A Visual Guide

The concept of a vision board has become a bit trite, but I do think it works. I wholeheartedly believe that if you dream it and focus your energy on what you want, you can get it. Everything on my board for 2010 came true in some fashion whether it was better communication skills, laughing until my belly hurt with girlfriends and my sisters, beachy and European vacations, taking time to just stop for a moment, or growing my business and in turn making more Ben Franklins. For the past year, the collage of photos lived on my to-do list, making me face those goals daily, which I found as a helpful reminder of the path up ahead.

This year’s board is more of the same, but slightly deeper, despite the superficial feel–ahem, Rolex. Truth be told, that was my late father’s watch, and this year he and I have some healing work that I’ve needed to put a close on for some time now. Each item on my board represents a feeling or something I hope to accomplish. Whatever you believe for 2011, here’s to a fresh focus–may everything you envision manifest.

Good Fortune

I was going to write a piece this week about good fortune foods. The spread on New Years Day laid out with promises of abundant wealth, health, and prosperity in 2011. You know, Southerners have the ritual of Hoppin’ John, that I swear by. No joke, I made this exact recipe a week before my husband got his job offer this past summer because I thought, “Hell, it can’t hurt and we’ve gotta eat, forget that it’s June.” And by gosh, within a month he was a badge-wearing employee again with a direct deposit paycheck that arrives every two weeks. So, start soaking those field peas.

I make Hoppin’ John the way my mom makes Mississippi Caviar—a relish laced with black eyed peas piled on crackers every January 1. Italians have chiacchiere, gorgeous pillows of pasta-fried dough drizzled in honey, and in many parts of Spain it’s custom to eat exactly twelve grapes at the stroke of midnight. I was going to explore the ancient cultural and religious significance behind these foods and their relevance in modern times. Sounds fascinating, doesn’t it?

But, I got buried in writing deadlines, shopping, cooking, wrapping, traveling, and so, well, eff it … basically take your pick at eating pork, fried dough, cakes and breads (possibly with a coin baked inside, or nuts, or dried fruits), herring, cod, soba noodles, black eye peas, or collards, and call it a year brimming with possibility.

Instead of this well-researched gem of a piece, will a cocktail recipe do? What’s ringing in the New Year without a little booze, after all? And I particularly like the walk of shame this drink recipe is alluding to, I mean–what’s New Year’s Eve without a bad decision?

Here’s to 2011!

Redhead in Bed
Adapted from Food & Wine
Makes 10 drinks

3 pounds strawberries, hulled and coarsely chopped (use frozen this time of year)
2/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons citrus vodka
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
Ice
1/3 cup chilled Riesling

In a bowl, toss the strawberries with the sugar and let stand, stirring occationally, until the strawberries release their juices, about 10 minutes.

In a blender, combine half each of the strawberries and their juices, the vodka and lime juice with 1 cup of the ice and puree. Pour into a pitcher. Repeat with the remaining strawberries and juices, vodka and lime juice and 1 more cup of ice. Fill 10 Collins glasses halfway with ice. Pour the drink into the glasses, top each with ½ tablespoon of Riesling and serve.

Whoopie Pies

The cupcake trend is officially over. Finished. Dunzo. Here to take its place … the whoopie pie. I keep seeing recipes for these suckers. My top two reasons why:

1. One could call them rustic, which loosely translated means they don’t require the skill set of Martha Stewart and a gazillion kitchen tools to make. Sweet, creamy filling piled between two soft cookie-ish pillows trump stale cupcakes any day of the week.

2. People like saying the word “whoopie.” And like it with the word “pie.” It doesn’t hurt that it looks and tastes like a revved up Oreo (sans the lard-laden vanilla filling).

At any rate, my lovely sister-in-law made these for us at a holiday party she hosted, and everyone gobbled them up. Her version had chocolate cookies and a vanilla filling that she rolled in peppermint. They are tasty, simple to whip up, and will be an instant nostalgic hit in your dessert repertoire.

