Cleveland's Wonderful Street Fares or How To Get Fat And Really Enjoy The Process

     Page Ninety.
     Summer is upon us and here in Cleveland that means many things. Birds are singing, flowers are blooming, people are outside jogging and most importantly, neighborhood festival time is here! Cleveland has some glorious neighborhood festivals with their multitudes of sights and sounds. Young artists are out selling their wares and street musicians are walking around, entertaining passers-by. In theory every one of our street fairs exists for some cerebral reason, whether it be religious, cultural, ethnic or what have you. But really, these street fairs exist just to feed the masses.
     Cleveland is widely known to have very strong ethnic food. This is because we attracted so many immigrants from the early-1800's to the mid-1900's. Cleveland has no history of being white bread, vanilla or Presbytarian. People nowadays don't know that from the 1880's through the 1970's Cleveland was one of the ten largest cities in America and it attracted a more diverse immigrant community than practically any other inland American town. Honestly, I don't know why it attracted such an array of nationalities, but it did. Cleveland has 'em all... and their food. All the usual suspects have their Mom & Pop restaurants or grocery stores here (we strongly poo-poo national chain food in Cleveland. It's here, but we don't really like it.): Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Italian, French, Mexican, Jewish, African-American, etc, they're all here. Now, the thing is, we also have: Ethiopian food, Hungarian, German, Vietnamese, Indian, Lebanese, Spanish, Russian, every South or Central American culture and  all things in between and really good versions of them, too. In short, if you want great ethnic food, come to Cleveland. (Unfortunately, we have a severe shortage of 5 star restaurants of any variety. But we have more than our share of terrific ethnic eateries which serve any world food you could possibly want.)
     Which brings me back to our street fairs.

                                                                   Oh My God, Is The Food Good!!!

     I'll tell you my favorite Cleveland festival. It's the Feast of the Assumption in Little Italy. The Feast of the Assumption, celebrated on August 15th, is the day that devout Catholics believe Mary was assumed up into heaven. Cleveland's Italian community adopted this day to create Cleveland's largest festival, literally. It gets about 1/3 of a million attendees over the four day party and they're all really happy. It's also the only Feast of the Assumption with a party of this nature in the world. Weird but true. And the Italian food isn't to be believed. It's overpriced, of course. But who cares? I typically attend, maybe, three or four times each year. It's in Little Italy which is a ten minute walk from me. So I walk down Mayfield Hill to Little Italy, get lunch, then walk back up the hill and come home. But more importantly, I usually go down on Saturday night with friends and hang out for a few hours. It's just one of those annual get-togethers that I really enjoy.
     The reason I have street festivals on my mind right now is because the season just began a week ago. The first one, The Hessler Street Fair, is also located very near me. It's in University Circle which is the cultural hub of Cleveland. The Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals of Cleveland, Case Western Reserve University, The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Cleveland Orchestra and a few dozen more cultural and educational institutions are all in this relatively small district. University Circle is also at the bottom of the hill. So I can walk down to Hessler (one of Cleveland's long-time artist colonies), look at all the art, get a bite, walk back up and go home. It's easy as pie. (All this walking is how I can rationalize eating so much crap.)
     So there you have it. I don't know the street fair situation of any other city but I certainly hope that it's rich, diverse and worth waiting for where you live. (I just wish they wouldn't charge a million dollars for a glass of fresh-squeezed lemon-aid.)

