From their teeny, tiny kitchens across the country, my adult kids are kickin’ some keister in their kitchens.
It has been amusing, amazing, heart mending and mouth watering to see.
They are whipping up fluffy biscuits, deep friend chicken with homemade aioli, thin and crispy scallion pancakes, hand-patted tortillas, homemade mole, pulled chicken, pineapple cookies, gin-cured salmon and all sorts of other gourmet treats with whatever ingredients they can snag on their limited grocery runs.
Luckily for us (so lucky…have I mentioned how lucky we are?), one of them, the celebrated pie baker of Outagamie County, is currently stranded with us and turning out gourmet meals on the daily.
Last week, Molly happily butchered a wild turkey and, from that meat, produced three delicious meals — Coq au vin (really, Dinde au vin, but I don’t speak french anyway); homemade turkey sausage with biscuits and gravy (I can’t describe how leery I was to taste homemade turkey sausage and I also can’t describe how genuinely delicious it turned out to be); and turkey tenders.
She has made homemade phyllo dough, homemade doughnuts, and calzones. Weekly, she whips up a nice pizza crust for us and allows us to top them however we’d like. (Full disclosure, she doesn’t let us anywhere near her pizzas. We suggest the toppings, she considers our requests, and then she puts the masterpieces together.)
Our son Vinnie and his wife Danni smoked a chicken on a grill, and recently made homemade pasta over an open fire, our daughter Katherine has turned her LA one-room efficiency into a five-star fusion restaurant and our son Charlie and his fiancee Tara have been enjoying the quarantine challenge of teaching themselves new cooking techniques and stretching ingredients in their little kitchenette in Queens.
We can’t gather with them around one table right now, which is a big bummer because we are enthusiastic table gatherers. But, with a little effort and some ingenuity, we can feel like we’re sharing something special.
Food nourishes, comforts and inspires us on every level and it makes me smile to see the Julia-Child-Like joy on my offsprings’ faces when they whip up something especially good.
I know some of you and yours are also enjoying time in the kitchen because I see your mouth watering posts. Here’s to a time we can all enjoy excellent food together. And, here’s to the efforts we’re all making right now to make the best of a challenging situation.
Stay safe everyone and…
Bon Appetit!
Do these talents come from you, Laura? All of the kids seem to be creative chefs. I enjoyed the narrative and the beautiful photos.
Why don’t you eat fried eggs?
I’m with you Laura. The only way I can eat eggs are scrambled and even then, they have to be firm. My favorite was the biscuits!! Yum..yum..