Tomato Mozzarella Salad

This is simple and wonderful. The key is great tomatoes and mozzarella, and a little trick I learned from Alice Waters' The Art of Simple Food.

Tomato Mozzarella Salad
Serves 4-6

2 pints cherry or grape tomatoes (super fresh - I used homegrown)
2 ounces fresh mozzarella - firm enough to cut, but not that rubbery Precious
stuff that they shred for pizza
10 large basil leaves
1 Tablespoon good balsamic vinegar
3 Tablespoons good, fruity olive oil
fine sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

1. Wash the tomatoes well in cold water. Pat dry with towels.
   
2. Dice the mozzarella into a small dice. Combine the tomatoes and mozzarella in a medium non-metallic bowl.
   
3. Stack the basil leaves and roll them into a cigar. Cut across the cigar in very fine strips. (This is called chiffonade). Cut vertically across the chiffonade so you have small strips.
   
4. Toss the basil into the tomatoes and mozzarella.
   
5. Put the balsamic vinegar into a small bowl. Dissolve sea salt into the vinegar by stirring it well, a little bit at a time, tasting as you go. The vinegar is ready when it seems a little brighter and mellower, but before it tastes salty. If you taste salt, add a little vinegar. I used about 1/4 teaspoon, but it will vary based on the salt and the vinegar.
   
6. Slowly whisk the oil into the vinegar, pouring slowly and steadily.
   
7. Toss the dressing with the tomato mixture. Add freshly ground pepper to taste. This can stand for a while - the flavors marinate into the mozzarella - but do not refrigerate it.

With fresh bread, this is a great dinner. Alone, it's a wonderful appetizer or side dish.

The Plan for the Week

Every Sunday, I think about food for the week ahead. I try to come up with a plan for what we'll eat every night, and what I need to get at the grocery store. Most weeks, my plan is overly ambitious, and I skip 1 or 2 nights and we all have hot dogs or pasta with jarred sauce and frozen meatballs. But it's better than weeks I don't think about it at all. Those weeks, we eat badly every night: frozen pizza, takeout Chinese, chicken nuggets.

I have a pretty busy week. Monday is a holiday, which means I'll be exhausted by dinner time. Tuesday I have jury duty. Wednesday through Friday I'm driving all over the Bay Area for various interviews. So I need quick easy dinners every night. Here's my plan:

Sunday: BBQ with extended family

• Grilled Burgers with Portabella Mushrooms and Chipotle Ketchup
• Baked Sweet Potato Fries
• Fresh Tomato and Mozzarella Salad
• Blueberry Cobbler

Monday: Pasta with Chicken, Tomatoes, Artichokes, and
Mushrooms

Tuesday: Chicken Satay with Peanut Sauce, Broccoli, Mangoes,
and Lemongrass Rice

Wednesday: Chicken Burritos

Thursday: Clean-out-the-fridge: fried rice or salad

Since I went to Costco yesterday, my grocery trip today is pretty easy. All I need is mangoes, mushrooms, mozzarella, artichokes, tortillas, Amy's Organic Black Bean Chili, and salad stuff. Plus fruit. We eat a lot of fruit.

Teaching Kids to Love Chemicals

The other day, I was in the grocery store with my two boys and Dylan asked that I get him "Cheese Me!" I had no idea what he was talking about. He kept demanding "Cheese Me! Cheese Me!" Ryan explained to me that Dylan wanted Kraft Macaroni & Cheese. I was happy to see Dylan so excited about some kind of food. It was on sale, 10 for $10. How could I resist making my kid happy at such a low price? So I bought 3 boxes.

Today at 1:30, the boys were having what appeared to be a whining contest, alternated with bouts of physical violence. The real problem is they were hungry, but they denied it. There was nothing in the world they wanted to eat. Inspiration struck, and I asked Dylan if he wanted some "Cheese Me". Both boys were bouncing up and down from the excitement. For the 12 minutes it took to make the mac & cheese, joy reigned in our house.

Dylan took one bite, and refused to eat any more. He asked for pepper like I had. It didn't help. He wouldn't eat it. However, he also wouldn't admit he didn't like it. Not another bite of fake mac & cheese would pass his lips, but he seemed utterly incapable of disparaging it.

Ryan ate all of his mac & cheese and several servings of pineapple. I could tell that Ryan didn't really like the mac & cheese, but he wouldn't admit it either.

After the Burger King experiences of the last few months, I've been thinking a lot about kids' palates and the effects of advertising on kids. I've come to believe that we as parents unintentionally conspire with the advertising industry to make our kids like chemical-laden crap.

Dylan is a pretty healthy eater, when his emotions aren't in control. He loves eating oat bran with PopPop, spinach salad with Grandma, and anything his parents are eating. His main criteria seems to be that if it comes from your plate, he likes it. However, with the exception of canned soups, he refuses most heavily processed food. He rejects fast food burgers, frozen french fries, all Chef Boyardee products, and now mac & cheese.