The Absentee Party Host

     Page Eighty-One.
     I was the kitchen help at an intimate dinner party in 1983. The job was next door with the neighbors while I was at my first live-in nanny position. These neighbors, the Windsors, had a particularly beautiful, and comfortably large home and hired me to do many projects over a two or three year period. I think I painted a few different bedrooms plus the first floor enclosed porch. I cleaned their basement, took care of the backyard while they were vacationing and was the party help on a couple occasions.
     Each of their parties live in my memory for different reasons. This one in question was slightly bizarre because the husband, a hot shot surgeon at The Cleveland Clinic, spent most of the party with me, in the kitchen. He explained that he liked me more than he liked his guests. He went out front occasionally and talked to them during cocktails and, of course, had to sit with them during dinner. But mostly he was with me in the kitchen. His wife came in and admonished him regularly, but he didn't seem to care.
     I think that the party was primarily her friends. Also, I suspect that he was introverted and had a hard time with crowds. He saw me as a compromise. He was technically attending his party by being on the same floor (as opposed to spending the entire evening in the bedroom) but socialized primarily with me. I didn't care. He kept me company. I bet lots of husbands do that sort of thing, too.  

The Ice Cream Man

     Page Eighty.
     I've recently begun hearing the alarm of the local ice cream man. I say alarm because really, that's what it is. It's an alarm to neighborhood children that lots of over-priced, under-quality ice cream treats are available just in time to diminish their appetites. (In this particular neighborhood, the neighborhood where I nanny/cook, the ice cream man shows up in the late afternoon, just prior to dinnertime.) Now, don't worry. I am not going to complain about the ice cream man. I'm not a crab. What I am going to do is write about euphoric recall.
     Euphoric recall is a beautiful thing. It's that part of our memory which helps us remember things not as they were, but as we wish they had been. Euphoric recall works on any manner of topics: The size of the fish you caught with your dad when you were eleven; the smell of the perfume your long-gone grandmother wore; the softness of the Teddy Bear you got when you were four... all of these things are prone to euphoric recall. Specifically though, for the sake of this blog, I'm going to talk about euphoric recall as it pertains to food memories.
     I have a friend who's childhood memories include many fond thoughts of a particular fast food joint and their signature sandwich. As an adult though, she gone back to that place, ordered the item in question, and insists that they've changed the recipe as it's nowhere near as good as she remembers. Well, gee... I wonder why? It's always possible that they really have changed the item, but highly unlikely. What is likely is that it's much easier for a fast food joint to please the palate of a child than that of an adult.
     Or, how about those glorious frozen dinners? As a child, weren't they warm, fuzzy, comfortable, filling and just plane delicious? Nowadays, I think they're gross. I ate a LOT of frozen dinners and also many cans of prepared pseudio-italian foods when I was a kid. I'm practically alive today because all that stuff prevented me from starvation back then. (Having been an incredibly picky child, there weren't a lot of things I liked.) Nowadays, I rarely get a craving for that stuff, much as I loved it then. But I can promise you, if I didn't have access to it, and if I hadn't tasted it in the last thirty years, I'd remember the stuff as being glorious.
     How about some of the candy I loved as a kid? Admittedly, I'm still fond of Smarties, Baby Ruths and red licorice. In fact, I just bought some red licorice a few hours ago. But really, those things are no longer the center of my universe. (If you want to mesmerize me with some chocolate today, make it dark, thank you very much!) Also, back in the olden days, I could make a meal of Ho-Ho's. Lemme tell you something: compared to a piece of real, fresh devils food cake with fudge frosting, Ho-Ho's are like a frozen, toaster waffle compared to a real, fresh one.
      Which brings me back to the ice cream man. The items he sells really suck. They're overpriced. They ruin a child's appetite. No good can come from his services, except for one thing. He creates memories. And those memories are the most wonderful things in the world.

