Duck Eggs

On a much lighter note from my last post (over a month ago... I'm not really doing too well with this whole blogging thing), I recently read in Bon Appetit that duck eggs are, well, I guess are the new chicken eggs. (Yes, I do realize that the article I link to is from January and I say it is "recent." I  don't have too much time to read magazines. I am too busy working, caring for my children, and searching for obscure, out-of-print Maisy Mouse books to feed my toddler's Maisy obsession.) So, I picked up some ducks eggs at a local farm. Ok, in an effort of full disclosure, I mentioned said article to my mother, who then went to a local farm and bought me 6 duck eggs. I love my mom.

Anyway, not heeding the advice of Bon Appetit (why should I? They only have light years more experience with things like this than I do, not to mention a test kitchen and people who are paid to figure out things like this), I decided to scramble a duck vs. chicken egg to see if I noticed a difference. Note that I used farm-fresh duck and chicken eggs, so I wasn't comparing store bought eggs of either variety. The first thing I noticed that the shell of the duck egg was significantly harder to crack. It wasn't a problem, just interesting. I cracked each egg into a small dish and whisked them up with a fork. It was obvious immediately why the duck egg is said to be richer - the yolk was much more viscous - to incorporate it into the white took more effort. The actual scrambled eggs weren't too different in my opinion. However, in the interim period between the cracking, whisking and cooking both kids woke up, so I couldn't take the quite the care I had been hoping. (Also, my two-year old loves scrambled eggs, so I couldn't make eggs and not share - particularly when "sharing" is currently a big point of contention in our house - and I make her eggs slightly less "wet" than I make mine, so perhaps had they been done perfectly I would have tasted a bigger difference.)

I then hard-cooked two of the duck eggs. I accidentally gave one to my brother, who probably wouldn't have noticed if it was a dinosaur egg, so that one was kind of a waste. The other I sliced up and ate alongside a hard-cooked chicken egg.  I thought (and my mother, with whom I shared the eggs, agreed) that the chicken egg was actually tastier than the duck egg. It had more "egg" flavor.

A few days later I told my colleague about this. She mentioned that she heard that duck eggs make much richer, tastier baked goods. So, with my remaining 2 eggs, I made corn bread. I chose this because its something I make fairly frequently so, since I didn't have the time (nor care) to make two batches, I would be able to make an extremely unscientific judgement about whether this batch tasted different from my last one. I found that I didn't notice a difference in taste, but the duck-egg bread had a richer texture - not so crumbly - which was nice.

So all-in-all, with the price difference (the duck eggs were more expensive than our usual farm-fresh chicken eggs) as well as what I consider a tastier flavor, I will continue eating chicken eggs. However, if I make a cake for a special occasion or something, I would consider splurging for some duck eggs. Now another reason I did this is because I'd really like to raise my own egg-laying poultry and I like ducks more than I like chickens (chickens kind of scare me, honestly, and have you ever SEEN a baby duck? They are absolutely adorable), so I thought if they laid a better egg maybe I would get ducks instead. This little taste-test did not help that decision-making process at all. Luckily, I can barely care for myself, my two kids and my house at this moment, so it's going to be awhile before any live fowl, duck or chicken, make their way into my yard.

I Chose Joy

I am currently in the throes of the "dreaded" four-month sleep regression. If you have an infant who is less than four months old and you haven't heard of this term, google it. Then you can be angry that I ruined your state of blissful ignorance. Little guy is now 5 months, but we are still deep in the dark depths of sleep regression. My sweet little dreamy baby boy sometimes only wakes up twice a night. Those nights are, for lack of a better adjective, absolutely awesome. Blissful. Lovely. Sometimes I even get to sleep for three or four hours in a row. However, more often than not, he wakes up more than twice a night...more like 4, or 5, or 7 times a night. Or sometimes, like last night, I lose count of exactly how many times he wakes up.  On nights like this, I inevitably give in and go "sleep" in the bed in his room, bring him into bed with me, and the entire night is spent in strange half-awake, half-dreamy, half-hour stretches of sleeping, comforting, breastfeeding and, often, crying (who is actually crying is anyone's guess).

Now before any of my "followers" (ha. I know there are none of you out there) start in on me for sleep training, or not sleep training, or weaning, or not weaning, or co-sleeping, or not co-sleeping, just stop. I'm not going to sleep train at this point or ever (that's a issue for another post, perhaps) and I'm not going to stop breastfeeding on demand. I'm also not going to start exclusively co-sleeping. This post isn't about any of those issues. It's about how I am choosing to handle our current state of regression (as a statistician, I find an odd bit of pleasure that I am languishing in a state of regression, but I digress).