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Ho-Ho Holiday Films

This time of year my husband goes Clark Griswold crazy for about five weeks. From roughly Thanksgiving to the first of January-ish the exterior of our house looks like it’s on fire, and the interior has more greenery than a vegetarian’s dinner plate. In other words, decorating for Christmas is on like Donkey Kong. Normally this fuss stresses me out, but through the years we’ve managed to compromise a bit—he’ll curb the excitement and I’ll wean myself from my freak out level regarding the Santa and snowflake knickknacks taking over every room.

One thing I do enjoy this time of year is holiday films. There is something about cozying up on the couch and watching movies with someone else’s dysfunction. Here’s my list of holiday movies that always make the rounds. Side note–refer back to my Turkey Tension Playlist circa 2008 if you think watching “Love Actually” in front of the in-laws is a good idea.

 

Peppermint Bark

Growing up, my family didn’t have many holiday traditions. I can remember two—opening one gift each on Christmas Eve, and an annual Thanksgiving morning competition to decide which team has dish duty (the year of the pinball tournament was the best). But I can’t remember food ones that stuck year in and year out. Some years my mom would bake her holly cake—a jelly-rolled number shaped like a log with frosting spruced up with mint extract, and decorated with jellied gummies that she’d cut into leaf shapes—we loved it. Or some years she’d make candies like fudge or use cup molds for caramels and peanut butter meltaways.

Like most traditions, ours just sort of happen once and then are requested year after year. But most are labors of love, entailing loads of stress (I get that the turkey stuffed inside a duck was fun one year, but maybe it’s just a one-time deal?). In my family’s case, my guess is that there were so many of us kids that the recipe requests varied, and my mother tried her best to appease us all. Maybe that’ll be my story once we have children too, but the first year I was married I stumbled on Paula Deen (I think) making peppermint bark on television and have been making it each December since.

The thing with peppermint bark is that it’s everywhere—Target, Williams Sonoma, department stores—everywhere. Which totally surprises me, because it’s the most embarrassingly simple thing to make. I riffed off Deen’s basic recipe and made it into something I could actually tell people about—even two glasses of wine in. You’ll see what I mean below. At any rate, it’s a favorite around our house. This year I’ll package it in sleek tins, nest in pretty tissue, and make labels to give the bark as gifts. Or I might do them Donna Hay style and put them in metallic cups for individual little treats. Either way, it’s a holiday staple we cannot live without, and a tradition not worth stressing over.

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Iconic Events

I saw Nigella Lawson on book tour last year touting her holiday cookbook, Nigella Christmas. She gave a fantastic history lesson about medieval times and the tradition of glowing lights (err lanterns) lining the exterior of houses, making it easier for loved ones to find their way, despite the frigid weather and blackness of night. Those lights–warm and comforting, beaconing family and friends inside.

That story is so fitting because I just got back from spending the holiday in my hometown of Leavenworth, Kansas, just outside of Kansas City. One thing I love the most about KC is the plaza lighting ceremony, an annual event Thanksgiving night, marking the outdoor district open for the shopping season. That one night sums up what Kansas City means to me, it’s about family and friends and being bundled up and, as Nigella’s history lesson proved, one seeped in tradition.

But, not many people outside of Kansas City know about it, or other events similar to it for that matter. These iconic events that define a city, specific to a certain time and place; this country is full of them. Here are my picks for some of the lesser-known iconic events that sum up a time and space.

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A Simple Side Salad

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. My birthday falls around it and most years I’m surrounded by dear friends and family, which is pretty perfect. But, really, birthday or not, it’s about the food, isn’t it? At our house, we’re traditional all the way, but sometimes I want sides that aren’t so rich. Several years ago I started making an asparagus salad that I found in an old Food & Wine magazine that has become one of our staples. I like that the fennel dressing can be made in advance, same for toasting the walnuts, so day of, it’s just blanching asparagus and assembling. It doesn’t get simpler than this; save the fussy for the cornbread stuffing.

