Foodmomiac

Cottage Living

We are back at the cottage again,and it feels like it's been a long time. Because of family camp (and yes, I do promise to share more about the cold and rainy week in Northern Michigan), we only had one night here for each of the last two weeks, and it wasn't enough.

We haven't really had a summer yet in the midwest, and I already feel like fall is biting at our heels. Part of it is the produce situation. All of the very best fruits and vegetables have such small windows of availability. You blink, and they are gone. The asparagus is gone. The strawberries are (mostly) gone. On our way to dinner last night, we saw a sign for sour cherries at our local farm stand. By next week? They will be gone as well.

On a more positive note, the weather forecast for this weekend promises to be warm and sunny, so after a visit to the Holland Farmers' Market, we will be camping out at the beach for the duration. The Kindle is charging, Michael is grabbing some cold cuts, and our sunscreen bottles are at the ready.

Now Hiring: Alice from the Brady Brunch

Image courtesy of TVAcres.com

Remember that post about the life intern? Well, I still need help (I really, really need help), but the position has been updated slightly. We spent the last week at Family Camp, and thanks to some horrible weather (rain, cold, mist, fog), I basically lived in the Arts & Crafts center. This led to lots of deep conversations with other campers while tackling my ceramics painting, lanyard stitching and trivet mosaics. One of those conversations was with a mom who had just hired a housekeeper. I started complaining to her about the level of chaos in my life, and explained that we have no solution in place once our au pair leaves next month. She looked at me like I was slightly slow, and said, "Get a housekeeper!"

Huh.

That got me thinking about the famous housekeepers of 70s and 80s TV, and I developed a little fantasy. What if I could hire Alice from the Brady Bunch?? Or Mrs. Garrett from Diff'rent Strokes? (and then Facts of Life, of course - and maybe she could bring her contractor, a.k.a. George Clooney).

Sadly, I don't think either of those lovely ladies is on Sittercity or Craig's List (and George Clooney probably has some other stuff going on), so I have decided to look for a real live housekeeper/nanny/dog walker. Max will be in prescohol for the same hours that Dylan is in 2nd grade (and at the same school), so we don't need that many hours. My Craig's List ad has generated the world's most insane responses (a future blog post perhaps), but I've gotten some great responses so far from Sittercity, and am in the process of scheduling interviews. Fingers crossed that I find our Alice!!

Life is insane, but good hair helps a LOT

So.. if it weren't apparent by my erratic (i.e. lame) blogging schedule, things have gotten a little bit hectic in the Foodmomiac household. School ended, camp began (two camps for Max, one for Dylan, all of which require swimsuits, towels, lunches, snacks, water bottles, ACK!), and work changed a lot.

Michael and I are now in the same department, and he's kind of my boss now, which is an interesting dynamic. I think we're handling it splendidly, though. As I told my dad, our style at home is kind of Archie and Edith, but at work we are MUCH more well-behaved.

That said, any reorganization is stressful, and the workload lately has been intense. Today we leave for our annual week at Family Camp, but it doesn't seem real. When you're running, running, running all the time, it is impossible to just STOP. It's kind of like that physics rule about an object in motion staying in motion.

While I'm gone trying to decompress, I do have an assignment for you. Actually, it's just for those of you attending BlogHer, but it's a very fun assignment. Here's the deal:

The BlogHer conference is in Chicago this year, so I have the opportunity to share some of the things that I love about this city with those who are coming into town. One of the things I love most is my hair stylist, Sheba, from Sparrow Hair. Sheba is honestly one of the coolest women in Chicago, and she is amazingly talented. Though I recently chopped all of my hair off, she is the only stylist who has ever been able to help me grow my hair out without many, many months of horrible, jewfro ugliness. (That is skill, my friends.) So, I want to share Sheba (and her business partner Susan) with all of you, and to do so, I have partnered with two lovely ladies; the always-gorgeous Susan Wagner of Friday Playdate and the stunning Heather Barmore of No Pasa Nada.

We are going to award four of you with a free hair makeover!

The rules:

1. If you are coming to BlogHer and want a hair makeover, post a photo or video on your site, showing us why you need one. Please be sure to include links to our three sites and to Sparrow Hair.
2. Post a link to your post in the comments of this post, or Susan or Heather's posts once those are live.
3. All entries must be in by July 3.
3. All entries will be judged by the lovely ladies of Sparrow and by the super-talented Whoorl of Hair Thursday.
4. We will select and announce 15 finalists. These women will all be invited to attend a special party at Sparrow Hair on the Thursday afternoon before BlogHer.
5. At the party, we will announce the four winners and document the makeovers.
6. Before and after photos will be showcased on all of our sites, sending the winners lots of link love in addition to the joy they are already receiving from their new hairdos.

Can't wait to see your pictures!

Foodmomiac's Macaroni Salad

I have never been a huge fan of macaroni salad. It's usually gloppy and overly sweet, and just... blah. But, there's something really appealing about a macaroni salad. I love elbow macaroni, and I love mayo-based salads, so I always knew that I could probably rescue this dish.

After doing some online research and some in-kitchen tinkering, I think we have a winner. This is based off of a recipe I found on All Recipes, but the additions and changes make it my own. Enjoy! (Note: this makes 10 VERY generous servings, so make sure you have plenty of guests, or are ready to eat macaroni salad every day for a week.)

