Happy Friday! In haste! In ultra haste! For I gotta do this and that and these and those, and then get a kid to a party and go to adoration. Here’s what we ate this week:
Oh, but first, last Friday Corrie made her first pie dough. She is a giant rhubarb fiend and wanted to make something with it, and everybody should know how to make a pie.
My pie crust recipe
Jump to Recipeincludes freezing the butter for at least 20 minutes, then grating it into the flour. Which is great work for people who enjoy complaining.
And then you scrumble it around with your fingers until it’s just barely incorporated, then sprinkle cold water on top and encourage it to become a ball.
SATURDAY Leftovers and hot pretzels (?)
Strawberry rhubarb pie with streusel topping
Saturday we had our usual leftovers, and honestly I was pretty sick that night, which leads me to believe we need to be a little careful about how long we keep leftovers around. Duh.
But anyway, Corrie picked some rhubarb from the garden, washed and cut up a bunch of strawberries, and made the pie filling using this recipe.
Then she rolled out the pie dough on parchment paper and laid it in the pan, and trimmed the edges
filled the pie shells
and then opted for a streusel topping. She had wanted to make a woven crust, but we ran out of pie dough. So for the streusel topping, we just took a package of yellow cake mix, poured a stick of melted butter on top, and scrunched it into big crumbs, and sprinkled those on top of the fruit filling.
baked ’em and they were great! Very successful.
and you can trust that she really truly did it herself, because boy did she get mad at me when I tried to help. This is the secret to raising independent children: They get mad at you.
SUNDAY
Beach day (PBJ for me)
Sunday I was really feeling terrible, so Damien took the kids to Hampton by himself. We’d been planning this beach trip forever, so even though the forecast was for rain, they forged ahead.
Hardly anybody else was there, because honestly the water is pretty dang cold even on a hot day. The kids did eventually go in the water in their swimsuits, because they are New England kids. Then they went to the arcade, and then to McDonalds. Moe sent me this pic of Corrie waiting for her burger, wearing one of her arcade prizes.
I myself had a PBJ sandwich, which I have once a year or so. Pretty good!
MONDAY
Buffalo chicken wraps
So all summer I’ve been telling myself I have two big writing projects, and one was due in July and one was due in August, so as long as I paced myself, it would be okay.
In fact, one was due July 28 and one was due August 1. Also I did not pace myself. So I was not okay. I spent the week writing furiously, and one project turned out really well, and one did not, and also I didn’t finish it. So I am feeling like a giant loser moron, but what are you gonna do.
On the bright side, everybody likes buffalo chicken wraps. I had mine with buffalo chicken, shredded lettuce, sliced tomatoes, crunchy fried onions, and blue cheese dressing.
That night, I pitted six pounds of cherries, in preparation for some long-anticipated visitors the next day!
When I have a lot of cherries to pit, I always start out by putting them on top of a bottle with a narrow neck, and stabbing the pits out with a chopstick.
After a pound or so, I get annoyed with this technique and just start ripping their hearts out with my fingers, which is honestly just as fast.
I also made two batches of vanilla ice cream. Two eggs, 3/4 cup sugar, 2 cups of heavy cream, and one cup of milk per batch.
TUESDAY
Smoked pork ribs, cole slaw, grilled corn, chips, cherry berry crisp with homemade ice cream
Tuesday afternoon our guests arrived! My oldest sister, her son, one of her daughters, and her three kids, whom I have never met! Absolutely lovely kids (ages 3, 2, and 3 months) and we had a really wonderful visit.
Damien smoked three racks of pork ribs, I made a bowl of simple cole slaw, and we had chips and watermelon, and corn grilled in the husk. Absolutely scrumptious.
I never get good pictures of the best foods, because I’m in such a hurry to eat it up. So this is the best pork photo I got, but take my word, it was smoky, spicy, sweet, juicy, and insanely tender.
I bought something called a black watermelon, which turned out to be just a watermelon with a dark green outside, and inside it was extra juicy and had a kind of vanilla taste? Interesting, not outstanding. The kids had fun watching what happens when you offer watermelon to a duck (mayhem).
I didn’t get a pic of the cherry-blueberry crisp with ice cream, but it was yummy. I used this recipe, except I omitted the coconut from the topping. I, uh, made a quintuple recipe.
My nephew, who is a very good sport, especially where goober dogs are concerned, spent the night, and the rest of them stayed in a hotel.
WEDNESDAY
Oven fried chicken, raw vegetables, chips, fruit salad
The next day my visiting family had a complicated day of other things to do and places to be, but we saw them again in the afternoon, this time with the addition of another niece I also haven’t seen in quite a while!
We had oven fried chicken,
Jump to Reciperaw vegetables, chips, fruit salad (watermelon, strawberry, and mango)
I had been planning mashed potatoes and maybe biscuits, but it was tooooo hot, and a simpler meal was the right call. Nephew spent the night again, and they all left in the morning.
So at one point I said to my niece (remember, she has three kids aged three and under) that she is doing such a great job, and she is such a natural mother. She said, “Oh, well you are seeing me with lots of adults around me to help” — implying that the way she REALLY is as a mother, when she’s alone with the kids, is not so impressive.
Hey! Hey mothers!!! You are supposed to have help! That’s supposed to be the normal thing! Mothers are not supposed to be alone with little kids all day long, doing everything themselves without any other adults! I don’t know what can be done about it, and I sure wish I had had some help myself when I was drowning in babyland. But if that’s you, at least you should know that it’s not how it’s supposed to be, and if you’re struggling, it’s because it’s ridiculously hard. Of course it’s so rewarding and we love our kids so much and we have no regrets, but it’s HARD, and doing it mostly by yourself isn’t what’s best for anyone. So there.
