Library of Congress, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
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I love how people are using this technology to animate ancestors, and also add life to historical figures we know only as two-dimensional figures. Here are just a few examples:
I tried animating this picture of Twain I colorized a while back. Used the new feature on the MyHeritage app. pic.twitter.com/Y5W7trHg31
Some of my food choices have not made the transition to adulthood. Lightbulb fried salami. My Kraft Mac & Cheese and ramen habit.* Fruit Loops when I could get them, which was once a year or less (it was a good rule, parental units, but don’t think I’m over it! 😉
But some have.
Consider the peanut butter and jelly sandwich.** Is it a perfect balance of densities, sweet and savory, carbs, protein and flavor? Crunchy or smooth, with your choice of fruit flavors. Spark it up with homemade bread if you’re into that sort of thing. And so easy to assemble!
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* What? Alternate days, it was all perfectly reasonable.
** Am I posting this because it’s lunchtime, because I enjoy reminders of my often unconventional culinary childhood, or because I want to remind my mother that a PB&J is a terrific option for those days when lunch seems like a lot? Let’s go with all of the above.
The original recipe is very good, but we wanted something a little more traditional. I kept the dough method but modified the rest. I use a standard pizza pan (works very well), stretch the dough out to ~14” and increase the toppings by a factor of roughly two. This way isn’t as fluffy as the original recipe, but there’s more pizza:)
See the original recipe for instructions and helpful pictures. It’s easy but the crust takes a little upfront fiddly time, so I make four times the amount, split the dough after the initial rise, and freeze the extras.
This is our usual, Butter Chicken Pizza. As always, topping ingredients and amounts are flexible.
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Ingredients
Quadruple Batch of Crust
960g All-Purpose Flour, King Arthur if you can get it
200g Butter Chicken or other sauce, tweaked with a little soy sauce and balsamic vinegar
200g cooked chicken, drained and shredded
wilted, chopped spinach and mushrooms or other veg, a handful or two
freshly grated Parmesan cheese (optional)
olive oil for the pan
Instructions
Crust:
Place the flour, salt, yeast, water, and olive oil in a large mixing bowl.
Stir everything together to make a shaggy, sticky mass of dough with no dry patches of flour. This should take 1-2 minutes by hand. Scrape down the sides of the bowl to gather the dough into a rough ball; cover the bowl.
After 5 minutes, uncover the bowl and reach your wet hand down between the side of the bowl and the dough, as though you were going to lift the dough out. Instead of lifting, stretch the bottom of the dough up and over its top. Repeat three more times, turning the bowl 90° each time.
Re-cover the bowl, and after 5 minutes do another fold. Wait 5 minutes and repeat; then another 5 minutes, and do a fourth and final fold. Cover the bowl and let the dough rest, undisturbed, for 40 minutes.
Split into four parts of ~425g each. Place into oiled containers (I use oiled takeout dishes.)
If using soon, refrigerate for a minimum of 12 hours, or up to 72 hours. It’ll rise slowly as it chills, developing flavor; this long rise will also add flexibility to your schedule. (A 72 hour rise will require a largish container.)
To save for longer, seal each container in a ziplock bag and freeze. The night before you want to use it, move one batch from the freezer to the fridge.
Assemble:
Crust: About 3 hours before you want to serve your pizza, prepare your pan. Pour 1 1/2 tablespoons (18g) olive oil onto pizza pan or cookie sheet. Spread the oil across the bottom.
Transfer the dough to the pan and turn it once to coat both sides with the oil. Press the dough to the edges of the pan, dimpling it using the tips of your fingers in the process. The dough may start to resist and shrink back; that’s OK, just cover it and let it rest for about 15 minutes, then repeat the dimpling/pressing. At this point the dough should reach the edges of the pan; if it doesn’t, give it one more 15-minute rest before dimpling/pressing a third and final time.
Cover the crust and let rise for ~2-2.5 hours at room temperature.
About 30 minutes before baking, place one rack toward the bottom of the oven and preheat to 450°F.
