End of semester happenings

 It's been a very nice few weeks: for my birthday, Boo surprised me with a birthday themed puzzle, her very first 9x9 puzzle!  And it's a lovely puzzle --- I solved it on video for her, and it subsequently got featured on BremSter, with the result that as of today, a few weeks later, it's had 1990 solves!

In related news, we put up our thousandth FullDeck and Missing a Few Cards puzzle on missingdeck.net, passed 600,000 solves, and over a million views of videos of people solving our puzzles.

We were honoured by the college with the Community Engagement award, largely for sudoku related outreach, and will be giving a TedX talk in the Fall on this topic.

Yours, thrilled by all of this,

N (or MaFC)

It's been a while

 It has been a while since I posted anything as BreadBox.  One of the last posts was that Boo was a student in Halifax, at University of King's College.  Well, she's now graduated, and Skibo is a senior there as well: he's looking to earn double Honors majors in History and Physics.  

In the meantime, I've taken up setting variant sudoku puzzles: I co-create with "FullDeck", setting together as "FullDeck and Missing a Few Cards".  

A couple of weeks ago, I drove up to Halifax to visit Boo and Skibo for a week, and while there, taught  both of them to start creating puzzles too!  I'm looking forward to their creations!

Yours, puzzlingly
N.  Or, MaFC.

Boo at college

 A month, and more, after dropping Boo off at her college, we're thrilled with how things are working out for her.  She's swiftly made close friends, most importantly with her roommate (we were so worried ahead of time how that would work out, and it's been absolutely fantastic!)

Now we have to get Skibo to the same stage a year from now!  An adventure:-)

Yours, proudly parentally,

N.

Three years have gone by

 My.  Three years since I last posted here --- I knew it was a while, but didn't think that it was quite that long. 

Time has passed, that is for sure.  Boo has finished their high school work and will graduate next week, planning to move on to college in September --- emphasis on "move": heading to Atlantic Canada to study Classics.

Skibo is also done with his schoolwork for the year, and in this,  his senior year, plans to apply to colleges  in Ontario.  He's developed a passion for history and politics, choosing to read extensively about both the past (especially the middle of the last century) and the present (currently on his reading list: The Deficit Myth and Capital in the 21st Century). 

I'm thrilled with who they are, how they are growing into adults before our eyes.

Yours, with joy,

N.

Construction

I'm sitting watching Boo and Skibe sitting, crosslegged, on the living room floor, peeling protective plastic from the pieces of a model of a steam engine.  It was one of the gifts from the Gathering last weekend, and they decided this evening to put it together.
What a wonderful, lovely, sight! They're co-operating, chatting and helping each other out. 

Yours, parentally heart-swelled,
N.

Puzzled

Every two years, for a little while now, I've attended a conference of mathematicians, puzzlers, juggles, sceptics, neuroscientists, magicians and other similarly fun folks.  This past weekend marked the latests such gathering, and as always it was incredibly exciting, inspiring, and fun.

Highlights included meeting lots of new people (from each of the categories listed above), learning about new puzzles (and especially the Hanayama collection) and watching amazing magicians and performers do things that are plainly impossible. 

Watch Twenty Toes.  Then tell me that she's a human.  Just impossible!
And the Smirnov quick change duo.  Likewise. 
I'm not providing links -- you have the google (or bing, or duckduckgo): use it.

Yours, not puzzled, just unsure how any of it is possible,
N.

Raptors

Here in the wilds of the slightly rural deep south, we see raptors on a fairly regular basis.  LOML, of course, being a naturalist, is better at spotting them than me, but today a colleague came down to my office.  "N", he said, "have you seen the hawk outside?"
We went out to the stairwell of the building, and sure enough, there was a large hawk.  It sat there, occasionally changing branches, for a good hour or so.  It was completely aware of us, and completely unconcerned. 

Yours, in awe of this amazingly beautiful bird!
N.

Big soup

I remember, growing up in Britain in the 60s and 70s, that food was beginning to change.  At some point, when I was around 7 or so, I guess, my mum took a Cordon Bleu cooking course, and got more adventurous with what she cooked.

