Faux-liday Food

National Spaghetti Day and trying to keep food interesting in trying times.

Yesterday was National Spaghetti Day - a marketing gimmick, surely. But hey, if it helps me to decide what to eat, so that I actually eat (and avoid the paralysis of indecision, and the resort to snacks), I will take it… this stupid pandemic, combined with work from home that has basically morphed into all work all the time, and more home cooking than ever (and utter exhaustion with my own culinary repertoire), has taken a toll on my eating habits. Others ate more. I ate less; I tend toward that direction when stressed. I am back down to the weight I was two decades ago, 15 pounds less than 2.25 years ago, even with far, far less exercise. So maybe it’s not all bad.

Tonight’s meal had a hefty assist from Mommy sauce from the freezer - the sauce I grew up eating that someone pointed out has little resemblance to Italian spaghetti sauce. Um, yeah; we’re Vietnamese. Mama Hen has always added carrots and peas - probably in an effort to get veggies into us. But that’s my comfort zone pasta sauce.

The nod to adulthood is the fresh basil leaf adornment. That’s right - fresh basil in January, from the cutting Mama Hen put in water to root, that I decided to transfer to the hydroponic tier of the beta fish tank from some Christmases ago (the fish died soon after). My hope was that the basil would grow and flourish through Winter and I would have a steady supply of basil. The reality is I don’t think there is enough light in my north facing window, though it has popped some new leaves. C’est la vie. At least maybe I’ll get a head start on basil come Spring.

Speaking of out of season foods, a few weeks ago, in December, there was the pan roasted tomato sauce from the last of the tomatoes, including a handful harvested in December the day before the first freezing night. Tomatoes - in December! - to go with the tornadoes, in December, alas. Paired with whole wheat pasta and snack mozzarella balls - pretty tasty, even if not so visually appealing.

So, a faux-liday, with foods that would seem faux for the season, but are very much real.

[Edited January 6, 2022.]

First Non-Manic Monday

The dreaded, anticipated, manic Monday may be more monstrous mental manifestation than the music to be faced.

When I drew open the curtains this morning, this greeted me from the windowsill - the geranium I beheaded right before the first freezing nights a few weeks back, and plunked into water in hopes of propagating it for color over Winter and maybe getting a head start on planting come Spring if it survives. I have been checking for roots - none yet. But the upper leaves stayed green and vibrant, and this cluster of buds hadn’t withered. But only with today’s flowers can I dare hope it’s taking in water and still actually alive. And I didn’t even discover these lovely little blooms until after noon - because I was cocooning in bed until then (taking advantage of an “off” day of work for me - one of the few “off” days on my part-time schedule I have actually felt free to be off in the almost two years since I switched to this schedule), on this whiplash-inducing frigid January Monday that followed on the heels of a pair of 50+ degree days for the start of 2022.

The reduced schedule just hasn’t really worked out that way. The last two months leading into year-end have been rough work-wise. (The last two years have been rough work-wise, and otherwise.)

[No More to come.]

[Edited January 4, 2022; then to finality August 26, 2023.]