Toppings: once the dough is risen, sprinkle about three-quarters of the mozzarella over the entire crust. Spoon a spiral of sauce from the center outward, over the cheese. Laying the cheese down first will prevent the sauce from seeping into the crust and making it soggy. Sprinkle on the chicken, any veg, and remaining mozzarella.
Bake the pizza for 20-22 minutes, until the cheese is bubbling and the bottom and edges of the crust are a rich golden brown (use a spatula to check the bottom). More and/or moister toppings will take longer to cook.
Remove the pizza from the oven and slide the pizza onto a cutting board or other heatproof surface. Cut and remove extra slices to a cooling rack to avoid sogginess.
Thinking about my grandfather yesterday got me thinking about our trip to Sweden. Here’s one of the best souvenirs I brought back, an adjustable driving distance calculator. The sheet inside slides to show distances from a given starting location. I like maps, and this one is particularly well done.
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For fun, here’s one of the first known distance maps, the Tabula Peutingeriana, with measures for (where else?) the center of all things at that time, the Roman Empire. Although at 22 feet long, it’s not exactly portable!
Conradi Millieri derivative work: Thecinic, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Today would have been my grandfather’s eleventy-first birthday.
Paul Johnson loved golf, travel, photography, his Swedish heritage, fishing, the beach in Florida, women, and a good game of bridge, not necessarily in that order. He and my grandmother married in secret for the usual reasons, then again two years later when he was able to support them both. (She wore a light blue dress, again, for the usual reasons.)
One terrific part of life is that you can choose how you want to look back. When I think of my grandfather, I don’t dwell on the Parkinson’s and how it took so much from him before it finally took his life. I think of his smile as he watched a rocket launch at Cape Canaveral, the heart-felt yet hilarious haircuts he used to give my long-suffering brother, and the way he remembered to call me Princess even after he’d forgotten my name.
He saved sand dollars from the beach, enjoyed hot dogs with sauerkraut and introduced us to tomatoes with sugar, always kept a bag of butterscotch for the grandkiddos, tolerated both hijinks and shenanigans with good cheer, and had the best laugh, right from the belly.
He was a wonderful grandfather.
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Photo by T. Johnson. Location: Pine Grove Mills, PA. Date: Summer 1974. Probably.
I used to love waking up to Saturday morning cartoons at my grandparents’ (no TV at our house, I may have mentioned), but now that I’m an adult I’ve moved beyond such childish things. Right?
This morning Mr. Man turned on the TV and quickly found a station playing Spy, Paul, Battleship and True Lies. Cheers all around!
Yesterday we made yogurt and pizza. Today I’m baking bread and it’s almost time for lunch, so let’s stick with the food theme.
These are more recollections than recipes, and from a time when I didn’t worry about pesky things like saturated fat or fire codes. My tastes have changed over the years, but I happen to be having macaroni and cheese for lunch today.
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Hard salami
Don’t ask how we came up with this idea but my brother and I decided that fried salami would be a pretty good late-night snack. This was back in the days when we shared a bedroom and were often sent to it before we were sleepy enough to go to bed. Reading in our bunkbeds with matching shelves and lamps, it seemed perfectly natural to want a little something to eat. Hard salami was always high on our list; who doesn’t like the seductive appeal of a food that’s half fat and salty to boot? The McDonald’s empire was built on such foods. We loved it. Our real innovation, though, was to cook the salami so that its texture was similar to that of pepperoni on pizza. The only way to accomplish this in our bedrooms was to fry each slice on our reading lamb light bulbs. The edges curled and the fat melted a bit, making the salami a warm succulent treat. I have no idea why it didn’t all just burst into flames.
Kraft macaroni and cheese
I made this so often that I knew the recipe by heart at age 9. I’d eat it one elbow at a time, sliding a fork tine down into the elbow’s open center and chewing slowly while reading in the La-Z-Boy by the window.
Mushroom and oyster soups
These two brands of Campbell’s soup were my favorites. Something about the rich creamy taste and filling texture made them perfect snacks for a winter’s afternoon. I’ve probably had more than my fair share of sodium and modified food starch, but at the time it was delightful.
