waited so we used the time productively.
The medical assistant took me back, and said she needed to get my weight. "I can tell you what it is if you want, but I really don't feel like stepping on the scale right now," I said. "Sam-I-Am would be proud of me," I thought. She used to love the way I'd refuse to be weighed at the doctor's office. It's such a disincentive for people who have weight issues to seek medical care if they know they'll be confronted with the scale at every visit, no matter how completely unrelated to weight the visit is, so other than my annual physical, I refuse to be weighed. Conscientious objection as it were. (I do not, for the record because I know people are always trying to paint CR practitioners as anorexic, have weight issues. I am merely acting in solidarity with those who do.) It's just so stupid: I'm there cause I stepped on a needle in a parking lot. One look at me confirms that I am of healthy weight, and even if I weren't, what does that have to do with stepping on a needle in the parking lot? If you're trying to decide my doses for chemotherapy (which thank heavens is not necessary as I am perfectly healthy) then sure, get my weight. But a visit due to stepping on a needle? Please, no. Not in the mood.
The medical assistant was cool with that, no pressure at all. Took my blood pressure, which was up a bit, 116/70 whereas it's usually 90/70. I was pretty stressed. Even though on some level I knew that the chances of infection were minimal, it's still scary.
Then the doctor saw me.
Sure enough, I needed a tetnus shot. And they decided to draw blood to make sure I had a baseline test, and then do follow up tests in six weeks. The chances of catching anything from a needle that had been on the ground for a long time (it was beat up, I saved it in case they could test it but they couldn't) are almost nothing, but life-extensionists don't take chances.
I don't know if anyone remembers my stories of blood draws, but I am a very, very rough stick. You can see my veins, but they're very hard to get blood out of.
So the medical assistant (I don't think she was a nurse, I can basically smell nurses with my nurse radar and it wasn't going off at all) attempted to draw my blood out of my right arm. I was lying down because I am a serious fainter. Needle goes in. Ouch. Room starts to go black. I struggle to think of something else. Keith Olbermann in a hotel bar? Nope, not working. My new campaign? Yes, that works. How badly I need more staff... plans for literature calendar... yes, soon I am sufficiently stressed about my campaign that I'm not completely freaking out as the medical assistant mentions starts to move the needle around inside my arm.
Ouch. Ouch ouch ouch. "I can see the vein, but I can't get any blood out of it," she says.
For some reason I feel compelled to offer an explanation.
"I forgot to mention that I'm a vampire. I don't have blood. Sorry bout that."
She laughs. I make jokes when I'm in pain. Anyone who's been through a campaign with me knows that.
Still, moving a giant needle around inside my arm. The room is once again going black again.
"I'm so sorry, but this isn't going to work. We need to stop."
She pulls the needle out of my arm and I hear a commotion outside. "Her partner is here, can he come in?"
Of course he can! And through the door walks an angel... well, actually a 37 year old man who vaguely resembles a giraffe but he's my angel. I had called him while I was waiting to see the doctor but I didn't realize he'd jump in the car and come to be at my side.
"Oh sweetie, thank you so much for coming."
"I knew you'd have a hard time if they were drawing blood, so I came to hold your hand and take you home."
I felt so loved that I figured I could get through another round of attempted blood draws, even though my Keith Olbermann fantasy was failing me and even my attempts to stress myself out about work weren't dulling the pain.
"She has tiny veins, use a butterfly needle," he commanded the medical assistant. He is very protective of me and I love it. I've spent much of my adult life rescuing men from bad situations... I have what I call a Princess Leia complex, named after the part of Return of the Jedi where Leia comes to save Han Solo from Jabba the Hutt. Don't worry, the princess is here to rescue you, and she's holding a thermal detonator, isn't that nice? But even warrior princesses need to be protected sometimes, and it always makes me feel so safe when this extremely soft-spoken skinny fellow takes over the situation.
The medical assistant did as he asked, much like my cat, to my amazement, does whatever MR tells him to, including jumping down from the counter on his command.
It hurt terribly but they did get some blood out of me (I made up the part about being a vampire, I should point out, before an article on Slate asserts that CR folks drink the blood of small children or something.)
MR went to tell Jeannie that he'd take me home so she didn't have to wait, and I drank some of the cherry Coke Zero he brought me (my favorite!) I stayed there resting with him holding my hand until I felt like I could get up, and even then he offered to carry me to the car if need be. One advantage to being both short and on moderate CR is that just about anyone can carry me if necessary.
