The Super Duper Pooper Scooper...Makes White Bean and Kale Soup

"I feel like a...like a...sh@$ shoveler. I can't help it and I know I'm like a broken record whining and moaning about this every year at this time. But I do. Every year there's this grand celebration about gifts and giving but once it's over and everyone has moved on to the next "big thing" who has to take care of the clean-up? Go through the old stuff to make room for the new stuff? Figure out what to do with the old stuff? Dump? Goodwill? Craig's List? Me, the sh@$ shoveler, that's who. Where's the giving in that?? I should have known that this would be part of my destiny. All those years of my parents handing me a bucket and a shovel and pointing to the dog pen while my father called out, 'There she goes, our little Super Duper Pooper Scooper!'"

And on and on I went, lamenting to one of my dearest, dearest friends about the aftermath of the holidays. Same old song and dance. But I can't help it. It's how I feel every year. The prospect of a pile of new stuff coming into our house just doesn't thrill me the way it might for other people. I tend to be cranky about it. I've been called Scrooge. I've even been told by my sweetie that I can be downright "scary" about the whole thing. And I know that any family member of mine who might be reading this right now is probably rolling his or her eyes....."Here she goes again."

But here's the thing....nothing thrills me more than a small handful of freshly sharpened pencils. A medicine cabinet that is organized and labeled. Lego pieces that have been separated into individual bins - Small, Medium, Large, People...as opposed to dumped into one big bin or "Horrors!" strewn across the floor making it difficult for people to walk down the hallway without knocking over a prized creation. A toy closet with up-to-date toys as opposed to one filled with toddler toys no longer used or wanted. A bookshelf with just a few loved possessions on it. Less is more. Less is more. Bring more stuff in the house and now "we" (ie: me)  have to find a new place for it. In closets that are already full.

As the years have gone by and time has become scarce due to the magnitude of responsibilities required for raising a family, I haven't been able to indulge my OCD tendencies like I used to. Organizing and purging take a lot of time. But, opening a closet, a cupboard or just walking in our garage has become a hazard. And every passing day, I become grumpier and grumpier about the situation.

And then, the funniest thing happened. I hung up the phone after my "vent session" and paragraph one, above, kept replaying in my mind. Over and over and over. And what I heard was that I am, in fact, the "Super Duper Pooper Scooper." So let's get going. Less talking...more walking. Just like the dishes....can't think about it. Just do it. And so, right at that very moment, I grabbed my labeler, wrote garbage on one bag and donate on another and ran up the stairs. I hauled everything out of my medicine cabinet and my toiletries drawer and dumped it on the floor. I wiped down the shelves. Dug out from another closet the organizing bin I'd purchased years ago for my drawer. Fired up the labeler. Categorized. Organized. Pitched. Purged. And not but an hour or two later, I stood back and admired my new sparkly clean and organized bathroom. I felt refreshed. I could breathe.

Right then and there, in that moment of blissful deep breathing, I decided that this had to continue. I had to make this a goal for 2011 - Clean out all closets, and dare I say it, the garage!! Lighten the load. And so, my dear friends, I have blocked out a regular time each week that I will be purging based on my prioritized list. Whatever gets done during that time is what gets done. I have been trying to talk my dear friend and neighbor into doing this with me. It could be like a race. As soon as the last ones are on the bus, we announce what we are organizing that day and then,...."On your mark get set go." We would meet back up at lunch time to discuss our progress. A little competition is always good for getting things done.

Want to join me...us? Choose your day, afternoon, evening. Perhaps tell me what is first on your list to organize. A little accountability is always good. I will be posting at the bottom of my weekly posts, what I will be organizing that week and whether or not I finished the project from the week before. That's my way of being accountable. Once winter is over....the spring cleaning may already be done.

In the meantime, as a way to lessen what actually comes into our home, I will continue to preach my time-honored mantras to my tribe:

Less is more.
Use up what you already have. 
Don't just buy to buy.
Take a moment to actually consider your purchases. 
Purge what is no longer needed. (This does not mean throw it in the garage or an already full closet.)
Time is a gift.

Hopefully one day, on the way from one ear to another, what I'm staying will get stuck there in the middle.



And speaking of gifts, here is one for one of you.....