What To Do Next Time or How To Fix It

     Page Seventy-Nine.
     So yesterday I served something new to the family I cook and nanny for. I made prosciutto wrapped chicken breasts stuffed with fresh mozzarella with risotto on the side (see page seventy-eight). As predicted they profoundly adored the risotto, as did I. They also liked the chicken a lot, but I didn't. I mostly made the recipe up as I was going along and I'll definitely do some things differently next time.
     Here's what I did yesterday: I split each chicken breast in half creating two thin fillets. I then put a slice of freshly cut mozzarella in the middle of each filet, wrapped the chicken around the cheese, then placed a single slice of prosciutto on top. I then secured everything with a toothpick and baked for 30 minutes at 425. It was okay, by my standards, but they loved it.
     Next time, I'll not use fresh mozzarella. It was a mess. When I took the pan out of the oven. it had so much liquid, it was crazy. It looked like I put an entire stick, or two, of butter in the pan and let it melt. Who knew that fresh mozzarella doesn't really melt? It just sort of turns to water and then leaves tiny particles of cheese flavor in it's wake? Also next time, I'll use more prosciutto. In fact, what I'm thinking is layering the ham on the chicken more heavily, then sprinkling lots of cheese on that, then rolling it like a Hostess Ho-Ho in stead of having it filled like a Chicken Kiev. Yesterday, I was aiming for a Kiev type dish. Didn't work. Though, again, it might have come closer with the right cheese. I think I'll cook it five minutes less too, but that's a minor detail. It was just a touch dry for my taste.
     Thankfully though, my employers liked it very much. The children, the parents and grandma all thought it was novel and gourmet. So there you go. I'm definitely my own worst critic.

Springing A New Dish On The Family

     Page Seventy-Eight.
     I've been bored lately with cooking the same old stuff for the family I work for. So tomorrow I'm going to try something new. I"m going to make prosciutto wrapped chicken breasts stuffed with fresh mozzarella cheese. Doesn't that sound great? Then, to complete the Italian feel, I'll accompany the chicken with risotto. Both of these things will also be new to the family. Wish me luck.
     I think I can sell these things. The family loves rice. I mean LOVES it. So, if I tell the boys that it's just a particularly flavorful and creamy type of Italian rice (which, of course, it is) they'll try it, and, I think, (I hope) like it. Concerning the chicken, I'm pretty confident that with all the new things I've introduced over the last two and a half years, they'll just see this as one more. I'm very lucky in that they're not stuck in the "we want the same food all the time" cycle. This family, including the three young boys, aren't spoiled in their eating habits. Lord knows, they're picky, but they will try new things.
     And for crying out loud, prosciutto is simply an extraordinarily wonderful Italian salami. Who could say no to that? Then there's the fresh mozzarella. Cheese is a big sell in that family. So again, I think that won't be a problem. And, of course, chicken breasts are the catalyst. The problem, if there is one, will be the combination. Isn't that a common conflict? You have a kid who's perfectly okay with this item and that item and the other item, but if you combine them it's like you're trying to poison them. 
     Sooooo, we'll see how it goes.

What Should I Serve At The Graduation Party?

