Food | M. Suzanne Terry

Archive for the ‘Food’ Category

Friday Five – Easing Into January

Posted in Dance, Food, Friday Five, Home, Mental Health, Quiet, Reading Challenges, Work on January 5, 2024| 2 Comments »

Happy New Year, everyone! Back to work this week, getting to do a lot of interviews for next year’s staff. We’re losing almost half of our student staff in the office, and there are a lot of great candidates. Definitely go home and just sit in the silence after all this social interaction, though. Ready for a calm, quiet weekend.

Here are some things I enjoyed this week:

I’m intrigued by the concept of house hushing. On the one hand, it makes sense that a neat environment can be more peaceful – more mentally quiet. On the other hand, this feels like another person telling me why I need to clean my house, and I’m not sure I’m open to that sort of advice today. Does hushing still work if I’m overwhelmed and exhausted about it? Maybe I’ll revisit this concept when I’m in a more cleaning-as-catharsis mood.
Here’s something more manageable – turning my office into a cozy workspace. My current favorite things about my office at UNT – a full candy jar, inspirational notes on the bulletin board, coloring books and supplies available for students to use, and twinkle lights (battery-operated, per Housing rules).
I love this piece about dancing – at parties, in clubs, in your living room – how it feels to move in time with music and other people and be a part of something. One of the reasons I don’t mind crowds quite as much when I’m dancing is that it lets me be a slightly different person than I usually am when I’m standing or sitting still. It’s an experience of being both together and alone.
Leave it to Joy the Baker to speak my mind. Gentle January is such a good idea. I mean, I clearly am not going to leave goal-setting and looking toward the new year until the end of the month. But I am starting off soft in other ways. To me, this looks like even more nights at home than usual and longer writing/piano/knitting/crafting sessions. And I am definitely on board with eating down the fridge and pantry to use up all the things before restocking. Work and medical stuff are out of control this month, so embracing as gentle a January as possible sounds like such a relief.
I’m not adding yet another reading challenge to my plate this year. I’m really not. But I do find this one intriguing. If you get book FOMO, this might be a good one for you. A little backtrack on things that might have fallen under your radar in the last decade or so. Enjoy!

Have a good weekend, friends!

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Friday Five – Happy Almost-Holiday!

Posted in Books, Food, Friday Five, Home, Roots, Work on December 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

It’s the last workday of the year (well, at one job – probably going to do some writing for the other one next week. Probably. Maybe. We’ll see.). I am in the process of interviewing everyone who passed through the application portion of selection (for the department’s new live-in student staff next year) and indicated they were specifically interested in the Housing Ambassador side of things, but I am done with today’s round! I desperately need to organize my office, so that’s on the to-do list this afternoon.

Then tomorrow, it’s off to the family farm with my sister and brother-in-law!

But first, I have some things to share with you today:

My favorite news this week – Martha Wells’s Murderbot is going to become a show! I love Murderbot. Very excited to see what they do with it.
I Am From Here by Vishwesh Bhatt – This cookbook is written like a love story to food and family and all the influences that brought Bhatt to where he is today. Beautiful pictures and a horde of new recipes to try.
In a Holidaze by Christina Lauren – I enjoyed this book, but I was stressed out for most of it because there was a going-back-in-time/Groundhog-Day-esque element, and I didn’t feel like the conclusion to that was thoroughly flushed out. Are they OK? Did everyone make it out alright? I needed answers sooner and also more completely.
Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt – I LOVED THIS BOOK. The characters are endearing and one of them is an octopus. It’s not as weird as it sounds. It’s charming and wonderful and if you liked A Man Called Ove or Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine or books like that, you will like this one, too.
And finally, while I’m definitely going to pick up dinner tonight on my way home, I am looking forward to my upcoming slower week. Gonna make some big-batch meals in the crock pot and roast a whole lot of vegetables for warm salads. Maybe make some soup. I’ve pretty much depleted my stash of frozen leftovers in the last couple of weeks, so I’m excited to replenish them.

I also look forward to posting some year-in-review thoughts as well as my theme and goals for next year in the upcoming week. I wish you contentment and love as you finish out the year!

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Favorite Book(s) of 2023

Posted in Books, Church, Food, Getting It Together, Mental Health, Reading Challenges on December 6, 2023| Leave a Comment »

The prompt for December Reflections today is “Best Book of 2023.”

I tried to choose just one. I really did.

Okay, I didn’t try super hard.

But I did narrow it down to five books. And they’re (for the most part) in slightly different genres.

So there’s that.

When I am choosing the “best books” I have read in any given year, I may not be selecting ones that had the best writing (although all of these are well-written) or were the most profound (although all of these definitely had those moments). The sole factors that determine my decision are:

Did I love reading it?
Did I get something meaningful (possibly even life-changing) out of it?

And out of all the books I’ve read so far this year, these five meet those two criteria the best.