Seattle's Best Coffee Curiosity Pack

The kind people at Seattle's Best Coffee have sent me a Curiosity Pack - 5 blends, 1 box - to give to one of you. I think the idea is quite ingenious. It's a way to try out a variety of blends, without having to purchase large quantities, in order to determine which type of coffee you like best. Mild, light, crisp...to bold, dark, intense. Should you be interested in receiving this little gift, leave me your name and email address in a comment below by the end of the day Friday, January 14th. I will draw a name from a hat and email the lucky person.

And while you're leaving comments....does anyone have any tips for organizing my nemesis....LEGOS!!



White Bean and Kale Soup Peppered with Pancetta

Since I was so busy with my organizing frenzy, no plans were made for dinner that evening. No inspiration was to be found. However, preaching my own mantras to myself, especially, "Use up what you already have.", I went to the cupboard and discovered I still had the ingredients for a soup I had planned to make the week before but never did. My family loves this soup and it incorporates one of those nutrient filled winter greens...kale. I'm sure if you wanted a vegetarian version, you could omit the pancetta and substitute vegetable stock for the chicken stock. Wouldn't be quite as richly flavored but would still be good, I'm sure. If you don't have cannellini beans, you could substitute any other white bean that you like. Make sure you read through the recipe below before starting. Dried beans are added at a different time than canned beans.

Ingredients:

1 lb dried cannellini beans OR 3 15-oz cans cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
2 tbsp olive oil
4 oz pancetta, diced
1 large yellow onion, peeled and diced
4 large carrots, peeled and diced
4 large celery sticks, diced
5 garlic cloves, minced
1 tsp salt
1 tsp dried oregano
pinch of red pepper flakes
freshly ground black pepper
10 cups chicken stock
6 c loosely packed kale, chopped (I prefer lacinato kale.)
grated, parmesan cheese

Directions:
If using dried beans, rinse and pick over the dried beans, removing any possible pebbles. Put them in a heat-proof bowl. Cover beans with 8 cups of boiling water and let them soak for 1 hour. When they are finished, drain them in a colander. Meanwhile, start the rest of your soup.


In a large soup pot, heat your olive oil. Add pancetta and brown, about 5 minutes. Add onions, carrots and celery. Saute until soft about 8 minutes. Add garlic and saute 1 minute more. At this point you can remove from heat until your beans are ready.

Once dried beans have finished soaking, add them to the pot with your vegetables. Stir in the oregano, red pepper flakes, salt, a few cracks of black pepper and your chicken broth.

Bring the soup to a boil, then lower heat and simmer for 45 minutes. (30 minutes if you're using canned beans.)  Test for seasoning. Adding a bit more salt and pepper or red pepper flakes if needed.

Add your kale to the pot and if using canned beans, add them at this point as well. Simmer another 30 minutes until beans are soft.

Ladle into soup bowls. Top with grated parmesan cheese and enjoy.

Yield: One big pot full.


Super Duper Pooper Scooper Goal:
Jan 3-9 - medicine cabinet/toiletries drawer - done.
Jan 10-16 - dreaded shelves in game/toy closet


All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010

Une Petite Pomme: The First Ever La Pomme de Portland Dinner Party

I simply must tell you about one of my dear, dear friends and an entertaining endeavor she took on. She recently had a dinner party. For three families. Including all offspring. Before I go any farther into her story, let me stop and ask you, "Aren't you impressed with just these details I've given you?!" Three families! Including kids! For dinner! I find that we seem to be at an age where nobody is doing much entertaining. Remember all those Christmas parties, "wine club" parties, block parties, progressive dinners, Birthday dinners, drinks on the deck, kick-off to camping barbecues?? Nope. No one's doin' them anymore. We're all just too dang tired. So the fact that my dear friend actually threw a dinner party, during this frenetic stage of life, leaves me duly impressed.

But wait, there's more. She didn't serve frozen lasagna and a Caesar salad from Costco. No. She made everything. From scratch. And to top it off, each and every recipe was from right here. From La Pomme. I feel quite honored and thank goodness I didn't exactly know what she was doing ahead of time or I would have felt a tad bit stressed out, worrying about the caliber of my recipes I've posted here and whether or not they are dinner party worthy. When I hooked up with her afterwards, she flashed me one of her beautiful, infectious smiles (the fact that she was still smiling is saying quite a bit) and shared with me that the party had been a huge success. The dishes had been so simple to prepare, so delicious to eat and....quite healthy to boot. Even the kids had enjoyed the offerings.