     Page Seventy-Seven.
     'Tis the season. For graduation parties, that is. And as usual, the big question is: "what to feed all those pesky guests"? (Or, "with Lord's grace, do you think he'll actually graduate"?) Well, if he actually fooled  all those teachers into thinking he deserves to receive that valuable piece of paper, just exactly what will you feed all those people? Here are some suggestions:
     1) Burgers and dogs always sell. Plus the outdoor grill is really quite low maintenance. And they can be made to order. 
     2) Cold pasta salad works. Plus you can eat it while stranding up. This, as opposed to mac 'n cheese which works better in colder weather.
     3) If your income is strong, beef tenderloin sandwiches (on really good bread) will be savored. Serve with good mustard, horseradish and mayo. Of course, if you serve this or the burgers and dogs, you also want to have veggie burgers for those irritating vegans.
     4) Cole slaw.
     5) Ribs are wonderful. Be prepared though, with ribs you need to have seating for everybody. You don't need seating for sandwiches.
     6) Chicken... depends how you prepare it. Good old fashioned fried works for this type of party as does baked if it's in reasonably sized pieces. This really is the key to any type of informal party food: can it be eaten comfortably while mingling, standing and talking?
     7) A salad bar is refreshing, original, delicious, creative and healthy. But again, just make sure that all vegetables are cut up into small enough pieces.
     8) Fancy little tea sandwiches are a fun and retro throwback which will elicit copious positive comments. Use good bread and a variety of fillings. Perhaps four or five different varieties.
     9) Go international. Hummus or tabouli salad served with pita bread, falafel sandwiches, lox or cream cheese with bagels, beef teriyaki or chicken teriyaki - both on bamboo skewers, tacos, burritos, Hawaiian grilled chicken with grilled pineapple over white rice.. all works outside in warm weather. And if you go international you can then decorate appropriately.
     10) Corn on the cob is the ultimate warm weather, outside food, but I'm not sure why. It really doesn't lend itself to being eaten under these circumstances, but people always do it anyhow.
     11) Three bean salad is great. Just make sure to purchase bowls in addition to dishes.
     12) Potato salad works, but has no nutrition whatsoever.
     13) Steak really doesn't work unless there's seating for everybody.
     14) Baked beans, either hot or cold definitely work. Again though, bowls, bowls, bowls.
     15) Shish-ka-bobs on the grill are different. Use lamb, chicken or beef with red peppers, tomatoes and mushrooms. They can be served with rice.
     16) I think pizza and pasta are too heavy for this type of affair, but let's be honest: "if you build it they will come". That goes for pizza and pasta at a graduation party also. (If you cook it, they will eat it and love it."
     17) Shellfish is expensive and requires seating. Be prepared. But some parties would welcome this tremendously.
     18) However, grilled salmon always sells.
     19) Tomatoes and chopped basil leaves with blue cheese in oil and vinegar is a wonderful, little refreshing side dish.
     20) Sliced cucumbers and thinly sliced onions prepared Pennsylvania Dutch style. Vinegar, sugar and water as the marinade for a few hours or overnight.
     21) Melon-based fruit salad. Watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew and any other melon, with a surprise of blueberries.
     22) Berry-based fruit salad. Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and any other with a surprise of chopped dates and flaked, sweetened coconut.
     23) Tropical fruit salad, Bananas, mango, papaya, pineapple and any other tropical fruit with a surprise of marachino cherries.
     24) A thousand desserts and sweets.
     25) I think that's enough food for one graduation party.
     If this is a kindergarten graduation, have fun. If this is a middle school graduation, have fun with all the impending high school drama. If this is a high school graduation party, have fun paying for college. If this a college graduation party have fun supporting him 'till he gets a job. Good Luck and Mazel Tov!

Those Brilliant Case Students

     Page Seventy-Six.
     One of my favorite pans is an eight inch cast iron skillet. I use it a lot, for your typical variety of things. Wanna know where I got it? The garbage. It was in the dumpster behind my building about six or seven years ago.
     It was clearly new but already had some rust stains. I thought, "why is there a new, but rusty, cast iron skillet in the garbage"?  I'll tell you my theory, though it may very likely be incorrect.
     My building is filled with Case Western Reserve University students as CWRU is just a couple blocks away. CWRU isn't easy to get into. It specializes in engineering, medicine, law, business and other difficult type things. It isn't your average liberal arts school. So, my neighbors tend to be brainy. They're also a bunch of total idiots.
     This is to say that most people age 17-22 tend to teeter on that edge anyhow. They think they know everything and there's absolutely no reasoning with them.(If you've ever known anybody aged 17-22 you'll know just exactly what I'm talking about.) So, that age bracket knows everything in the first place, then you give some of them extra brain power. They're completely unreasonable. Welcome to my neighborhood.
     I've lived in this neighborhood since 1993, when I moved out of the Shapiro's home (the family where I was the live-in nanny for eight years.) I've had four different apartments in that time: all four within a two block range. I've always been surrounded by these students as it's a built in hazard around here. I'm really quite used to it and in fact I've become friendly with many of them over the years. But, after all this time, I'm still occasionally surprised by the behavior of some of these "geniuses".
     Getting back to my favorite frying pan, I'll bet you anything that it was a gift to some little boy Case student, from Grandma, on the occasion of his first apartment. Problem was: he didn't know how to take care of it. He didn't know that you can't let cast iron air dry. So he used it one day, (I'm theorizing) then washed it with nice, hot, soapy water, then put it in the dish rack to dry. It goes rusty overnight, he freaks out and viola! it ends up in the dumpster and subsequently, my greedy little hands. It's a good pan, too. Nowadays, it's nice and jet black and nothing would dare stick to it as I've seasoned it to within an inch of it's life.
     There you go. It's only my theory, but I'll bet anything that I'm close to the truth. You wanna know some of the other tricks these brainiacs have pulled over the years? I had a downstairs neighbor not too long ago who used to practice his electric guitar at 4.30AM. The first time I went down to admonish him he was shocked that I thought there was anything inappropriate about this. Then there was the time that one neighbor thought that if she put something outside her door, it would magically disappear. She thought that little, magic fairies would take her garbage to the dumpsters. Then there was the brilliant student who let her kitchen water run all day long so her cat would always have fresh water. (This little shenanigan actually forced the management company to change the water policy for ALL the tenants in ALL their properties. No more water included in the rent.) 
     I choose to believe that these stunts aren't just symptoms of the brilliant type. I think that they're symptoms of many young, contemporary Americans who haven't been trained properly in the fine art of "Living On Your Own For The Very First Time". If you know any parents of graduating high school seniors who will be sending their spawn off to college in the autumn, please encourage them to spend the summer training them to be good tenants and neighbors. (Please forgive my soapbox.)