There have been lots of articles and posts as of late about enjoying every moment of your children's childhoods. Conversely, there are have also been lots of articles and posts as of late about how it is impossible to enjoy every moment of your children's childhoods, and how that's ok. Maybe they have always been out there and I just didn't care because I didn't have children. Who knows? All I know is that I have seen lots of articles and blog posts on these topics recently.

What I do know is that I have a lovely, sweet, smart little toddler. She is my shadow, my twin, my absolute, take-my-breath away joy. All I want to do is smother her in kisses and spend all day snuggling her. But, alas, she has no interest in all day snuggles. She wants to "run all around the house." She wants to play outside; she wants to "eat, eat, eat!" Sometimes, when I put her down for a nap, she asks me to lie down next to her. That lasts for about 2 seconds before she starts wiggling around and asking to play. Apart from those rare, short occasions she is a busy, on-the-go little girl. Her sweet baby snuggles are a thing of the past. And that is sad.

I also know that I have an adorable little five-month old who, for some reason, has decided that sleep is not his favorite thing.  Nursing, on the other hand, IS his favorite thing. There is nothing my little boy likes more than snuggling up with his mommy, in the peaceful stillness of the night and enjoy some warm milk. His tiny little hand grasps around wildly in the air until I offer him my hand, and he closes his little fingers over mine, closes his eyes and nurses until he falls back into a peaceful sleep (for another hour or so until this routine begins again). Its all very sweet and lovely until I remember that I need to work in the morning, and that toddlers DON'T sleep in. There have been a few, several, many nights when I tearfully exclaimed to my husband that I just "can't do it any more!" I'm not going to claim that I enjoy every night-waking, because honestly there are A LOT of them, and sometimes (read: all the time) I'm really tired.

However, I'm also not going to remove the quotes from the word "dreaded" in my first sentence. I know everyone tells you to enjoy these moments because they go by too quickly. They told me that with my first baby, and I believed them in that weird I-can't-really-fathom-what-you're-telling-me-because-I-haven't-been-there kind of way. But now I have living, breathing, running proof that babyhood is finite. That someday soon I will have two children who are just too busy to snuggle, and who crash into their beds at night, exhausted from running and playing and learning all day, and who have no need for their mommy's breast and warm, milky comfort.

So when I hear cries through the monitor only 45 minutes after I last returned to my warm bed (and I (may or may not) take my frustration out on my husband) and I stumble into his room, frustrated, and feel his warm little body relax as I pick him up and hold him close, I decide to chose joy instead of frustration. I may wake up grumpy because I saw pretty much every hour on the clock the night before, but once I get into the shower and take a deep breath, I decide to chose joy instead of anger. On those rare occasions when he is inconsolable, I look at his face and I decide to chose joy, even though all I am getting in return is angry wailing. Joy because I get to experience his babyhood. Joy because I get the privilege of holding a tiny infant who wants nothing more than to be held, by me. Joy because right now, I can fulfill his every need by doing nothing but holding him close and smelling his sweet, baby smell. Joy because even when he is upset, he is mine, and I have the honor of witnessing his life and his every emotion. It doesn't mean I love getting up all the time, it doesn't mean I don't wish I could get a full nights sleep, it doesn't even mean I have to enjoy every middle-of-the-night feeding. It simply means that I'm accepting that this is the way my life is right now, so instead of being upset about it, I choose to try as hard as I can to find the joy in it.

I may never have another baby, but I have one right now, and in an instant I won't. So I  choose to spend this time with him being full of joy, even through the "dreaded" phases. Tired, but joyful.

A fresh start?

So...to my non-existent blog audience: I obviously gave up blogging. I never remembered to take pictures of the food I cooked. I never had time to blog. I felt too much pressure from myself to make an awesome food blog, but I just didn't have the energy to put into it.
And we moved.
And we started building a house.
And then we got pregnant again.
And then we moved into the house that we built.
And then we had another baby.

So, things have been kind of busy. But sometimes I read things (like other blogs) that make me think hard about a particular topic, and I wish I could write a response (of sorts), or just my perspective on that same topic. Or sometimes I make choices that I think people may be interested in reading about (this, of course, requires me to have readers...but maybe I'll get there someday). Or sometimes I cook something I think is awesome (like the Italian 3-bean soup I made a couple of weeks ago) and I wish I could share it.

