Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Sorry, You've Got the Wong Kitchen

Mmmm, hungry for some maple glazed salmon? Or spicy orange beef?

Sorry, we don't serve that here.



How about a lovely spinache lasanga or wild mushroom pizza with salad greens?

Nope. Not on the menu



Okay. channa masala, butter chicken, saag paneer!

Look somewhere else, buddy.



Fine! Soup of the day - whatever's in the pot.

Right, well, we don't DO soup.



Welcome to The Wong Kitchen - my daily attempt to prepare a healthy-wholesome-eco-friendly-immune-boosting-delicious-toddler-friendly dinner for my family on a (semi) nightly basis following the complex set of rules, preferences and mores that have been set before me by my darling husband.



They are:



1) No sweet on the meat

2) Vegetables are a side-dish. If there ain't no meat, it ain't complete.

3) Pasta and pizza are too carb heavy (besides, I ate pizza for lunch) but rice is okay.

4) Indian food gives me gas

5) Soup is for sick people.



There's also:



6) Sandwiches do not a dinner make

7) Eggs are for breakfast

Okay...I'm making him sound like a jerk (or, at the least, a food snob) which he isn't at all. This is just his own personal kosher - his rules of food physics - that I have discovered over the past 9 years of eating together. And the truth is there is another over-riding rule that trumps all: "Put it infront of me and I will eat it, all of it, whether I like it or not."

We all have our own ways with food...odd little imprints of our cultures, childhoods, personalities that make us followers of our own food religions. For example, I do not eat boiled meat of any kind and I do not eat leftovers. I feel like the melding of food ways in a family is an incredible act of love and intimacy. Plain and simple, cooking food for someone just the way they like it is a caring act and is deeply satisfying.

So that's what this is about...the one thing I do consciously, planfully, (almost) every day to build our family with food and love (they are kindof the same thing, right).

Tonight's Dinner:

- BBQ beef sandwiches
- Corn on the cob
- Caesar Salad

Explained:

BBQ Beef: I'm getting a much needed haircut at 4pm which means that I needed to do something in a crockpot that would be ready and require little last minute prep. Hence BBQ beef. I realized I am braking 2 rules with this meal:

1) it's a sandwich (but I think the amount of beef involved balances that out)
2) it's sweet & meat (I use kindof a sweet bbq sauce but it's SOOOO good) and again, the sheer amount of beef involved should make it okay

Corn: Loki will eat it. I need at least one component of dinner to be my "Loki Safe" ingredient. He might not touch the beef or the bread and definitely not the salad, but I've never seen him push away corn...(and Herb changes his diaper in the morning so HAH!)

Salad: Part of my own food heritage from my mother... you MUST serve something green with every meal or you are probably a terrible person.

2 comments:

  1. Fantastic entry. I had to read it (especially the rules) to Derek and Ashley, and we were all killing ourselves.

    Sounds just like hanging out with you and the boys and wittering on about how the guys have annoyed us this week. :)

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  2. This is hysterical---can't wait to read more!

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