Lost

I found out that my grandmother is scheduled for surgery on Friday, to have her brain tumor removed.

Husband and I are supposed to leave for vacation tomorrow, a combination of a celebration of our one year anniversary, but far more importantly, one last chance to do something together before he moves away. 10 of the past 12 months have been call months for him, so the majority of our marriage has worked such that we have seen each other for a few (2-3) hours for two days (most of which involves me cooking and him playing Playstation, then him cleaning the kitchen while I analyze data), and then not at all for the next two days, with the pattern repeating. Given the few hours per week that we see each other, and the fact that this is now going to decrease to one, sometimes two, weekends per month, we were very much looking forward to spending a whole week together, just the two of us, with no lab/hospital time.

But now, my grandmother is having surgery. Back in January, her neurosurgeon did not opt to do surgery because her chances of survival were not high. She has only gotten worse since then, along with her chances of surviving major neurosurgery.

My parents and grandparents say we should go. My grandmother wants no funeral, no ceremony, no memorial – nothing. She is old, cranky, and miserable, and no longer wants to be living day-to-day as unhealthy as she is. She has been ready to die for months, and my parents suspect that the reason she agreed to the surgery is because she is hoping she will not pull through. She does not want her death to alter anybody’s plans – my aunt and her husband are in Barcelona (my uncle is an opera singer, currently performing with the Gran Teatre del Liceu) and she does not want them to fly back regardless of the outcome; my husband and I should go on our vacation – nothing should change.

But even if she doesn’t want anything to change, everything would change. And I don’t know what to do. Do I ignore my dying grandmother’s last wish and cancel my trip and last opportunity to do something with my husband so that I can be around my family, even though that wasn’t what she wanted (and will upset my still-living grandfather)? Do I go on vacation because that is what my grandmother wants – even if it means being far away from the consolation of my own family? Do we leave as planned on Thursday, and then if she doesn’t make it through on Friday, turn around and have a 12-hour drive to Pennsylvania?

Moments like now, even more than usual, I wish I had a sibling, or even just one single first cousin, who would be going through the same thing and might be able to offer up some advice. Having a tiny family just makes the depressing even more depressing.

I fear that no matter what decision I make, it will be the wrong one.

One Year Ago

May 25, 2008

Getting ReadyFirst MeetPictures at the Philadelphia Museum of ArtSigning the Ketubah Yarmulkes (crocheted by me), Rings, Philadelphia-themed Guest Book Ceremony Just Married! Cocktail Hour Reception First Dance HorahToastsDancing Cake Cutting The End

Happily Ever After.

Grandmother’s Pinwheel Cookies

Every month, Jenna over at That Wife hosts a “food challenge”. This month, in honor of Mother's Day, the challenge was to retrieve our favorite recipe made by our mother and replicate it. Well, Jenna, I’m bending all sorts of rules here, but once you hear the story behind these cookies, I hope you’ll forgive me.

First off, these are not my mother’s cookies – these are my grandmother’s cookies. And secondly, I made them not in May, but in December, and the pictures have been sitting on my computer ever since, waiting to be posted (though this challenge did give me the perfect excuse to write up the recipe). But, December was the first time I ever made the cookies, so I felt like it still qualified in the whole tackling a new recipe; I just did it a bit early.

Up until three years ago, my grandparents always lived a state away from my parents, so “going to Grandma’s house” was always an adventure. We didn’t have the luxury of just meeting up for dinner; rather, with the four hour drive involved, it was limited to weeks in the summer and long weekends during the school year. Despite being fortunate enough to have a well-traveled childhood, my favorite place in the world to visit always remained my grandparents’ home; even though it was not exotic, I always knew I would have a wonderful time. And one thing was always constant throughout these visits – we would park in the driveway, walk in through the cellar (oh, how I loved the musty basement smell! To this day, musty basements immediately bring me back to my grandparents’ grey painted basement with the pool table), ascend the curving staircase, and emerge into their black-and-white kitchen with the strawberry border, where my grandmother would be standing with a tray of pinwheel cookies. Every time.

Fast forward many, many years to December 2008. Nobody else in my family had ever made the pinwheel cookies, but my grandmother had recently handed down the recipe to me, as her failing health prevented her from doing any more baking. I had a strange urge to try them for the holidays, so I decided to give it a shot, following her directions and hoping for the best. Little did I know that the pinwheel cookies would wind up being the comfort food of my family.