So we went home and I couldn't face a real dinner (I am a stress not-eater) so I just dissolved some brewers yeast into veggie broth and put in a teaspoon of flax oil. Went to bed early.
I have huge bruises on my arms now, especially the right one, and little scars where she poked the needle multiple times. My arms hurt and I woke up feeling ill, no doubt a reaction to the tetanus shot. But I'm okay, and we did a bunch of research (MR's reaction to a crisis: pull up Pub Med!) and it's very unlikely that I could have caught anything from that needle. I'll be tested again in six weeks. Till then I'll try not to worry about it.
I have a new respect for the pin cushion though. I couldn't bring myself to stick another pin into that thing, not after this.
Posted by april at 6:22 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
October 19, 2008
But We Climb A Step Every Day
Last week I did four trainings for our members on how to do organizing meetings... back at Temple. Susie and I were so happy to be back at Temple... after all, we'd practically lived there for a few years of our lives. We've had some of our biggest victories there, setting standards for nurses in Pennsylvania. The best retirement for RNs in the private sector in PA... overtime after 36 hours (most nurses at Temple work 12 hour shifts, three a week), and improving staffing on the floors so that patients get the care they deserve. Some of the very happiest moments of my life took place at and around Temple, and re-connecting with some of the nurses I am close to was a wonderful experience.
On Wednesday night, after a member training where we all left feeling a little high on all the possibilities we're facing right now, I walked to my car, which was on the roof of the Temple parking garage. It was a beautiful clear fall night, and I was struck by the beauty of the Center City skyline from that high roof in North Philly. I stood staring into the skyline, imagining all the things to come. Then I saw a plane overhead, and I assumed it was headed for the Philly airport.
But soon it started to descend, and it wasn't long before it was practically landing on my head. The helipad is on the roof of the parking garage at Temple, and I was about to witness a landing of the trauma helicopter.
I ran to my car as the giant bird fell out of the sky... a medical helicopter whipping up so much air that I could barely hear and my hair was flying in my face as I turned the key in my car.
I had to wait there because I couldn't pass where the police car was blocking off the path where the flight nurses would take the patient into the hospital.
I sat in my car and watched the flight nurses unload the patient... a human being so profoundly injured that he (I think it was a he though I'm not sure) was almost entirely encased in medical equipment. IV bags, bandages... clearly this fellow had been in a bad accident. I thought of the pain he must be in, and of the fear and sorrow of his family as they were no doubt converging on the hospital to keep vigil until he was stabilized. In just a moment this person's life had changed forever... and I began a prayer that I keep up even now, that he be healed and made safe.
The seamless beauty of the helicopter falling out of the sky, the nurses unloading the patient, the technology that saves lives, but only with the judgment of experienced professionals who make split second decisions that are the difference between life and death. It's so easy to take these things for granted, but when you see it firsthand, and knowing as I do the toll it takes on the very humans who care for patients, the nurses... I was in awe of the lifesaving gifts these ordinary people possess and freely give, as part of their day at work.
Once the patient was in the hospital, I got out of my car and asked the police (who were parked at the helipad to make sure no one drove by while the unloading occurred) if it was okay for me to exit. I called MR to tell him I'd be home soon.
As I was walking back to my car I passed the helicopter pilot, who was standing outside and updating his charts.
"Thank you for all the work you do, saving lives," I said.
"Well thank you!" said the pilot.
I realized I was probably going to cry but I went ahead anyway. "About seventeen years ago my partner was in a car accident that was nearly fatal, but he was airlifted out and he made it and is absolutely fine now, all thanks to the work of people like you. So I really appreciate what you're doing."
"Thank you so much for stopping to tell me that. It means a lot."
I sniffled and got in my car, and drove home to get into bed next to the love of my life who would not be here at all were it not for the efforts of the nurses and paramedics who saved his life back in Canada some seventeen years ago. I imagine them every morning in my prayers, even though I don't know their names. I hope that somehow they feel it when a nurse in Pennsylvania wins the right to a voice on the job. That somehow my work can be an offering to thank them for saving the life of the most important person in the world to me. Without them, I never would have even known he existed.
It's easy in the everyday-ness of the work to get cynical and jaded, but moments like this remind me of what I am fighting for. The people who saved my partner's life, the people who brought us all into the world, the people who care for our loved ones at their weakest and most vulnerable moments... yeah, it's worth all the late late nights and the early starts and the stress that at times I've thought was going to kill me. At moments like this I am reminded.
