Favorite Cookbooks and Recipe Organization

There are so many good cookbooks in the world, but here are some of my favorites:

I have three of Nigella Lawson's cookbooks, and I love all the recipes I've tried (although in the interest of full disclosure, she is a waaaaay more adventurous eater than I am).  This is a basics kind of cookbook that teaches you to do things like roast a turkey or chicken, make a cake from scratch, cook when you are trying to lose weight, etc.  Even more than the food, however, I love her writing.  This is the kind of cookbook you like to read just for the sake of reading.  I read it to get into the mood to cook and think about food (sometimes I am just not feeling the excitement when it comes to planning another week's meals and going grocery shopping).  She is intelligent and witty and assumes that you are an intelligent cook (while still giving great directions).  And I like it that she is a beautiful woman who looks like she actually likes to eat rather than gingerly and self-consciously nibbling a small bite of something and proclaiming "Delicious" (cough: Martha).  My best friend, Brynn, does a hilarious impression of Martha tasting food.  I miss you, Brynn!

I'm planning on buying Nigella's newest (or maybe asking for it for my birthday? Valentine's Day?):  

                                                         
 I can't wait!

My next favorite is Molly Katzen's "Moosewood Cookbook".  I used to make things from this when I was just starting to really cook when I was a teenager, and nostalgia is one reason I keep cooking from it.  It is a vegetarian cookbook, and the food is very good and flavorful--and her desserts are wonderful.  The font is all hand-written, with some of the directions illustrated with her own drawings, which makes it feel really personal, like you are cooking from a recipe a friend wrote out for you.



For my third favorite, I'll give you a hint:



Yep, it's the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook.  I refer to it all the time for basics like biscuits.  Plus, no matter how evocative it is of cheap Italian restaurants, I just love red gingham.  Sigh.

My fourth and last favorite is actually not a published cookbook, but rather a way of organizing recipes that makes my life better.  I cook from this more than any other single cookbook.

I started putting my recipes in plastic sheet protectors in a binder almost 10 years ago, and it is such a great system.  I now have three of these binders, and it makes it so easy to add a recipe or find one that I've clipped.  My newest folder is much cuter and has dividers to section things out into different types of food (salad, soup, main dishes, desserts, etc.), but my older ones are just in an order that makes sense to me.  I can easily flip through and find what I want.  Here are some pics of what I mean:

 This one has randomly clipped recipes that I taped or glued onto regular paper, then slipped into the sleeves.

 This is an example of whole pages from magazines that I've put into page protectors.

It is good to select a binder that has pockets so you can have a place to store recipes that are waiting to be slipped into page protectors, as in above. Ideally, you just have empty page protectors in your binder ready to go.  Long story short, my binder is an English A4 size from when we were living in London, so I can't get page protectors for it here.  I need to shuffle around my recipes and put some in a normal binder that uses normal page protectors.  I will add this to my endless list of needed yet not crucial projects and will probably get to it when Lucy starts college soon.

Anyway, not rocket science I know :), but this sure makes my life easier!

I am linking up to Works for me Wednesday over at We are that Family.

Terrible, no-good, very bad day

Yesterday was a not-so-good day.  A really not-so-good day, that actually started the day before yesterday when my almost 7-month-old Lucy soaked me in throw up down to the skin not once, but twice.  She was not happy, and neither was I.  By the way--I promise this blog is not going to devolve into a bodily fluid theme despite recent posts... .

Instead of turning my frown upside down, I was pretty determined to keep a bad mood going.  Needless to say, frowny-faced moms are not usually nice.  They tend toward the cranky, barky way of interacting.  At least this frowny-faced mom does.

Oh, I had my reasons for crankiness.  A cranky sick baby meant that I got nothing done.  My mental to-do lists, both the realistic/fundamental one (laundry! cooking! tidying! helping kids!) and the in-my-dreams/frippery one (decorate my bare mantel! make something fun with my fabric stash! buy a new sofa!)lay there, undone and pouting at my neglect.

Interestingly, I normally think I get nothing done, but today I realized that compared to a day like yesterday when I had a baby who wanted to be fed or rocked every minute, I normally accomplish a surprising amount.      Once I made that realization, I was ready for this learning experience to be over.  And it wasn't, so I got even more grumpy.

