The answer is Chinese Curry Noodles, and with ground beef, frozen peas, and a few pantry ingredients, you’re good to go. Tastes better than it should.

While you’re there, take a look at the other recipes she’s posted in her January Jeliciousness series. I’m going to give the Chicken and Cabbage Soup, which involves meatballs, a try. Thank you for your time.

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Thanksgiving, 2010

For Thanksgiving two years ago I pulled out all the stops. We had a Chinese-influenced meal, with about 112 dishes. OK, only 14, but still. Culminated in bao from scratch. Phew. Exhausting.

Last year Significant Other and I were on our own and and we ate out.

This year, the kids are with me again, and the Northern California siblings will gather at my house. But we’re all already tired, what with jobs, children, and life. You know the drill. We’re thinking we will let the magic of caramelizing vegetable sugars and slightly salty gravy do all the work. Our jointly planned menu:

Mashed potatoes: Cut up organic russets into thirds, boil for 15 minutes or until you can poke them easily. Drain, keep in pot, cover. Just before serving, boil water, add bit bit bit while you mash. Add in some butter. If you must get your foodie on, boil some garlic cloves in the water with potatoes.

Roast butternut squash: Buy a container of pre-cut cubes from Whole Foods. Peeling those beasties is an impolite word. Dump them onto a baking sheet with a lip, toss with olive oil, salt, pepper. Roast at 450 or 500 degrees until they start to blacken.

Roast brussels sprouts: Recipe here. Involves pancetta and lemons.

Rolls: These, frozen, baked right before you eat them, are delicious.

Cranberry: Oh just buy the damn stuff. I was advocating canned but my sister took it up a notch and volunteered to buy cranberry-orange relish. Fine.

Molasses bars with icing and or chocolate chips: I haven’t baked these before. Every Thanksgiving needs a Dish of Adventure. Best made with your recipe, by your daughter, helped by her small girl cousin. All finger-dipping allowed.

Pumpkin pie: The recipe from the can. It’s there for a reason. Even better, your sister-in-law might volunteer to bake it, or your brother-in-law to involve your son and niece.

“Wait,” you might be saying, “Wait! What about the main attraction?”

Stuffing: Bagged Pepperidge Farm. You are going to cover it in gravy anyway, so who cares?

Gravy: This is important. Make a roux using equal parts flour and fat. Warm the fat, use it to cook the flour. Fat should be some turkey drippings, and maybe a little butter. Then stir in liquid, while whisking. Liquid should be part turkey juices (this means it is worth separating turkey fat from turkey juice, sorry to say), part broth, with a little white wine if you’re drinking (who isn’t?), and my mother’s secret ingredient, Worcestershire sauce. You’re welcome.

And for the turkey? Ultimate simplicity.

Have your brother bring his deep-fat gear and fry the thing. Just make sure he also brings a tarp to save your slate patio from a greasy death. Bon appetit! Julia approves. She says to serve with a nice Sancerre and some Pinot Noir because you can never have too many bottles of wine on the table.

Sometimes food is to make a show; of prowess, of love, of culture. Sometimes it’s just to eat well and be thankful.

Happiest of Thanksgivings to all, even to those in countries who don’t celebrate. It’s a time to share.

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Sometimes small changes are a big deal.

Today I’d like to introduce you, unprompted, to Justin’s Chocolate Peanut Butter.

We’re talking breakfast. In China they eat rou bao, and congee. Japan, miso soup. Sweden, a fishy paste squeezed from tubes, cracker bread, cheese, yogurt, fruit. Perhaps the world divides neatly into pastry and non-pastry breakfasters?

These days, although I may come from a savory tradition – herring, oatmeal, sausages – I eat breakfast like an average Anglo-American. Sweet, and Wheat.

When we were little, in the 60s, mom served us Froot Loops, toast from bread in bags, bacon, and orange juice. Because Mom was enormously competent and under the spell of 1960s motherhood mythologies, we ate like this every single day. On placemats, with table settings and napkins.

I don’t remember boarding school mornings. Probably because of boarding school nights. Come college, I turned to Dannon yogurt, coffee flavor. Every single day.

One year I started eating toast instead. And tea. And there I stuck, for veritable decades. Decades of Trader Joe’s Honey Whole wheat toast and English Breakfast.