When I got home I got an email from a new colleague, someone I'd heard about but never met before we went to San Francisco. We're working together on a project, and it was fun to have somebody to talk to at an hour when all my East Coast friends were asleep but I was still way too wired from my meetings to crash.
We have some difficult projects in front of us. But if I ever find my energy failing, if I ever think for a moment about doing something else, I will remember the helicopter flying in with the patient whose loved ones are waiting on the ground, and the opportunity we have to make things safer for nurses and patients.
And if I ever have doubts about CR, about whether or not it's worth the effort to control one's calories to try to extend life and health and youth as far as it will go, I'll remember the helicopter. The person in the helicopter is just barely hanging onto life, with all the technological interventions modern medicine can provide. How dare I damage my health with excess calories when I know first hand how very tenuous life is, when I've seen someone hanging onto it, when my own partner was nearly dead but for the interventions of modern technology and the efforts of some heroes whose names I'll never know but who are mentioned in my prayers every single day?
As I drove out of the parking lot that night, I turned on my car radio. That very old song from An Officer and a Gentleman,"Up Where We Belong," was playing.
Who knows what tomorrow brings?
In a world few hearts survive
All I know is the way I feel
It's real, I keep it alive
The road is long
There are mountains in our way
But we climb a step every day.
Posted by april at 6:04 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
October 18, 2008
More Food Network
The Food Network wanted to do another day of taping. Needless to say, I was not happy.
But I'd have to say that it's going pretty well. The guy who is taping, BJ, has been really nice, we haven't fed him any olive juice, and I hope the story will come out well.
They wanted to interview Aubrey too, so Aubrey came in Friday morning to do his day long meeting with MR, then he was interviewed today. It's always wonderful to hang out with Aubrey... I get to drink beer and imagine a world where aging is reverseable.
While Aubrey is in town I try to pack him full of as much nutrition as I can get into him. Here are the meals I've served:
lunch yesterday:
Black Bean Soup with Squash
1 can black beans
1 diced squash
Quorn tenders, Quorn grounds
garlic, chili powder, chipoltle Tabasco, Worschtershire sauce, black pepper
topped with 2 tbsps fat free sour cream and 1 tsp flax oil after heating
dinner last night:
Aubrey had leftovers from our Canadian Thanksgiving dinner. He loved the turkey with vegetarian gravy, and I made him some broccoli and asparagus sides. He thought the cranberry sauce too tart, would have preferred sweeter.
Today's lunch was filmed by the Food Network. I made portabella pizzas with squash, asparagus tips, Walden Farms marinara and nonfat mozzarella on portabella mushrooms, topped with olive oil after removing from heat. Sides were a "Caesar" salad with Quorn tenders, kale, my CR vinegarette, and mozza. Dessert was an apple parfait with fresh honeycrisp apples over fat free ricotta with hazelnuts and Walden Farms chocolate sauce.
I am exhausted. Cleaning, doing the interview, all on top of regular work... I am very glad this is my last media appearance for CR. The Food Network people have been great, but I don't want to be a spokesperson for CR. I just want to live my life, eat my food, and write my blog in peace.
Dinner: stuffed eggplant?
Posted by april at 1:30 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
October 15, 2008
Sage Stuffed Eggplant With Ricotta
Cut an eggplant in half lengthwise. Pre-cook half in the microwave for 3 minutes. Remove and reserve eggplant guts.
Chop guts, mix with two tbsps nonfat ricotta, minced garlic or garlic powder, and about a scant teaspoon finely minced fresh sage. Microwave 1 minute.
Replace inside eggplant.
Top with 2 oz nonfat mozzarella, shredded, and a few dashes black pepper.
Microwave to melt cheese, before serving top with 1 tsp olive oil.
Sage... so yummy... so wise.
Posted by april at 2:29 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
October 12, 2008
Sage!
And the herb of the weekend is... sage!
MR thought I was buying it to anoint the turkey for tomorrow's Canadian Thanksgiving celebration. MR being Canadian, we celebrate their Thanksgiving in traditional fashion, though substituting mashed cauliflower for potatoes and a Quorn stuffing for stuffing and low cal dressing for high cal. etc.
Nope, I bought the sage because one of my old favorite pumpkin recipes calls for sage, and it was on sale at the little produce store at the corner.
