1. Today was Mom's 89th birthday and Christy hosted family dinner. She didn't try to replicate Mom's cooking, but made one of my favorite meals Mom used to cook as a tribute to her. We began with one of Mom's favorite drinks, a daiquiri on the rocks. Christy made cheese balls, using, in part, that cheese that comes in jars (like Mom did) and we had cheese and crackers for appetizers. For the main course, Christy made a Sunday dinner favorite when we were growing up, ham and bean soup and accompanied it with corn bread and cole slaw made from a Sunset magazine recipe that she and Mom shared. For dessert, Christy baked oatmeal and pecan cookies and served the kind of after dinner drinks Mom enjoyed. I chose a brandy Alexander. I could have ordered a variant on the pink squirrel that Christy called a brown squirrel. I'm not sure, but I think it was an almond flavored drink that featured amaretto -- the pink squirrel features creme de noyaux, unavailable at the Kellogg Liquor Store. Mom loved these sweet after dinner drinks and famously chugged them, a longstanding source of good humor in our family when she was with us. (None of us, by the way, chugged ours!)
Mom devoted a lot of her time to food. She collected recipes. She shopped for our food. She was our family's only cook for many years -- Dad started doing some cooking after he retired and as we kids got older, we'd do some cooking when we came home to visit.
I listened tonight while Christy and Carol shared memories of their favorite Mary Woolum meals. They talked about pork chops, roasts, spaghetti, macaroni with hamburger and tomato sauce, Mom's homemade bread and rolls, vegetable soup, fried chicken, vegetable soup, beef stew, and, I'm sure, other meals.
Later, after this conversation ended, I remembered how much I enjoyed Mom's Sunday dinners. When she did it, Sunday was the day when Mom baked dinner rolls or bread, baked cinnamon rolls, or orange rolls. Her Sunday dinners often featured entrees that paired well with homemade bread: ham and bean soup, stew, other soups, and, my favorite, Mom's chili with ground beef. Mom didn't (very often, if ever) use canned beans and when she cooked dried beans the windows in the kitchen and living room steamed up. Our house was always warm, but when Mom fixed bean soups, the house was like a steam room. The moist heat was comforting and memorable, matched only by the comfort of the smell of ham broth simmering or the sweet chili powder and tomato smell of the her chili bubbling away or the smell of ground beef and onion frying.
Happy Birthday, Mom! We had a lot of fun eating food cooked in your style tonight and remembering how happy you made us with the countless dinners you prepared.
2. I guess it's a well-known fact in our family that I enjoy the foods of the Middle East. On Christmas (or was it my birthday?) of 2018, Carol and Paul gave me a beautiful cookbook of vegetarian Middle East recipes (perfect for the care of my kidneys) and on Christmas Day, 2019, Zoe gave me another beautiful cookbook of Palestinian recipes. Before we moved to Maryland, I owned a book I bought at the now defunct Eugene branch of the Book Bin (formerly the site of Original Joe's, now the site of Sushi Ya) back in about 1993 or 1994 of Lebanese recipes I loved. I lost track of that favorite cookbook when we moved from Eugene -- either I accidentally donated it to Goodwill or it was in a box that got lost in transit between Eugene and Greenbelt. I miss it. I've tried to remember its title, without luck, and so have never recovered it. (Losses like this happen. We live, after all, in an impermanent, transitory reality.)
Over the last year, one thing has kept from cooking out of these cookbooks: local access the recipes' spices. When I run into some of you who read this blog, some of you comment to me that you can tell I really miss living in Maryland, near Washington, D. C. I try to explain that I love both North Idaho and Maryland. I miss where I used to live and I love where I am.
OK.
Now, one of the things I miss about living back East is the access to international food stores -- whether, to name a few, Indian, pan-Asian, Mexican, or, this weekend, Middle Eastern. (If you are thinking, as you read this, "But, Bill, there's the internet!" I know. I'm getting to that. Just let me say that I like smelling my international food purchases and I can't do this online!)
So, I sat here today wistfully remembering back to August 27, 2018 when Melissa and I met up with Erik and we swam around Manhattan in the most unbearable humidity I've ever experienced and, among other places, popped into Kalusyan's, an entire store (with cafe) devoted to the sale of Indian and Middle East spices, teas, and other global food items.
It was intoxicating. The smells of curry, anise and fennel, cardamom, cinnamon, chilies, paprika, turmeric, etc. not to mention the incense, oils, and teas made me lightheaded with pleasure.
Since such markets are not a part of the Silver Valley landscape, I am going through recipes, deciding which spices I want to have on hand that aren't at Yoke's. I'm preparing to make an online order. I could order from Kalusyan's. I can definitely order from Penzey's. Maybe both. I'll decide. But I'm looking forward to having za'atar, cardamom pods, and other spices on hand and making some of these dishes.
3. It's rare to watch the U of Oregon women's basketball team play and see Sabrina Ionescu not be in the spotlight. But, essentially, that's what happened today when the Ducks played Cal. It seemed pretty clear to me (and Coach Graves confirmed it in his halftime interview) that the Ducks wanted, for starters, to get Minyon Moore some early shots, and, if she hit them, build her confidence.
This happened.
In addition, lanes to the hoop opened up for Satou Sabally and she made a variety of spinning and muscular drives to the iron as well as peppering some shots from outside and scored 31 points.
I was very happy to watch Erin Boley convert six of her eight three point attempts and score 22 points. If this was a confidence building game for Boley and if she is finding her rhythm and touch from distance, look out. It means opponents will have to stretch their defenses to account for her, opening up room inside for Ionescu and Ruthy Hebard to run their pick and rolls, Moore to score on drives and midrange jumpers, and for Sabally to find those open lanes to make her dazzling moves to the cup.
By the way, the Ducks won in a blowout, 105-55. Players who normally spend a lot of time on the pine got quite a bit of playing time this afternoon, giving the starters a perfect balance of playing time and time on the bench to rest their joints and conserve energy for future games.
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