The thing is, I embrace change elsewhere. Never reread a book, or want to see a movie twice. Hanker over future imaginary trips to Turkey and Iceland and Africa. Breakfast is possibly my comfort object, my Velveteen Rabbit, my thumb. It’s a reasonable strategy, finding a mundane anchor that allows for adventures of greater scope.

When I divorced I switched to La Brea Whole Grain bread. Too many memories in the taste of honey. And then, shazam, a few months ago, Justin’s Chocolate Peanut Butter. More sugar, more salt, more protein. I can’t say I feel like a new person. Not quite. But tastes that linger in your mouth may make up more of your self than do intermittent voyages. I have to admit, I find being human rather complex. The little things like peanut butter help make sense of those larger and more complicated bits.

Do you eat sweet? Savory? Do we agree that the more sanctioned chocolate the better? Have a wonderful weekend.

*By the way, no one came even close to paying me for this. Justin has never contacted me and almost certainly does not know I exist.

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At the top of the list of assumed WASP traits sits our presumed diet, replete with mayonnaise, gin, and all other forms of beige and clear foodstuffs. Go poke around your popular culture venue of choice, look up WASPs, and you’ll see. I’ll wait, you look.

Done? Need help finding the kind of discourse I’m thinking of? Here.

Well then.

Perhaps we have, traditionally, eaten less spicy food. Perhaps my elderly cousin did, once, tell me that New Mexico was a bit too “ranchero” for him. But let me put forth a conflicting theory, if you permit. Whatever you read about our food choices reflecting a lack of passion is absolutely and thoroughly wrong.

Consider the Wheat Thin.

We will ignore any crunch calls.

In the High WASP bible Cheerful Money, Tad Friends confirms the Wheat Thin’s natural habitat. Native to the deep thickets of High WASP family gatherings, most prevalent, of course, in the cocktail hour. Occasionally seen at lunch.

via Google books, here, and so worth a read.

Other observers make rough attempts at deconstructing WASPs’ Wheat Thins relationship . While Mr. Chatterbox, a columnist for Sarasota Magazine is correct in pointing out that Stoned Wheat Thins have replaced Nabisco, here and there, mostly people get it wrong. These guys just don’t understand. For example, High WASPs find Ritz Crackers too decadent. After all, they break without discipline, fairly oozing fat as they cover your chin with flakes.

Nabisco has done its own part to obscure the truth about Wheat Thins. If you trace the evolution of the brand, you see the sad state of affairs. Nabisco now offers so MANY varieties that the construct, “Wheat Thin,” has little meaning any more. The deadly drug of proliferation.

But let us return to the critical issue. Are these crackers bland? In some context, perhaps. In my culture, not at all.

For High WASPs of a certain generation, the secret, sweet, malted taste of Wheat Thins, spattered with salt, was a guilty, sensual pleasure. Anything sensual is guilty in this culture, of course, except heavy breathing from the exertion of a brisk walk. It’s also true that crackers from a box, after decades of food served on platters, felt daring, indulgent. How thrilling! We’re living without servants, we’re eating with our fingers, we’re moving to California.

I would posit that many among us are not bloodless, not without passion. Only, we are overwhelmed by surges of feeling at the smallest of stimuli. It’s always risky to generalize the feelings behind another culture’s habits.

Perhaps each culture has their own secret Wheat Thins. Do we ridicule lovers of xiao long bao? Smoked salmon? Brie. I thought not. Let us now celebrate the Wheat Thin by making our own. The blog, 6bittersweets, offers up this recipe. Reclaim that birthright. Wrest Wheat Thins from the over-marketing hands of their creators and find the salty, malted heart of darkness once again.

Eaten slowly, with a long time on the tongue.

With thanks to the reader who wrote me, saying she now understood her husband’s family better, in all their “Wheat Thins for lunch” glory.

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This week I will be taking a planned quarterly break. Aside from the traditional holiday planting for the 4th, and a guest post I have every intent of completing, I’ll be off.

Above you see my attempt at baking a chocolate cake this morning, for a family birthday. An example of plans gone awry. I asked Jan, at Jan’s Sushi Bar, for a recipe. It was impeccable, as is all the food she writes about. Well worth a read. Also pay attention if she says anything about cake layers “doming.”