Ryan used to be the same way. However, he had a year of school lunches, and he learned that the choices were to eat processed food or starve. Of course, bringing lunch from home was also a choice, but peer pressure took care of that: all the cool kids had "hot lunch". So he's had plenty of fake lasagna, canned spaghetti, and powder-based cheese products.

In other words, it took training to get Ryan to eat heavily processed food. The school lunch program did its part, but I also contributed. Some was laziness, making frozen chicken nuggets and hot dogs on nights I was tired or desperate. But I also wanted to share some of the things I loved from my childhood with him. I was the one who introduced Ryan to Spaghetti-Os, because I used to love them. He was grossed out by them, but he wanted to please me, so he made a solid effort. I tasted them, and I can see his point. But I also see how, with enough effort, I could turn him into a Chef Boyardee fan, just like I did with Oscar Meyer Weiners.

What scares me a little is how much advertising contributes to shaping the kids' tastes. Dylan wanted Cheese Me because he'd seen it on TV. Every day the boys request new food products because they're advertising during cartoon time. I believe that his refusal to say he disliked it is because the commercials showed that bigger kids like it. The ads he sees on TV are shaping his ideas of what it means to be a kid, and what he's supposed to like and dislike. I find that really disturbing. I want him to raise him to use his own judgement.

If I was a really skilled parent, I would have taken the opportunity to discuss how great the product looked on TV and what a disappointment it was. We would have had a heart-to-heart about advertising as a business and the cult of consumerism. However, I have no idea how to have that kind of conversation with a 3-year-old. Maybe I'll have the talk with Ryan and let him explain it to Dylan.

There is another alternative, of course. I could turn off the TV.

My End-of-Summer Treat: Blueberry Cobbler

It's Labor Day weekend, and it's time for one of my favorite summer treats. I'm making a blueberry cobbler for Sunday afternoon/evening. I'll be hitting Costco on Saturday because it's the only way I can afford all the blueberries I need for this recipe. While I'm there, I'll also pick up some peaches and apples. I love Costco's produce in-season. It's much higher quality and more affordable that what I can get at Safeway or even the local farmers' markets. I know it's probably grown in Central America by underpaid workers who are exposed to horrific pesticides, but I just can't go the Whole Foods All Organic route all the time. My bad rationalization is that Central American farm workers need jobs too, and my kids need fruit. There's always guilt.

Although this looks complex, it really only takes about 10 minutes to throw together. It's always a favorite at parties. The lime zest makes it really extraordinary and interesting. You could also use lemon zest - blueberries and lemon are divine together, and I'd add a little lemon zest to the cobbler dough, too. Or you can skip the citrus all together and use 1 teaspoon of cinnamon in the filling. This one is really hard to mess up.

Blueberry Cobbler

Blueberry Filling:
6 cups blueberries, washed and picked through
1/2 cup sugar
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
zest of 1 lime, grated

Dough:
1 1/3 cups flour (can use a combination of white and whole wheat pastry
flours)
2 Tablespoons sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 Tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut in small pieces
1/2 cup sour cream
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 Tablespoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Use a 2-quart glass or earthenware pan. I prefer my Corningware Round French White 2 1/2 quart casserole.
2. Combine the filling ingredients in the casserole dish. Mix gently but well.
3. Combine the dry ingredients for the dough in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse lightly to mix.
4. Add the cold butter and pulse repeatedly, until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Do not let the food processor run, as the butter will melt and you'll wind up with goo.
5. Scrape the dough mixture into a bowl. Gently stir in the sour cream and heavy cream until dough is just moistened. Knead it together with floured hands a few times. Flour a board and press the dough out into the shape of the top of the casserole. Gently lay the dough out over the top of the fruit. Trim the edges. If you'd like, you can use the trim to make decorations for the top of the dough. (I never do this).
6. Cut 3 slits in the top of the dough. Brush the dough with about 1 tablespoon cream.
7. Mix the cinnamon and 1 Tablespoon sugar together, then sprinkle evenly over the top of the dough.
8. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until top is golden brown and thick blueberry juices are bubbling around the edges of the crust.
9. Let cool for at least 15 minutes before serving. Serve with vanilla ice cream or freshly whipped cream.

Why I Hate Friday Nights

In the idealized vision of motherhood I had before I had children, I was a perfect mother. I was never going to be annoyed with my children, I would have endless patience, and I would serve them lovingly handcrafted dishes at every single meal.

Alas, I gave birth to real children with actual personalities, and motherhood did not suddenly instill reserves of patience. I can be short-tempered, easily annoyed, and impatient. And I do not have the time or the energy to make a great dinner every night.

