The kids are back

To quote the charming food writer and mediocre novelist Laurie Colwin: "Did people create families in order to keep themselves from wondering what the purpose of life was? With children it was a snap. Children were a purpose, and generally there was so much to do in their behalf that you might never stop to think at all."

I can handle the existential stress, but it's definitely restful to be picking up Star Wars figurines and mixing pancake batter after a week of somberly contemplating the horizon. What will I do when my purposes go to college? Is that why I ordered the bees? Why did I order the freaking bees?

Budget matters: 

On 4/15 Mark spent $11 at the supermarket on bread, lunch, etc.

Yesterday, after collecting the kids at the airport we went to Champa Garden, a Laotian restaurant in Oakland, and spent $55.

If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area and haven't been already, you must, must, must go to Champa Garden. Order the sampler appetizer plate, a dish that stopped all conversation for ten minutes while we devoured every last crumb of rice ball salad, sausage, and spring roll. The kids must have been starving because they didn't stop eating long enough to complain that they don't like "Chinese" food. Champa Garden is in a funky neighborhood and looks like a converted corner liquor shop or laundromat, but of course that made it all the more exciting. We staggered out of there stuffed and very happy because of the fantastic food and because we're all together again. Honeymoon should last until noon today.  

Going forward: Two more nights of cooking from Fat and Milk to wrap up and use the caul fat, then I'm going to start Into the Vietnamese Kitchen by Andrea Nguyen.

A new diet trick

Try to eat a smuggled-in turkey sandwich while watching a matinee of The Wrestler. You will have trouble doing so. Moreover, you won't want to eat a turkey sandwich again for a long, long time. I can see why this movie is powerful and special -- acting, tragic antihero, fascinating glimpse into a bizarre subculture, etc., but I had to be ready at all moments to cover my eyes which made it hard to hold the sandwich. There was the stapling scene, the vomiting scene, the bug spray scene, the hand-in-meat-slicer scene, and the degrading sex with skanky woman in public bathroom scene, which was possibly the most upsetting of all. 

Ending this budget stuff at the end of the month, as it is not fun or interesting, but I want to make it until April 30: 

turkey sandwich     $4.99

sushi dinner w. Mark 62.40

total               $67.39

Here is a piece in USA Today about gardening with which I fully agree, having reached the end of my puny soil amending strength. Now I have to enlist/bribe my husband or hire someone. I just don't shovel fast enough or deep enough and at this rate it will be August before the beds are done. 

April 13 $$

I've completely lost my cookbook momentum. Without anyone to cook for, why would I? And when I don't cook, what is the point of this blog? 

Kids return from Oregon on Thursday. I collected Mark from the airport last night. We went out to dinner at a Chez Panisse-like (very limited menu, everything restrained and tasteful and super-expensive) restaurant called Camino and spent $110, which is more than you pay for a whole packet of bees. The $25 lamb entree seemed to be comprised of a bunch of scraps. The term "scrag ends" keeps coming to mind but I don't exactly know what it means. Now I do, and it's about right. Tasted lovely, but: scrag ends.

April 12 $$

Crissy Field, where we had our Easter picnic, is practically in my mother's backyard. Lucky her, and she knows it. I was a lazy bum and only contributed two bags of potato chips to our pleasant lunch: $6. My grandmother isn't supposed to eat salty snacks like ripple-cut Lays, but does anyway.

That's her under the umbrella next to my sister. That's me on the left looking cool and sullen in my new(ish) skinny jeans. The jeans look especially fabulous from a distance when I'm sitting down.

 

Here's a better picture of my grandmother:

You know why she looks good? Because she's spent 97 years sitting under parasols while simultaneously wearing a HAT, a lesson she clearly imparted to my mother, but not to my cousin Marina. Actually, I think the hat thing is a big hoax. They were all three born with tan skin that wouldn't burn on a scorching afternoon in Andalusia and everyone knows the real secret of graceful aging is not botox or Oil of Olay or hats, it is an olive complexion. Duh.

Thank-you, Dad, for the pallor.

 

The taxes are almost done. Lots of lavender going in to the garden today because it will make the bees feel at home. I do not even own a hat, but am thinking, hoax or not, I should go buy one. 

 

April 11 $$

Because the no-photo posts are bumming me out.

I don't cook nice meals for myself when I'm alone. Last night I saw I Love You, Man, bought popcorn and that was dinner. 

popcorn $4.75

Movie was moderately amusing, fairly coarse. Paul Rudd: excellent. Jason Segel: excellent. Rashida Jones: good enough, though I'll always resent her for dating Jim when he so clearly belonged with Pam.

I also read this funny piece, amended a tiny amount of soil, moved some bricks, smashed several dozen centipedes nesting in the bricks, thought hard about whether or not to get chickens, fell asleep in the middle of the afternoon while trying to read Riven Rock, and collected tax documents. I bet the chickens would eat the centipedes.