Stir fried whatever
Usually I’d pull out whatever was in the fridge and toss it into the wok. First slice up an onion or scallion, some ginger or garlic if available, and stir fry for a minute or so until brown at the edges. Add frozen peas, and other vegetables you may have, cook for another minute, then add cold leftover rice and break an egg over top of it all and stir like mad for another minute, or until egg is thoroughly dry. Add soy sauce and snack.
BLT
When my brother finished his “meat-itarian” phase he was once again willing to accept a bit of green on his plate, at least when chaperoned by large quantities of meat. One result of this broadened perspective was his version of the BLT. It was simple, relying more on size and shock value for impact. I’m not sure anyone makes them quite like my brother.
Slice half a tomato thickly, grill up half a package of bacon, find a couple of lettuce leaves in the fridge. Slather mustard onto one piece of bread and hot chili paste onto the other. Assemble the sandwich using all ingredients. If you survive a few months of these, you’ll have a cast-iron stomach and cholesterol levels that are through the roof.
Dad’s grilled cheese
The secrets to a great grilled cheese sandwich are lots of butter* and a cast-iron pan. I remember Dad slathering the outsides of two bread slices with butter, filling them with cheese, and then grilling it all until crisp and brown. He’d even cut mine on the diagonal, just the way I like it.
* Note from the future: mayonnaise is even better than butter for crispiness.
Pumpkin seeds
Every fall Halloween would roll around and it would be pumpkin carving time. Some years my designs would be better than others but I always got a kick out of the process. First, spread lots of newspaper on the kitchen table or floor. Then cut around the pumpkin stem with a sharp and sturdy knife until you can pull the top out. Take a big spoon and scrape out all the strange, stringy membranes inside. Spend an inordinate amount of time rinsing these interior scrapings to separate out the seeds. When as done as you can stand, dry and spread the seeds onto a cookie sheet, then bake at 350ºF for a few minutes until golden brown and crunchy. Salt liberally and enjoy.
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Photo by Anna Tukhfatullina Food Photographer/Stylist on Pexels.com
Today is one of the first really warm days this year, and we just came back in from a longish walk. I’m hot and thinking a big glass of my grandmother’s sun tea would be just the thing. I don’t actually have that tea because I did not think that far ahead, but if anyone else is in a similar mood, here’s the recipe (not that you really need it):
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Grandma’s Sun Tea
(Dorothea Johnson)
6-8 tea bags
Water
Sunshine
Add water and tea bags to half-gallon bottle (old milk jars work well). Set outside in full sun for the afternoon, preferably between the driveway and marigold border in full view of any approaching grandchildren. Enjoy with sugar or maple syrup and a slice of something tangy.
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Photo by @thiszun (follow me on IG, FB) on Pexels.com
Maybe I should be thinking about new projects and ways to be productive, but I’m about to go get a Covid test and I’ve got work to do and it’s lunchtime, so instead I’m thinking about food.
Today that means I’m thinking about stuffed grape leaves. Our neighbor has a grapevine that has reached out to us and now covers a significant part of the fencing in the back. The vine is starting to bud and soon we’ll have new growth.
My culinarily-talented brother gave me this recipe years ago. I love citrus so I serve these with egg-lemon sauce, but adjust as you like.
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Stuffed Grape Leaves
2 lb. ground lamb 1 large onion ⅓ cup tomato paste ½ tsp. each thyme, basil, garlic powder 1 tsp. each oregano, dillweed, salt 1 cup cooked rice 1½ oz. Pernod Grape leaves (canned or bottled)
Dice onion and sauté in a little butter until tender. Add tomato paste, then lamb, stirring constantly as it cooks.
When lamb is almost cooked through, remove from heat, add spices, then stir in rice and Pernod.
Drain excess fat and refrigerate until use.
To assemble, lay out a grape leaf with the stem pointing toward you. Place a spoonful of stuffing at the bottom of the leaf, and roll leaf around it, working away from you. Tuck in the sides of the leaf as you go.
Heat in microwave for a minute or two just prior to serving. May be dressed with fresh lemon juice or egg-lemon sauce.
J.R. Johnson 
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