Explosive Chicken, Numb Tongues & Champagne

Our 2017 NYE party will be remembered either as the year of the Explosive Chicken or The Year Our Tongues Went Numb.

If you're wondering, you don't want a numb tongue.

I blame Andy Seiwert and a guy named Action Bronson whose "Fuck, That's Delicious" came to our home via the aforementioned Mr. Seiwert. That's the author/chef/taste-bud killer there to your right.

Within his book, which is described on the cover as, "An annotated guide to eating well," is the recipe for explosive chicken.

Jeff just had to trot it out as the main entree for our NYE party. He went to something like 17 different stores to get the ingredients and made use of Alison's new kitchen scale to get everything just right. His trusty partner in culinary crime, Eric Yocum, was all-in on the caper.

In Eric's defense, he did say "That's a lot of pepper" as Jeff revealed the ingredient list. In his prosecution, he continued to assist in making it anyway.

All I can say is, I was grateful we had tons of champagne, craft beer and other food. One of which was my famous guacamole, which Jeff had complained was too spicy. Cue the irony.

I also stole and adjusted a recipe from Jen Chase that involves artichoke dip, stir fry sauce and cheese stuffed into halved sweet peppers and baked. Lisa and John brought sushi. Sara and John brought some great dip and crackers and something else that I remember loving but can't quite name. I seem to have lost track of what all was scattered about in dishes and platters and bowls. I broke out the chocolate fountain and Tracy brought her gourmet European cookie tin.

Early on, Jeff triumphed in recreating a Ramen dish we were given as a sample at the sushi restaurant at the Baltimore Airport. It was really good and was the perfect thing to set everyone up for the promised dish from the celebrated chef. It was going to be even better, right?

 I think it was after 8  p.m. when Jeff started passing around our portions. We were all a little soused and therefore vulnerable.

Rather than describe the dish any further, I'll just give you a sampling of the reactions. Some are continuations of longer quotes from people as they chewed, swallowed or (in rare cases) had a second or third bite:

"Wow. That's interesting."

"My tongue feels funny."

"Gak. That's bad."

"The finish is, wow, uh, wow. That's something."

"Oh my God!" (Not in the good way.)

"I can't feel my tongue."

"My tongue is swollen."

"Nope."


"Dude: we're gonna need those mini pizzas, STAT."

Later that night, someone found a bottle of Little Kings in our fridge. Duane Jasheway, who will eat pretty much anything and love it, and has a wide range of alcoholic tastes, said, "I would rather pull that chicken out of the trash than drink that."

The chicken notwithstanding, we had a great night with great people and even a demonstration of how to fold fitted sheets properly. Eric interrupted his kitchen duties (at my insistence) to show off his sheet-folding skills even as Scott Cunningham kept shouting, "No! No! This is not the memory I want of my New Year's Eve!"

I'm pretty sure the chicken took care of that fear. I'll let  you know if I remember how to fold the sheet. I'm pretty sure champagne will help.

Happy New Year, everyone.

Angry Mama

"It's you!" my beloved child said to me, pointing and squealing in delight. "It's short. It has red hair and it's angry."

Working hard to be affronted, I said, "I'm not always angry."

Ali laughed. "It's SO you."

The "you" being discussed is what may be the most remarkable Christmas gift of the season: the Angry Mama stocking stuffer, which according to word on the street, is an effective and entertaining microwave cleaner. I don't have hard evidence, just two reviews from others who also received the item in their stocking and have used it.

Her head apparently spins around for 7 minutes while she squirts a vinegar and water mixture around.

I, for once, have a stunningly clean microwave already thanks to an explosion involving something red and sticky that happened just before we left for Christmas at home in Maine. I'll have to wait for a day or so for another catastrophe in our microwave.

For the record, I do, on the rare occasion, get angry. My head does not spin around, though, no matter what Ali and Jeff may claim.

In other news, we had a great time in Maine. Grandpa claims the crustaceans off the coast will be watching for Alison's return, and he may be on to something. On the way out, we discovered Gaicha Sushi at the Baltimore airport. It's worth planning your connections in Baltimore. On our return trip, the manager remembered us, and we had another lovely meal, including a sample of a new menu item. Ali can eat her weigh in just about any dish she likes, and she's getting more adventurous of late.

She left behind a mountain of hard shell crab at our annual Christmas Eve at a Chinese buffet in Portland. She munched on a softshell crab on the way home.

She worked a little of it off breaking ice up on the driveway. There was a ton of snow, which was pretty and only hazardous a couple of the days. I helped with the driveway and served as a craft beer mule for Jeff, who was determined to visit new and exciting breweries and beer outlets while he was there. We went with three suitcases of clothes, gifts and a few beers he took to share with other beer nerds he was planning to visit. We came home with six suitcases.

I think there was at least an equal ratio of Christmas gifts to beer, but I wouldn't be surprised if the beer edged the gifts out.

While waiting for one of the breweries to open its new release sales, I stood with Jeff who had made beer friends with a young couple behind us. They'd driven up from Connecticut and this was their second stop of the day. We'd passed a jack-knifed semi that had crashed into a sedan, a car that was on its roof in a ditch and a handful of other cars that had slid off the turnpike due to snow and sleet.

The young woman behind us asked if we were going to hang a while and sample the beer as well as buying the coveted new bottles or cans. It's possible I channeled the Angry Mama when I declined for the both of us before Jeff could reply.

She looked at me like I was the mean mom who didn't let her kids play in the rain. Maybe so, chickie, but there was no way I was making a call home to Grandpa telling him we'd crashed the car and were calling from the local county lock-up.

Harumph!

We may have done our best work in the cookie department this year. I had earlier reported to Ali that Auntie Jen was asking if we still wanted to make cookies. It's a tradition we started back when Ali was about two or so and horrified her Grammie by her less-than-precise cookie cutting and insistence on licking the icing spoons.

"Uh, duh!" was Ali's reply to the hint of a suggestion that we might not want to invade Jen's kitchen.

 In other traditions, Alison dragged out the dominoes. Grandpa long ago resigned himself to being bested by the reigning champ, and it was another year for Ali to triumph. We only played five rounds and while Grandpa managed to start each game by having the right doubles, that was his only luck.

Grammie taught Ali to play, and I'm convinced passed along her cutthroat approach to the game. Here they are, back in the day. you be the judge.

 On the other hand....

 

Hope your Christmas was great and you have only high-fives in the new year.

The Whole Package

Ali had a big swim meet yesterday -- did pretty well; improved on her times -- and her body is still demanding that it be rewarded.

I came back from the gym this morning to find her spreading Nutella on just toasted mini-waffles and using them to make ice-cream breakfast sandwiches.

"Did you put some banana on that to at least pretend it's healthy?" I asked.

"No," she mumbled with a mouthful of sugar and fat. "But that would have been a good idea."

She then decided we needed provisions to get us to Zionsville for a performance of The Nutcracker. That turned out to be two pretzel rolls, one of which she ate on the way. Then, she had a bag of chips and half a package of Starburst. She wondered if we could stop for a snack on the way home.

We didn't stop, as dinner isn't far off, but she could have easily eaten on the way to, home and had dinner too. All that and she is a tall, thin, muscular stick. It's sometimes hard to like her.

We had a great time at the ballet. Alison has great posture and is often very graceful. (When she's not belching as loud as she can, that is.) I can barely put one foot in front of the other without falling down.

We'd gone, primarily, to see my friend Vicki's daughter, Audrey, who was stupendous. I was bragging about how great Audrey is, basing my commentary on what I've seen and heard from Vicki. Ali listened attentively and checked out the program photo I showed her.

"Yeah," Ali agreed that she sure looked the part of a professional dancer. "I bet I would blow her away in the water, though," she remarked, thoughtfully.

I took that as a cue to focus on my own child for a while...

The girls have never met. I think if they ever do, they'd like each other. They're different enough that they'd have stuff to talk about and similar enough to like each other. God forbid their mothers arrange their meeting. That only worked when she was 4.

In other family conversation, Jeff and I were talking about something the other day that I had done well. I don't remember what it was, but it earned me a pat on the head and the comment that I'm
"more than just a pretty face."