Two days after making them, I received a phone call that my grandmother had a massive stroke and was in the hospital. After finishing his clinical requirements and starting his winter vacation, Husband and I rushed home to join the rest of my already-assembled family, awaiting future news in my parents’ home. Being the holiday season, everyone was well over their cookie quota, but not knowing what else to do, my Jewish mother continued to try to offer more sweets and desserts to everyone, which were immediately refused. Observing the scene – everyone so worried – I knew the cookies would take the focus off the not knowing, and instead onto discussing happier memories while we awaited more news the next day. I emerged from the kitchen with a cookie tin, and everyone groaned. “No more cookies!”, they protested. But then, I cracked the lid, and my uncle caught a glimpse inside. Even he, only married into the family for 12 years, recognized them immediately, and let out a little squeal of delight. Within 10 minutes, the entire batch of cookies had been devoured, while everyone swapped their favorite stories about my grandmother. My job was done, and these cookies will ALWAYS hold a special place in my heart as a reminder of my grandmother, and the culinary glue that brings my family together.

Disgruntled Julie’s Grandmother’s Pinwheel Cookies

Ingredients:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1 1/3 cups sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.
2. Beat butter until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add sugar and beat until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes more. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition, then beat in vanilla. Add flour and beat on low just until combined.
3. Divide dough in half. Form 1 half into 4- by 4-inch square, wrap in plastic wrap, and set aside. Return other half to mixer. In metal bowl set over pan of barely simmering water, melt chocolate, stirring until smooth. Add melted chocolate to dough in mixer and beat just until combined. Form chocolate dough into 4- by 4-inch square and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate both squares of dough for 30 minutes.
4. Line large baking sheet with parchment paper. Cut each dough square into 4 strips. Roll out one strip of vanilla dough into 6- by 7- inch rectangle (refrigerate all other dough strips). Remove 1 strip of chocolate dough from refrigerator and, between 2 sheets of parchment paper, roll out into 6-inch by 6-inch square. Peel off top sheet of parchment from each dough and flip vanilla dough over onto chocolate. Trim excess chocolate dough to fit size of vanilla dough. Run rolling pin lightly over doughs to adhere, then peel off top sheet of parchment. Using parchment as an aid, tightly roll up dough into log. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate. Repeat with remaining strips of dough to form 4 logs. 
    
5. Refrigerate logs 1 hour, then remove from refrigerator and roll each log on counter several times to prevent bottom from flattening. Refrigerate 3 hours more, then transfer to freezer to store.
6. Keep dough frozen until ready to slice and bake. Preheat oven to 350F and grease two large baking sheets.
7. Using a sharp knife, slice dough into 1/4-inch thick slices and plaice 1 1/2 inches apart on baking sheet. Bake until vanilla dough is slightly golden, 9 to 11 minutes.

Non-Graduation

I would need a third hand (maybe a fourth) to have enough fingers to count off the number of times some smug old jerk of a doctor has made a comment that the reason I am in research pursuing a Ph.D. is because I am clearly not intelligent enough to be a “real” doctor.  Of course, we all know that this is utter BS – but I also know that there is no point in trying to change the opinion of a old, ignorant, pompous man, so I just let it all go in one and ear and out the other.  Interestingly, my PI, who is an MD (aka, a “real” doctor), has mentioned on multiple occasions how he believes the Ph.D. process is exceedingly more difficult than medical school (and has unofficially mentioned to a few undergrads that if they are interested in a clinically based research field, like oncology, where physician-scientists are far more respected than in a truly basic science… they will have a much easier time just going through medical school and doing research afterward, even if they never intend to practice clinical medicine). 

While medical school may be more intense as far as the number of hours (while I have spent many a night working overnight in the lab… it pales in comparison to Husband’s call nights as a medical student), obtaining the Ph.D. is the marathon in comparison to the sprint, and the truly difficult part is not knowing when (or if?) the race will ever end.  It’s not just showing up everyday, studying, and working hard – it’s having to discover something brand new in your field, which is then important enough to warrant publication in a decent journal; often, multiple times before you are permitted to even start writing.  So while medical school and graduate school are entirely different beasts, I’ve always thought it was absurd for anyone to consider one entire population – MDs versus PhDs – to be more intelligent than the other.

Until now.  It recently dawned on me that had I attended medical school, I would have graduated this past weekend.  As in, over.  Finished.  Done.  Dr. Disgruntled Julie.  Four years and out.  The day my husband started his first year medical school orientation, he also knew his graduation date.  But… instead, I went the research route, via a Ph.D.  I could have graduated this weekend, but I did not.  Instead, I have another 2?  3?  12? years to go.

Degree FAIL.  I have seen the light.  MDs are FAR wiser than PhDs.  Lucky bastards.  Oh wait, excuse me.  Lucky INTELLIGENT bastards.