So this afternoon for Sunday lunch I made a really delicious pumpkin sage soup. Here's the recipe:
1 cup chicken or veggie broth
Lots of fresh sage, to taste, minced
1 cup pumpkin, unsalted, canned
A dash of garlic powder, No Salt, and black pepper
50 g shiitake mushrooms
2 oz nonfat mozzarella
1 tsp olive oil
Pre-boil the shiitakes in the veggie or chicken broth for 2 minutes. Then add pumpkin and sage, spices to taste. Allow to sit for a couple of hours to marinate. Re-heat and top with mozza, add olive oil after removing from heat. Serve piping hot with cheese melting into soup.
Tonight I made a dish with eggplant, asparagus, turnip green stems, squash, and sage. Tomorrow we will rub the Canadian Thanksgiving turkey with sage.
Makes me want to do yoga. Side plank is also called "sage pose." Not sure why, but it's one of my favorite poses, and one of my favorite spices!
Posted by april at 5:43 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
October 11, 2008
Squash Apple Pie
Another recipe from the files of "weird but good."
In fall, in addition to pumpkin, I find myself thinking of apples. Especially super tart Granny Smith apples. A few days ago a recipe idea occurred to me, and this evening I finally got to execute it.
Squash Apple Pie!
It's basically squash stuffed with diced Granny Smith apples, nonfat ricotta, nutmeg, cinnamon, and topped with cheese. You could use American or cheddar like a more traditional apple pie, but I used nonfat mozzarella because MR likes that better.
Split the suqashes and hollow out with a spoon. Mix up the ricotta (about two tbsps per squash) with nutmeg, cinnamon, pepper (I used the Grains of Desire spice mix I've written about but you could use regular pepper) and about 50 g Granny Smith apples, diced, in a bowl, along with the squash guts. Stuff into the hollowed squashes and top with FF Mozza or whatever cheese you want.
If you didn't mind a bump up on the calories, this would be amazing with some chevre (goat cheese) mixed in with the ricotta. Green apples topped with chevre and finished off with a dash or cinnamon or nutmeg make a great simple appetizer too.
I was really excited about the squash apple pies. I mean really... what a weird recipe! MR took one bite and said, "This is really weird, but really good!"
Posted by april at 11:53 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Calling All Lemon Victims
Google ads are really, really funny. They think they're matching to what you're talking about, but sometimes it's just ridiculous.
I was exchanging recipes with a friend and there was some lemon in the recipe. So this is what Google comes up with. It's about Lemon Law, as in cars. Funny.
I suggest an alternate definition of a Lemon Victim:
Have you ever had it happen that you were squeezing a wedge of lemon into your water or tea and instead of going into the beverage, a large squirt of lemon juice went directly into the eye of one of your dining companions? That person, the one with the eye full of fresh squeezed lemon juice, is a Lemon Victim.
Cherry Tomato Victim doesn't have the same ring to it, does it?
Posted by april at 11:45 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 9, 2008
Maybe I'm Just Missing Rice?
This country is full of them. Coffee addicts. I used to be one, until I discovered that drinking regular coffee gives me anxiety attacks. Good to know. I'm always amazed at people who can drink four shots of espresso and not end up shaking. But lots and lots of people can't function without their coffee, and it's not a bad drug, unless you have a bad reaction to it.
Tea, on the other hand, is harder to explain. I've always liked tea a lot, but definitely never had cravings for it. Unless you count a few years ago when MR's supplier gave us some sencha gold, really expensive fancy stuff, that he somehow got (I'm certain it was legal, but I don't need details.)
That I had cravings for, but it ran out so I had to get over it.
I've definitely had better quality tea than the genmai cha MR got me... in fact I was reading the other day that it used to be the tea that poor people drank, since the roasted rice was cheaper than tea so mixing them lowered the price. Often times the poor have good taste, I note. It's the peppery taste that I seem to be hooked on, a very interesting little spicy taste that is hard to describe.
However, yesterday when I had the tea at the fancy tea shop, it definitely hit the spot. This is good news: special treat while in town. And also bad news: the tea is expensive at the fancy tea shop -- $3.21 for a small cup. That could rapidly become an expensive hobby. Quite worth it, especially if you can sit in the shop, which is very cute, and drink a whole pot. But I'd better not make a daily habit of it.
At least it's a healthy treat.
