Today, I’m pleased to report that Jeff and I are as comatose as two people can be without actually being hooked up to medical equipment or shooting heroin.
After three days of painting, two road trips, three fireworks shows, a couple of cookouts and a family reunion, we are in deep recovery mode. The shades are drawn. The a/c is cranking. How many episodes of “Band of Brothers” have we seen today? I don’t know, but we’ve been in it to win it since 1100 hours. Since Normandy!
Fighting aside, I didn’t want to let the day slip away without sharing this recipe for Ina Garten’s Greek Panzanella. It’s a serious contender for summer stapledom.
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According to my hometown newspaper, a few weeks ago, someone found a box in a parking lot downtown. The writing on the box warned that anyone who touched it would lose their hands. So, the person who found the box called 911, and the Bomb Squad came to investigate its contents.
Just then, the box’s owner showed up. She was a Chicago woman who’d driven down for a family reunion and brought something special with her: a big, messy box of ribs. After the party, she’d left the empty box to dry outside, because it was too big for a trash bin and too funky for her hotel room. And what about that “lose your hands” warning? It was written on the box by a rib joint employee who didn’t want anyone taking them besides this customer.
When it comes to picnics, it pays to take something that won’t get you in trouble with the Bomb Squad.
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The good tomatoes are in.
Tomatoes that smell like tomatoes and taste like tomatoes and send wet tomato trails running down your arms every time you bite into the season’s first BLT on homemade sourdough. With thick-sliced bacon. And real mayo.
Tomatoes that make a salad. Like this couscous salad with chopped tomatoes, chickpeas, red bell pepper, onion, cucumber and feta. So good you’ll feel like you’re doing something bad. And isn’t that what summer is for?
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I’m a new convert to stir-frying.
Yes, it can feel like it’s taking FOREVER to get everything sliced and ready to go, but the time you spend in prep, you save in standing over a hot stove. For example, this Sizzling Beef and Scallion Stir-Fry only takes about four minutes in a wok.
FOUR MINUTES! Children have been conceived in less time.
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I think I’ve been in denial about summer. About it coming back. But yesterday, the temperature was around 90, and this morning, I saw Lifestyle Expert Colin Cowie on TV flanked by huge pitchers of sangria. So, resistance is futile. Especially to the sangria.
If you’re like me, the less time spent in a hot summer kitchen, the better, but salads and sandwiches can get a little boring. This recipe was inspired by a sandwich I sampled at the Potlikker Film Festival last month. Two slices of thick, fresh bread stuffed with chopped radishes, arugula and capers. It was light but full of flavor, a vegetarian option that didn’t seem like an afterthought.
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I’m feeling a little guilty about all the pasta recipes, but I can explain.
Pasta is quick. And delicious. And it goes with everything.
And when you’re sneezing so loudly that it’s waking up your husband and setting off car alarms, pasta requires exactly the amount of effort you want to put into a home-cooked meal: minimal.
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My sister and I have April birthdays that are one day apart. Mom always referred to our birthday week as “Hell Week,” which I didn’t really understand until I got older and realized that, every few years, our birthdays, Tax Day and Easter all fell during the same week.
Hell, indeed.
I’m still not sure why Mama didn’t jump in the car in her nightgown and drive off into the night, like Vivi in “Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.”
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This is the sort of lunch you make between applying layers of primer to the Future Home Office of Champions. Something easy and light and…
What? The primer you use only takes one coat? Well, I’m betting the room you painted was a nice, normal color. Something that exists on the
color wheel. Or in nature. Or at least on one of those paint sample cards at Home Depot. Our room had walls the color of radioactive Pepto paired with electric green built-in shelves. MY EYES! MY EYES!
Until a few days ago, our response to the room was to just OMIGOD CLOSE THE DOOR. The same response the parents had to Carol Anne’s room in “Poltergeist.” But then we started talking about how the Poltergeist Pepto Pink room would make a great home office, and when Jeff saw how many electrical outlets are in that room, it was ON.
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