As should be clear, I do not know how to bake. I haven’t made a layer cake since the Duncan Hines days of late grammar school. My sister and I also agree that High WASPs don’t bake much. I’m not sure whether it’s difficulty in doing something on purpose that can make you fat, or the risk of looking like such a dope when one fails.

But now I have a bee in my bonnet and will most like persist in mastering the skill. As a first step, I asked Twitter for help. Many kind folk offered moral support and suggestions. In the end, I  relied on the fix suggested by Mary McKenna, who usually exercises her considerable brain power on writing about epidemics here, and for Wired Magazine, here. Again, well worth a read.

The cake is better now, no? Still slightly psychotic, but with strawberry teeth comes impunity. Clearly, as the Queen of Cashmere explained, baking requires Mary’s sort of scientific thought process.

Privilege is, purportedly, about luxury. It’s a luxury to have time to learn something new. It is a luxury to have helpful friends, and a family sure to find this funny. Many failures improve with laughter, and I can hear my sister, now, in my imagination. Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

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I’ve been helping my brother and sister-in-law design their wedding. They thank me occasionally, but all I can think, is, they are letting me do this? It’s wildly fun.

She took me to see the space. It boasts triple height ceilings in an Arts and Crafts decor, with standard brown and gold carpet. They wanted a fun, intimate, feeling, with touches of Burning Man.  I was seized by a vision of purple and gold tables. White felt too weak, blue too conservative for this couple, red too autumnal for just about anyone.

They also knew they wanted to uplight the walls, in amber, perhaps a leafy pattern. Given the high ceilings, we toyed with the idea of large lanterns hanging above, but eventually found a photo of the space, on Snippet & Ink, with festival lighting strung at standard ceiling height. Perfect.

Oh, and the beautiful bride? Her dress is here. She’s looking to the Burning Man community to replace the flower belt you see with one that’s a little more subversive. Perhaps involving feathers, and picking up the blush pink of her shoes, which are here, in other colors.

My brother’s still thinking about which suit. In all honesty, he’s one of the best-dressed men I’ve ever seen in person. For the wedding, he’ll probably wear a thistle as boutonniere. As do many good Scots. Besides, the thistle is a raggedy flower, prickly with a sweet heart, perfect in the spirit of feathers and deconstruction.

We settled on Studio Choo for the flowers. I follow florists. Yes I do. Down in Southern California, there’s Flowerwild. Out in New York City, the absolutely astonishing Saipua, and her erudite blog, here. And Elizabeth, at The Nouveau Romantics in Austin, who was invaluable in figuring out just what we were doing. You can see her work on her blog too, here.

Studio Choo also contributes to the We Like It Wild feature on design*sponge. When I discovered that I was intimidated, having heard Grace Bonney speak at Lavish!. Good thing we’d already made the choice. Here’s the deciding image.

A good friend of the bride, (I don’t think of her as a bride, really, more as my future sister-in-law) designed the invitations. Her name is Susan Asher. That little icon is a twin-trunked bodhi tree. Brother and future sister-in-law are both interested in the tenets of Mr. Buddha.

I like the colors, and the reference to classic motif stationery. Gold pineapple, pink palm tree, pink/red bodhi tree. So does society evolve.

The other day I was invited to their food tasting. The Bi-Rite Market, a San Francisco institution, is catering. I met my future sister-in-law’s parents, and did my best to make a good showing for our family. We sat in a little office above a Mission District street, eating crostini with fava beans, asparagus in ham with a name, heritage bean salad that tasted faintly of maple syrup. Delicious. Rain poured down outside. A memorable afternoon.

Weddings are so much fun. Planning and organizing one, if you want a large and original party, so much work. These two are putting on a celebration that speaks to who they are. It’s going to be just beautiful. I’m honored to be involved.

And the joy at a dearly beloved brother’s great good fortune in finding this woman, and hers, too, in finding him? Well. Of course. But I suppose all great joys come with that feeling of surprise. As though we have to hide our capacity for that much emotion from our everyday selves or we’d never get anything done. On to candle strategies, escort cards, and hallway arrangements.