In pondering why I've become psychologically if not physically addicted to this tea, it occurs to me: maybe I just miss rice? It was one of the staples of my diet pre-CR, and I've almost entirely cut it out. It's a lot more calorie efficient to drink unsweetened tea than to eat rice!
Posted by april at 4:48 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
October 6, 2008
Captive Audience
In union organizer lingo, a captive audience meeting is one held on work time that the workers are required to attend, where the boss talks about the union. It is perfectly legal for management to lie, and they do.
Before I met MR, I was always frustrated that the guys I dated did like my cooking, but often wanted to go out anyway. Now don't get me wrong, I love a good dinner in Center City Philly as much or more than the next girl, but I love to cook. Love love love to cook. And love to cook as an expression of love.
Living for over three years with a man who loves my cooking has been a very rewarding experience. I may grind my spirit into little tiny shreds every day on the front lines of organizing, but I get to be creative when I cook dinner for my baby. He depends on me to make dinner: he is a captive audience for my cooking. And he likes it!
Tonight I had a lot of fun with dinner. I stuffed mushrooms with eggplant. The trick is to pre-cook both the mushrooms and the eggplant. Else they're bitter. I topped them with fat free mozzarella and microwaved and then topped with olive oil after heating.
In the middle of the plate I served chopped eggplant and Quorn meatballs topped with fat free mozzarella, basil and oregano, then covered with Walden Farms marinara. Side dish of lemon broccoli.
He loved dinner. I love cooking CR-friendly, and it is so satisfying to have someone enjoy my cooking so much.
Now it's late and I'm craving genmai cha but fearing to ingest even the smallest amount of caffeine in case I can't sleep. I'll brew a pot first thing in the morning, then do my yoga, meditation, and work out.
I can never get enough of that tea. I'm planning a trip for work in November and already panicking about how I'm going to make my tea. Seriously.
But of all the things you could be addicted to, at last it's something healthy!
Posted by april at 10:37 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
October 5, 2008
Portabella Pumpkin Pizzas '08!
Here they are! This year's pumpkin pizza: simple, elegant, delicious, nutritious, and low calorie!
Portabella mushrooms, relieved of their stems.
Canned unsalted pumpkin.
Fat free ricotta.
Nonfat mozzarrella.
Olive oil.
Garlic, No Salt, dash of chili powder.
Pre-cook the mushrooms in the microwave for two minutes. Top with pumpkin, into which you will sprinkle garlic, No Salt, and chili, followed by a large dollop (approx 1 tbsp) of fat free ricotta. Top with mozza and microwave till they're all melty. Then top with olive oil just before serving.
Simple, easy. April's style of cooking: fast, healthy, no big fuss, but comes out delicious every time.
I've gotta go brew another pot of genmai cha before I go insane with longing for it. It doesn't take much to get me addicted. One good taste and I'm hooked.
Posted by april at 12:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Curried Pumpkin Stew With Asparagus and Portabellas
Yesterday I made the most amazing pumpkin stew for lunch. Pumpkin dissolved in a small amount of vegetable broth (no salt added Rapunzel vegan vegetable broth) with Quorn tenders, asparagus, and a chopped portabella. Lots of curry, garlic, and a dash of No Salt. The mix of pumpkin with portabella is so tasty. Also great with shiitake.
I love pumpkin season!
Woke up this morning feeling sleepy but craving genmai cha so much that I got out of bed and immediately made up a pot. Now that is some good tea!
Posted by april at 6:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 4, 2008
Where Is Your Head Katherine? Where Is Your Head?
I'm sure that it did not escape the notice of regular readers that I was absent for much of the summer.
What was I doing? you may ask.
Well, a lot of things. Re-connecting with old friends. Enjoying the first slow period at my work in six years. (Gasp!) Taking vacation time! I had racked up 52 days. And writing plays.
Yes, writing plays.
Apparently I write plays. Don't feel left out -- I didn't know either.
Well, I had an inkling. I went to an arts school for high school (Interlochen Arts Academy, to be exact) and I majored in theatre. I hated acting: I was the stage manager. And one of the greatest stage managers who ever went there, if I do say so myself. Stage managing is a lot like leading organizing campaigns: attention to detail, ability to nurture people through stressful situations while retaining discipline, etc. I also directed. My senior recital was Anouilh's Antigone. The leadership of the theatre department said my interpretation was overly political. I was already a union organizer, I just didn't know it yet.