Foodmomiac's Macaroni Salad

1 box elbow macaroni
1 cup mayonnaise
1/4 apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup turbinado sugar
2-1/2 tablespoons yellow mustard
1-1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 sweet white onion, cut into 3-4 big chunks
2 stalks celery, cut into 3-4 big chunks
2 carrots, cut into 3-4 big chunks (you can use a handful of baby carrots if that's all you have on hand)
3 hard boiled eggs, diced
2 dill pickles, diced

Cook macaroni for eight minutes. Drain, rinse in cold water and set aside.

Mix together the mayo, vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt and pepper in a large bowl.

In a food processor, mince the onion, celery and carrots. (You can also just dice these finely on your own, but the food processor does a great job and is super fast.)

Add the veggies to the sauce in the bowl, along with the macaroni, eggs and pickles. Mix to combine, cover, and refrigerate for at least two hours (overnight is fine, and probably preferable!)

Job Opening: Life Intern

I need a life intern. I am completely incapable of keeping track of all of the things that need to be done in my life. Work I can handle. But life? I'm not cutting it.

Apparently there are orientations this week for the kids' camps. I had no idea. I only found out because a friend of mine can't make one and asked if we could tag team.

And also? The forms for the camps were due one week ago. Did I fill them out? No. Did I even know that there were forms at all? NO.

Max's surgery is this Friday. He needs a full blood work up done in advance. So, now I have to take him for that on Wednesday morning. I almost forgot completely (and only remembered because I looked at the medical form for camp).

Laundry has not been done in over a week.

Food shopping will not be done at ALL this week.

Dylan wasn't signed up for the next session of guitar, Max has never taken any classes at all and the pile of forms that need to be filed in our home office is threatening to take over the entire desk.

Hangin' Around (with some Sweet and Sour Cabbage)

It's Sunday evening, and we are still at our cottage. The plan was to leave after dinner, but we just couldn't do it. We had to prolong the fantasy of a stress-free life just a TEENY bit longer.

It was a great weekend at the cottage. Michael's dad, sister and her boyfriend came up, and we loved showing them around. We did the Holland Farmers' Market (where we scored country pork ribs, rhubarb, radishes and a giant jug of Michigan maple syrup), Chicken Scratch Farm, Saugatuck downtown and the beach. The weather wasn't warm enough for any sunbathing, but we skipped rocks and explored a bit.

Megen and Nick left in the early afternoon, but, as I said, we just couldn't do it. Michael's dad is still off work from his car accident, so he was able to stick around as well. The kids are in bed, and we're just sitting around and watching TV.

Dinner was terrific. I bought some Korean meat rub at the Saugatuck Spice Merchant, and we rubbed it on the pork ribs from the market. We are very much asparagus'd out, so we grabbed a head of red cabbage at the little farm market down the road, and I made some old fashioned sweet and sour cabbage. The recipe is from the Betty Crocker cookbook, which came with the cottage. It's not the type of cookbook I'd normally buy, but I'm loving the recipes. They are simple and comforting - just perfect for a weekend hangin' around in the country.

Sweet and Sour Cabbage

1 head red cabbage, cored and thinly sliced
4 strips bacon, diced
1 red onion, sliced
1/4 cup brown or Turbinado sugar
2 tablespoons flour
1/4 cup water
3 tablespoons white vinegar
freshly ground black pepper

Boil one inch of water in a 10-inch skillet. Add the cabbage, and cook, uncovered for an additional 15 minutes. Drain, and set aside. Place the bacon in the skillet and cook it on medium for about 3-4 minutes. Add the onion and cook an additional 4 minutes, until the onion is soft and the bacon is crisp. Remove from the grease with a slotted spoon, and place it on a paper towel or brown paper bag covered plate to drain. If your bacon is super greasy, remove some of the grease (you want to leave about 1 tablespoon). Add the sugar and the flour, and stir to combine. Add the water and vinegar, stirring well to scrape up all of the bits from the bottom of the skillet. Add the cabbage back into the skillet, stir well to combine and season with some freshly ground pepper. Serve hot or at room temperature.

Highlights, Lowlights and some Pork Chops

Today was absolutely insane. Here are some highlights (or lowlights, as the case may be):

- Pretending to work while my colleague Jessi took dozens of photos of me for an upcoming Ad Age piece (link to come once it's complete)

- Meeting Max and Franzi (our au pair) at Children's Memorial Hospital for an ENT appointment. At the appointment, I was told that his left ear looks "hideous." The ear drum is totally retracted (not sure what that means), and the doctor is shocked that Max is able to hear us. Lovely. On June 12, he'll have tubes placed back in his ears (the tubes from December of 2007 have fallen out) and his adenoids removed.

- Suffering through nonstop coughing attacks at work, and having a colleague actually feel my head to determine whether I had a fever (the verdict was yes).

- Rushing out of work at 3:30 to see Dylan perform with her afterschool group, only to hit traffic and miss it.

- Managing to make a homemade dinner from scratch with no recipes. This was the true highlight of my day. I marinated pork chops in a mixture of plain Greek yogurt, dill, Dijon mustard, olive oil and the juice of one lemon. I then cubed some potatoes, boiled them, and fried them up with olive oil, scallions and an herb mixture that Franzi's mom brought me from Germany. Michael threw the pork chops on the grill, and I finished up the meal with some broccoli roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper.

- EVERYONE finished their plate. Success!

- Laying in bed resting while Dylan read Max his bedtime story. They read Curious George Goes To The Hospital in preparation for the big day.