Friday nights are particularly tough. I pick up the boys at 5:15 and I have a commitment at 6:30. In those 75 minutes, I need to get the boys fed and get to my commitment. A couple of years ago, I took my kids to Burger King for dinner. I had no idea that I was starting a tradition I would come to despise.

The key problem is that the boys and I have completely different goals when we go to Burger King. I want them to eat dinner. They want to get new toys and play. It's stressful when all they want is the cheap unsafe, inappropriate toy that's hidden in the bag, and all I want is to get some food in them so that I don't have to deal with the bedtime hunger tantrum.

I find myself in the absurd position of demanding that they sit down and eat their chicken strips and fries. I hold the toys hostage until they've consumed a certain portion of the food. The reality is that they don't like the food, and I don't feel good about feeding them nutritionally worthless, and perhaps damaging, food. I get resentful because I'm paying for food that gets thrown away, and they get used to demanding and receiving more toys.

The toys create their own set of problems. We're adding two toys a week to the already ludicrously large toy collection. They often don't get the same toy, so they wind up fighting. And the toys themselves often promote age-inappropriate things. I spent much of this summer refusing demands to see Indiana Jones and Iron Man, both of which were heavily promoted at Burger King. Iron Man was rated PG-13, but was heavily marketed to little kids through fast food tie-ins and with television advertising on kids' channels.

I'm tired of the Friday Night Struggle. Tonight, I'm doing something different. I'm going to pick the boys up a little early. I'm packing a toy treat bag of a few Hotwheels, a bunch of Zoobs, a deck of GoFish cards, and some dominoes. We're going to go to Pasta Pomodoro, where the boys actually like food I feel good about - they even have vegetables! Before we go, I'm going to read up on strategies to counter kid-marketing, and see if we can have a real conversation. Maybe tonight we'll have a Friday night we all enjoy.

Big School Day Breakfast

This week, my older son started Kindergarten and my younger son began preschool. I'm not at my best in the morning, so breakfast is always a challenge. My kids want whatever sugary nutritionless concoction they last saw advertised on Nickelodeon, and I want to give them something healthy and hearty that will fill them up. Since I'm not really functional until 2 hours after I wake, I need it to be quick and easy.

A great solution: My sister-in-law's Pregnancy Oatmeal. She consumed this daily throughout her pregnancy, then got me hooked on it when we were on family vacation. It takes 3 minutes to make, everyone loves it, and it keeps you full for hours. It's as easy those expensive flavored instant oatmeals, and it's ever so much better.

Pregnancy Oatmeal
serves 2-3

1 cup rolled oats (I like Quaker)
1 3/4 cup water
2 Tablespoons crunchy
natural peanut butter
1 large banana, diced
honey or syrup

Combine oats and water in a large bowl. Microwave on high for 2-3
minutes (until desired consistency). Stir. Add peanut butter and diced banana
without stirring. Microwave 30-60 seconds more, until peanut butter is soft.
Stir well. Divide between serving bowls, drizzle with honey or syrup, and serve.

This recipe is easy to vary: add raisins or dried cranberries. Use
Splenda instead of honey. It's also good with almond butter and apples instead
of peanut butter and bananas.

A Good Eater

I remember my grandma saying about my brother, "he's such a good eater!" There was so much pride and admiration in her voice that I wanted to be a good eater, too. Alas, noone has ever described me as a good eater, and it's not going to happen anytime soon. I have always had strong opinions about food. As a kid, I would rather starve than eat onions, tomatoes, fish, most vegetables, many fruits, or any unfamiliar food. I have no idea how my mother fed me. I think she mostly ignored my food preferences and made what she liked. I remember many nights of grumpily scraping all of the red sauce off my spaghetti, picking through onion-studded meatloaf to find bits that hadn't been contaminated by onions, and drowning fish in ketchup to mask the horrid taste. I knew I would never treat my kids that way - I was only going to make food they liked!

Now that I'm a mom, I know what an impossible task it is to please a whole family with meals. I still don't like visible onions or fish. My husband can't eat anything red, orange, pink, or spicy because it inflames his rosacea. My 5-year-old son, Ryan, doesn't like any vegetable except broccoli, loathes cheese, and prefers to be able to easily identify all ingredients in his food. Dylan, my 3-year-old son loves vegetables, salad, and spicy food, but the only fruits he'll eat are watermelon and apples. Of course, Dylan is still exercising his power in food, so he'll suddenly declare a food off-limits that he loved the day before.

So, this blog aims to explore the challenges of raising good eaters in a busy, crazy world. What's a good eater? In my opinion, a good eater:

• eats a variety of foods,
• is willing to try new things,
• has a healthy relationship to food,
• makes predominantly healthy choices,
• enjoys eating, but does not have it as the center of life,
• and finally, is polite and has good manners.

What do you think a good eater is? Is it a good thing to be a good eater?