So this summer I started to write plays. I've belonged to a group that does some experimental theatre for awhile, but I'd never tried to write anything myself. This summer the creative impulse that thirteen years of union organizing had wrung out of me reared its ugly head again, and I started to write. I wrote a trilogy of plays, very experimental, that are based on Greek mythology. Specifically they are based on the Iliad and the events that followed.
For the task, I've been re-reading the Iliad. I got a new translation, by Robert Fagels, that is much better than the Lattimore translation I read at Yale. I was reading it on the plane to San Fransisco and back.
The thing about re-reading all this Greek mythology is that you start to see everyone you know as a character in the Iliad, or maybe the Aeneid. Or the Odyssey. Especially if you are in the midst of high-level negotiations of any sort. I realized today that no one but my father would really get the joke so I called him:
"Dad, it just occurred to me that while (insert name of a friend of ours) thinks he's Hector, he is just so Agamemnon."
My dad laughed hysterically. He totally gets it.
In the Greek classics, humans are acted upon by the Gods, forces they can not control but that often push them in one direction or another. Aphrodite causes Helen to fall in love with Paris. Hera and Athena are mostly to blame for the Trojan War. The Greeks were really good at blaming the Gods for causing problems. But reading their literature, we reflect on many ways that we as humans pretend that forces are beyond our control, when in fact it is only our own ego dictating our course of action.
"Don't be Achilles," I say to myself every morning.
My classical education may be making me crazy, but it did yield a lot of creative output, and it was fun to be something other than the organizer bunny for a little while.
I'm more of a Clytemnestra than a Dido, more of an Odysseus than an Agamemnon, and if I had my choice I'd probably set sail for Rome too.
But in case you're wondering where I've been, that's it. I wrote plays. I had a really good time. I'm still putting the final details on them, actually. And still reading the classics. My father and I are still in hysterics as I compare everyone I know to a Greek hero.
And the headline, in case you're wondering, if from K. D. Lang's "The Mind of Love."
Posted by april at 10:33 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Pumpkin Time!
As soon as the calendar hits October, my thoughts turn to pumpkin. I already cooked up a bunch of pumpkin dishes on October 1, but this weekend is going to be a major pumpkin fest.
Remember last year when I made the portabello pumpkin pizzas? Or the lemon pumpkin soup? Curried pumpkin squash is just the tip of the iceberg... or the stem of the pumpkin... but let's not mix metaphors.
I am very excited.
It's a beautiful crisp fall day here. I love fall, even though I know that winter follows it quickly and I hate freezing. I'm looking forward to this winter though... 2009 is threatening to be the best year ever.
Pumpkin recipes to follow... I'm off to yoga class! Nothing starts your weekend off right like a very tough 9:15 am Vinyasa on Saturday.
Posted by april at 8:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 2, 2008
Flavor of the Week
A few weeks ago I took my friend ML out for sushi at what I strongly believe is the best sushi place in Philadelphia, Kisso at 4th and Arch. I always order the Jay roll because even though I know it's named after an employee and not my friend Jay (who couldn't make sushi if his life depended on it, though he might be able to make it disappear!) I still feel like I am heaping more honor on his name by invoking it when I order sushi. We ate a whole lot of food, and then we hung out talking. The restaurant was nearly empty and after a little while they started to bring us tea. Really, really hot tea in nice cups.
I took one sip of the tea and turned into a completely different person.
"What is this?" I asked ML. She's an expert on tea... she even moved to Japan to study tea, and now conducts tea ceremonies at various places in Philadelphia. She told me that it was a special fall tea, as apparently there is a tea for every season, as well as for different festivals. This, she said, was a green tea with roasted barley.
We sat drinking cup after cup until we were about to float away and when I got home I told MR that I had found a tea I loved and I had to have more.
Now MR has been trying to pour green tea down my throat for years, and I do love it, the organic sencha he orders from somewhere, I'm not sure where but I'm quite certain it's legal. When we first got together and I would visit him in Canada, I'd make pot after pot of the tea. Once he moved here, we started making blends of green tea with herbals that I like, such as peppermint, lemon, or blueberry. But I often forget to drink my tea, and MR gets worried because EGCGs in green tea are so good for you that he quite demands that I drink a pot a day.
Consider that problem solved. I am in lust with genmai cha.
As soon as he found out that I had discovered a green tea I was crazy about, he phoned the restaurant to make sure he knew the right kind to order. Sure enough, it wasn't sencha with barley, it's sencha with roasted rice. He ordered it, and it just arrived a few days ago.