What's The Hurry?

     Page Seventy-Five.
     I baby-sat a lot as a teenager, for a variety of ages and genders. I was a live-in nanny to two pre-school girls for one and a half years while in my twenties. Then, I was a live-in nanny to three teenaged boys for eight years, also while in my twenties and early thirties. Fast forward fourteen years. Six years ago I nannied two early-teenaged girls for a year. Five years ago I nannied two other mid-teen girls for a year and a half. Four years ago I started nannying two preteen boys for the next couple of years and two and a half years ago, I began nannying a family with four kids: a girl who's now away at college and three boys who are entering their teen and preteen years. (And, just a reminder: I'm a boy.)
     Nobody's ever asked me, but if an average, American parent ever requested just one suggestion on parenting, I'd say: "don't be in a hurry for your kids to grow up".
     Savor the crazy, dysfunctional, overly energetic times which comprise your child's early years. Enjoy the noise and the fighting. Appreciate the fun of watching your children pretend they're playing on Mars. Because, one of these days those kids will be grown and gone. There'll be no more noise and running and playing. Many, not all, but many parents miss that.
     As the youngest of your kids drives off to her first year of college, a part of you goes with her. The part that got to teach her about manners and charity. The part that soothed her knee and kissed her after she fell off the jungle gym. The part that scolded her after she lied about doing her homework. Now, as she drives off, you're left with two things: all those memories and all the worry in the world that she'll be safe and sound. You can't take care of her anymore. When she was little you could. Her concerns and fears were so simple, like falling off a jungle gym. Now, you can only pray that she's secure, happy and that the values you attempted to instill in her actual took hold.
     In the mid-nineties, a small book was written called, "Life's Little Instruction Book". It was a series of suggestions and thoughts that a father wrote for his his college bound son. One of the thoughts was, "right now your mother misses you". That's so true and kids and young parents don't realize it until it's too late. Kids can't be blamed for not realizing how much their parents miss them. And young parents tend to be oblivious to how fast the time will really go by. Of course this is human nature. The brain simply can't grasp all that can happen over the course of a future eighteen years. And eighteen years seems so far away anyhow.
     But most children really will grow up and move out. And from birth to college there'll be many fights and disappointments and dramas and poor grades and romantic break-ups and shocks and unsavory friends and poor decisions and sarcasm and unappetizing table manners and experimentation with chemicals and disagreements galore. But there will also be unbounded joy. One of the greatest gifts that humans have is the gift of gratitude. As long as we are grateful for the many joyous moments of our childrens' early years and and then commit those moments to memory we will be blessed.
     Until the grand-kids show up, there will be no more pillow fights. There will be no more jumping on the bed (and breaking it). There will be no more lemonade stands. There will be no more indoor forts. There will just be peace and quiet. It's not all it's cracked up to be.   