Invitations, Susan Asher Designs @ 510.534.7757
Images in inspiration board
Boutonniere via Jena D. Events by Imagewell Photography
Flowers via Studio Choo
The bouquet via Snippet & Ink, by Anna Millett of Mira Aster, photographed by Larissa Cleveland
Purple and Copper Linens via Blue Water Rentals
Belt by FInkelhoo Fashions
Shoe picture by me
Venue via San Francisco’s Presidio., photo by Bruce Forrester
Photo of light strings via Snippet & Ink by Matt Miller for Our Labor of Love
Dress via Vera Wang

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How, you might wonder, do High WASP women keep their weight where they want it?

For it’s true that we tend more often to the slender. Of course, that renders us prone to shriveling in our later years, but there you go.

Let me say that I understand and have lived the difficult and unfair impact of cultural expectations for women’s bodies. Let me say that I believe to each her own, and health is paramount. But let me also confess that I watch my weight, that I derive enjoyment from the results of that effort, and that I rely on lessons from my culture as secret weapons.

Which I am quite prepared to reveal. I do not diet. I do not torture myself. I am comfortable now with my relationship to food, despite occasional petulance at not being able to eat as much as in days past.

Let us always remember that eating well is one of the greatest privileges of all. Did you know that inner city Detroit has few actual grocery stores? That quality produce is unavailable for many rural or urban communities, particularly of color? You probably did. Here’s a summary of the studies. I find it helps me eat fruit if I perceive it to be a result of good fortune.

10 Sneaky Tricks Of The High WASP Diet

1. Eat breakfast. We like our breakfasts and we eat them sitting down. (Did you see the part in Downton Abbey when the butler was scandalized by the nephew serving himself? Said all meals would be ‘like breakfast?’) Every day of my childhood mom made us bacon, toast, a bowl of cold cereal and a glass of orange juice. Now I just have tea and toast. I know I’m supposed to eat protein, according to various doctrines, but the High WASP Diet says I don’t have to if I don’t want to. And I don’t.

2. Partake of high tea. Eat sweet afternoon snacks. That’s when to indulge in cravings. If things get out of hand, if the cravings surpass your capacity to have only one, or just a handful, the problem is simply solved. Move dinner forward. And please don’t eat dessert. It unseats the savory taste of an evening meal.

3. Develop the capacity to feel pleasure in delayed gratification and self-limitation. This one is hard, and drilled into High WASPs at a very early age. Eat fruit before cookies. Throw away the piece of cake when you’ve only had 4 bites. Physically remove yourself from temptation, telling yourself, “Good job!” over and over again. Or hearing your father’s voice tell you something similar.

4. Rely on hot liquids to combat actual hunger. Tea. Miso soup. Any soup. Good for the budget too. It’s possible High WASPs enjoyed hot liquids to appease appetite without tasking fading family fortunes.

5. Give lettuce its due but do not expect too much. Lettuce is a harsh mistress. Always eat a salad, never only a salad. Those we see eating solely greenery at midday are often compensating later with something not so kind to one’s weight.

6. During times when one really must get rid of a pound of two, cut out a meal. Pretend it just doesn’t exist. Chin held high. Mom had Fresca for lunch. I replace dinner with a little cheese and bread, a tangerine, and a glass of wine. Diet sodas are the devil’s work.

7. Never learn to fry. High WASPs are afraid of deep fryers. The closest we can get is a sauté pan.

8. Bring your high performance, excellence-in-everything attitude to eating – i.e. learn to cook food from other cultures ahead of the curve, worship salmon, respect the blueberry, culture yogurt. Processed foods are not ingredients. Recipes that include a purchased sauce aren’t recipes for anything but laziness. To say nothing of the salt, sugar, and unnatural fats hidden therein.

9. Fall victim to the vapors, otherwise known as low blood sugar. Eat protein early and often. I often have second breakfast, like Winnie-the-Pooh’s elevenses. It’s always protein. Sometimes even vanilla-flavored whey protein from Whole Foods stirred into 2% milk. I can’t drink milk with less fat, it tastes too weakly sweet.