But I wasn't allowed to have it until I finished the backlog of green and herbal blends he made me while I was in California.
"Oh, you are so two teas ago!" I thought as I consumed the last dregs of the pre-genmai cha era.
Then this morning he made me the first pot.
As soon as I smelled it I knew it was the right stuff. Slightly peppery. The first sip was ecstatic. Yep, that's it. Unmistakeable. Real green tea but with an unpredictable twist.
I like to have something to sip on all day at work (and all night, in many cases, as organizers work 24/7.) This summer I discovered that I can't drink coffee because too much caffeine at once gives me anxiety. This after years of being a hardcore coffee drinker, but anyway... sometimes you don't know what's hurting you until you accidentally go without it for awhile.
So all summer I drank decaf iced coffee. I'd brew it at home, super strong, and keep it in the fridge, pouring it over ice when I was ready to drink it. But it's turned fall now, quite cool really just as of today, and it's time for a new drink.
I'm on my second pot of the day. Drank the first within the first hour at work. Went home for lunch (I live six blocks from my office, for those of you who are just joining us) and made another pot while eating my salad.
I even gave Susie a taste, and she likes it. Ever since she got pregnant, her taste has changed. We used to have radically different tastes in everything, but lately we've found we like some of the same things. Including tea, it seems.
The tiny amount of caffeine in green tea is fine for me, and the EGCGs are actively health-promoting. I am the kind of person who gets into a taste and has to have a lot of it, so it's good news that I've become infatuated with something that is actually good for me!
I am one of those people who is in constant need of a thrill. A new taste, a new trick, a new high... I suspect that my thirteen years of organizing have completely shot my dopamanurgic receptors to the point where normal life is just too boring for me... if I'm not running a campaign, dodging bullets, and drinking something piping hot, I'm bored. And when I'm bored, I'm dangerous. Ask anyone. (Wait, don't ask. Well, don't expect them to tell you. Just keep me busy, okay?)
Genmai cha is both good for me and extremely tasty. I could get really used to this. Just finished my second pot of the day. EGCGs running all through my veins. I may need a constant infusion.
I believe Prince has some wisdom on this topic for us, from "Pop Life:"
Everybody needs a thrill
We've all got a space to fill
Everybody wants to be on top
Life it ain't really funky
Unless it's got that pop
Posted by april at 2:21 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Really Simple CR-Friendly Vinegarette
This is very easy, and MR is replacing the Walden Farms Italian dressing he had been using on his morning salad with this... much lower sodium.
Red wine vinegar
Dried basil
Dried oregano
Crushed garlic or garlic powder
Black pepper
Capers (not too many, just about a teaspoon for a normal-sized salad dressing bottle.
Either blend in the blender or just shake before using. Add your oil separately, so that you can measure it.
MR also added a fat substitute called Z-Trim to make it thicker, but I like it just fine in watery form... then again, I've been putting plain vinegar on salads for thirteen years.
Posted by april at 3:41 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
October 1, 2008
Hello October!
I turned the page on my Hello Kitty calendar this morning to reveal the headline. Yay! October is my favorite month.
And now that it's October, it's time for cooking with pumpkin!
Here are the pumpkin treats I'm serving today:
Curried Pumpkin Squash Stew:
1 cup unsalted canned pumpkin
2 small yellow squash, chopped
180 grams Quorn tenders (you could use any other protein too, would be great with chicken or tofu)
a lot of curry, garlic, black pepper and a dash of chili
8 g hazelnuts
Dissolve the pumpkin in water, stir in the spices, pre-microwave the Quorn and add. Spice to taste. Add a little no-salt if you need. Add the squash at the last minute so as not to overcook. Feel free to garnish with fresh black pepper or a dot of fat free plain yogurt or nonfat sour cream. Add a teaspoon flax oil (or olive) after removing from heat, add hazelnuts just before serving.
For his dessert tonight he's getting a nonfat ricotta parfait topped with a half cup of pumpkin, cinnamon, "Grains of Desire" (a wonderful spice mix made of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, cardamom, and hot black pepper) and Walden Farms chocolate sauce, topped with hazelnuts and flax oil. Pumpkin chocolate sundae!
Okay, gotta get back to work. Chuck, I'll answer your question on the previous entry asap.
Posted by april at 11:56 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack