Stories

There’s not really anything to do with noodle kugel – put it back in the oven and heat it up. There’s not really anything to do with Katherine’s Mother’s carrot ring either (which is more like carrot cake) and which we ate too much of, except wrap it in tinfoil and put it in the oven and heat it up, too.

Brisket, however, is a whole other story. Brisket hash for Sunday brunch with poached eggs on it. BBQ Brisket sandwiches. BBQ Brisket tacos (just go with this, they’re really great!)

BBQ Brisket Sandwiches

So easy. Sauté a little sliced green pepper in olive oil. Slice and shred brisket. Add shredded brisket and heat for a minute or so. Throw in a half a cup of bbq sauce and simmer or more if it seems too dry. If you’re feeling really brave, throw in some sliced jalapenos. Lightly toast a hamburger bun and spoon bbq brisket onto bun, put on top bun, and slice in half, cause it’s kind of messy!

“I wasn’t as happy as I could be, and my life wasn’t going to change unless I made it change. In that single moment, with that realization, I decided to dedicate a year to trying to be happier.”-Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

On Friday night, my co-worker joked that I had to take my glass half-full outlook and check it at the door. Then on Saturday afternoon, while wearing my yellow sunglasses, I purchased a pair of yellow pants, blue running shoes, an orange cardigan, and pink Bermuda shorts. That’s what I call optimism—but we can always have more—and we can always be happier.

In fact, when Gretchen Rubin took her bus ride and had her great epiphany on her yearlong quest for happiness—she was already happy—she just knew she could be happier.

Selfishly, I had picked up Rubin’s #1 New York Times Bestseller, THE HAPPINESS PROJECT, from Barnes and Noble just a few weeks ago because I was looking for inspiration and tips in regards to my own book project: one that also involves a yearlong quest—to become a professional amateur.

The second cookbook I bought, as a new bride, was Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. My First Cookbook was the Alice B Toklas Cookbook, but unfortunately for me, that proved too esoteric for the grocery stores in Fort Worth Texas.

I was a new bride. Who knew grocery stores didn’t carry larks and laurel branches. Alice B Toklas cooked for “writers, artists, and expats who lived in Paris between the wars,” but my dreams of dining with Picasso and Hemingway faded quickly.

Then, just in the nick of time, Julia brought me not only a cookbook I might master, but with ingredients that were available. Just having that cookbook on the shelf made me courageous in the kitchen, while I prepared my canned tuna and green noodle casseroles.

It might have ended there - a young bride clutching Julia’s culinary wisdom of France, while she burnt the toast – had I not seen Julie and Julia so many years later.

That gave me Nora. With Nora comes true girlie wisdom: Humor, Love… and Butter.

In Nora’s honor and with both love and humor for my darling friend, Amy Ephron, I searched for a recipe that overflowed with butter, in hopes that eating Scottish Shortbread might bring comfort to us all.

We will truly miss Nora Ephron’s talent and beauty, but fortunately for us, the magic of film allows it to linger always, and I will always have what she is having.

For a long time, I wasn’t writing because I was swept away by a passion that completely eclipsed my love of food and cooking. There’s something about losing weight that makes me start thinking about clothes again. I speak not of the utilitarian Mom Garb that tends to be stretchy and sexless, and purchased for the dual purposes of comfort and covering up body parts which are too awful even to contemplate. I mean fashion. I mean I start reading “Vogue,” and “Allure,” and “InStyle” and (my personal favorite) “Lucky” and scheming about where to get a faux Chanel jacket and whether I can get away with a pair of the 4-inch Gladiator shoes  that are essential for the transition from summer to fall this season. I cooked, I worked, I kept my kid in clean Abercrombie jeans, but my mind was usually far off in the land of boyfriend cardigans and vintage Diane von Furstenburg wrap dresses. I had nothing to write, unless it concerned the preparation of food that would not leave a stain on a Prada jacket, or how to pick an outfit and accessories to coordinate with one’s dinner. (Hint: a large Mabe pearl ring is a delightful tongue in chic accompaniment to a plate of oysters on the half shell).