Ricotta Gnocchi (Daring Cooks’ Challenge)

Okay, OKAY, I know.  The posting date for the newly-formed Daring Cooks is the 14th of the month.  Today is the 17th.  I could tell you my woeful tale about how I got stuck in lab extra late analyzing a ton of data on the 14th and then was out of town for the weekend and managed to leave my power cord at home so had to conserve battery power for data analysis and not for blog posting… but instead I’ll just sum it up this way: you get what you pay for.  I cook as a hobby, I blog as a hobby… and if the Daring Cooks want to kick me out because I couldn’t get my act together in time, well then so be it.

That said, May marked the first month of the Daring Cooks, and ricotta gnocchi was chosen for the inaugural recipe.  I’m not sure if it was perhaps because it was the first month and the goal is to ease everyone into the cooking challenges, but I found this month’s recipe to be a bit of a disappointment, because it was so… easy.  Sure, it took a bit of time (though not so much that it prevented me from making it on a weeknight), but there wasn’t really anything complicated, hard, or frankly, challenging about the recipe.  Or perhaps this just means that I have flexed my culinary muscles more than I thought in the past.

The gnocchi turned out fine, though I still prefer potato gnocchi to ricotta gnocchi.  I also ignored the suggestion from the recipe author to use fresh ricotta – I have no doubt that it would be more flavorful, but it is also more expensive, and considering we had a near marital battle in the supermarket two weeks ago over the cost of portobello mushrooms, I was NOT going to push any buttons by requesting fresh ricotta when I had a perfectly functional tub of generic ricotta in the refrigerator.  I did, however, use fat-free ricotta because it tends to be a bit drier than full fat, which was probably a good call on my behalf.

Ricotta Gnocchi
from the Zuni Cafe Cookbook by Judi Rodgers

Ingredients:

• 1 pound ricotta
• 2 large cold eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 2 or 3 fresh sage leaves, a few pinches of grated nutmeg, or a few pieces of lemon zest (optional)
• 1/2 ounce Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated (about 1/4 cup, lightly packed)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• all-purpose flour
• sauce of choice (I threw together a caramelized onion and basil tomato sauce)

Directions:

1. The day before preparing the gnocchi, the ricotta must be drained.  Line a sieve with paper towels and place the ricotta in the sieve.  Cover and let drain for at least 8 hours or up to 24 hours in the refrigerator.
2. Place the drained ricotta in a large bowl and mash with a rubber spatula.  Add the lightly beaten eggs, the melted butter, the sage, nutmeg, or lemon zest (if using), Parmigiano-Reggiano, and salt.  Beat the ingredients together very well – the resulting dough should be soft and fluffy with no streaks.
3. Fill a small pot with water and bring to a boil.  When boiling, salt generously and keep at a simmer.  In a large, shallow baking dish, make a bed of the all-purpose flour that is roughly 1/2 inch deep.  Using a tablespoon, scoop up 2 to 3 teaspoons of batter and use fingertips to gently push the ball of dough from the spoon into the flour.  Shake the dish to ensure that the flour covers the gnocchi.  Gently pick up the gnocchi and cradle it in your handle to form it into an oval, but do not squeeze it – resist the urge to over-handle the gnocchi, as ricotta gnocchi are far more delicate than potato gnocchi.
4. Gently place the gnocchi in the simmering water.  It will sink to the bottom of the pot, and then float to the surface.  From the time it floats to the surface, the gnocchi should be cooked until just firm – 3 to 5 minutes. 
   1. If the gnocchi begin to fall apart, the ricotta cheese was likely too wet.  Beat in a tablespoon of egg white into the batter.
   2. If the batter was fluffy but the test sample comes out too heavy and dense, add a teaspoon of beaten whole egg to the batter. 
5. Form the rest of the gnocchi.  Gnocchi can be cooked immediately, or stored in the refrigerator for one hour prior to boiling to allow them to firm up.  Repeat shaping, flouring, and boiling process, but be sure not to overcrowd the pot of water with too many gnocchi (I had to make mine in 4 or 5 batches).
6. With a slotted spoon, remove the gnocchi from the boiling water and gently drop into the sauce of choice.  Carefully roll in the sauce until coated.  Serve immediately.

Thank You, Penguins

The first six games in the Penguins-Capitals series were back-and-forth, jumping up-and-down nail-biting type of games.  And, as a huge Penguins fan, I am, of course, ecstatic that the Penguins won the series and will be advancing in the quest for the Cup (and the fact that I hate the Capitals makes the victory that much sweeter).

