On Foodie Kids & Pumpkin-Eating

It's so yesterday to talk about cooking on a parenting blog...but here's the thing: it's also so tomorrow.  Every single morning, no matter how much I fed them the day before, those pesky kids wake up hungry. 

We are blessed with foodie children. That is to say, they get excited about things like crispy kale and mustard cod and curried chickpeas.  I say "blessed" because I don't in any way take credit for this miracle, nor will I try to explain for you how to get your kids to eat a wider variety of flavors or colors. Mine have got a bit of jealous streak to them, so if anything maybe their culinary adventurousness stems from wanting to eat what the grown-ups are eating. (This gets murky when it comes to beverages, of course; a discussion for another day.)

Like all of us, they have their aversions: Ruby wouldn't touch a mushroom if Daniel Radcliffe were offering it from his palm, and Bella has similar feelings about tomatoes. Louisa will beg like a pro for anything on my plate, and then will decline, quite politely ("no tank you") if what's on my plate happens to be lettuce or fish. 

Undoubtedly, if the kids helped to cook it, they tend to enjoy eating it. Ruby is a pro at making meatballs and pancakes. Recently she made her birthday cupcakes with very minimal assistance. Bella likes to make her own eggs. They are both all over the smoothie maker (hand blender).

A few weeks ago, we went pumpkin and apple picking, which led to a fantastic spate of family cooking projects. There's nothing like eating foods made from fruits you picked yourself. (Even better, I would imagine, if you grew them yourself. One day: growing fruit and veg is on my bucket list. Check back with me in thirty or so years...) Josh and Ruby made apple galettes, and 

caramelized apple slices. I made apple muffins, and then pumpkin muffins.

In honor of the national week of the pumpkin, I really wanted to post my recipe for child-approved high-fiber pumpkin muffins (these kinds of blog posts are supposed to have recipes!). Those muffins were fought over like...like...hotcakes. But, sadly, I can't, because I didn't write it down. My recipes are often devised by opening no less than three web pages, and then creating, in the bowl, a mashup based on what I have at hand. I have no fear of oat bran, nor sugar. (Okay, maybe that's why they were so good).

We still have another pumpkin. What pumpkin experiment will be next? No time for frivolous baking; there is still dinner to cook for today. Maybe a spicy pumpkin coconut curry would be just the thing. Or, on second thought, a nap.

A Holiday of Schmaltz and Love

Josh made chopped liver yesterday. I will admit that this very fact made me a little crazy, on the day before Passover when I had to clean and change over the kitchen: a dastardly chore perhaps only understood by other Passover-observers for its full-on over-the-top-ness. By the time Josh was able to start cooking in our Passover-ready kitchen, I had spent several hours scrubbing, boiling, and covering. I was tired, and could have used a full-body massage, or at least a nap. But instead, I gave over the kitchen to him, where he reined in complete thrall to his schmaltz and livers for the next half-day, while I took two of the kids out to pick up those last-minute chopped liver indispensables: a Passover food processor and fine mesh strainer.

(As Passover observers, we need to have a separate collection of kitchen utensils and equipment, all only to be used for this one week each year. Our collection is bare-bones, indeed. Every year, we say we'll buy more tools for proper cooking on Passover, and every year we fail to make the necessary investment. "It's only a few more days," we tell ourselves. "We can get by without a knife that can cut through a carrot, and a saucepan makes a perfectly fine teapot.")

Josh and I have different approaches to time spent in the kitchen. I tend to be efficient, using simple but tasty recipes that produce predictable, appreciated results. As my big brother likes to say, Josh is ambitious. No shortcuts for him. He spent hours rendering schmaltz from chicken skin, which he bought from our awesome local/ pastured/ sustainable/ kosher butcher, Grow and Behold. His inspiration for taking this project on, as well as the recipe he used, came from The Book of Schmaltz: A Love Song To a Forgotten Fat, which was a birthday present from his sister, Nina. The two of them share the ambitious-cooking gene.

There was one hairy moment in the kitchen, after I returned with the equipment. Josh realized, after all that rendering, that he wouldn't have enough schmaltz for the recipe. Glitches like this frequently happen when you're making a recipe for the first time--something doesn't turn out just the way you expected, because, in fact, you don't really know what to expect. This may be why, come to think of it, I avoid new and complicated recipes. So much effort, without guaranteed results? Yikes.

I suggested he could make chicken stock, and use the fat skimmed from the top of the pot. Thence began simultaneous project number two: several burners going, plus rising stress levels as the frozen chicken bones were stubbornly stuck to their styrofoam packaging.

I had to go out again to pick up last-minute groceries: eggs, onions, milk, eggs (there are never enough eggs on Passover). Our three girls, plus one friend, were full of energy and none of them wanted to come out shopping with me. They were screaming and doing wheelbarrows and making Louisa laugh. I told Josh I was leaving and he looked at me like I was nuts. "Can't you take them with you?" he asked. To which I responded by smiling and telling him it would be ok. And I left.

When I came home our whole apartment smelled like Golde's kitchen from Fiddler on the Roof. The stove and counters, which, remember, I had just hours before meticulously scrubbed, were covered in a film of grease. The sink was stacked high with grimy bowls and utensils. But the kids were all happy, and Josh greeted me with a bite of what may be the best chopped liver I have ever tasted: creamy, umami-ful, with delicious crunchy bites of onions and gribenes. Love.

Wishing you and yours a happy holiday, complete with old-world ambitious food, be it schmaltzy or vegetarian, made by someone you love.