So you can share in the astonishment OR perhaps throw a dinner party of your own, I give you her La Pomme de Portland Dinner Menu:

Herbes de Provence Goat Cheese Spread

A Simple Salad

String Beans and Caramelized Shallots

Braised Pacific Halibut with Mushrooms and Leeks

Cinnamon Apple Crostata

I also feel compelled to share with you that another friend let me know that she made the Ginger and Garlic Stir Fry and her kids ate some particular veggies in that dish for the first time. Veggies they had not been willing to try before...and loved them.

And then, just the other day, another friend told me that she made the Pasta e Fagioli Soup I recently posted but instead of pasta, she used cheese tortellini. Her kids lapped it up. And another friend's husband proclaimed after she made him this same soup, "Well, we're never going to have that again, are we?" "Why not?", she asked. "Because I really liked that." She and I have the same problem of making things that the whole family loves but then, never making them again simply because we can't remember what we made. And so the hubbies, much to their dismay, never see that tasty dish again.

Thank you Kim, Laura, Suzi and Tammy for sharing your culinary adventures with me. I love hearing about them but then again, I love food....actually it's more than love. A small obsession is more like it...

Happy Weekend to All....wherever you may be!!



All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010

Pasta e Fagioli Soup for a Tired Mind

It's only Monday and yet, I woke up exhausted. The kind of exhausted that hits you to the core. I thought, "Gads...I need a weekend to recover from the weekend." Somehow I managed to drag myself downstairs and throw lunches together for my children. The standard fare...peanut butter and jelly, grapes, a couple of cookies, some water. Under the circumstances, it was the best I could do. After setting the finished lunch boxes on the counter, I started making my way around the house to open all of the blinds. Growing up, I would watch as my mother would put down every blind in the house in the evening and then, reverse this daily ritual in the morning. I seemed to have inherited it. This closing down or opening up our home every evening and every morning. As I pulled back the curtains in the living room, my eye caught the ever-growing flock of weeds in my flower bed. They almost seemed to be taunting me as they waved back and forth in the windy weather. Right next to them was the patch of proliferating clover that seems to be taking over my lawn. I sighed, looked at the rain pouring down and thought, "Not today."

For the first time in weeks, everyone was off in his own corner of the city. No one was home sick. The house was silent. Out of sheer will power I hopped up on the elliptical machine for 30 minutes hoping that might give me a burst of energy. As my legs went around and around like a gerbil in a habitrail ball, I watched a recorded episode of Parenthood. I realized I must really be losing my mind be tired because I cried through the whole thing especially the part where the father says to his teenage daughter, "You're right. There is a double-standard and it's not fair. But you're my daughter. And......life's not fair." I thought about the time in high school when I was at a friend's house. Her parents were away and we were hanging out there with her older brother and his friends when suddenly my Dad shows up and yanks me out of there. At the time I was mortified and thought he was over-protective and nuts but now, of course, I realize he was just trying to keep me safe.

Somehow I managed to tackle the stack of bills, the "overflowing" email in-box and fetch my youngest ones from school. But then, when it came time to tackle dinner, the will-power started to wane. Too tired to go to the grocery store, I stood at the door of the pantry praying something would pop out at me. We'd had pizza last week more times than I care to admit. I couldn't serve it again.  I spied a half used box of orecchiette pasta and some canned beans on the shelf. Grabbing those, the gears in my mind slowly started to turn. In the fridge, I found some pancetta left over from last week's big day. An onion on the counter. And, out on the deck, were my newly planted herb boxes just waiting to be put to use.

As I laid our dinner of Pasta e Fagioli soup, greens with a homemade vinaigrette and some "day-old" bread I had livened back up with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top and a quick run under the broiler, I was relieved that I wasn't putting pizza on the table...again. Watching my family enjoy this simple meal, I reminded myself that, even at our most exhausted, it's amazing what we can come up with if we just take a moment to look around and see what's there.