THURSDAY
Sloppy Joes, Psych fries, banana splits
Thursday was the day we had the third installment of Kids Make Supper, and Lucy opted to make the crazy stuffed twice-fried pub potatoes they had on Psych, which they’ve been watching this summer. (Which I have never seen, and which turns out to be a surprisingly entertaining show.) I guess they are called “Fries Quatro Queso Dos Fritos,” and I haven’t actually seen the episode, but SOMEBODY ELSE WAS MAKING SUPPER, so I was in favor of it. She found the recipe on Reddit, I think.
Here’s the potatoes with their insides scooped out, stuffed with cheeses:
and I guess you fry them once, and then coat them in something and fry them again?
She forgot to add bacon to the insides, but she did serve them with some kind of peppery sour cream dip.
She wasn’t sure what to make for the main course, but the general vibe seemed to call for Sloppy Joes. Now, Damien and I both grew up avoiding Sloppy Joes with all our might. It was a cafeteria food that you’d see on the weekly menu and decided to bring a bag lunch that day. But I guess Lucy had it at a friend’s house, and was smitten. So I got a few cans of Manwich Sloppy Joe Sauce (HAD TO GO TO THREE STORES FOR THIS DELICACY) which is, as far as I can tell, ketchup. Anyway she fried up some ground beef and mixed in the sauce, and we had kaiser buns.
and I had to admit, it was a . . . .well, it was an insane meal, but actually quite tasty!
I still don’t think I would ever seek out a Sloppy Joe, but it’s not terrible that I know the kids like it, and would be happy to eat it for supper again.
I will be honest, the Psych potato things were kind of underdone, which is an achievement, because of the “twice fried” thing. The concept was there, and they looked good, but the execution was a little off, which is understandable, because it’s an insane recipe. I don’t know if she will make them again, but, hey, KIDS MADE SUPPER.
We don’t usually have dessert during the week (well, unless we have guests), but I suggested banana splits, just because the rest of the meal seemed so absurdly American. So we had chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry ice cream, topped with something Aldi was calling “Neapolitan bark.”
And that was that!
FRIDAY
French toast casserole and eggs?
We have lots of leftover bread in the house, so this seemed wise.
OH it’s so late and I have to go! Goodbye! I love you!
Basic pie crust
Ingredients
- 2-1/2 cups flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1-1/2 sticks butter, FROZEN
- 1/4 cup water, with an ice cube
Instructions
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Freeze the butter for at least 20 minutes, then shred it on a box grater. Set aside.
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Put the water in a cup and throw an ice cube in it. Set aside.
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In a bowl, combine the flour and salt. Then add the shredded butter and combine with a butter knife or your fingers until there are no piles of loose, dry flour. Try not to work it too hard. It's fine if there are still visible nuggets of butter.
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Sprinkle the dough ball with a little iced water at a time until the dough starts to become pliable but not sticky. Use the water to incorporate any remaining dry flour.
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If you're ready to roll out the dough, flour a surface, place the dough in the middle, flour a rolling pin, and roll it out from the center.
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If you're going to use it later, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap. You can keep it in the fridge for several days or in the freezer for several months, if you wrap it with enough layers. Let it return to room temperature before attempting to roll it out!
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If the crust is too crumbly, you can add extra water, but make sure it's at room temp. Sometimes perfect dough is crumbly just because it's too cold, so give it time to warm up.
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You can easily patch cracked dough by rolling out a patch and attaching it to the cracked part with a little water. Pinch it together.
sugar smoked ribs
the proportions are flexible here. You can adjust the sugar rub to make it more or less spicy or sweet. Just pile tons of everything on and give it puh-lenty of time to smoke.
Ingredients
- rack pork ribs
- yellow mustard
- Coke
- extra brown sugar
For the sugar rub:
- 1-1/2 cups brown sugar
- 1/2 cups white sugar
- 2 Tbsp chili powder
- 2 Tbsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes
- 1 tsp paprika
- 2 Tbsp salt
- 1 Tbsp white pepper
Instructions
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Coat the ribs in yellow mustard and cover them with sugar rub mixture
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Smoke at 225 for 3 hours
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Take ribs out, make a sort of envelope of tin foil and pour Coke and brown sugar over them. close up the envelope.
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Return ribs to smoker and cook another 2 hours.
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Remove tinfoil and smoke another 45-min.
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Finish on grill to give it a char.
Oven-fried chicken
so much easier than pan frying, and you still get that crisp skin and juicy meat
Ingredients
- chicken parts (wings, drumsticks, thighs)
- milk (enough to cover the chicken at least halfway up)
- eggs (two eggs per cup of milk)
- flour
- your choice of seasonings (I usually use salt, pepper, garlic powder, cumin, paprika, and chili powder)
- oil and butter for cooking
Instructions
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At least three hours before you start to cook, make an egg and milk mixture and salt it heavily, using two eggs per cup of milk, so there's enough to soak the chicken at least halfway up. Beat the eggs, add the milk, stir in salt, and let the chicken soak in this. This helps to make the chicken moist and tender.
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About 40 minutes before dinner, turn the oven to 425, and put a pan with sides into the oven. I use a 15"x21" sheet pan and I put about a cup of oil and one or two sticks of butter. Let the pan and the butter and oil heat up.
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While it is heating up, put a lot of flour in a bowl and add all your seasonings. Use more than you think is reasonable! Take the chicken parts out of the milk mixture and roll them around in the flour until they are coated on all sides.
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Lay the floured chicken in the hot pan, skin side down. Let it cook for 25 minutes.
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Flip the chicken over and cook for another 20 minutes.
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Check for doneness and serve immediately. It's also great cold.
I love sloppy Joes (grew up eating them quite a lot as a kid in NH), as long as they have plenty of French’s mustard to cut the sweetness of the ketchup.