April 9 $$

ZERO

April 7 & 8 $$

April 7

Bought caul fat at Cafe Rouge butcher shop            $16.75 

bacon cheeseburger at 900 Grayson in Berkeley*  14.00

Mark to Safeway (oil, Cheerios, oj)                         21.73

April 8

Mollie Stone for lamb & sausage casings**             21.07

TOTAL  $73.55

*I had read about this burger and always wanted to try it, but thought the bacon was too smoky. Too-smoky bacon is like too-dark chocolate, overwhelms all other flavors.

 

**6 ft. of sausage casing = 75 cents. Too bad you have to fill it.

April 5 & 6 $$

Fell behind. 

Sunday was a spendy day. 

Safeway (strawberries, Sure Jell, sandwich)     20.38

Whole Foods (eggs, milk, flour, cabbage, ground lamb, etc.)  80.48

pound of French Roast (bought by me) 10.45

another pound of coffee (bought by Mark) 13.45

Monday was cheap.

Mark bought an It's It  1.50

Total for April 5 & 6        $126.26

Actually, it is a manic Monday

Busy, busy, busy today. Fortunately, clotted cream practically makes itself if you just let it sit around. First you let it sit around in a cool room, then on a burner turned very low for four hours, then in the refrigerator for eight.

Interesting fact from my utility company: To heat an ordinary electric oven costs 32 cents per hour. 

Shocking fact from my utility company: The average person spends $1.65 per month to use their gas stovetop. 

How can that be? So cheap. I ran a calculation based on the specifications of my particular stove and the price of energy in our area and it turns out that it really IS cheap. Though my math and logic are always questionable, it appears that it costs me 14 cents an hour to cook something at high heat (boiling pasta) and 9 cents an hour to melt butter. To make the clotted cream, therefore: 36 cents of gas. 

Back to work.

April 4 $$

Mark hit Safeway yesterday. He spent $51.07 on store-brand cheese, store-brand chicken soup, peanuts, beer, cherry 7-Up, and some other junk. I mean, food. 

Plus, there's a carryover from April 3 when he went out to a goodbye party for his boss and estimates he spent around $25.

Total: $76.07

Bad. But what can you do.

April 3 $$

So much to report, but I'm too stuffed with pork belly to remain upright. Tomorrow, all about pork belly, plus homemade marshmallows, yogurt vs. yogurt, lemon tart, and our baby apricot tree.

Tonight, just expenses. I made one trip to Safeway because my father was coming over and he likes a martini before dinner. Bought a big jug of vodka (so much cheaper when you buy the giant bottle), a package of cupcake sleeves, and some Kerr canning jars. Do I count the jars and cupcake sleeves as food? Executive decision: no. Vodka? Of course.

Vodka   $28.99

Total:  $28.99

I don't drink vodka anymore, but a girl has to take care of her pops. Plus, he brought me five more pounds of lemons from his insane tree. Man should open a lemon stand. 

All in all, a fiscally decent day.

April 2 $$

I was in San Francisco yesterday and found myself on Clement Street, which is death on the budget because everything is a bargain. Funny how that works. 

-mace, Aleppo pepper, honey candy from Haig's: $7.57

-5 lbs. pork belly, long beans, ginger, kumquats, 4 bunches of green onions from the New May Wah Market: $21.33

-Mark bought a cup of coffee: $1.29

-Owen's school lunch: $4.75

-Isabel's school lunch: $5

TOTAL: $39.94

I have to buy something whenever I go into Haig's because I ardently love that little store and will cry if/when it goes out of business. Also, the mace was in "blade" form. Exciting.

We'll use all the New May Wah purchases pretty quickly. Look at that ginger:

Just incredible, so much fatter and juicier than the shriveled stalks at Whole Foods and it's a quarter the price. It's from China but I don't think you can put melamine in ginger.

The school lunches are stupid and overpriced, but the kids like pizza day and I don't want to be stingy. 

April 1 $$

New month, new resolution to track our food expenses. 

-two chocolates* at Cocoa Bella for sustenance while shopping: $3.75

-Mark bought a microwave burrito for lunch at work: $3.99

TOTAL: $7.74

*incredible chocolates -- one was filled with dried pear. Almost worth it.

 

Fat: I want a cow

That's a blurry photo of the butter I "churned" yesterday using the instructions from Jennifer McLagan's Fat. Tasted against Trader Joe's butter, the homemade was sweeter, milder, and lighter. Lovely and completely different -- but not better. Both butters were delicious.

Also, unless you own a cow, homemade butter is expensive. A $3.39 pint of cream yields a quantity of butter you could buy for under $2.

Still, a fun kindergarten exercise to repeat every thirty-five years or so.

Here's what Owen thought: 

"You're making so many things homemade. Can't we have just ONE dairy that's not homemade? I don't want to be tasting something different for the rest of my life. I want to stick to the usual way."

As for food expenditures, Mark went to Safeway today and spent $13.94 on Minute Maid fruit punch and Honey Nut Cheerios. As nutritional gatekeeper I strongly disapprove, but they don't let me carry a weapon.

In any case, I'm stacking all our grocery/Starbucks/sandwich receipts here on the coffee table where I can gaze upon them every time I sit down to relax. We're at $230.52 after four days. I'll be interested, almost certainly mortified, to see the number at the end of a week.