10. Watch the alcohol. A High WASPs downfall. I didn’t drink regularly until I was over 40. Started with an nightly glass of wine. “How odd,” I thought, “I’ve put on 3 pounds I just can’t take off.” The nightly glass crept up to 2. “How odd,” I thought, “I’ve put on another 2 pounds I just can’t take off.” Then my doctor told me that the recommended 2 glasses of wine should actually be 1, for women. “Oh drat,” I thought, and focused on cutting back. You know how the story ended. With a step on the scale one morning, and a small, quiet, “Huh. There go those 2 pounds.”

11. Eating disorders. The which I cannot and should not refer to lightly, having battled the little fiend of bulemia in my youth. Although I came away relatively unscathed, I feel it would be ill-mannered to banter at all about something so excoriating. Let me just say, show better judgment than I did. Food is, first and foremost, something you put into your mouth to keep yourself alive. With abundant resources, we have the good fortune to be able to enjoy what we eat. I try to merit that privilege.

There you go. Eat like a High WASP. Or not. Entire civilizations live on rice with vegetables, and a little meat. Or pasta, salad, and a little fish. This is how my culture does it. And I left out kippered herring, although they are deeply-rooted in our food stuffs, just because I don’t like them. You’ve got to like the food you eat or you forfeit one of the great joys of life.

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2. Plant said plant in your front yard. What? That’s where the sun is, that’s where the tomato plant is going, the neighbors will understand. And no, we don’t think it’s overly quirky.

3. Install simple drip irrigation. It’s very nice to rough it, and grow food, and all, but we’re not going to stand around with a watering can for days on end. Thank you very much.

4. Rebel against cages. Decide you are going to stake your tomato plant simply, with dignity. Drive a stake into the ground. Imagine you are done. Spend the next couple of months tying your plant to said stake with unsightly white twine, searching wildly for more stakes, and even using your kids old stilts for yet another stake. Eventually simply lay your excess tomato plant branches on top of your basil plants and hope for the best.

5. Wring your hands at the unbearable cute of your first green tomato. High WASPs like to wring our hands, it ties us to our heritage.

6. Curse the same green tomato when it takes forever to ripen, even as all around you people are forecasting bruschetta with a chance of basil.

7. Read that you need to prune suckers, those little vestigial branches that grow next to real branches. Hear that Accordion and Lace’s mother’s wisdom from the old world says you prune the third branch from the third branch. Realize that since you don’t have an old world any more you’ll do as told. Try to prune. Get lost in the scent of tomato branches on your hand, and the marjoram that you’ve crushed in your efforts. Go have a glass of wine. Remember France. And childhood. Back then even sunscreen smelled good.

8. Squeal when your first tomato reddens. Look at it closely. Repeatedly, like a toddler at Christmas.

9. Pluck your tomato carefully, as though it might explode. Feel the shock as it separates from its stem. Revere the process.

10. Make Fresh Bruschetta for your son. Chop your one tomato. It really is yours. Add 2 or 3 finely chopped cloves of garlic and a handful of basil leaves, shredded by hand in a surprising fit of sensuality. Add some olive oil, salt, and pepper to taste. Slice a sweet baguette into little ovals and toast them. Doesn’t matter how. Sit at the counter and eat quite impolitely, spooning the bruschetta on to toast, and murmuring in pleasure.

11. Go outside one morning and realize that you have built it and they will come. Prepare for tomatoes galore. Go buy fresh mozzarella, (bocconcini are good) combine with more basil and call it Caprese Salad. Even if you never go near a plate.

12. Roast a bunch of tomatoes in the oven at high heat until they collapse in their own sugars. Smear the resultant jammy mess on everything.

13. Make Raw Tomato Pasta With Goat Cheese.

1 1/2 lb firm ripe tomatoes
1 bunch fresh basil (leaves from as many stalks as you can grab in one hand) If you are tired of basil use some other herb. Parsley. A little marjoram.
8 tablespoons of the best olive oil you can find
salt to taste
4 oz of the best goat cheese you can find
1 lb good quality spaghetti

Core, seed, and chop the tomatoes into very small dice. Chop the basil coarsely. Combine tomatoes, basil, olive oil and salt in a large pasta bowl. Crumble goat cheese into small pieces and add to bowl. Cook pasta in large pot of boiling, salted water. When tender but al dente, drain, add to bowl, mix, serve.