Pasta e Fagioli Soup
Inspired by Giada De Laurentiis' recipe of the same name 

I have been making this dish for years and my kids love it. I tend to fall back on this when I can't think of  anything else to make because I usually have all of the ingredients in the house and it's so simple to put together. I always make it with kidney beans but I suppose you could switch those out for another kind such as cannellini beans if you would prefer. I have a little herb garden that I keep year round on my back deck so I always tend to have fresh herbs around (unless an ice storm has come through and killed everything) but you could definitely use dried herbs if the fresh aren't available to you.

Ingredients:
4 sprigs of fresh thyme
1 med fresh rosemary sprig
1 bay leaf
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp of butter
1 cup chopped onion
3 ounces pancetta or bacon, chopped
2 garlic cloves
8 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth
2 (14 1/2 ounce) cans red kidney beans, rinsed and drained
3/4 cup penne pasta (or any other "smallish" shaped pasta)
freshly ground pepper
freshly grated parmesan cheese


Directions:
Heat a large, heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add your olive oil and butter and heat until butter is melted. Add your onion, pancetta and garlic and saute until the onion is tender and transluscent about 5 minutes. Add the broth, beans and herbs. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat, then decrease the heat to medium and simmer until the vegetables are very tender, about 10 minutes. At this point, using tongs or a slotted spoon, pull out the stems from the herbs and the bay leaf and discard.

Add your pasta, cover and boil, until pasta is tender but still firm to the bit, about 8 minutes.

Season your soup with pepper. Ladle into bowls and and sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Enjoy.

Yield: 6 servings or so



All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010

Une Petite Pomme: My 7 Minutes of Fame....Sort Of....

Thanks to a dear, sweet friend from high school and a thoughtful producer at AM Northwest who took pity on me kindly invited me to be a guest on the show, La Pomme made her television debut last night cooking up "Peas and Pancetta in a Flash." For those of you who are not from Portland, here in our fine City of Roses, we are fortunate enough to have our very own hour-long morning show. Having been on the air since 1976, most of us Portlanders have sat in the AM Northwest audience at one time or another. We all think quite fondly of this show. (I always think of my Granny when I use that word...fondly. She preferred to sign her cards that way: "Fondly, Granny") Currently, AM Northwest is being hosted by the very funny, Dave Anderson, and darling, Helen Raptis.

Now, you may be perplexed as to why La Pomme was on AM Northwest last night, since the name implies a morning show. Well, without getting into the nitty gritty, the "powers that be" currently air the first half hour in the morning and then, the first and second half hour in the evening under the name of AM Northwest Primetime, but the whole thing is shot in the morning which, for those of you who know my morning habits, getting there...on-time...wide-awake...and actually thinking clearly...early yesterday morning was quite the challenge for me...but I did it....(thanks to a lot of back-up help from my sweetie.) And yes, of course, I was a bit nervous. Nervous about the fact that when I get nervous I tend to laugh...loudly...and tell bad jokes because I think I'm funny. And, I was nervous about the timing since I was invited to cook on the show and I needed to have an edible meal that really takes about 30 minutes to make, ready to eat in 6 minutes. To my relief, after I arrived...on-time mind you...I was ushered back-stage and right up to my very own cooking island. There I could set-up and cook away to my heart's content and then, the whole kit and kaboodle was wheeled on-stage when it was my turn. Can I say that I've never actually made pasta without being interrupted and even had time to stir it a few times while I watched it cook? I almost started whistling.

The actual time I was on-camera was an absolute blur. I remembered nothing that I said or did so I was quite anxious to watch the debut myself. At 6:45 pm, my family gathered around the television and waited. As we watched the final minutes of the lead-in show...a movie in which the main characters wore mullets that would put Billy Ray Cyrus' to shame...I had a sudden curiosity about the actual viewership of my debut here on Comcast Channel 302...but that quickly vanished as Dave Anderson appeared on the screen welcoming people to AM Northwest. With rapt attention, we watched the exercise segment, the book review segment, the ceramics show segment and all of the advertisements for the Japanese Gardens, assisted living centers and car dealerships out on SE McLoughlin. I knew my time was drawing near and I suddenly started to panic, "Had I itched my nose on-camera? Will it end up looking like a "pick"?" And then, there was Dave Anderson saying, "Our next guest writes a popular local blog about the mingling of food, family and life...." and I was on. I'll let you be the judge of how I did but I do have two thoughts, "Lose the sweater next time." And, I can already hear my kind, sweet mother saying, "Sweetie, stand up a little straighter next time....and maybe get the bangs out of your eyes." We never stop being a mother, do we?




