Sink Your Teeth Into This...

I’m surfacing. Finally. Please excuse the flour dust and my apron.

Because I’m a little left of insane at times, I decided I needed a change from my normal writing routine. As June keeps harping I am such a foodie that I should be writing a cookbook. Since I was spinning my wheels in other areas, I took up the challenge and joined her and Stephanie Berg in assembling a cookbook. The first one is different from the others I have planned. More on that in a moment.  This one is A Vampire Cooks: 40 Recipes to Sink Your Teeth Into. http://www.amazon.com/A-Vampire-Cooks-ebook/dp/B009C0PC66/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347918184&sr=8-1&keywords=A+Vampire+Cooks+Tara+Manderino

I love writing about vampires. Since vampires have problems eating, I had to think about what they would like to serve their mortal friends. The recipes are light on a variety of colors: red predominates.

But why write a cookbook at all? Because I am not just a foodie. I grew up in a family of foodies. A little background: I’m of Italian descent. My father’s family was from Calabria and Abruzzi. My mother’s family is Sicilian. With that kind of background there were always a lot of family events growing up – holidays, birthdays, religious milestones – and they all involved food. Lots of food. This doesn’t count the spur of the moment visits by family and friends (most who were Italian), which entailed more food. This scenario is not so different from what a lot of people experience. Now these larger events often meant both sides of the family would be together in the same house at the same time. No problem. Where some families would talk about current events  my family talked about – food. Not just how to prepare it or where to buy it, but about the food business.

My father had a pretty exclusive restaurant.  I grew up there. By the time I was 9 I knew how to devein shrimp, write menus and make French Onion soup. In quantity. When I was older, he had changed venues (long story about the building) and now had an Italian take out and pizza shop. I could toss pizza with the best of them. My father had one sister and two brothers. The sister married and had a family and cooked a lot. One brother who lived nearby decided to open his own pizza shop. His sons pretty much run them now and he oversees things.  The other brother had a restaurant in New York City. On my mother’s side, her mother had a pizza shop (think we had a monopoly here?) and my mom’s sister also worked there. Since my grandmother would occasionally keep an eye on the grandchildren, we all grew up assembling pizza boxes, making sausage, making pizza sauce and leaning how to sweep out the pizza ovens. As soon as we were tall enough to see in the ovens, we would get the peel and check for doneness and yell to an adult to remove the pizza.

Current events at the dinner table?  Not here. It was about pizza ovens, recipes, the competition and exchanging trade secrets. The Abruzzi/Calabrese side vs the Sicilian. It was never dull.

I plan on talking more about my family, and food in the future cookbooks I have planned. How could I not? The next two deal with biscotti, and Christmas Eve.  For now, since I’m in the mood for soup, I’ll leave you with one of the recipes from A Vampire Cooks.

Manhattan Clam Chowder.

Very different from its heavier New England cousin, this soup has a red and flavorful broth.

Ingredients:

• 3 (6.5 ounce each) cans minced clams
• 1-1/2 cups water
• 1 (16 ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 2 potatoes, peeled and chopped
• 1/2 cup finely chopped carrots
• 1/2 cup finely chopped celery
• 1 teaspoon salt
• Ground black pepper to taste
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

Directions:

1. Drain clams and reserve liquid. Set clams aside.
2. Add enough water to reserved liquid to equal 3 cups.
3. In a large saucepan, pour clam juice and water mixture, tomatoes and their liquid, onion, potatoes, celery and carrots and spices. Cover and simmer for 35 minutes.
4. Reduce heat. Add clams. Heat thoroughly.

Serves 6

Time Management

Tons of things have been written on the subject. It’s a skill most people can learn. But after living with my family, I am convinced it really is more -- it’s an internal clock. Either it works or it doesn’t.  In a family of 4 we were split down the middle.

My husband and I were at opposite ends. Anthony and our son, Aaron, were the proverbial two peas in a pod. I never understood my husband so well until Aaron was born. That’s when I realized the internal clock thing was genetic. To this day, I ask him how he passed Kindergarten. He was perpetually late. (And yes, he was born 2 weeks late. In the afternoon. I didn’t realize then it was a sign of what he thought was a normal waking time.)

After Kindergarten, he didn’t grow out of being late. I used to have set one kitchen clock 10 minutes ahead or he would miss the bus to high school -- 45 minutes away. As it was, we chased the bus a fair number of times. If he wasn’t on the bus, kids would keep watch out the back window for my silver van and then tell the bus driver to pull over. The Thanksgiving after he graduated, we were all getting ready to sit at the dinner table, but Aaron still wasn’t there. I had been periodically calling up the stairs to him. Finally, just as everyone took a seat, he popped in, saying, “I thought you were going to say, ‘hurry up or you’ll miss the bus.’” My mantra for 4 years.

On the other end of the spectrum, there’s Christopher. He did and still does everything quickly. My husband and Chris demonstrated the best example of disparity in time management skills. They were both sitting in the Family Room. Anthony got up and started to prepare a bowl of cereal. He took out the bowl and a spoon, placed them on the counter, then got the cereal from the pantry, opened the box, poured the cereal in a bowl, folded down the wax inner wrap, put the cereal away, then reached for the milk. Only there was none. There had been when he started. While he was fussing with the cereal, Christopher went into the kitchen -- walked behind Anthony, opened the refrigerator, took out the milk and Hershey’s chocolate syrup, grabbed a glass, poured, mixed, drank, put the glass in the dishwasher, and put the empty milk carton in the trash -- in front of Anthony.

When a distant cousin of my husband’s expressed amazement at my time management skills, she wanted to know how that happened. I told her, “It was from years of getting Manderino’s out the door on time.” Trust me, every single family member has heard that story. The older generation seems to appreciate it the most.

In case you would really like some time management tips, check out this list: http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/timemanagement/a/timemgttips.htm