Asparagus Salad with Toasted Walnuts and Goat Cheese
6 servings

1 cup walnut halves (4 ounces)
½ teaspoon fennel seeds
2 pounds medium asparagus
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 ½ tablespoons sherry vinegar
1 large scallion, white and light green parts only, very finely chopped
1 tablespoon chopped tarragon
1 tablespoon chopped mint
salt and freshly ground pepper
4 ounces crumbled goat cheese

1. Preheat the oven to 350°. Spread the walnuts on a small baking sheet and bake them for 8 minutes, or until lightly toasted. Transfer to a plate to cool, then break in half.

2. Meanwhile, in a small skillet, toast the fennel seeds over moderately high heat until fragrant and golden, about 20 seconds. Transfer to a work surface and let cool, then finely chop.

3. Pour ½ inch of water into a large pot fitted with a large steamer basket and bring to a boil. Discard the tough ends from the asparagus and add the spears to the steamer; cover and steam over high heat until just tender, about 4 minutes. Transfer to paper towels and pat dry. Let cool to room temperature, then cut on the diagonal into 2-inch lengths.

4. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk the olive oil with the vinegar, scallion, tarragon, mint and chopped fennel seeds. Season with salt and pepper.

5. Add the asparagus and walnuts to the bowl and toss. Add the goat cheese. Season with salt and pepper, transfer to plates and serve.

Turkey Tension Playlist III

It’s time for the annual Thanksgiving playlist that’s often served with sides of tension and drama. This year, I’m bucking tradition and pairing it only with gratefulness–that’s the point of Thanksgiving, yes? I’m grateful for the hardest year I’ve had in about a decade, yet the most rewarding, by far.

The biggies–my mom’s through chemo and a stem cell transplant; my husband is happily employed. Last fall, I felt like I had a brick tied to my ankles and I was drowning in a gigantic ocean, scared of the unknown horizon ahead. I’m thankful for the support of dear friends and family who stood by us through the poorer and sickness parts. Some years aren’t exactly bottles of bubbly-worthy, but here’s a toast to the days that actually are. These tunes remind me of that and I’m publishing with ample time to get the iPod all loaded with turkey dinner party mood music.

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Before & After, Bathroom

My marriage survived a bathroom renovation.

Let me rephrase–my marriage survived showering at the gym for a week with a cold the size of Texas taking up my chest, allowing a grown man who likes to be called Plug into my home to install a toilet, putting my contact lenses in at my kitchen table (since that’s where the contents of our medicine cabinet lived for the better part of a month), watching my father-in-law and husband install over-the-sink lighting and both live to talk about it, and blow-drying my hair in the dark while waiting for my husband to install those same vanity lights. Good times.

We live in a two bedroom, one bathroom 1940s bungalow that we bought just over four years ago. We love it, adore it even. Except for the one part … the bathroom.

I suppose the bathroom trouble really started at move in, so let’s back up. There were parts of it we liked … the pedestal sink, the vintage tiled floor, but the shower, my word, that was a different situation entirely. It had always been an eyesore, just awful to look at, let alone shower in. Moldy cracked tile which I made worse in an incident I try to not bring up, but I will here–I was shaving my legs with one propped on the tiled soap tray and it ripped off the wall. I blame it on the shoddy wall and cracked tile, not the weight of my gam, but, what ensued was my husband doing a tile patch job so horrific and non-matching that I never brought up a renovation again for fear of what the end result would be if he starting thinking laying tiles himself was a good idea.