But the best part about extending the Penguins season?  It continues to give me an excuse to talk to my father every other night.  I don’t call home that often – generally once a week at most, usually more like every 10-12 days.  It’s not that I don’t like my parents, it’s just that my mother has horrible phone etiquette and I cannot handle talking to her.  From the moment I say I need to go and say my goodbyes, it takes a minimum of fifteen minutes to actually get her off the line.  And as I have no patience for this (or the constant “When are you going to be done? Why aren’t you done yet? Do you have an estimated graduation date yet? rapid fire questions), I choose to just minimize the phone calls home.  (Really.  Every. Single. Time. She cannot get off the damn phone.  Ever.  And if I hang up on her, she calls back to yell at me for hanging up on her, even if I warned her that I desperately need to go and am hanging up the phone.)

Until hockey playoffs came into the picture.  My father follows hockey closer than any other sport, and stays glued to his TV during the playoffs.  He can give-or-take football, and taught me to love baseball but falls asleep in front of the TV more than actually watching the games.  But hockey?  And the Penguins are in the playoffs?  It’s perfect.  Every night after the game, he calls, and we discuss the game… and it is wonderful.  So thank you, Penguins, for pulling off the blowout tonight and giving me at least another four nights of hockey phone calls in which I am able to talk to my father in peace… with the guarantee that my mother will not answer the phone and ask a single question about the lab.  As a bit of a Daddy’s Girl, I really cannot thank you enough.

Peanut Butter Bars

These are both one of the easiest possible desserts I have ever made, and one of my most frequently requested treats.  Hardly a party or event goes by when friends do not ask me to bring along a batch of peanut butter bars, and I am more than happy to oblige, because of the minimal effort involved – I can quickly whip up a batch in next to no time at all, regardless of how much time is spent in the lab that week.
Peanut Butter Bars 

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
• 1 cup peanut butter, smooth or chunky
• 1 1/2 package (12 1-ounce squares) semi-sweet baking chocolate

Directions:

1. Line 13x9” baking pan with foil, with ends of foil extended over sides of pan.
2. Melt butter in a large microwaveable bowl on high for 45 seconds, or until melted.  Add sugar, graham cracker crumbs, and peanut butter; mix well.  Spread into prepared pan.
3. Melt chocolate in a double boiler or a glass bowl tightly set over barely simmering water, stirring until thoroughly melted.  Cool slightly, and pour over peanut butter mixture in pan.
4. Cut partially through dessert to mark 48 squares.  Refrigerate 1 hour or until set.
5. Lift from pan, using foil handles.  Run a knife under warm water, dry, and then cut all the way through dessert into squares.  Store in airtight container for up to 1 week – but I bet they won’t last that long!

Beef “Faux”-ganoff

I haven’t consumed any land-based animals in well over a decade (I do eat fish), but even back in my childhood when I did eat meat, my family rarely ate red meat, and when we did it was generally once a year hamburgers on the grill in the summer and once a year beef stew in the winter. Beef dishes have always remained a mystery to me – not because my mother cannot cook them, but because I was raised in a health conscious household, and any meal revolving around red meat did not make the cut.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but back in college, I participated in intramural fencing, and one semester I had room for an extra credit, so I took fencing as a class for an easy A, which wound up being a lame A-. While we were actively fencing, the instructor would yell out various facts, like the number of quarks in a proton (three) or who defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo (Duke of Wellington and Gebhard von Blucher). When it came time for our final at the end of the year, we had both a performance final, which I scored perfectly, and a written final… which tested us not on fencing… but on all the random facts that he had spouted during the course.

Quite humorously, one student associated the Battle of Waterloo victor with a beef dish… but couldn’t quite place which one. Unable to recall Wellington, he finally gave up and wrote down “General Stroganoff” as his answer. When the pompous English-born instructor told the class about this, it resulted in many laughs, followed by a 10 minute lecture on how it was such a “stupid answer” because how could anyone possibly associate Beef Stroganoff with England? At this point, I realized that I had no idea what was involved in either, and made a note just for my own knowledge to go home and look it up.

A few days later, I decided to give a whirl at my own meat-free version of beef stroganoff, which Husband has since re-named Beef Fauxganoff… but he’s been willingly eating it ever since!

Beef Fauxganoff

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 pound soy crumbles
• 1/2 cup chopped shallots
• 1/2 pound cremini mushrooms, sliced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried tarragon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 cup light sour cream
• 1/2 pound whole wheat egg noodles

Directions;

1. Melt butter in a large pan and cook shallots. Add frozen soy crumbles until warm.
2. Add the mushrooms, tarragon, and nutmeg. Stir occasionally for about 5 minutes.
3. Add the sour cream after reducing heat to low. Stir well.
4. Serve over cooked egg noodles.