Two Further Thoughts About Barb

At the washline this morning, I realized that I wrote my post yesterday before my thoughts had really crystallized.

Thought one: I don't know if I expected Barb to have some tricky tricks or clever solutions or fancy systems up her sleeve for her beautiful life and pleasant home, but in fact, it seems that Barb's magic is just faithfully keeping house all the time.  "Just do it" as a homemaking method is not very enticing and won't sell magazines, but it's extremely effective.  (But I also wonder if Barb's skills and habits are so deeply ingrained that neither she nor I could tease out and articulate what is really going on day in and day out.  I wonder.)

Thought two: I have a stereotype of women Barb's age who see the homemaking I'm doing and say, "oh, I used to do that. . . "  It's almost as if retirement finally gives them permission to take shortcuts and buy solutions or hire help in every area of homemaking. Was homemaking just a phase, a season of life? Barb isn't doing that.  She's pretty much carrying on the way she always did, which makes sense to me (please know that I take shortcuts sometimes!).  But what I want to know is what makes a homemaker slack off anyway? What kind of homemaker will I be when I'm retired?  I wonder.

How Barb Keeps House

Barb first got my attention as a homemaker when she volunteered to bring a plate of Christmas cookies to a little gathering of ladies.  It was a real old-fashioned cookie plate, with at least 6 different kinds of cookies, some exquisite and some straightforward, all delicious.  Barb told me she likes to bake half-batches ahead of the Christmas season so she can keep the cookies in the freezer to pull out for occasions where a cookie plate is called for.

I was impressed with her efficiency, enjoyment of the season, and baking.  I probed deeper, betting that here was a homemaker that I could learn from.

We each had a little Lenten rose from Barb's yard at our place setting.

Barb invited me and Phoebe to her lovely home for lunch and let me write things down and snap some photos, all while we handled a busy toddler.  Barb is an experienced daycare and preschool teacher, as well as a mother and grandmother, so she knew how to wrangle Phoebe.

Some highlights of our conversation and my notes:

1. Barb enjoys homemaking, which is why she's still doing it all instead of taking shortcuts that I think are typical of retired women I know.  Not only did Barb's mom enjoy entertaining and flowers, but she was willing to share her enjoyment and let Barb do some of the cooking for company as early as 13.  

2. Barb writes out menus a week at a time before she goes grocery shopping. She hopes to save money and not waste food.  In fact, she writes down every penny she spends in order to keep track of where her money goes; she's been doing it for years, in fact, and compiling the information each month.  Her husband tallies it year by year.  

3.  Clutter is Barb's cleaning priority because she feels better when things are in place and she can find things easily.  However, she also wants her family to feel good about coming home and being themselves, so she prioritized happy kids over a perfectly clean and tidy house.  Barb doesn't have a schedule for cleaning, although she said she likes to clean towards the end of the week and laughingly told me not to look behind doors where she had stashed clutter in advance of my visit. 

Creative kitchen storage.

4. Barb relies on her big freezer a lot.  She always cooks full recipes even though she and her husband are the only ones at home, freezing the extra for times of sickness, hosting guests, or for Sunday dinner. When she was working long hours and parents would complain about not knowing what was for supper and not having time to cook, she would tell them how she filled up her slow cooker before she went to bed and then in the morning, put the food in the fridge to be heated up for supper.

Clever to add the decorative towel over the regular handtowel.

5.  Barb loves trying new recipes, probably 1 or 2 a week, and is grateful for a husband who enjoys her experiments.  She's attracted to quick and easy recipes that don't require her to buy specialty ingredients.  In the winter, she makes soup at least once a week and in the summer, main dish salads.  

6.  Barb has four raised beds where she grows vegetables.  She freezes and cans a lot of food, keeping track of the total yields for two years at a time inside her cupboard door.  

Homemaking is a deeply layered set of skills, is it not?  Barb keeps her house running efficiently and graciously, and I'm so glad I had the chance to ask her about it, to try to deconstruct the skills that she's built up over the years and takes for granted. 

I encourage you, dear readers, to seek out the experts among us - not necessarily the professionals with the degrees to prove it - the competent people whose skills you admire and ask them:  how do you do this?  Why do you do this?  You'll probably get farther than I did without a toddler and her exigencies. 

Mayo in No Time at All

I've been making mayo for years in the food processor, but when I blogged about it two summers ago, several of you suggested that I try stick blender mayonnaise.

I was struck pretty much dumb the first time I tried it.  It's so easy!  So fast!  You just put the ingredients in a jar, shove the stick blender down in, and pretty much before you can say "mayonnaise," it's done!

So that's how I make mayo now; it has never failed me in quality or speediness.  It's magical to watch it form in the jar!

Magic Mayo

Measure into a wide-mouth pint jar (I use the line on the jar):
1 cup neutral veg oil

Add:
1 egg
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
1 Tbsp. white wine vinegar
1 tsp. prepared mustard (dijon is called for, but I just use my homemade)
1/2 tsp. salt

Put immersion blender in jar, firmly on bottom.  Hold blender to bottom of jar while blending until you see creamy mayo rising up to 2/3 of the way.  Pull the blender up through the mixture to get the top layer of oil emulsified.  Give a few more blasts on the blender through the whole jar, but do not overbeat. Done!  Put the lid on and store in the fridge.