Thank you so much, Julie and Tammy, for making this opportunity happen for La Pomme and since it appears that I didn't pick my nose, I'm hoping you'll invite me back.


All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010

Pasta from the Freezer, the Pantry, the Fridge

Gone are the days of frenetic food buying. You know the kind. The kind where you walk, briskly, into your favorite grocery store, dutifully carrying your list. The list you made after actually taking the time to plan meals for the week. Just the week. Not something crazy like a month of meals but still, a week of planned meals. And, seeing as though you're quite proud of yourself for your organization, you smile a bit smugly as you tighten your grip on that list and dash in the entrance to the store...although not before grabbing a cart and sanitizing yourself and the cart from head to toe. No time for the flu.

You enter the store and begin traversing it in your usual manner. A loaf of blueberry bread here, a 1/2 pound of sliced turkey there. Check. Check. And then, you make a gentle turn and find yourself veering off the appointed path and heading straight to the latte counter. You tell yourself it's okay since with all the list making you forgot to eat a proper breakfast and you can feel the dull ache of a headache in the works. The caffeine will surely be the cure.

Back on the path, you find that even though you've been in this store hundreds of times and it's practically your home away from home, you're starting to feel overwhelmed by the list and trying to find the corresponding aisles for the products you need. So, you just start going up and down each one. Hunger is gaining on you. The time is ticking away. The caffeine just doesn't seem to be helping and now, you just start throwing things in your cart. "Ah, the baby's favorite crackers." (I know, I know. He's not a baby anymore but humor me, and just let me call him that.) "Voila...my dear daughter's beloved tapioca." "Some more dried blueberries for my sweetie." "Doesn't the 10-year old love Honeycrisp apples?" And, so on and so forth and before you know it, your cart is brimming, half with items off your list and half from items you just tossed in.

Arriving home, you find that there are already two unopened boxes of the baby's favorite crackers waiting in the wings, two uneaten containers of tapioca in the fridge and your sweetie and the 10-year old are a bit burnt out on the dried blueberries and Honeycrisp apples. So, you give yourself a gentle scolding and tell yourself you'll try to do better next time. Stick to the list.

Fast forward a bit and you've arrived at the "Great Recession" and with a nod to the economy, you force yourself to exercise restraint. To stick to the list. To use up what you have. And you remember trips to your Grandmother's house. Trips in which you would explore her fridge, her freezer and....down, in the deep, dark basement her "deep freeze". That fascinating, "space-agey" contraption. At her house, you would always find an assortment of jars covered in foil and filled with last night's meal. Little bits of food rolled up in tin foil. And, frozen ice cream pops in the shape of Santa. Nothing put down the drain. Nothing thrown in the trash. And, you recall, how once a week, your own mother would pull out all of the leftovers from that week's meals and lay them on the table...from reheated stew to a scoop of stuffing to 5 green beans. And, you remember how much you liked leftover night. Your own personal buffet. And, you always looked forward to those 5 green beans...but then, again, you have a thing for green beans especially these green beans.

And so, even though you sometimes miss the "Roaring 90's", you realize that restraint is good. It forces us to prioritize. To make decisions. And, you insist to yourself that you'll stick to the list. And, what's more....before making the list, you'll force yourself to get up out of your chair and actually take a look in the pantry, the fridge, the freezer. What is lurking in there? What needs to be used up? And, there, in the back of the freezer a little bit of sunshiney orange will catch your eye. "Ah-hah!" The leftover butternut squash you threw in the freezer after making this soup. Which is perfect since you just came across a recipe you're dying to try and it calls for...what else...but butternut squash. And you'll smile a bit smugly to yourself. Feeling quite proud of not just your organization...but your resourcefulness to use up what you have.