Don’t make cooked pasta sauce, San Marzano canned tomatoes meet those requirements perfectly.

14. Make soup. For a change-up to all-tomatoes-want-to-be Italian, try very easy Chinese Tomato Noodle Soup.

1 teaspoon vegetable oil
2 large ripe but firm tomatoes, cored, seeded, and cut into small dice
2 scallions, trimmed and minced
3 tablespoons Chinese rice wine or sake
21/2 tablespoons soy sauce
5 cups Chinese chicken broth (to make quickly, combine 3 cups commercial chicken broth, 3 cups water, 1/3 cup rice wine or sake, 4 slices smashed ginger. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, simmer uncovered for 20 minutes )
1 teaspoon or less of salt
ground black pepper to taste
1/2 frozen peas, thawed
1/2 very fine noodles, somen, capellini, cooked until just tender then rinsed under warm water and drained.

Stir fry tomatoes and scallions in oil until fragrant (~10 seconds), add rice wine and soy sauce, cook for one minute, stirring. Add broth, salt and pepper, simmer for 5 minutes. Add peas, cooked for 30 seconds. Add noodles, cook for 30 seconds until just hot. Serve.

15. Give the rest of your tomatoes away. Stave off the end of summer with generosity. Pretend that this will go on forever. Tomato plants, like the High WASP species, end as abundance starts to decay, faintly, perfumed. With tomatoes, as with High WASP family fortunes, charity redeems most excesses.

Image: Me. My very own tomato. I grew it myself.
Raw tomato sauce pasta recipe via Pasta Fresca
Chinese Tomato Noodle soup via Nina Simonds Asian Noodles
(support your local bookstore)

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The Grandes Dames among us might dream more grandly. Maybe of Swedish gilt.

In fact, as lived, Swedish home design is above all endearing. Made for smiling. Some things are fuzzy, some anthropomorphic. White for dark winters, and color for long summers – woven, or bended, or carved. But little seems to be made without thought, or placed without care.

The Swedish interiors I have experienced are places of comfort. Where each detail warms your heart. Sort of like one long wedding, of family to itself. Even in summer, when the interior is, well, outside.

This is my stepfamily’s house on Ingmarso, in the Stockholm Archipelago, taken early one morning as everyone else lay sleeping.

Being infinitely wise about people living in close quarters, they have also built an attached little house, known as, The Little House.

My stepfather acquired this land almost 50 years ago. Recently his daughter remodeled the main kitchen, beautifully. The counters, I believe, are teak, the cabinets stainless steel, all from Ikea. This should surprise no one.

When you wake up early, pull open a drawer and find pastry from the local bakery. The plastic bag closes with a miniature clothes pin, decorated with what appears to be a sailing flag. I want 65, please, since I’m sure I would lose many and feel sad if I could not return immediately to Sweden for replacements.

As you can see, the kitchen is now part of the living room. And, other than four small bedrooms and one bathroom, that’s it for the main house. Can you see the red-painted wood chairs? My favorites.

There’s little need for space in vacation cottages. You live outside. You shower outside. You eat outside.

The first night, we had salmon, salad, and potatoes. This should surprise no one. Potatoes are to Swedes as snow, mythically, is said to be for the Inuit. They have even invented special potato-poking tools to assess doneness. Often decorated with a carved wooden moose head. See the printed napkin on the right? Blue, white, gold, and paper. Oh boy.

Warmth, humor, and detail carry out past the home and into restaurants. One day we all got into a large boat, owned by my stepsister’s colleague, and went to Sandhamn. Another island. One with a delicious restaurant. Where they serve chilled water in glass bottles decorated with a rope braid collar. My sister held the bottle and poured. Thanks, sister.

The napkin ornamentation was nice too. I love a monogram and chain stitch.

The kind restaurant owners had painted the ceiling a gorgeous cerulean blue, and mounted cobalt chandeliers for contrast. A gorgeousness overdose, really.

The brass hinge on the window next to my seat. They had me at cerulean, hinges were unnecessary.