I was then (as Skibo is now) a food sceptic.  I didn't like very many dishes, would screw up my face and make unpleasant comments, and no doubt drove my parents crazy.  Skibo, as I say, is following in my footsteps.  Unfortunately, he's too old to fall for the trick my father played when I was nine or ten: he announced a family competition to see who liked the most different foods: somehow he convinced me that it would be a prestigious competition to win, and sure enough, I declared that I liked this, that, and the other.  And of course, he rigged it so I would win.  From then on, I was open to eating most things: there are still things that I actively dislike (melons, for example!) but I'm somewhat more open to trying new foods.

For a while now, I've been attempting to recreate a soup my mother used to make: her version of minestrone.  Since it's a sense memory, and I don't have her recipe, it's been a bit of a struggle.  I have not succeeded, but I have succeeded in making a delicious soup.  It's not so much a recipe as it is a method: the two keys for me are pancetta and parmesan rind: the rest of the ingredients can be chosen and played with according to what is in season or available in the store.  The pasta should be small, so it is a feature, but not the star: and remember, pasta swells immensely when cooked.

Old age is beginning to take its toll: I went to write this recipe up after I made the soup this week, without a recipe to follow slavishly: only to discover that my other (newer) laptop already had the 

following recipe written down.  The only small difference is that this time I didn't include the potatoes, and the pasta that I used was small rings, perhaps 6-7 mm in diameter, which swelled to about twice that with loving application of heat and liquid.

This soup is not a delicate shy dish: it is a big, bold, brash, full of flavour meal.  I found one site that claimed that the name translates as "big soup": I don't think that that is quite the case, but it is descriptive, hence the title above.

This post may seem to be about food, but it's more about family.  I'm deeply grateful for the love of food that my parents helped me learn to find, and for the love of cooking that my mother sparked!

Yours, in gratitude, to two people I can no longer say thank you to,

N.

Minestrone Soup

  

1 tablespoon olive oil

4 oz pancetta, chopped small

1 medium onion, diced

6 cloves garlic, minced

2 carrots, diced

2 ribs celery, diced

1 28 oz can diced tomatoes

1 15 oz can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed

1 teaspoon dried thyme

Salt

Pepper

1 yellow squash, diced

6 small red potatoes, diced

Handful of green beans, cut into 1-inch pieces

Parmesan rind

4 cups stock

Couple cups spinach or kale, chopped

Red wine vinegar

1 cup small pasta, such as orecchiette

Heat the oil in a large soup pot.  Saute the pancetta until it is beginning to crispen,

and has rendered its fat.  Add the onion, and saute for a couple of minutes.  Add the garlic,

and stir for a minute, then add the carrots, and celery.  Saute until the celery is softened.

Add the tomatoes and cannellini beans, thyme and salt and pepper to taste.

Add the squash, potatoes, green beans, parmesan rind and stock.

Bring it to a simmer, and simmer for an hour or so.  Add the chopped spinach and a splash of

red wine vinegar.

15 minutes before serving, add the pasta, making sure that the soup is at a simmer.

Serve with freshly baked bread and butter.

Blogs on hiatus

I sometimes  wonder about blogs that appear to die, for months without a post.  I'm well aware that this one has gone for stretches like that, and then I have an idea  for a post --- and either it inspires me to write several posts in quick succession, or I write one post and wait months for another.

This afternoon I was inspired to look at a blog I used to delight in reading: Syllabub: a delightful, intensively evocative, beautifully written series of posts about food and cooking.  The author is an academic, and  writes about food in an historical context as well as other topics.  I suspect that her energy for blogging died after realizing that she had to write for her job as well as for fun.  She stopped posting in 2009, and hasn't been heard of since (at least by me).  But her old posts are still there!

So now, nearly a decade since her last post, I'm delighting in re-reading her four years of erudite posts about food. 

Yours, in salivation,
N.