“Oh, yeah, Yeah, I’m the whole package,” I agreed. Because, well, sometimes even a blind squirrel finds an acorn.

"Hey now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” said the Captain who had a different nickname before we knew of his military service and that became his nom de plume. “ I’m the Package.”

My Postal Carrier's Name is John

I've learned a lot about my neighborhood in the past seven months or so.

More of my neighbors work from home than I knew. Most of them are awesome people. I don't have one I don't like. And our postal carrier's name is John.

I've known John for about 12 years, and I'm pretty sure he's liked me (and us) from the start. But it was only this week that I learned his name. Yes. Shame on me.

Why he would like me: In the winter when it snowed, we always shoveled a path for him from our west-side neighbor's house to ours and then to our east-side neighbor's house. And regardless of the season, if Ali has baked some goodies and I'm home when he comes to the door, I always share.

I remember the time he found me mowing my neighbor's yard and said, "Hey, you don't live there."

That might have been the first time it occurred to me that while I had been smiling and nodding at this guy for a long time, I didn't know his name. I don't know how many times I've thought to myself that I should know his name. It became too awkward to ask.

Besides, ours was a fly-by-night kind of relationship. I'd seem him fleetingly when I was doing chores in the yard and he was on his rounds.

This summer, I've seen him a lot more than I ever have in the past. I'm generally working at the kitchen counter, so I see him coming. Unless I'm on a call or absorbed, I meet him at the door. If I have them, I give him cookies and cupcakes. We chat about this and that.

When Ali broke her collarbone, she and I walked a gift over to the people who'd helped her. He saw us from a street away and he stopped his truck to see what we were doing. He commiserated with Ali and told her she'd be just fine. He'd had a similar injury. She had been super worried about always having a knot poking out. He made her feel a lot better about it.

I was walking to the mailbox the other day with Christmas cards for the mailbox (Yes, Amer, I did it.) and it was super cold. My plan was to get in a few steps to shut my FitBit up. A block away, I ran into him and he suggested that I might want to just give them to him and go get warm.

That afternoon, I lamented to Ali that I needed to break down and confess that I didn't know his name. I knew that he's an Army vet. I knew he likes chocolate. How could I not know his name?

"It's not that big a deal, Mom," she said. "Just ask him."

So I did. He laughed and said it was no big deal, "I've only been coming by for 12 years."

Ha. He's funny, too.

I don't know that me wanting to know his name meant anything to him. For all I know, I'm the most annoying stop in the neighborhood.

If you have a person in your life like this, there's no better season than to toss your awkward self to the curb. People deserve to have folks know their name. Except crappy people. Keep away from them.

I don't have a photo of John. That would be a step too far. But I do have the shot below. Ali and Jeff were twins in gray shirts and flannel the other day. They refused to pose for me. (That's borderline crappy...)

 

Family tradition

Thanksgiving weekend may be the best weekend of the year if you're fortunate to have friends, family and reasonably good health.

Thursday was for family. I got to see my friend Sandy Cazee. (Thanks for the trip down memory lane, for being interested in what's happening in Claymont and that awesome fridge photo. I miss him, too.)

We gathered at my sister Donna's house where Ali and Rachel beat the snot out of me at euchre and I absconded with most of my cousin Lori's cranberry relish. It's good as part of the holiday meal, but it's even better the next day for breakfast. And lunch.

My Uncle Larry had a vintage fishing pole to get to his cousin, Johnny, and I delivered it to his sister Elaine who in spite of living just a town away from me, I never see. It was fun catching up with her and her husband Tom. We may even get a cousins/sisters/nieces shopping trip together soon.

While Jeff did a combo bourbon-craft beer trek, Ali and I spent most of Friday shopping and I scored this awesome wreath as part of my Broad Ripple Kiwanis winnings. It's from Sambol's Tree Farm and well worth the drive. It was almost a top-down day -- beautifully clear and sunny-- which was good because we were in the car for a good eight hours.

We had packed provisions, so we didn't go without food or water.