What appears to be Libby’s Corned Beef Hash, below, is in fact a dish called Pytt i Panna. Cubes of beef, ham, potato, onion and beets. While my tongue craved a crayfish stew, Pytt i Panna is what my stepfather wanted me to cook when he first got out of the hospital so I felt that fate was saying this needed to be my lunch. It was pretty good. Jamie Oliver agrees with me.

Even the most casual of places cater to aesthetic sensibilities. Later in the week we ate at the Ingmarso harbor cafe. This place used to be called something like Armadillo Willy’s but came to its senses for the most part and reverted to cultural roots. Except the nachos but we will gloss over those quickly. A blue metal pail full of utensils and napkins. Sigh.

To say nothing of something called Planka, meaning “board.” An aquavit and sealife taster. For my brothers-in-law.

I had beer and fried Baltic herring, or strumming. I can’t eat pickled herrings, no matter how they pickle those poor critters, but fried in batter and nestled into some mashed potatoes and melted butter? Oh boy. Oh boy.

Finally, the stairs leading from the inlet dock up to the house. Whether the builder knew that the top landing would make a perfect place to sit, mug in hand, and watch the sun play on the water, I do not know. In a Swedish summer, home style includes skylight. And I love the way unfinished wood smells when it gets warm. Especially when it’s old enough that you don’t have to worry about splinters.

I can’t forget my manners. The only Swedish word I know is thank you, but it’s the most important here. “Tack,” Swedish family, “Tack sa mycket.”

Images:
Bended thingies from life is carbon, all about Scandinavian design
Mirrors from Cupboards & Roses, specializing in Swedish antiques
All others by me

Note: The scenery is yet to come. I haven’t forgotten that all these home goods sat in the middle of the sky on some water.

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This giveaway also boasts a harmonic convergence of epic proportions. In this case, a reader request for my simple spinach and goat cheese omelette recipe, and recent forays to France, converge at an All-Clad, copper-covered, 8-inch frying pan. I have one just like it. You also get some cleaner. Because you may like to keep your copper looking like, um, copper.

All you have to do is leave a comment below telling us about the first omelette you ever ate. Or your favorite omelette recipe. Or, what else would you use an 8-inch frying pan for? Imagination is a good thing.

The first time I ever had an omelette was on Mont St. Michel, in France. The year must have been 1977. Yes, some of us were alive and eating omelettes back then. My sister and I spent that summer traveling through France. We took a train out from Paris, if I remember, to see the small island. Omelettes were famous on Mont St. Michelle. Still are, although now it’s quite a tourist industry. My sister and I just sat, and ate the souffled omelettes, in wonder at how delicious they were. Then we got back on the train, if I remember, and went back to Paris.

Nowadays I eat omelettes because they a) are full of protein b) make a good container for vegetables c) use few dishes d) are easy to make, after 30 years of practice.

Omelettes are also the key to entering the kingdom of High WASPs. Surprised? Have you ever watched the original Sabrina? (*cue sound of 15-year old Lisa, sighing*). Audrey Hepburn comes home from Paris, having learned how to cook an omelette. Which causes Humphrey Bogart, eldest son of the estate, to fall in love with her. Oh, indeed, it’s a terrible story from the perspective of class and gender. But what do we know at 15?

Do you need any more encouragement? Here’s my recipe.

Ingredients:
3 eggs
(1 tbsp of water or milk is sometimes advised. I fail to notice any impact whatsoever)
Some goat cheese from California. Just because.
Two handfuls of frozen or fresh spinach
Butter
Salt
Pepper

Required Tools:
8-inch frying pan
Fork or spatula
Small mixing bowl
Strainer

Steps:
Let me say first that despite my experience in Mont St. Michelle, I don’t cook souffled omelettes for myself. Jan does, here. I will be trying this recipe, and it may change my life forever.

Neither do I like the thin rectangular egg sheets that pass for omelettes at many diners, nor the masses of compacted scrambled eggs often seen in Northern California breakfast havens. I like my omelettes tender, moderately fluffy, and cooked all the way through. Just like salmon. Except the fluffy part.

So the entire art to omelettes is what you do in the 45 seconds between when the egg hits the pan and when you fold the resultant material over whatever filling you’ve put inside.