Some food experiments

This weekend, I've been playing with some things that I haven't made before. 
Yesterday, at LOML's urging, I tried my hand at pho.  I'd not had a great deal of success with Vietnamese food in the past --- the results always turned out too subtle for my tastes, and without the Asian notes that I wanted and expected.   The recipe I tried, a simplified version, used store bought beef broth rather than spending a day making a (super expensive) slow version from bones and meat.
I thought that it turned out really well: everyone loved it, and it's going in to my keeper list.  When I get a chance, I'll put up the recipe here (as always, I used several recipes online, decided what bits I liked, what I didn't, and mixed and matched).
Tonight, I made pad thai.  I'd only ever made it from packet kits before (and truth be told, to an extent I did tonight too: I used a jar of "pad thai sauce", since none of the stores in a 20 mile radius seem to stock tamarind).   It too turned out really well: Boo was skeptical, and took only a small portion to taste, then immediately returned to the kitchen to fill her plate a little better.  Skibo claimed to like it, but as is his wont these days, only ate a bit.  I'm looking forward to him developing a teenage appetite, even if it does eat us out of house and home!

Yours, with a south-east asian inspiration tonight,
N.

Pork Pies

One of the things that I miss most about living in the US rather than the UK is food and drink.  Not that anything is necessarily better over there: but there are options that cannot be found in this country, or are hard to find.
For example, we've recently managed to find places to buy crumpets (at much less than four times the price we'd pay in the UK), and I've persuaded a brewer friend that making British style bitter is a fun thing to do (and he's produced some wonderful beer for me).
Pork pies, though, are unknown here.  So this afternoon, I embarked on a journey of at least two steps.  I made hot water pastry, I filled tins with pastry and pork, and once they were cooked, I poured pork stock into the pies to gel into aspic.

No, it wasn't a success.  I was worried about the pastry, but it turned out to actually be really good.
But the filling wasn't the nice, jelly-wrapped gentle pork goodness I'd hoped for.

But at least I'm batting .333 (to put it in a US perspective).  All I need to do is fix the rest:-)

Yours, in failing, inspired to fix the issues,
N

Playing with ancestry

I've been enjoying playing with Geni.com for a few years now: Boo's particularly delighted that it claims (with several dubious links) that she's Cleopatra's 63rd great grand-daughter.  She likely is, just not from the path they claim!

My favourite find so far is perhaps that I'm related to Jim Callahan, former prime minister of the UK.
How, you ask?  Oh, let me tell you:
Rt Hon Leonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff, KG is my 6th great aunt's second great niece's husband's son's wife's first cousin's husband's great niece's ex-husband's great nephew's wife's grandfather.

Yours, Feeling connected,
N

And it's not just Boo!

This week, Skibo has been following in his sister's footsteps.  He's  currently in the kitchen making waffles.  Independently.  Well, largely independent: he's come through to ask where the salt is (and then, finding several different types, to ask which sort to use).
He's making a mess, and he's yet to learn how to clean up all his bowls and jugs and spoons and whisks, but that will come with time. 
The big thing is that he's cooking!

Yours, celebrating this new thing in the New Year,
N

Boo, the baker

Boo has suddenly started cooking: LOML and I went out a week ago to take the dogs to the dog park, and to check on the status of the new-stove-to-be: when we returned, the house was fragrant with the aroma of pancakes: Boo had decided to make them for her and for Skibo.  A couple of days later, she decided that waffles were the order of the day, then -- get this -- scones.  And the scones in particular were impressive.   They are not something I've had much success with, so colour me

Yours, parentally proud,
N

New stove

As a Christmas present this year, I was given a new gas stove: the old one didn't work right (burners wouldn't ignite without a lighter, the broiler wouldn't reach a decent temperature, one of the burners wouldn't light at all, etc) and we decided it was time for a replacement.  The old one had lasted 20 years, so it worked out to about pennies a day --- a worthwhile expenditure, especially since a good friend was willing to chip in too.
It's been transformative --- the high-power burner is so much more effective than on the old stove that it has changed my appreciation of deep-frying --- two days later I almost have chips down to perfection: crispy texture with fluffy interior, just like Mum used to make.

Yours, knowing that a bad workman blames the tools, I'm choosing to praise them!
N

Welcome to the teenage years, Skibo

And now there are two.

