É o que é

on (not) sweating the small stuff. Recipe: Romanesco with Tahini Sauce

Save the chocolates!

I suppressed a scream when J inadvertently dumped the turkey stock that had been simmering on the stove for hours, following the hours I had spent roasting the turkey parts that I was proud to have procured from our local talho (butcher). He had just returned to Portugal with our visiting daughters after a month in the US and, since we hadn’t all been together in almost a year, I was trying to recreate family holiday magic. Cue the gravy.

In my decades of holiday cooking, I’ve always made turkey stock in advance of the main meal, so we could enjoy it with rich gravy. As part of the ritual, we strain the stock and use the cooked morsels of meat as “pet turkey.” So fixated was jet-lagged J on procuring pet turkey for our cats (who missed him very much while he was away and the feeling was mutual), that he dumped out everything else in the pot, an uncharacteristic move for a guy like him.

Remember when Curious George went to a chocolate factory and mayhem ensued?

I felt like the man with the tall white hat, but instead of yelling, save the chocolates!, I admonished J to save the turkey bones.

Pet turkey for the win

I acknowledge that I am sharing this post at a time of hopelessness. Untimely tragic deaths, political instability, cravenness, and cruelty have destabilized the world and deeply wounded our already fragile souls. Just when you think the news can’t get worse, it does.

So I apologize if these reflections come across as solipsistic or insensitive. The thing is, we’re all still trying to navigate life, with all its mundane messiness and joy. But now, heaviness and anguish and despair and fear for the future are sadly an unavoidable part of the mix.

***

Let me tell you what else went wrong with my holiday fantasy. The Hanukkah latkes were a bitch to get out of the frying pan intact, maybe because the variety of potatoes I found was waterier than my trustworthy Yukon Golds, or because it took longer than expected to properly heat the oil on my temperamental induction range.

Despite the tsouris, they tasted good

The Christmas morning waffles took forever to cook in the new waffle iron I had purchased, which the salesclerk proudly told me, comes with a three-year warranty. It might take that long to cook a batch of waffles for a family of four. We gave up and turned the rest of the batter into a giant pancake.

The Brussels Sprouts which were in every supermercado I visited in the weeks leading up to Christmas, were nowhere to be found when it was time to purchase ingredients for the holiday meal. I still don’t trust my convection oven, even though I had one in the US. I got the smallest bird the talho could sell me and it was still a few pounds larger than what I had wanted, just managing to fit into my little oven. Making sure the turkey cooked evenly was a delicate dance.

But you know what? It all worked out in the end.

So, too, did family time.

Even when everyone lives in the same country, renegotiating the parent-child relationship now that we’re all adults, can be tricky.

It’s even trickier when you haven’t seen your kids in person for a long time and want to get in a full dose of mothering (aka nagging) to tide everyone over till the next visit.

The kids and husband could be forgiven for not recognizing that in this new life in Portugal, mom is a neat freak. During my month alone in the Blue House while J was away, I kept things immaculate.

New country, new me.

Five minutes after everyone got here, it felt like chaos, though I may be exaggerating.

But oh, our first sunset together was spectacular.

Like many (probably most) families, we have our strategies for recalibrating and finding equilibrium. For us, it’s beautiful walks (and them suffering through the innumerable family photos I insist on taking. For those of you who saw the pictures I posted, I promise that Daughter #2 was happier than she looked), good food, humorous catch phrases, pet appreciation, and suffering through reformer Pilates together.

And then they leave and it’s bittersweet. Where has the time gone, what will the future bring, and how much of the story will we get to experience together?

***

New Year’s resolution?

Now, it’s the new year and each of us is embarking on our own personal journeys towards whatever passes for resolutions, while we figure out how to withstand the horrible news and not succumb to hopelessness.

Fellow Portugal-based Substacker Maria Anderson wrote a beautiful piece about appreciating the quality of days, of light, love, good food, good friends and an impending 70th birthday. I commented positively and mentioned that I am turning 65 this year. Lovely Maria said she looked forward to hearing my thoughts on this impending milestone.

Would that they were so beatific.

In my book, there is a story about how for women, drivers license photos are a referendum of how you’ve weathered the different stages of life. I wrote that piece when I was in my mid-40’s. Little did I know.

I thought about it last week, as I attempted to obtain a passport photo that didn't make me cringe. I now understand what Nora Ephron meant when she wrote, I feel bad about my neck.

Then I realized that the next time I need a new passport photo, I will be approaching 75 and will probably envy my 65-year-old visage. Time marches on.

I went straight from the photographer’s studio to the gym we have just joined, where we had fitness evaluations and my results were humbling. I know I drink more wine here than I should, enjoy Portuguese bread, and add sugar to my espresso, but I also play pickleball three times a week, hike once a week, and do yoga most days. Clearly, that’s not enough.

I thought about how silly it is to be so stupidly and unrealistically vain (J - you are 100 years old. It is what it is. Me - not helpful!)), especially in the face of so much tragedy and, as a two-time cancer survivor, to not simply celebrate that I get to embark on this season of life. Like my abs, my attitude adjustment is a work in progress.

I’m grappling with when to accept “it is what it is,” or as they say in Portuguese, é o que é, and when to resist. So I now lift weights and do crunches every day and have my first-ever robo vacuum cleaner and will celebrate from afar, as my daughters turn 27 and 25 next week. That’s the easy part.

What’s harder is to wait for the light at the end of this fucking tunnel.

Who cares if I recognize myself in my next passport photo, ten years from now. It is what it is and though I may wince and complain, I can accept that.

But I’m afraid I won’t recognize the values of my country of origin, which I proudly served for many years. And that, I will never accept.

The Best Thing I Cooked During the Holidays.

My cookbooks' new home, the antidote to America's bullshit, and peacemaking romanesco

Romanesco with Tahini Sauce from Gjelina

Always a mercurial eater, Daughter #2 now lives in LA and has fully embraced the lifestyle. She did an ab workout every day while she was visiting us. At first we clashed whenever she decided to skip whatever we were having for dinner and make herself a spinach smoothie or a chopped salad instead. She’s in her peak cute drivers license/passport photo years.

We came to a meeting of minds and we even kept two batches of carrots in the house — one for her, and one for the rest of us.

So it was a surprise when I made something for dinner that she devoured and asked me to make again. But maybe not such a surprise since it comes from Gjelina, the celebrated restaurant near LA’s Venice Beach. How handy to have that recipe in my back pocket when I couldn't find Brussels Sprouts for Christmas dinner.