After that, I was looking for reasons to be grumpy, and I sure found them.  Lukas, 6, stayed home from school because he was too sick, but he seemed well enough to tease his younger brother (funny how that works).  An early release day brought everyone home to tear through the kitchen like hungry locusts, leaving a trail of peanut butter smears, crumbs and dirty dishes in their wake and on to scrap over TV and computer time.  I only had time for the shower part of getting ready, so let's just say that I've had better dressed and groomed days in my life.  I ate the rest of a bag of m&m's intended to help/bribe Sawyer to be potty-trained.  The house was a disaster, I didn't have the foggiest what to make for dinner and my husband accidentally left his keys at the office, so he needed me to pick him up at the park'n'ride at the last minute.

By the time I got in the car, my mind was filled with more existential questions: What am I doing with six children when I can't even seem to keep myself together? Will ever be able to finish a worthwhile project again? Can I maintain a sense of self if I don't do the things that make me, me?  Are my kids going to grow up to become self-centered slobs who plague their spouses or become criminals and everyone will blame me for all of it?

Me, overdramatic?

Maybe a little.

But you know what?

My problems may overwhelm me some days, but most of them aren't permanent or life-shattering.  I know so many people whose challenges are much more acute (and whose attitudes are much better than mine, to be honest).  I have people that love me who want to help if I ask for it before I get so cranky that I am barking at them.  Even more, I have a God who wants to help and soothe me if I lay down my pride and ask Him.

On that note, I read a great quote today by Carl Bloch, a 19th Century Danish painter.  He is most famous for his depictions of Christ.  He said: "When things are at their worst they then become their absolute best.  Grey skies and rain splashing are a part of (life)--one must be washed off thoroughly before one goes in to God."

The joy and the hardship are a part of life.  I guess the trick is to learn to play in the rain.  I'm still working on that...

P.S.  Here is a reason to be happy, albeit a shallow one: I love bum flaps on baby PJ's.  Here is a picture of Lucy's Petit Bateau (thrift store bought) PJ's that I took last night when I had shaken off my bad mood.  Sigh.  How can life be bad when there's a bum like that hanging around :)?

I'm linking up to Weekend Bloggy Reading at Serenity Now:

Be afraid...be very afraid

Warning: the following post contains subtle references/innuendo about excrement, so if you are squeamish or live in a fairy world where you don't have to deal with such realities, you may want to pass on this one.

This morning, I was was wasting time on the computer doing housework, when I noticed this pile of orange peels:

They were fresh, and they were all eaten by one person:

That is a heckuva lot of oranges for a three year old's system.  Especially one whose mom is still changing his diapers.   

I am afraid to see what the next day will bring, if you know what I mean... 

Decorators and Marriage Therapists afterthought

This bit from Jim Gaffigan's King Baby (transcript below) is hilarious:

00:21:55	I have a nice bed.
00:21:56	I don't believe in making the bed though.
00:21:58	My wife is always like, "why don't you ever make the bed? " For the same reason I don't tie my shoes after I take them off.
00:22:05	It doesn't make sense.
00:22:08	You know?
00:22:08	We're not putting this thing in storage.
00:22:13	I'm hoping to come back in a couple of hours and I would like it open, 'cause when our bed is made it's covered in 40 pillows like we're stockpiling ammo for the global pillow fight.
00:22:28	I ask my wife, I'm like, "what's the deal with all the pillows?" " how often are you giving a tour of our bedroom?"
00:22:36	And has anyone ever been impressed by pillows?
00:22:39	Like someone's gonna leave your bedroom, "i didn't know they were doing that well.
00:22:46	They got like 40, 50 pillows on that bed."

Perhaps my husband is right. I need a pillow intervention :)...

I dressed myself today...

This is a day when my three-year-old insisted on dressing himself.  

I would have probably been more concerned about it if I hadn't been at the DMV waiting for my 15 and 1/2-year-old to take his exam to get his driver's permit.  Eeek.  

Pretty soon three-year-olds will learn to put their velcro shoes on the right feet, and then they will outgrow velcro altogether.  

Then they will be getting their driver's permit and reminding you by their much taller-than-you presence that they are going to be leaving and making their own way in the world sooner than you would like to think.  

Of course, I want my children to grow up and become independent and I can't wait to hear about their adventures, but I already miss them just thinking about it.  

  So the truth is, I find badly fastened toggle coats and shoes on the wrong feet oddly comforting.  At least with my three-year-old, I have a few years left...  