First, get your goat cheese out of the refrigerator, where you keep it, although you wonder if you’re doing something declasse keeping cheese too cold. Unwrap it. Put it on a cutting board. Wonder why on earth no one has solved the problem of good/reusable cheese packaging. Separate 4-5 clumps of goat cheese from the mother ship, each about the size of a teaspoon. Put the cheese back in the refrigerator and quiet your inquiring mind.

Second, take out the butter, and some spinach. If you are using fresh spinach, be virtuous, take out olive oil which is good for your heart, and saute at low heat until wilted. Not your heart, the spinach. Then dump said spinach into a strainer. Probably good to squish a little, overly wet fillings are anathema to omelettes.

If you are using frozen spinach, put it in a glass bowl with a little water, cover with a paper towel, and microwave it for a minute until thawed. Then dump the spinach into a strainer and proceed to the squishing.

Third, take that SAME glass bowl from the microwaving process, (you see, the goal is to have as few dishes to wash as possible), once it’s cooled down, and crack in 3 eggs. Some people will tell you to use 2 eggs. In my opinion, 3 is perfect, leading to the right balance of you-can-cook-all-the-egg and the-resultant-egg-layer-is-substantial. Mix until whites and yolks are one yellow mass. If you don’t, you’ll get streaks of egg white – like fried eggs – in your omelette. To me that is a sign of a Diner Omelette and is not my preferred mode. To each his or her own, however. In all my 30 years of cooking the Omelette Police have never paid me a visit. I believe them to be apocryphal.

Fourth, light a medium-high burner under your frying pan. Go get slice a tablespoon of butter off a stick and walk across the kitchen balancing the butter on your knife, hoping it doesn’t slip. Throw it into the pan. Let it melt, then foam up, but not burn. As you can see, sometimes one forgets to pay attention and butter browning commences. Forgive yourself. This is not the worst thing one can fail to notice in a lifetime.

Swirl the butter around so that all the pan is covered. Or spread the butter around with a spatula. This is effective, just less graceful.

Now pour in all the eggs. If there’s an art to omelettes, here’s the moment. This is my way – taught me by my mother. There are other ways, and other mothers in the world.

• Let the egg cook for 5 seconds. You will see the edges foam and puff a little bit.
• Start to shake the pan gently. The egg mass will loosen. Move it from side to side inside the pan just a bit.
• Take your fork and hold its tines horizontal to the layer of egg that has cooked, stirring the uncooked liquid. Do this for 5 seconds.
• Now move your fork down towards the pan, keeping the tines horizontal. Do this in an area halfway between the center of the pan and the edge. Use the flat fork to press on the cooked egg layer and pull it away from the edge, towards the center.
• Tilt the pan so the edge you’ve pulled the egg away from is down.
• Liquid egg will run into the now-empty part of the pan.

• Repeat all around the egg mass, fairly quickly, making sure you are creating a circular form of cooked egg, and letting the uncooked egg run UNDER and AROUND the cooked part, so that it gets cooked in turn.
• Once the egg is mostly done, you can pick up the edges of the cooked circle here and there so the last bits of liquid egg run out and cook. If you’re obsessive about raw egg, *raises hand*, you can scrape any liquid left over the edge of the cooked mass onto the pan surface.

Now it’s time to put in the filling. Place the gobs of goat cheese at regular intervals on one side of the egg mass. Now spread the spinach on top of the cheese. Tilt the pan and slide the omelette in one direction, up the side of the pan, about an inch. Then pick up the edge of the omelette that’s still on the flat part of the pan, and fold it over on top of your fillings.

Turn off the heat, leave the omelette to sit in the pan for a minute so the cheese will mostly melt. Salt. Pepper. Serve. Goes well with whole grain toast.

Now I’m hungry. The winner will be drawn next Tuesday, June 7th. Please enjoy.

They specified that I say the words, “TV Stands,” linked, up here at the top of this post. Why “TV Stands,” I can’t tell you. But it seemed a reasonable price to pay. Think about it, if someone said to you, “Say, ‘TV Stands’ and I will give you a copper frying pan,” wouldn’t you do it?

BTW, The Cape House is ALSO hosting a CSN giveaway, in her case for a gift card. Go here and double your chances.

Images:
Frying pan from CSN
Mont St. Michel
Omelette in process, me

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