Pasta from the Freezer, the Pantry, the Fridge

(aka Orecchiette with Pancetta, Butternut Squash and Broccolini)

From Louisa Neumann of The Portland Pickle

Truth be told, I would have never thought to put pancetta, butternut squash and broccolini together in a dish and top them off with pepitas. Not only would I have not put them together but I could never have imagined how absolutely delicious they are together. The way the salty pancetta plays off the sweetness of the squash....yum!! Last summer, I stumbled upon Louisa Neumann's delightful blog, The Portland Pickle. I love being surprised by the little gems of food knowledge that she passes along to all of us with her posts. Besides writing and managing her blog, she is also a personal culinary instructor, a caterer and can be found regularly teaching classes at In Good Taste in the Pearl District. Many of you know how I feel about my children learning to cook (if you don't, click here) so I look forward to signing them up for one of Louisa's children's cooking classes.

In the meantime, I thoroughly enjoyed this recipe of Louisa's that I filed away last fall, just waiting for some leftover butternut squash. And, in case you were wondering, my kids loved it just as much as I did.

Ingredients:

2 cups butternut squash, cut into 1/2-inch dice

Extra-virgin olive oil

Kosher salt

1/2 bunch broccoli rabe, tough lower stems removed, cut into thirds

(I was unable to locate broccoli rabe at my grocery store so I substituted in broccoli which I realize is not the same thing at all as broccoli rabe but it turned out delicious.....)

3/4 c pancetta, diced (I used "thick sliced" Boar's Head pancetta from the deli counter)

Pinch of crushed red pepper

2 cups orecchiette pasta

1/2 cup grated parmesan

1/4 cup green pumpkin seeds (pepitas) (I found mine at Trader Joe's)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Toss the squash with olive oil and salt and place in a single layer on a sheet tray and bake in the over until soft, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and reserve.

Bring a large pot of well-salted water to a boil. Set up a bowl of well-salted ice water.

Drop the broccoli rabe (or broccoli, if you're like me) into the pot of boiling water, swirl it around, remove from the water and immediately plunge into the salty ice water. (If you're using broccoli, let it cook for about 4 minutes). Reserve the boiling water to cook the pasta in. Remove the broccoli rabe (broccoli) from the ice water, squeeze or drain out excess water and reserve.

Coat a large saute pan with olive oil and add the pancetta and crushed red pepper. Bring the pan to a medium heat and cook the pancetta until brown and crispy. When the pancetta is brown and crispy, add about 3/4 cup of the broccolini cooking water. Simmer until the water reduces by half. (The original recipe has you adding the squash in here as well but I was worried about the squash getting...well, squishy and squashy so I waited and added it later.)

Add the orecchiette to the reserved boiling broccoli rabe water and cook until the pasta is al dente, about 1 minute less than the cooking time says on the box.

Remove the pasta from the water and add to the pan with the pancetta. Add the broccolini and about a 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water but be very, very careful here, since you are adding water to oil and it gets rather combustible. Gently add your butternut squash here. Cook until the water has evaporated and the sauce clings to the pasta. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with the grated parmesan. Gently combine all the ingredients.

Spoon into a dish. Top with a little more grated parmesan and the pepitas. Enjoy.

Yield: Serves 2 - This is what the original recipe says but I was able to feed myself and 3 children from this. Definitely no leftovers though which is a shame since I can't stop thinking about this dish so I would recommend that you at least double the recipe. You won't be sorry.

NOTE: Whatever you do, don't skimp on the pancetta. It's needed to balance out the sweetness of the butternut squash. If anything, you can cut back on the squash a little. Enjoy....

All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010

Peas and Pancetta in a Flash

So, it had been one of those weeks. You know the kind. The kind where the baby, trying to make use of his limited vocabulary, hollers at his older brother in peak frustration, “Just…just…just go put your head in the potty!” and then storms out of the room, leaving the 10-year old to shrug his shoulders and mutter, “Good dis, pal…real good dis.”

The kind of week where in the middle of the costume store, not but 24-hours before the big day, you have to inform your eldest son that no, you weren’t kidding when you told him he couldn’t get the mask with the blood pumping through it because you find that there is something inherently wrong with it. “But, Mom, all my friends have that mask. It’s so cool.” “Well, then, I guess you’ll be something original.”