So I decided to give blogging another go, but I'm changing it up a little.

There are lots of amazing food blogs out there, and for now (with a 2 year old and a 4 month old, and a job) I don't have the time to make a food blog of which I could be proud. This is not to say I won't include recipes sometimes, because, as I mentioned that bean soup was amazing and it deserves to be shared with the world. But sometimes in the evenings or during a nap, or whenever, there are other things I want to write about. So, that's what you'll be getting here - a little bit of this, a little bit of that - random things that come into my head while my children are (hopefully) sleeping and that eventually flesh themselves out into blog posts. Maybe a theme will emerge, maybe it won't. Maybe eventually the recipes will take over and I'll become a "real" food blogger, or maybe some other thing I am passionate about will win out. Who knows. Right now my goal is just to have a creative outlet, maybe spark a discussion (only with people who wholeheartedly agree with me though, obviously), and maybe write something interesting that someone, somewhere would be interested in reading. Wish me luck!

Italian Wedding soup

So, I haven't posted in forever. My maternity leave ended, so things like blogging, working out, and sleeping got pushed aside. I have managed to keep cooking dinner almost every night though! I have to say, I'm pretty proud of that. One way I do this is by planning a series of meals that all stem from one main item that I can make on a weekend. Meatballs were the first item I chose. On Sunday, I made meatballs and Italian wedding soup. I used 1/2 of the meatballs in the soup and froze the other 1/2. We had the soup for dinner that night and for several lunches throughout the week. Then later in the week, I reheated enough of the meatballs to make meatball subs. The remainder of the meatballs became spaghetti and meatballs for my husband one evening when I was out. I'll post the meatball recipe later this week, but for now here is the Italian Wedding soup recipe. I made this recipe up based on about 4 I found online and in my cookbooks. I really love how it came out. Aside from making the meatballs, it's also really simple. It is a nice hearty soup, perfect on a rainy, chilly day (which we have had plenty of recently) with some crusty bread.

Italian Wedding Soup
1lb uncooked meatballs
4 tbsp butter
1/2 cup onion, diced
2-3 carrots, diced
2 celery stalks, diced
2 garlic cloves, diced or pushed through a garlic press
1 bay leaf
6 cups of chicken broth (I used 4 cups + 2 cups of water with 2tsp Better than Boullion)
2 cups of water
1/2 cup dry white wine
1.5 cups uncooked pasta
6 stalks of swiss chard, middle stem removed, chopped
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese 
salt and pepper

Melt butter in large saucepan or dutch oven. Saute onion, garlic, carrot and celery until soft. Add wine and cook for 2-3 minutes. Add chicken broth, water, bay leaf, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil. Add meatballs and pasta, lower heat to medium-low and simmer for 15 minutes or until meatballs are cooked through and pasta is done. Add swiss chard and cook until wilted, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in cheese.

Serve hot. This recipe makes about 6 servings unless your father, brother, and husband are all eating it.

Notes:
*Reheat over low if you won't be eating until later
*You could probably make this with frozen meatballs, but I think one reason I like it so much is that the meatballs cook right in the soup adding a nice flavor that already cooked meatballs would not.
*Once everything is added to the soup, you may want to add another cup or so of water depending on how much broth you like in your soup
*You may need to play around with the overall broth-to-water ratio depending on the type pf chicken broth you use. I originally used all broth and no water and felt it overpowered te flavor the vegetables and meatballs gave the soup
*Feel free to use a different green (escarole, spinach, etc.) depending on what you like and what's in season

Sorry there are no pics, but, hey, at least I'm posting!

Bacon, Spinach and Cheddar strata

Baby girl's bedtime is 8pm. However her bedtime "routine" starts at 7:15. First she eats, then she takes a bath, then we read her a story, then she eats again and then she goes to bed. We're also trying to gently teach her to fall asleep on her own, so that can take even more time. Since I am breastfeeding, I am a rather integral part of the bedtime routine, so I can't be downstairs making dinner while my husband takes care of bedtime. So, things that I can prep ahead of time, then pop into the oven so they are ready  just about at the same time she falls asleep are great. I found this strata recipe in Everyday Food and changed it up a little so it is a full meal. Note that the magazine says it serves 4. If you are having it, and only it, for dinner I would say it serves 2. Add some salad and bread, and it could definitely feed more though.