We started out around 8:30 a.m. to score some bargains at Half Price Books on West 86th Street. Our quest to win $100 gift car was for naught, but we snagged a free $10 and some fun gifts. We went east on 86th Street to some shops and then up to 96th Street to meet Elaine. From there it was Fortville, then back north of 86th and eventually back into Broad Ripple.

At one point, I think I said something to Ali about how we might be doing too much shopping.

"That's not a thing, Mom," she replied and scrammed to another aisle at The Good Earth.

Friday was also our annual Friendsgiving with Patricia and Patrick Jackson, who will one day simply make a date with Ali and make a reservation for a party of three. We tried out Public Greens, which was awesome.

Ali and I traditionally decorate the house starting Friday and throughout the weekend. I had a bunch of yard work, too, so I left her with most of the tree work on Saturday. Jeff channeled his inner lumberjack and cleaned up our woodpile and chopped some new fireplace fuel. He was celebrating a bit because he got in on a Kahn's liquor lottery that involved dialing until you got through to the store owner. I don't know how many other men (maybe women, too) for dialing for booze, but he was at it for more than an hour before he connected and ended up with a bottle of William Larue Weller bourbon.  It's apparently exceptionally rare.

When he connected, he was able to buy more, also collectible or coveted bottles of other stuff, but declined saying he'd give other people a chance. He'd made a bit of a haul the day before and probably had already exceeded his booze budget, but it was still a generous thing. Some people sell this stuff on a secondary market. It's a little like King Rat, apparently except no one's in prison. I think.

Anyway, when he went to get his super, jizzmonic bottle of booze, the owner of the store remembered his generosity. They got to talking and Jeff said if he'd made a miscue, it was that he'd let slip by the chance to buy a 2014 Duckhorn Vineyards Three Palms Merlot, which is this year's Wine Spectator Wine of the Year.

Just so happened there were three left, so I scored too and now have that bottle waiting for me downstairs. Karma apparently is a boozer.

Ali abandoned us for dinner at a friend's house, and Jeff suggested we go visit one of our favorite restaurants, The Vanguard. He made this offer just after I'd just about crippled myself mulching and blowing and bagging some of the gazillion leaves that have been standing ankle deep in parts of my yard. I was smelly, dirty, sweaty and achy in places I'd forgotten I had.

For a nanosecond, I thought, "No. I just want to go to bed and I might not make it to the shower first." But then I remembered that he had dismantled our bed and gotten out his power drill, mumbling something about needing to reinforce a support.

Apparently the lumberjack had morphed into Bob the Builder. So I couldn't have gone to bed if I'd wanted to. The shower was good. The Vanguard was even better.

Some lovely wine and two Aleves later, I was in my apparently reinforced bed and dead to the world. This morning brought a little more decorating and cleaning up but no yard work. The leaves are out there taunting me but I have the best wine of the year in here.

It's no contest. In fact, the leaves may be there come Spring.

Today, I decided my back porch will be a great wrapping room. Also, I got tired of looking at it looking so gross. I really need to find a permanent solution to that wall. I worked on a temporary measure for a bit before football began. I'm sure Martha Stewart wouldn't approve, but she's probably not going to be in my neighborhood this season.

Ali's doing homework and chores and we're all drifting slowly back to a normal school and work week. I need every bit of the four days of Thanksgiving weekend, and I suspect you do, too.

If I had one more day off, it's possible that I would get to those damn leaves. But not likely.

There's wine, you see...

Oh! Before I forget: I dug deep in the Christmas boxes and came up with these gems, which Jeff harvested from his father's basement one year.

Jeff's Dad always hangs a decoration, who the Reed siblings call "Sickening Santa." I don't know if it's because of the rotating lights or maybe they each, independently got soused and came home to see it blinking and in their bleery hazes, deposited part of their holiday spirit. Regardless, I offer these two Santas from the same vintage.

Ali thinks the one that's just a head is creepy, and I think the smaller one is angry. I think they may need to be reunited with their buddy back home.

For now, they've been allowed to be unboxed but are relegated to the porch.

If your teenager doesn't kill you, she might make you stronger

When I was pregnant with Alison, I prayed every night that she would get Jeff's genes but I had a recurring nightmare that she would be born with my legs and his arms, and her hairy knuckles would drag the ground when she walked.