The kind of week where your daughter has seconds to spare if she’s going to make the bus and you have but seconds to spare to make it to your godforsaken annual doctor’s appointment and she flies down the stairs headed for the front door wearing a masterpiece of fashion know-how that clearly took hours to put together, and you can’t help it. You even try to stop yourself because it’s just so…so…textbook but somehow you hear yourself saying, “Wait a minute, sweetie. You can’t wear that to school. Your skirt is too short.” And she looks at you, aghast, and replies, “But, Mom, everyone wears skirts like this.” And you know that you have truly been anointed a mother when you hear yourself say to her in return, “Well, not you. Go change and make it quick.”

The kind of week that found your sweetie trying to save his favorite chair at three in the morning from the cat who sat poised on it ready to cough up not just a hairball but what appeared to be his entire innards

The kind of week where you begin to wonder if you are stuck in a remake of Groundhog Day since every time you look around you find yourself in your car. “Here I am driving.” “Here I am, still driving.” “Wasn’t I just driving?” “Gads, I’m gripping this steering wheel again.” “Somebody help me. I’m driving again.” “I’m driving again and this same dang song keeps playing every time I’m in here.” “Ahhrrrgh….somebody save me from this car!” And you find yourself wanting to pull over to the side of the road and huck the CD with the song that you used to love on it, but now can’t stand, into the bushes.

And then, without warning, you come upon it. This little bit of frozen time. Where the road behind you has slipped away beyond the bend and the road in front of you is hidden by the horizon and there you are, fully in the moment. All thoughts of masks and skirts and heads in potties and what’s for dinner disappear and you are taken aback by the way the sun filters through the leaves. The way the branches arch over the road so you and your car feel as though you’re slipping through an arbor. An arbor leading somewhere magical. And then, just as quickly as you came upon it, the moment is gone and your mind fills back up with the static humming of life’s busyness. But, in that moment, your mind was able to clear a tiny spot. A tiny spot to remind you to breathe, to slow down over the bumps and that Peas and Pancetta are good on a night when you are out of time.

Peas and Pancetta in a Flash

(Adapted from Farfelle with Peas and Pancetta, Gourmet, June 1999)

4 cups frozen petite peas 

2 tbls olive oil

¼ - 1/3 lb pancetta, diced

2 large shallots

1 lb dried bowtie (farfelle) pasta

salt and pepper, optional

freshly, grated Parmesan cheese

Fill a large, pasta pot three fourths full with water and bring to a boil for peas and pasta.

Cook frozen peas in boiling water until tender, about 2 minutes, and with a slotted spoon transfer to a colander and spray with cold water to stop the cooking. Do Not drain the water from the pot.

In a large, heavy skillet, heat oil until hot but not smoking and cook pancetta in oil, stirring occasionally, until golden brown and edges are crisp, about 8-10 minutes. Now, at this point, I usually take my pancetta out of the skillet and drain it in a paper towel lined bowl. Then, I give the skillet a once over wipe with a paper towel, drizzle a little bit more olive oil in and then, add the pancetta back in along with my shallots. I do this because I'd rather cook with olive oil than bacon grease, but you could skip all of this and just add your shallots into the skillet when your pancetta is done cooking. Once, you've added your shallots, cook them, stirring occasionally, until just tender about 3-4 minutes.

While your pancetta is cooking you can return the water in pot to a boil. Cook pasta according to directions on package. Before you drain your cooked pasta, reserve 1 cup of pasta water. Drain pasta in colander and add it to your finished pancetta mixture with the peas, ¼ cup reserved pasta water and salt and pepper to taste. (I find that this recipe doesn’t need any added salt and pepper, but that’s just my preference.) Heat mixture over low heat, gently tossing (and adding more pasta water as needed if mixture becomes dry), until just heated through.

Serve pasta with your freshly, grated Parmesan cheese.

While I have made this recipe exactly as written before, some nights I don’t bother with the mixing it all together with the reserved pasta water that I forgot to reserve and I just have the troops scoop up their pasta and put the peas and pancetta on separately. On this particular night, I also happened to serve this dish with a cornucopia of fall fruit: persimmon, pomegranate, pears and apples. What did the children think of the persimmon you might ask? Not much.

Yield: Enough for a family of 5 with a bit leftover…perfect for a thermos in a lunchbox the next day.

All original text and photos copyright: Carrie Minns 2009