Stroller Organizer

Phoebe's main stroller kept breaking at a joint, and my husband would fix it and shake his head warningly.  So I took that as a sign that the stroller was going to collapse on the sidewalk with a full load of market provender some sweet day.

I could not bear the suspense.

So I took a lot of things to the children's consignment store and got $40 off a used stroller for a grand total of 20 bucks.  It feels a little wiggly and its basket is not as big as the old one, but I am now free from suspense.

I knew I was going to need some kind of stroller organizer for the new stroller because I did not want to throw my phone, wallet, and keys down in the basket.  I decided to see if I could make something that would look nice and function well.  I'm so pleased with this stroller organizer!

I used some scraps of Sunbrella fabric in my stash, so it's more like home dec weight with the added weatherproofing.  Each end has a gusset to make a roomy box with fabric ties at each corner.  I used some yellow scraps from this very misguided skirt as interior pockets.  And I put two bands of wide striped elastic at either end to tether water bottles.  There's also bottom space that I toss a book and a stroller hook into, as well as small purchases and doodads.  The fabric ties are very secure on the stroller handle.  I've been using it for over a week now, and I love it!

Sunday Dinner: Provencal Squash

The main dish of this Sunday dinner was actually sausage, potatoes, and sauerkraut, but the provencal squash is what I really want to tell you about.

Saturday:
thaw sausage
get sauerkraut out of crock in basement and into jar in fridge
peel and cube butternut squash
make cranberry applesauce (I think that's the last bag of frozen berries I have!)

Sunday morning:
assemble sauerkraut, sausage, potatoes and put in oven on timed bake
assemble provencal squash and add to oven
set out cranberry applesauce to come to room temperature

Sunday noon:
set table

I do love a side dish vegetable that is tasty and innovative but still answers to the description of vegetable; if a "side dish" has substantial cheese or meat or breadcrumbs, I treat it as a main dish, but then I still am back to square one for a vegetable.  So here is Provencal Winter Squash Gratin from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.  It's not hard, but it's clever with the ingredients and so delicious.

Provencal Squash

Place in large shallow casserole dish, well-greased:
approximately 2 lbs. winter squash, such as butternut, peeled and cubed
5 garlic cloves, chopped
1/2 cup chopped parsley
3 Tbsp. flour
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Toss gently to combine.  Drizzle generously with olive oil.
Bake uncovered at 325F for 2 hours.

Note:  I have not once included the parsley because I never remembered to buy it before I made this dish!  So a few times, I would sprinkle in a little dried rosemary or sage.  But I really do intend to include parsley next time I make this squash.

A Cozy Spot with a New Painting

This spot in our kitchen has been a process.  First there was the free table and stools from a friend's parents who were moving.  Then we installed the red light over the table; I really wish it was a translucent red, so that it would glow when the light was on.  Then I made red slipcovers for the stools to hide the boring beige.  Finally, I bought an original oil painting from Anna of Pleasantview Schoolhouse.

People perch there while I'm cooking, or I stop there with a cookbook and a snack. I leave the parts of the Sunday New York Times that I haven't read yet on the table, and read at them throughout the week.  I pull Phoebe's high chair out there for lunch and have a cozy tête-a'-tête with her, sitting sideways so she puts her feet on my knees.  It's a fun spot.

International Ice Cream For Breakfast 2017

I'm really sorry that I'm posting this a week after the holiday (it's the first Saturday in February, which was February 4 this year).

But!

 Let's say it's Ice Cream season, just like Christmas season and the way the retail stores celebrate holidays!  So you can eat your ice cream tomorrow for breakfast.

Our menu:
:::yeasted waffles (My favorite for ease, thrift, and deliciousness - recipe below)
:::hot fudge sauce (I make this in hopes that there will be leftover in the fridge so that I can sneak a spoonful at odd moments - it's ganache, essentially, and so very very very divine)
:::vanilla ice cream (from the store - not in the mood to make ice cream right now)
:::strawberries (which I bought on a whim at market after the standholder said they were delicious; no, they were not; of course they were not: this is the Northeast in February!)
:::bananas

This is Ben's plate.  He did, indeed, eat all of that. 

Yeasted Waffles, tweaked from America's Test Kitchen The Science of Good Cooking

Heat together to melt the butter:
1 3/4 cups milk
1/2 cup butter
(I do this in a large glass measure in the microwave - and my measure has a lid, so that's what I use to stash the batter in the fridge overnight; very handy)

Set aside to cool to lukewarm.

When lukewarm, add and whisk together to form batter:
1 cup whole wheat all-purpose flour (a blend of pastry and bread flour)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. instant yeast
1 tsp. salt
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla

Refrigerate the batter for 12-24 hours.  It will inflate. Whisk briefly to recombine when you're ready to make waffles; the batter will deflate.  Fry in waffle maker according to manufacturer's instructions.  Hold waffles in single layer in 200F oven for 10 minutes for maximum crispiness.