Those Awful Rice Cake Things

     Page Seventy-Four.
     Today's blog is short. I have a bad cold and I really don't feel like writing.
     Have you ever wondered how to dress up those awful rice cake things? I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Rice cakes are little rounds of crunchy air. How anybody can eat rice cakes and then claim they don't like tofu is beyond me. (And you'd figure that both items would be eaten by the same market.) They have the same taste. Rice cakes are simply crispier than tofu.
     But anyhow, I've discovered one thing which tastes great on rice cakes: lemon curd. That is such a wonderful snack; it's like manna from heaven. The next time you think of it while your grocery shopping, purchase some plain rice cakes and a jar of lemon curd. Bring it home and apply one to the other. You'll be happy you did.

Pepperoni Sauce

     Page Seventy-Three.
     On page seventy-two of this blog, I wrote about the world's most questionable spaghetti sauce. Let me tell you now of a truly great spaghetti sauce trick.
     It was April, 1912. I was traveling from England to New York by way of the Titanic. It was one of the more interesting experiences I've had in my life. And that's saying something, 'cause I've had some pretty interesting experiences. I mean really. Have you ever sailed on the Titanic? It's not dull. Everybody was trying to outdo everybody else, with all their name dropping and jewels and furs. And the conversations were completely over the top: which is a superior autocar? The McLaren F1 or the Bugatti Veyron. They really were arguing about this, no kidding. Also, some of the other passengers were debating Niece vs.Monaco, which is better? I just wanted to throw up. But still, it was an entertaining trip.
     I was staying in first class, and  on the third night I was eating dinner in the A La Carte Restaurant. I wasn't in the mood for anything too fancy so I ordered the spaghetti with meat sauce. While waiting for my meal, who in the world should appear in the doorway but James Dean? I was really surprised too, because I'd recently read in one of the tabloids that he was busy filming The Wizard Of Oz in Hollywood. That just goes to show how much you can trust the tabloids. He appeared to be alone so I invited him to join me as I was solo too. He was as sullen and moody as is his reputation and he also drank a lot. But he was a nice enough chap; he seemed interested in finding out about me and my interests. It turned out that we both loved the book Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner and also the rock band Joy Division. So we had a lot to talk about. He also ordered the spaghetti.
   By the time dinner showed up we were famished. The salad was great. It was a bed of greens: romaine, butter and arugula with, get this, hot, sauteed onions, red peppers and mushrooms placed on top. Then, blue cheese, whole, marinated, garlic cloves and sweetened cranberries were sprinkled on top of that. It was deadly good. There was also a hot, crusty bread to go with it. But the award really goes to that red sauce. It was a normal meat sauce, but it wasn't. It was spicier than normal and a little sweet. I was deliriously happy while eating it. James liked it too, but he didn't seem to see heaven the way I did.
     I couldn't resist and requested an audience with the executive chef to find out his secret. As it turned out, the executive chef was Marilyn Monroe! I knew that she was quite the cook as I'd read that in a number of different sources (you don't think of Marilyn Monroe as being a strong cook, but she really was). I just was shocked to see her moonlighting as the executive chef on the Titanic. She explained that she had a little time in between film shoots. She'd just finished filming Forrest Gump and had a while prior to pre-production on A Christmas Story. So during her hiatus, she'd acquired this job. (She also had never met James Dean, so it was nice to see them mingle.)
     She was as nice as you can imagine and she told me her trick. After browning the ground beef and sauteeing the onions, add tomato paste and tomato sauce as usual. But then, instead of lots of spices, cut up a good amount of pepperoni and add it, along with a dash of sugar, to the sauce. Let the sauce simmer for an hour or longer. Unless the pepperoni is really bland, the inherent spices will leach out and flavor the sauce beautifully. Marilyn further explained that this trick even works with boring jarred sauce. Pour some jarred sauce into a pan and add the same pepperoni and the same sugar. Let it simmer for an hour and serve. It always works.
     Though I didn't love all aspects of that voyage, I made some good friends and met some interesting people (James Dean and Marilyn Monroe. If that's not enough for you, I don't know who else I could add.) I also learned this amazing trick for spaghetti sauce. The trip was definitely worth it.  
     