Bacon, Spinach and Cheddar strata (adapted from Everyday Food):
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1 package baby spinach, chopped and stems removed
1 red pepper, chopped
1/4 cup of onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, smashed
4 pieces bacon (I use thick sliced bacon, if you use thin-sliced bacon, I would recommend using 6 slices), cut into small pieces
3 cups day-old bread cubes
5 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup whole milk (I used a combo of skim milk and cream, since I don't always have whole milk)
1 1/4 cups cheddar cheese, grated
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 400. Heat oil in a large non-stick skillet. Add bacon and saute until almost cooked, about 3 minutes if using thick-sliced bacon. Add onion, garlic clove, and red pepper, and cook until bacon has finished cooking and vegetables are soft. Remove garlic clove. Add spinach and cook until just wilted, about 1 minute. Put bread pieces into an 8-inch square baking pan. Pour vegetable-bacon mixture evenly over the bread.

In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together eggs, milk and 1 cup of cheese. Season with salt and pepper. Pour over bread and vegetable-bacon mixture. Top with remaining 1/4 cup of cheese. [Here is where you can put the entire mixture in the fridge until it is ready to bake and then eat]. Bake until set in the middle and golden brown, about 30-35 minutes.

Variations:
- Vegetarian! I don't think this necessarily needs bacon, although it does add a nice smoky flavor
- Ham, crumbled sausage or pancetta instead of regular bacon

Pasta and meat sauce

I used to buy jarred pasta sauce (I was, and still am, particularly fond of Rao's), but then I realized how easy it was to make my own. I made this recipe up myself, so the measurements are inexact at best. But it makes a nice pot of sauce, so that you have some leftover to freeze. It's really simple, and feel free to experiment - use less garlic if you are not a garlic person, use a different combo of tomatoes if you like more or less chunks, etc. I like to make the sauce during the baby's morning nap (10am), simmer it for an hour or two, then let it sit for the rest of the day to really let the flavors meld. Then I reheat over low heat at serving time.

Lisa's meat sauce
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 an onion, diced (about 1/2 cup)
4-5 garlic cloves, minced or pushed through a garlic press
1 lb ground beef
1 28-oz can tomato puree
1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
2 tbsps tomato paste
1 "shake" or pinch red pepper flakes
fresh or dried oregano and basil
kosher salt and black pepper, to taste
1 tsp sugar, if needed

Heat the oil over medium heat in a heavy-bottomed pan (I use a 2.75 quart enameled casserole). Add onion and garlic and cook until soft and fragrant, about 5 minutes. Raise heat to medium-high and add the ground beef. Cook, breaking apart with a wooden spoon, until meat is almost cooked through but still has a few pinkish spots, about 5 minutes.

Add tomatoes, tomato paste, red pepper flakes, herbs, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for at least 1 hour.

Taste and add more salt and pepper if necessary. If sauce tastes a little "sharp" stir in sugar.  Spoon over pasta and enjoy!

Mom's Scottish Oatmeal Scones (with pics!)

My mom has been making these scones for as long as I can remember and I love them! They are not your typical English cream scone. I like them toasted with honey...the perfect breakfast when you need something quick.

Be gentle with the dough and don't overmix - it is similar to making pie crust.

Mom's Oatmeal Scones
1 and 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp coarse salt (or 1/4 tsp table salt)
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 tbsp butter (1/2 stick), chilled and cut into small pieces
1/4 cup shortening (i.e., Crisco), chilled and cut into small pieces
1 cup of oats (she uses quick, I use rolled...just don't use instant)
1/3 cup buttermilk (if you don't have buttermilk, add1 tsp of white vinegar to 1/3 cup of milk and let it "sour" for a few minutes)

Preheat the oven to 375. Mix or sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, sugar and cinnamon. Work the butter and shortening into the dry ingredients with a pastry blender or your fingers until the dough the texture of oatmeal.

Stir in the oats. Add the buttermilk, mixing just enough to moisten the dry mixture (you might need a bit more buttermilk depending on the amount of moisture in your flour, the weather, etc. just be careful not to make the mixture soggy!). Turn dough out onto a floured surface and pat into a circle 7-8" in diameter.

Cut into 8 equal-sized wedges and transfer to an ungreased baking sheet. Bake 10-15 minutes or until edges are just starting to brown.

Variations:
*Brush the tops of the scones with melted butter before baking
*Sprinkle the scones with sanding sugar before baking
*Add chopped fruit or raisons