Decorators and Marriage Therapists

"True love is not so much a matter of romance as it is a matter of anxious concern for the well-being of one's companion." 

— Gordon B. Hinckley (Stand a Little Taller: Counsel and Inspiration for Each Day of the Year)

I have done something for my marriage lately that I am actually proud of.  I don't know about you, but I find that marriage is sometimes equal parts connection/love/peace/fun and dismal realization of your own imperfections.  I don't like the second half of that equation.


Anyway, I have been amassing pillows for about a year at the Goodwill and Deseret Industries in order to make my master bed a thing of wonder and beauty.  As all good decorators would tell me, pillows are an inexpensive way to bring color and texture to your bed.  Finally, I had a glorious concoction of pillows that would have pleased most decorators, even the most spendthrift (the accent pillows in front cost a total of $8--less than $2 a piece at thrift stores).  My heart would leap with pride and satisfaction whenever I walked in and saw my beautiful, thrifty bed.

Isn't she lovely.  Ah, yes.

However, about a month ago, my husband said something that caught my attention.  He said: "I hate having all these pillows on the bed."  In all fairness, he had said this before, but I had not really paid him much attention. I had sort of listened the way you listen to a two-year-old's temper tantrum "Yes, I know you want an ice cream cone for breakfast, sweetie..."  Anyway, for some reason, that day was a day I actually listened to him and asked some probing questions.  Does he hate having to throw them on the floor at night?  Hate having to feel like he has to make the bed with them in the morning?  Hate having them in his way when he wants to take an after-work catnap (don't worry, his catnaps aren't as frequent as Will Ferrell's George Bush).  Hate the way they look?  It boiled down to the fact that they get in his way and that his heart does not give the same sort of leap when he sees them.  In fact, in sounded more like his heart would sink when he thought of dealing with the unwanted pillows every day.

Now, the selfish part of me thought, "Eee gads man, get some taste.  Of course the pillows stay."  But then I realized that he wasn't asking me to give up the pillows on my side of the bed.  He just didn't want to have to deal with something that didn't bring him joy or satisfaction.  Really, that seems pretty fair and reasonable.

So, this is what our bed looks like now:

You know, I really thought it would bother me every time I walked in my room to see my hideous Two-Face bed.  But surprise of surprises--it doesn't bother me a bit.  My heart leaps when I see my pretty pillows, and when I see my husband's plain, ascetic side, my heart leaps when I think of him :).  

I am sure that we are not going to win any decorator's awards, but not having to go to a marriage therapy because of $8 worth of pillows: priceless.

Why me, why blog, why now?

Well, it's been several weeks since I've posted, and the real reason is that I've been plagued by self-doubt.  I've been starting to wonder why in the world I thought blogging was such a great idea for me right now.  I have six kids and a crazy life.  Just laundry, grocery shopping and cooking are the equivalent of a normal person's full-time job.  Have I actually slipped into the abyss of large family insanity from whence no traveller returns?

I realized I needed to figure out what my real motivation is for blogging before I could go on.  Is it a bid for attention and adulation, since of course this little blog is destined to become famous (please note the intended sarcasm)?  Is it a desire  for some kind of connection with others, since I am still working to find more meaningful face-to-face connections with people since our move?  Is it because I enjoy subjecting others to my navel-gazing moments?

The truth is, it may be all those things.  Bottom line, my life is a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and a whole lot of monotony that paradoxically actually matters in the grand scheme of things.  Only sometimes it's easy to wonder if I am doing a good enough job.  It's easy to wonder if doing work that is at the bottom end of the pay and prestige scale in terms of labor economics is turning my brain to mush.  Most frighteningly, it's easy to wonder if, by the time my much-loved and wanted children leave home, I will even know who I am anymore.

I need this blog now because I need to affirm, by putting it out into the world, that what I do, the decisions I'm making, and the thoughts I'm thinking are worth sharing.  Hopefully my blog will also give me some satisfying connection with other people (known and as-yet unknown) who are experiencing and thinking some of the same things I am, as well as inspiring my creativity.  But more than anything else, I need to reinforce the idea that what I do and who I am is worth expressing.  Writing it down in a format where I am sharing it with other people is symbolically and literally very powerful.


Well, I feel better having clarified that and gotten that off my chest.  Blogging world, here I am...