Yours, wondering if I should be saying this in trepidation,
N

Thoughts on teaching

I'm teaching two classes this summer, and both finish next week: one with a final exam, and the other, potentially, with a performance.
The mathematics class, of course, is the one with the exam (and homework, tests, etc).  Lots of evaluation along the way to see how students are doing, and to help them assess their progress themselves.
The other class, teaching the Tai Chi 24 form is going very nicely: it's a ten class session, once a week for 90 minutes, and I'm finally, I think, getting the hang of how to teach it.  In previous sessions I'd stuck with a traditional "teach the moves sequentially" style: this time, I started on the first day with practicing the end of the form too --- trying not to give it short shrift in the last couple of classes.
We have a continuing group of former students in the class who meet weekly, so there have been plenty of opportunities for them to continue to learn the end of the form --- but not everybody chooses to continue to practice with us.  So, I'm happy with this group's progress, and with my developing insights into how to teach.
As for assessment, and the potential performance, I'm thinking of inviting my old instructor to come view the final class of the session.  I'd love him to see the progress these folks  have made!

Yours, proud of my students in both classes,
N.

Bringing things into the 20th century

 Both Boo and Skibo are in the middle school now (which here in our little town is where 7th and 8th grade go to get lessons, if not necessarily to be educated).
Last year, we struggled with issues of dress codes: Boo wanted a blue streak in her hair, so we got her one, only to discover that the school didn't allow it.  Then she got called out a few times for wearing "inappropriate" clothing (this, I should add, was ridiculous --- and Boo is most definitely not one to want to break these sorts of rules, or to dress to shock, or worse yet, to "distract the boys").
At one point, a counselor at the school asked her if she were a "bad girl", and did she "regularly get in trouble?"  Just a couple of weeks into school, she was being labeled a "bad girl".
She's not.  Far from it: she knows her own mind, and as her T-shirt puts it, she's at "Sarcasm Level: Expert".
But she's not a bad girl at all.

Today they had a drill.  An "intruder" drill --- they were to pretend that there was a bad guy roaming the school, and act appropriately.  But before the drill, they had an assembly, at which the principal called up the male teachers, and all the boys, and informed them that they "had to care of the women, to keep them safe".
My god, but what an unreconstructed attitude.

Now we have to decide how to approach this.  Something must be said, but how best to actually effect real change, and not just piss off the basket of deplorables.....

Yours, protected as much as protecting,
N/N

Bringing things into the 21st century

Boo, being in 8th grade, has been told that she should buy a calculator.  An expensive calculator.  A piece of equipment which was pretty radical in the late 80's, and costs just as much now as it did then.  The reason being, of course, that they can't figure out how to get the students to use their chromebooks (which cost about the same as the calculators, and are almost infinitely more powerful) to work without letting the students have access to files, the net, etc.
The reason for the calculators is not pedagogical.  It's a reflection of a lack of understanding of how to use technology appropriately.

When I complained to the principal, he proudly told me that his son, a freshman at university, had had to return home to pick up his calculator because he needed it for his freshman calculus course.  This told me two things.  One is that his son is taking business calculus, where the instructors haven't been given the time and encouragement to figure out how to do things better.  The other is that the principal is not willing to think hard about this issue.

Yours, unhappy at being decades ahead of the educational system,
N.

Moroccan recipes

Promised these four years ago: went to print them out to use today, and the printer is out of paper.
Couldn't find them on the blog, so perhaps I never fulfilled the promise.  So, here I am blogging, so
I can see the recipes on my phone in the store.  All because the printer is out of paper.

Chicken Tagine
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons plus 1/4 cup olive oil
1 (3-lb) chicken, cut into 6 pieces, wings and backbone discarded
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 medium red onion, halved, then sliced 1/4 inch thick
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
5 fresh cilantro
5 sprigs fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 1/2 cups water
2 tablespoons mild honey
1 (3-inch) cinnamon stick
1/2 cup dried Turkish apricots, separated into halves
1/3 cup whole blanched almonds

I add a tablespoon or two of ras el hanout as well as
the spices called for.