The Tomato Sauce That Wasn't

     Page Seventy-Two.
     When I was little, I spent a few years attending parochial school. I attended the Hebrew Academy of Cleveland for kindergarten, part of first grade and then third grade. The rest of my schooling was local public education. The Hebrew Academy was Cleveland's only orthodox Jewish day school at the time. I won't try to explain the situation in my home, but my family's religious tradition was primarily orthodox Jewish, mixed with a touch of the other Jewish denominations and a smidgeon of Christianity thrown in just to mix things up a little. (My parents didn't live in an insulated, Jewish world. They had true friends of other faiths and skin tones, very unusual for their generation.) So I went to the Hebrew Academy to get my nice religious education, but I only went erratic years because I don't know why. To this day I've never figured that part out. Why only part of first grade? Why not second grade? Sorry. I can't tell you.
   I didn't really like it there. Nobody does. To this day, those teachers have a reputation for being mean. But, I didn't actively dislike it until third grade. My third grade Hebrew teacher was the meanest person who ever lived (this is eternal truth). I just couldn't stand her or the school. There was only one thing I liked about the Hebrew Academy: the spaghetti. It had the best tomato sauce in the world.
     I've relived eating that spaghetti so many times over the years, I just can't tell you; though the last time I did it in reality was 1971. I've pondered that spaghetti with tomato sauce many hours during my lifetime.
     In about 2010, I was a guest at a friends Yom Kippur Break-Fast. Yom Kippur is the Jewish day of atonement which is ten days after the Jewish New Year, always in early autumn. You fast for 24 hours to make penance to God for all your sins of the previous year, then starting the next day, you are virtually sinless, just like a newborn baby. Many people have gatherings on Yom Kippur night to break the fast with friends and family. Even though I don't fast on Yom Kippur (for a variety of reasons) I do attend my friends Break-Fast and always enjoy myself tremendously.
     Well, the year in question, 2010, I got to talking with one of the other guests about the Hebrew Academy. Dan was some years older than me and had attended more years than me but still, we had some similar experiences. I brought up that glorious spaghetti.
     "You know what that sauce was don't you?"
     "No. I've always figured it was some ancient recipe."
     "Ketchup."
     "WHAT?!?!"
     "They mixed ketchup with the pasta and called it spaghetti."
     "I don't believe you."
     "It's true. It was ketchup."
     "You've just completely ruined one of my few pleasant memories of the Hebrew Academy.
     "Sorry. They still do it, too."
     "Let's stop now. I'm getting sick." The actual conversation lasted closer to ten or fifteen minutes. You get the idea. 
     So... there you have it. One of my favorite things to eat when I was a kid was pasta with ketchup. I just didn't know it at the time. For the record, I did love ketchup when I was young, still do in fact. But the thought of mixing it with pasta just makes me sick.

