We’re in a deep freeze here in my neck of the woods. Frigid temps all last week. I believe it was a ridiculous 3 degrees when I got up this morning. BW lets me know how vicious the cold every day when he gets home. Fortunately for me, I work at home, and had a good, solid, warm writing week.
I ain’t going out there till I have to.
Poor guy even had to go out on Saturday, twice. Me? I had a stellar Saturday in the kitchen, cooking with my 13-year-old granddaughter. Kayla has a fresh and fun interest in learning to cook, and I’m delighted to have the time and opportunity to tutor her. In fact, Friday night when her mom and brothers came for dinner, I served as her sous chef, and had her make the bulk of the meal. And very well, too.
But Saturday gave us the whole day.
I’d decided on chicken and dumplings. It’s really cold, and who doesn’t like some comfort food in February? Since my girl came up mid-morning we pretty much dived right into the day. After she–claiming starvation–ate a bowl of three bean and ham soup I had leftover from earlier in the week.
I show her an easy marinade–just Italian dressing and white wine. And while the chicken’s soaking that up, we decide we should bake something. She looks through my personal cookbook, finds my mother’s outstanding sour cream pound cake. I don’t have any sour cream in the house, it seems, but it goes on the list for next time. I think, when we make that pound cake, there will be three generations in my kitchen.
But today, we settle (ha!) for chocolate chip cookies.
I’m reminded as I now serve as the cookbook, sitting back and letting her do it all, of first guiding her little hands through the process, and the mess made when she was surely no more than two. Now she’s as tall as I am, so grown up, and I’ll just say: Now add this. She’ll measure it out, say: Is this right, Nana? As I give her the nod, I imagine her baking in her own kitchen one day, and hope she’ll remember lessons at Nana’s.
Naturally we have to sample the cookies, warm from the oven, and I love she’s excited she’ll take a bunch of them home, surprise her family. I love she’s excited for Grandda to get home and find cookies (one of his favorite things) she baked. When he does, his reaction is just what she was after.
But now BW is starving, and gets out the left-overs from Friday night’s dinner. Which prompts Kayla into starvation yet again. So it’s warm up some pork loin, roasted potatoes and carrots, some herbed up steamed broccoli. She has two servings. I don’t know where she puts it. She’s my height, 5’4″ (though I have a quarter inch more than that, she’s really anxious to beat) and weighs 90 pounds.
The very first time I saw her, in the warmer in the hospital after birth, I thought: Oh, look at you, my long, lanky girl. That hasn’t changed. She’s all leg, slim as a wand. And eats like a stevedore.
Now it’s time to head into the main meal. I didn’t have a whole chicken, as I’d usually use, but am adapting to the boneless, skinless chicken breasts I do have, so I have her use my handy-dandy multi-tool (shout out to Laura for telling me about this wonder) and mince up some garlic, which she sautes in olive oil. I have her add a whole carton of chicken stock and a good dose of white wine. Then herbs–some harvested from my garden and in freezer bags. This interests her, the little cubes of frozen herbs. In they go. I’ve run out of my own rosemary, so show her how to crunch up the dried herb with her fingers. Salt, pepper, so on. Stir it up! Add the chicken. This is my job as she refuses to touch raw meat, something she’ll get over one day.
I have her use the wonderful multi tool, dice up carrots and potatoes–let’s add some hearty to the comfort. She adds them in, and while they’re simmering along, we sit, talk, surf the web for dresses for her Eighth-Grade Formal this spring. We just hang out awhile.
And as she objects to touching the cooked chicken, I show her how I shred it. But she does slide it off the cutting board and back into the pot. She hangs with Grandda awhile, helps me with a couple chores as the aroma of cooking fills the kitchen.
I tell her how to make the slurry with flour and water for thickening the broth, how to add it, stir it. When it’s time, I sit back again, telling her how to make the dumplings. Is this right, Nana? You bet–exact measurements are not my thing when it comes to cooking. The girl loves dumplings, and gets a charge out of making them, out of just dropping them into the simmering stew in the pot. And how they change with the cooking until we have a very pretty pot of chicken and dumplings on the stove.
She asks how the dumpling mix still on her fingers will taste. You won’t like it. (It’s not like cookie dough!) But she has to try. Then drink a very large glass of milk to get rid of the taste.
Now I’m starving. The two of us each have a bowl of the meal we’ve made together, and we’re very happy with the results. She wants to take some home, so I tub some up, bag up a bunch of cookies.
When she leaves, she hugs me–she’s a champion hugger–and says: Thank you for letting me cook, Nana. Thank you for loving me.
That’s my long, lanky girl, and I’m honored, truly, to know I’m not just teaching her to cook, but showing her cooking is love.
Nora