Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

A moment of Dr. Demento fame

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My brother-in-law Scott’s singing group, One of Each, recorded a Christmas parody song entitled “Christmas Rhapsody” (sung to the tune of “Bohemian Rhapsody,” natch).

Evidently, it’s the lead song on Dr. Demento’s show this weekend! So if you happen to listen to the Dr., make sure you tune in at the beginning of the show.

(Or you can listen to the song on One of Each’s site.)

Christmas dinner plans

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In a fit of who-knows-what, last year I told my sister that I’d be more than happy to host Christmas this year.

“Great!” she said.

So here we are, in December. I’ve had lots of cooking practice in the interim. Not so much large-party preparation practice though. (Note to self: host more parties in 2006, get practice.) I’m trying to come up with my dinner menu for Dec. 25. Here are the caveats:

  • We’ll have about 9-10 adults.
  • Plus 4 kids.
  • I have one oven.
  • I have a godawful electric stove (Note to self: get gas range next year!) that has three burners. Maybe four, but one seems to be blowing a fuse. Yes, I need to get this looked at before the 25th.
  • We have a small refrigerator. I could not keep lots and lots and lots of stuff in there before the big day.

There are three basic periods to any party gathering: 1) pre-dinner, 2) dinner, and 3) dessert. Here’s what I have so far:

Snacks, nibbles, appetizer type things

  1. Gingerbread. Or perhaps the Caribbean Rum Cake I made a few months ago, which was very tasty and meant to remind us of the cake we’d gotten on Grand Cayman. Gingerbread: traditional, Rum Cake: a known quantity.
  2. Something savory. I know, I know: what’s this with “savory”? A pointless taste. But still… some people prefer it. I’m thinking cheese twists (made from puff pastry) or gougeres.
  3. Scones. My mother loves scones. Of course, I’ll have to make them with currants or sultanas (thereby ruining a perfectly fine scone, in my opinion, but she swears she loves them!)
  4. My sister usually has a platter of prawns at her gatherings. I don’t know if I want to do that, because a) my father-in-law keeps nominally kosher, and b) there’s not going to be any damn room in the fridge for a tray of prawns. Perhaps I’ll go with a tray of meats and cheeses, like pastrami and salami and brie and whatever instead.
  5. Spiced apple cider. Damn you, Williams-Sonoma, for your stores that smell of tasty spiced cider! My biggest problem here is that you can’t get real apple cider in California. This makes no sense to me, given that stuff is flown in from Chile every day, for God’s sake, you’d think we could get some real apple cider from, say, Michigan. But no go.
  6. Coffee. And tea. I probably should make some hot chocolate for los niños.
  7. Wines and beers? I hate buying too much alcohol, because in the absence of the alcohol being port, it’s just going to sit around here forever and ever.
  8. Update: During Thanksgiving Uncle Bob suggested we get a wheel of Brie and heat it in the oven with a glaze such as horseradish and pineapple.

Dinner

  1. Mushroom soup. The Amateur Gourmet posted a lovely recipe for mushroom soup from Balthazar that I think I will try this weekend as a test run.
  2. Prime rib — Uncle Bob says it’s nigh impossible to get real prime rib any more. I’m going to go by a local butcher and check into this. Barring that, I will talk to the butcher at Lunardi’s, which has a fairly decent meat counter, and discuss a special order. I made a large roast a few months ago that turned out well. All hail the instant read thermometer!
  3. Yorkshire pudding/popovers. In bulk.
  4. Green beans, possibly dressed up in some way. I think I will blanch these on the 24th, then store them for sauteing on the day of.
  5. Creamed spinach. I’m not especially fond of the stuff, but I know all these terribly misguided people who are. Cook spinach ahead of time, cream on day. Can you do that with spinach?
  6. Salad. Somehow made interesting. Despite having a wider range of tastes these days, I still find salad terribly boring.
  7. Champagne, water, juice, milk.
  8. Update: How could I have forgotten potatoes! I’ve been thinking of something like potatoes au gratin or the wonderfully rich potato dish that’s in Baking With Julia (I think) Roasting – A Simple Art by Barbara Kafka.
  9. Horseradish whipped cream!
  10. Gravy! Or “au jus.”
  11. Asparagus! Squash!

Dessert

  1. Something lovely and professionally made from Fleur de Cocoa. This will be heavily chocolate.
  2. I do, however, have a niece who cannot stand chocolate. (I’ve asked my sister if they’re sure they brought home the right baby. She just sighs and nods.) So I need to pore over my collection of dessert books for something she’d like.
  3. Some kind of fruit dessert. Maybe an apple pie? Maybe a few smallish apple tarts. These can’t be pre-assembled — no room in the fridge.
  4. Whipped cream. Must remember to stock up on the whipped cream. In bulk.
  5. Coffee and tea.

Good lord. I’m not even that fazed by how much work that would be. I’m sitting here wondering if I have to get a smallish fridge to put in the storage closet under the stairs to hold things.

School day

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Simon is home with me two days a week: Mondays and Thursdays. I made Thursday my volunteer-at-Sophia’s-kindergarten day — give Simon exposure to kindergarten, let him play a little with the big kids, give me something to do during the day when I have him. (Yes. I am selfish enough to keep the days when both of them are in school for myself.)

What do I do when I volunteer? Mostly, clerical stuff. Marvin the Robot Voice: Brain the size of a planet, and I do photocopying. I photocopy pictures for class projects. I collate papers for the students’ files. I stick handouts into the students’ bookbags. I cut out poems for projects with scrapbooking scissors that have various edges — today was the “Sunflower” design. I couldn’t cut with a scissors to make an interesting design when I was in school and I haven’t gotten any better at it in the meantime.

Meanwhile, Simon is either on the K playground, which he has to himself until recess, or near me playing with the boxes of blocks they keep in the manipulatives section (used for counting and sorting in math). He also enjoys, on the nicer, warmer days, sitting at one of the “big kids” tables and eating his lunch. He likes paging through the books in the classroom’s library. His favorite is the I Spy books, and he insists I read one to him, which I do before we leave.

One of the things I love about doing the work is spending a little time watching Sophia’s class in session. Watching how the kids and teacher interact. Watching how Sophia behaves — she usually forgets I’m there after a while. Whenever the teacher asks a question, whether about the book he’s reading, or about doing the calendar, or math, Sophia raises her hand to answer. Sometimes she gets so excited she just blurts out the answer. It’s interesting watching the way she behaves — which I have generalized in my mind to “the way all five-year-olds behave” — with the way her peers do. The differences, the similarities. One of the things the teacher has said is great about Sophia is how verbal she is, talking to everyone, articulating her ideas.

I only stay there an hour, which means I don’t get terribly much done. (Less, if the photocopier is acting up, the way it was one week.) But Simon starts to go stir-crazy after an hour, whether from lack of running around screaming or from hunger or from simple tiredness.

There are still times I wish I could home-school. But I don’t have the temperament for it, at least not right now. I don’t doubt that I could do it, but currently this school is working well for us, and more importantly, for Sophia. And I like being a small, hour-long part of it every week.