WEDNESDAY
Iām all about quiet starts and rituals. I get up and grind coffee beans (this week itās a nice, dark roast from La Colombe) and get my Moka pot off and running. I brew it good and strong, because the next step involves me cannibalizing it with almond milk and sugar. I do some mat-based Pilates, then get ready to head to the office.
When I have my boys, which is half time since Iām a single/divorced mom, I try to leave work as close to 5pm as possible to make it home around 6pm, but today I got a little buried, so I donāt make it home until 6:30. I always keep emergency food in the freezer for times like this, so I text my 12-year-old, Julian, and ask him to turn on the stove and pull the veggie burgers from the fridge. I often have homemade veggie burgers individually wrapped and ready to sear (so easy to do, just make a double batch and save half!), but not tonight. Tonight weāre doing Beyond Meat burgers, waffle fries, and sheet-pan broccoli from my book.
What Iāve learned after going back to work full-time after working from home for more than a decade is that itās okay to not beat yourself up about having to pull a freaking frozen veggie burger out of the fridge. Iām a realist, and realistically speaking, I canāt make a homemade meal every night of the week. Thatās just the truth (and you know what else? Iām sure not going to spend my precious weekend cooking for the week either!).
We devour dinner, then itās a one-hour bum rush of dessert/bath/shower/reading/did you brush your teeth/yes you can have warm milk and honey/lights out and good night.
THURSDAY
I turn the leftover broccoli and waffle fries into breakfast tacos with some scrambled eggs and salsa. I love giving the boys a hearty, savory breakfast. I make myself one too. I wrap up a leftover veggie burger for my 8-year-old, Rhys, to take to lunch, and pack Julian a brie and pickle sandwich (he's an oozy-cheese nut). Then out the door and to school/work.
I leave the office at just past 5, home in time to work on a recipe for my new cookbook out in 2019, Umami Bomb. Every chapter of the book focuses on a different umami ingredient. Tonight Iām testing an idea for polenta made with grated apple and smoked cheddar with garlicky sautĆ©ed kale and a fried egg on top. I happen to have some homemade vegan pepperoni (also for the bookāmade with olives!!) in the fridge so I crumble some on top. Not every recipe is a winner, but this polenta gets a super thumbs up from the boys (though we all unanimously decide that the grated apple is a bit weird).
My boyfriend is over for dinner tooāheās vegan and he likes the polenta as well (though I made his without the egg and the cheese, obvi, and he actually hated the vegan pepperoni because he said it tasted too much like pepperoni, which Iām calling a win for the recipe). We share a gorgeous bottle of 2011 French Pinot from Burgundy that is outrageously luscious. The boys have a couple of those chocolate-covered ice cream slab treats from Ben & Jerryās for dessert. We all go to bed happy.
FRIDAY
Coffee; bagels for boys (Rhys likes his with avocado, J likes cream cheese), I make their lunches (grape leaves for Rhys; brie and pickle for J) and see them off.
I stop at Whole Foods after work to grab a few items to bring to Rhysā schoolās potluck, which I totally forgot about. He is supposed to bring in food that represents his heritage. Like so many people, we are mutt AmericansāRomanian, Russian, Belgian, English, Swedish, Norwegian, and probably a whole bunch of other stuff I don't know about, but my dad was Israeli so I grab a container of hummus, a bunch of veggies to make Israeli salad, and some mini pita. I know, itās super lameāI should be making something wonderfully homemade. But I figure if I balance good intentions with effort and occasional achievements, Iāll end up ahead(ish).
I get home only to realize that I must have left the pita bread at the registerā¦oy, now what?!? Israeli āseven layerā salad it is! I spoon the hummus in the bottom of a container, top with layers of tomatoes, cucumber, red bell peppers, parsley, feta, and scallions, drizzle it all with smoky olive oil and smoked salt, and grab some airy cracker crisps from my pantry.
At the potluck, J goes for pizza, Rhys eats nothing, choosing instead to chase his friends around the gym, and I have lots of salad with some fried yucca and tostones, because Latin food is my culinary spirit animal. We take the bus home and watch āSpy Kidsā before conking out.
SATURDAY
I could totally go for pancakes, but the boys want muffins, so there you have it, Mom overruled. I have a recipe notebook that I keep all my notes in. Iāve had it for about 5 years and itās filled with about 20 scone recipes (ābestā scones followed by āno, really, best sconesā followed by āuse this recipe: sconesā) among pancakes, waffles, biscuits, cakes, cookies, and the like. I make a muffin that is supposed to be half flour and half cornmeal, but Iām out of cornmeal, so I grab something else yellow in a jar (semolina? Corn flour? Canāt tell but in it goes!). I have blueberries and lemon, so I zest some citrus in too and add the berries. The muffins come out great, which isnāt always the case, but today, it works out.
After several hours at the park for the boysā back-to-back flag football practice and games, I stop at the market to buy provisions. One of my most treasured friends, Izabela, and her son, Luca, are coming over for dinner and I want to make something easy and comforting since Iāve been outside in the crisp fall air for, like, ever.
Once I get home, I start dinner: minestrone soup, garlicky cheese bread, and a kale salad (so clichĆ©, but I love it anyway). I think about making sheet pan cream pie squares from my book, but Iz brings two bottles of wine and we drain them both as we gab and eat, so dessert becomes something impromptuāmicrowave mug cakes! We watch some mug cake videos online and the boys start mixing their own. After 45 seconds (yes, 45 seconds!) we have warm cakes topped with sprinkles, confetti, bananas, cocoa powder, and chocolate chips. Par-tay!
SUNDAY
J went home with Iz and Luca, and we gained an hour in bed from the time change, so the rest of us are sleeping in and feeling lazy. Rhys eats a chocolate croissant and I sip an almond milk cappuccino while proceeding to laze in bed for as long as possible before jetting off to Rhysā tennis lesson. I grab apples for sustenance. After, we train it to meet Julian near Lucaās, then we walk about 17 miles through frigid, rainy gross weather to get to an Uzbek restaurant Iāve been wanting to try. After lunch we take the train to Williamsburg to catch the new "Thor" movie. Itās so good! This either means a) I donāt get to see enough movies and my standards have plummeted or b) it is actually really well written (Iām choosing to believe option B). We taxi it home because I canāt deal with the rain anymore and then we eat minestrone and bread for dinner.
MONDAY
I have some leftover white rice in the fridge from earlier in the week, so I decide to make the boys fried rice for breakfast with scallion, edamame, and a fried egg. I throw together their lunchesāJ has brie and cornichon (again) and Rhys is getting stuffed grape leaves (again). I bring a container of minestrone for lunch with a half avocado I can eat with some smoked Maldon salt I keep on my desk. The boys go to their dadās tonight, so I donāt have to worry about dinner, which is good because Iām going to Schmaltzy, a Moth-like presentation of storytelling about Jewish foods presented by the Jewish Food Society. I see lots of friends and we catch up over pastrami egg rolls from Ed Schoenfeld's fantastic Red Farm restaurant on Hudson. The first words out of my mouth to nearly everyone that night: "Have you ever made a mug cake?"