Thankfully, the prayer rather than the nightmare came to fruition. She has long legs, long arms and  the metabolism of a hummingbird. As I am at the other end of that spectrum, it's a daily struggle not to smack her in the face.

Not really. We invested heavily in orthodontia, and I'm not one to waste money. But add killer smile and naturally curly, red-gold hair to that list of physical attributes and you'll see why I should win Mother of the Year for my soft and gentle approach to parenthood.

Why she keeps trying to kill ME, I'll never understand. Her latest attempt was cleverly disguised in a bid to get me to stop complaining about my weight.

"Come swimming with me, Mom," she said. "It'll be good for you."

Ali joined the Herron High School swim team last year and she's back at it again. She's doing well this season, beating her times and having fun, to boot. She practices every stinking day of the school week (she gets Thursday and Friday off this week) and swims laps that total out in the thousands of meters. Thousands. Every day. And she's 16.

Last year when I fell for her "Let's do it together; it'll be fun!" lines, I was left nearly dead at the side of the Jordan YMCA, panting like a beached whale.

This year, we're at LA Fitness and somehow I haven't drowned or beached myself. In a post-swim delirium, I did walk into the men's locker room instead of the women's. Twice, actually, but who's counting. (In my defense, they are very close together and I don't wear my contacts in the pool. Thank God the row of urinals is hard to miss even if it's a blur of white.)

Today was rough, but I pushed through. I stumbled home to find her on the couch.

"How'd it go?" she asked.

"I almost threw up," I said, truthfully.

"Awesome!" she said. "I'm proud of you."

She's a killer, I tell you.

A Bug's Life (2)

It was inevitable.

We went to the International Festival this weekend with two other couples and Ali, and she showed us the Taiwanese food stand where she had volunteered earlier in the week. She gave us pointers as to what to buy.

Next door was a stand shilling cookies and cupcakes that were made with ground up meal worms instead of flour. It's environmentally responsible, if a bit unusual to Hoosier palates. But it wasn't long before a dare was making itself known.

Ali came back after the boys had downed bites of tiny cupcakes that tasted like dry cupcakes. (I may be spoiled by Alison's confections. Or, worm cupcakes may just be gross.) No one threw up so of course, the cookie had to be tried.

Ali came by after the men had downed their share of the cookie that wasn't just made with worm-flour, but was riddled with actual, non-ground-up worms. "You have to try it, everyone else did," lied her father.

Susie did support the effort to get another mini-cupcake but Tracy was having none of it. No one asked for a take-out box.

I wish the lady at the stand luck in her endeavor. I like the planet, and I'd like to keep it humming. Living off bugs will be my last choice in environmental consciousness, though...

We've had quite the friends weekend: dinner with Team Vielee on Friday night where we shared some awesome wine and got caught up on John's impressive, month-long Camino de Santiago pilgrimage.

On Saturday, our Evansville friends, Tracy and Eric, met our Ogden friends for dinner at the Keystone Sports Review where we had just about every kind of bad-for-you-food (not one worm on the table.) It was yummy.

I don't know if it was the spirits or the fact that Tracy and I had taken a long walk before the trip to the fairgrounds for the festival or Ali coaching me through a swim at the gym, but I fell asleep soon after we got home. On the couch. While listening to a story someone was telling.

It's official: I'm old. Today, I finally got Halloween tucked away where it belongs and even cleaned up the shed a little bit, sweeping out the summer's dirt and getting the Christmas containers down. I won't decorate for Christmas until Thanksgiving weekend, but it's good to get them down from their perch on the high shelves.

Jeff is at a bourbon tasting, Ali is doing homework, and Tracy and Eric have gone home. It feels too quiet, and I'm kind of hungry. Not so hungry that I need a worm cupcake, mind you...

I leave you with a few of my favorite photos of my favorite veteran. Back when I was a younger and just-as-trusting version of Alison, he convinced me that the tiny white curvy thing I found in a walnut was candy. Funny how history repeats itself. #BoysAreWeird

Happy Veterans' Day to all who served, those who are serving and those who will. It's a big deal to be an American soldier. I know I'm not alone in being grateful for  your sacrifice.