An Old Lady's Recipes

     Page Seventy-One.
     Does anyone need a short cookbook which teaches how to prepare 1950's style gourmet?
     When I worked at Fancy-Shmancy Nursing home, I befriended an old women who had been a private cook prior to retirement. For twenty-five or thirty years she cooked in an upper crust home in Shaker Heights. She knew of my interest in food and one day approached me about writing down her old recipes. Mostly because I thought it would be good for her, I accepted the challenge and went to her room most Friday mornings and had her recite, from memory, all her old cooking instructions.
     At the beginning, when she said things like, "now add some chopped tomato" I would say, "how much tomato". That would frustrate her to no end, so I stopped. (Today, I understand the aggravation inherent to that question.) It took a few months, but I finally ended up with a few dozen of her favorite recipes. When we were done, she said, "how do we get this published"? At that point I realized she didn't just want to save her recipes for posterity. She wanted to make some cash off them. I explained to her that it's nearly impossible to publish a cookbook and make money from it. But she badgered me for a few months anyhow until she gave up.
     She would die a few years later. Two of her four children wrote me letters of thanks for all I did for her. (There were other things too, but, that's for another time.) She wasn't even on my unit either, but, whatever. So, I still have all those recipes. They're stapled together nicely and stashed away in the back of my clipped recipes folder.
     If I ever have reason to make Chicken in Aspic, golly, I'm ready.

What Was The Name Of That Bread?

     Page Seventy.
     When I was in college, I took a lot of art. I mean I took a LOT of art. In fact, I'm only two classes from an art degree. One of the classes I took was wood turning. The reason I took that class was because it was there. Nothing more, nothing less. And the reason it was there was because one of the art professors had gotten heavily into wood turning a few years prior and convinced Cleveland State University's art department to go out and buy a massive, state of the art lathe. So since the college owned an incredible lathe, they offered wood turning. Isn't that some nice circular logic?
     This particular professor, Mike, was famous for his sculptures and acclimated to wood turning very quickly in his home studio. He became well known in the wood world fast and during the quarter that I was training, he had a wood turner from England come and give a master class which was open to the public. The visiting turner, Bert, had things in museums; they really were quite beautiful. Also, in conjunction with the master class, there was a reception.
     I helped plan the reception in question and ended up ridiculously busy as happens when you throw a party for one hundred and fifty people. As a thank you, Bert gave me the piece the he turned in the demonstration. (When I retire, I'll sell it and postpone living on dog food for a little while longer.)
     So, the thing I remember best about the party, is some bread that another volunteer brought. This round-loafed bread was white and somewhat dense. But what was striking about it was the fact that it had veins of sweetened cream cheese running through it. It was Eastern-European in origin, I think. There was some leftover so I took it home and froze it, thawing a few slices occasionally to make myself the best French Toast I've ever experienced.
     I wish I could remember any other details about that bread, but I can't. In Cleveland, Ohio, a city widely recognized for it's fantastic ethnic foods, I'm positive that I could find it in an old world grocery store somewhere. I'm just positive. But I just don't remember anything else about it. Oh well. If this is the worse thing that haunts me, I'm doing pretty good. 

The Trick To Great Pound Cake

     Page Sixty-Nine.
     I was at Valley Forge as the Revolution seemed to be decaying. George Washington was telling me his problems and wasn't certain that the ragtag group of soldiers could withstand the British onslaught. It really was bitterly cold and we were all desperately hungry.
     What angel should appear in the shadows of night bringing us desperately needed food? None other than Julie Andrews. She'd been with some of the folks who'd been cooking for us. Nobody had much food, but everybody shared what they had. Their care packages were tremendously appreciated and delicious, too.
     Actually, there was so much food, we really had a feast. Here are some of the items that stick in my memory: King Arthur contributed more than enough escargot for everybody in the camp; Heathcliff and Cathy prepared peanut butter and jelly sandwiches; Little Lord Fauntleroy made a fantastic jello mold; and Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger made spaghetti and meatballs. But I have to tell you that the prize really went to Winston Churchill who made the best pound cake I've ever had in my life. It was soooo smooth and soft. Of course it was dense and heavy as it should have been, but it was still melt in your mouth delicate. I've never had anything like it.
     He told me his secret: when you sift the ingredients, you have to sift three times. That's it. There's something about the multiple siftings that make a light but still dense cake. So that's it. Who'd ever think that I'd learn such a simple trick in the middle of such a horrible situation. I guess I never know when or how I'll learn valuable life lessons.