Stir together ground cinnamon, ginger, turmeric, pepper,
1 teaspoon salt, and 2 tablespoons oil in a large bowl.
Add chicken and turn to coat well.  Heat butter and 1 tablespoon
oil in base of tagine (or in skillet), uncovered, over moderate
heat until hot but not smoking, then brown half of chicken, skin
sides down, turning over once, 8 to 12 minutes. Transfer to a
plate. Brown remaining chicken in same manner, adding any spice
mixture left in bowl.
Add onion and remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt to tagine and cook,
uncovered, stirring frequently, until soft, about 8 minutes. Add
garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, 3 minutes. Tie cilantro
and parsley into a bundle with kitchen string and add to tagine
along with 1/2 cup water, chicken, and any juices accumulated on
plate. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, 30 minutes.
While chicken cooks, bring honey, remaining cup water, cinnamon
stick, and apricots to a boil in a 1- to 2-quart heavy saucepan,
then reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, until apricots are very
tender (add more water if necessary). Once apricots are tender,
simmer until liquid is reduced to a glaze, 10 to 15 minutes.
While apricots cook, heat remaining 1/4 cup oil in a small
skillet over moderate heat and cook almonds, stirring occasionally,
until just golden, 1 to 2 minutes. Transfer with a slotted spoon
to paper towels to drain.
Ten minutes before chicken is done, add apricot mixture to tagine.
Discard herbs and cinnamon stick, then serve chicken sprinkled with
almonds on top.


Tomato and Cucumber Salad
eggous or cucumbers offer crispy contrast to tomatoes in this Moroccan salad (shlada) with vinaigrette and fresh mint. Sometimes referred to as shlada 'arobiya (country salad) or shlada nationale (national salad), it can be served as-is or used to make Salade Marocaine.

Mixing the salad at least 10 minutes before serving will allow the flavors to blend. A spoon can be offered, but the salad may also be eaten as a dip with Moroccan bread (khobz) for scooping it up.

Also see Feggous Salad with Orange Flower Water.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 15 minutes

Yield: 4 to 6 servings.

Ingredients:

1 lb. (about 1/2 kg) feggous or cucumber
1 lb. fresh, ripe tomatoes
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or mint
2 to 3 teaspoons finely chopped onion
2 tablespoons lemon juice or vinegar
3 tablespoons olive or vegetable oil
salt
pepper
Preparation:

Lightly peel the feggous so that some dark green skin remains, and finely chop it. (If using regular cucumbers, you'll want to remove the seeds before chopping.)

Peel the tomatoes, seed them, and chop them into small pieces. Mix the tomatoes with the feggous, parsley or mint, onion, lemon juice or vinegar, oil and salt and pepper to taste.

If time allows, leave the vegetables to marinate at room temperature or in the fridge for up to an hour. Serve in small bowls or on individual salad plates.


Red Lentil Soup
Serves 6

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 large onions, chopped
3 large cloves garlic, minced
2 heaped teaspoons ground coriander
2 heaped teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon turmeric
3/4 teaspoons paprika
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice (optional)
1 1/2 to 2 teaspoons kosher salt (to begin with), then to taste
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
7 cups vegetable broth
1 24-ounce can crushed tomatoes
2 cups dried red lentils, rinsed and picked over
a pinch of crushed red pepper flakes
juice of 1 lemon
a small splash of red wine vinegar (about 1/2 tablespoon)
3 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley leaves
1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan or dutch oven over medium-high heat.
Add the onions and cook until tender, about 6 minutes.
Add the garlic, coriander, cumin, turmeric, paprika, cinnamon, and allspice.
Cook for another minute or two, stirring to coat the onions.
Add the broth, tomatoes and salt, and bring to a boil.
Pour into a slow cooker, and stir in the lentils.
Cook for 4 to 5 hours on high, or 6-8 hours on low, or until the lentils are tender.

Stir in the lemon juice, a small splash of red wine vinegar,
red pepper flakes, cilantro, and parsley.  Season to taste again with kosher salt.
Cover and cook for an additional 10 minutes.


Yours, paper free!
N.