But, the conversation did come back up. We decided that since I work from home and would spend a good deal of the summer and fall traveling, wouldn’t it be great to get that bathroom redone on one of my trips out of town? Fabulous. Now, my husband and I operate on very different speeds of the spectrum, which most the time meshes into a semi-sane person working at a semi-sane pace. During my first trip away, I believed I was leaving and coming home to a surprise new bathroom situation. Come to find out the phone call to suss out contractors hadn’t even been made. I’m not saying I would’ve been slinging the sledgehammer (more like I would’ve swung it once and sat in the mess I made crying hysterically wondering how to fix it all); yet something would’ve been done.

Clearly men and women look at very different things when doing any sort of renovation project. Ours went something like this:

Me–Trying to rationalize a $128 shower curtain purchase because it’s pretty and convincing him that the color scheme of blue, steel and yellow is the way to go. PS–the shower curtain for that price was a no-go.

Him–Wondering about plumbing pipes, caulking and sealing, toilet with eco-friendly flushing, and non-chemical paint.

So, here’s the before and after bathroom renovation. It should be noted that I’m certainly grateful I’m married to a man who’s strong enough to know when to call in reinforcement and not just scream frantically “shut off the water!” while I scurry for a stack of beach towels.

Coffee & Eggs

I’ve never been a huge coffee drinker, which is a bit odd since tribes of them surround me. I grew up in a household where my mother brewed a full pot daily and proceeded to down the last drop by herself. I sometimes wonder what sort of person my mother would be without her entire pot of coffee a day habit.

And now, I’m married to a man I’ve learned through the years to not even so much as look at before he’s showered and poured at least one cup of really strong stuff and sipped it in silence (bar ESPN’s Sportscenter). I don’t set coffee meetings (I make cocktail, lunch, or dinner plans), and I’ve just never (even in my time spent on overnight rotations in news) felt like I couldn’t live without coffee. And I’ve had good coffee–Hawaiian, Costa Rican, Jamaican–though never been a fan of Starbucks, or as it’s referred to in my house, ‘burnbucks’ or ‘bitterbucks’ (they over-roast their beans, big time).

Now, don’t get me wrong, I do drink coffee. I like the ritual of it at home, the smell, the coffeemaker waking me up in the morning with its handy timer set to go off and rouse us out of bed. I like the kind of beans we buy and that we grind them finely ourselves. I like the way we make it. I like to add a teeny bit of turbinado sugar to it and I like the brand of organic half and half I buy. I like the white Crate & Barrel mugs that are one of the only things from our wedding registry dishes that aren’t missing from the set–-dinner plates and cereal bowls, that’s a whole other story.

But, the truth of it is this—I’ve never had a coffee drink. You know, my drink. Honestly, I never know what to order and usually settle for basic black that I doctor to resemble my coffee at home. As a matter for fact, I don’t even know what I like. I know my husband’s order (Americano with room), my older sister’s (skinny latte with a shot of peppermint), my twin sister’s (varies between time of day and runs the gamut of simple drip to lattes and cappuccinos), and my mom’s (no-nonsense black). In our world of coffee culture, wi-fi, and mobile offices, I’m supposed to know what I like to drink in the morning; society wants me to know these things. Every office I’ve ever worked in had the drill of sending the interns on a Starbucks run. I’d take so long trying to decide I’d just tell them to forget it and get back to doing whatever I was doing before the sweetly gestured interruption.

It all reminds me of that scene in Runaway Bride, the “how do you like your eggs?” moment where Julia Roberts’s Maggie character makes every sort of egg imaginable and ends up with Benedict as the only one she likes, after years of poached, whites-only, and scrambled with dill to appease whomever she was engaged to. Taking that time to figure out what you like. Not what everyone else likes, what you like.

And then it happened. I got my drink. While in Europe over the summer, at any cafe I’d just simply order a coffee with milk without even thinking about it. Though, unlike in my home kitchen, I wouldn’t add sugar because of the decadence of the whole milk, and also unlike at home, coffee there often means espresso and milk means steamed milk. These rich coffees were lovely and I wanted one every single morning. So, there you have it. I’m a cafe au lait. After all these years of skirting around the coffee culture, I finally have a drink worth ordering.