How To Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing by KC Davis – Anyone who veers in a neurospicy direction and has trouble keeping their home or other spaces organized/tidy/clean should read this book. I cannot count the ways it has helped me.
Here For It: Or, How To Save Your Soul in America by R. Eric Thomas – Kind and funny and charming. My favorite parts were the ones in which he talked about his wrestling with faith and identity and how that plays out.
Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner – As my parents age, I am more drawn to stories about loss and grief, and this was a gorgeous memoir that explored both as well as the food that reminds her of her mother.
This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone – Is it a love story? Is it fantasy? Is it science fiction? Yes. In all the best ways.
Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree – This book made me fall in love with cozy fantasy. I’ve already put the second one on hold at the library.

What were your favorite reads this year?

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Friday Five – Welcome to December!

Posted in Books, Food, Friday Five, Fun, Getting It Together, Home, Nostalgia on December 1, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Last week, I was at the family farm and limiting screen time due to a concussion, but I’m feeling much better now. It’s the time of the year when I’m holiday-ing and transitioning to a new yearly theme, but there are still snippets of home that you’ll see throughout each week’s review this month (and of course, there will be a general review of what the theme has taught me near the end of December).

I love this tour of the place where the writer lives. So much good stuff about home and honoring the generosity of the earth and all its creatures. Read it slowly with your favorite warm beverage.
Did You Hear About Kitty Karr? by Crystal Smith Paul – I would probably not have picked this one up if it wasn’t suggested for a book discussion at work. I’m so glad I did. The pacing was perfect. If I were teaching a writing class, this is the book I would use to show how it’s done. The writer unfolded the story beautifully, revealing just enough to spark interest along the way and building up to big moments with perfect timing. I felt like I was making discoveries along with the main character. I was never bored at any point, and there are not many books that I can say that about.
The Silent Gondoliers by William Goldman – I adored this small book by the author of The Princess Bride. Similar storytelling style – a lot of charm and humor and quirky characters. Fantastical, mystical…it was a lot of fun.
The 12 Week Year by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington – This book was about 200 pages, but it seemed so much longer. If you want to brush up on your time management skills, this is a decent guide with solid tips. It’s especially helpful if you’re a person who tends to thrive with short bursts of intense focus and activity. Reader beware, though – there is a LOT of traditional, neurotypical, motivational speaker-y advice on productivity that fell flat with me. If I could hype up or push myself into being more productive, I would have already published 40 books, own a house, be a Pilates instructor, and have a regular workout schedule that seems as intuitive as breathing by now. If you are reading it and find these bits more overwhelming than instructive, it’s ok to put it down.
Y’all. I was looking for my mom’s surprise cookies recipe to take to cookbook club tonight, and I ran across my old blog that chronicled the foodie weekends Maggie and I had. There are only a few posts, and it’s very, very yellow, but it was a fun trip down memory lane. Damn, I loved that kitchen. *moment of silence* Also, I notice that our cocktail weekend didn’t make it to print. That tracks. That was a fun time. And aw, also this one, the blog I had on Blogger for a minute before I decided that WordPress was a better fit for what I wanted to do when Livejournal started getting wonky. Good times.

The weekend is full, but it should also be fun. I hope yours is fun as well!

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Leftover Soup

Posted in Food, Home, Roots on November 30, 2023| Leave a Comment »

(Not a pic of the most recent leftover soup described below, but definitely one of my happier accidents from the past)

One of the things I get most excited to make when the weather is even the slightest bit chilly is leftover soup. It’s especially useful at the end of a holiday or multiple days of gathering when you’ve cooked a lot and have multiple random bits of dishes too big to throw out but too small to serve everyone for another meal. It combines three of my favorite things:

Soup
Creativity
Minimizing food waste

I take a look in my fridge and pantry and identify the items that will definitely be beyond their useful date before I get around to eating them. Or items that I have a ridiculous amount of (like The Great Chickpea Debacle of yore pictured above). Or items that don’t go with anything else but the very specific recipe I bought them for. Or items that would just taste great in a soup.

I gather them, imagine what they would taste like together, and ponder a spice profile that most closely fits it (and also my existing spice collection). Then I warm some oil, chop up whatever soupy aromatics (onion, garlic, celery, peppers, carrots) I have on hand, add them to the oil, and get started crafting my soup.

This past Saturday, I got to teach my dad how to make leftover soup. This was thrilling in several ways. First, I hardly ever get to teach my dad cooking tips – it’s usually just following his instructions on whatever plan he already has in his mind. Second, I got to root around freely in their over-the-top herb/spice collection. Finally, I got to watch his amazement as he discovered the joys of combining coconut milk and lemon, one of my favorite culinary delights in life.

In addition to sauteed onion, garlic, and celery, we combined:

mashed sweet potatoes with rosemary and butter
boiled russet potatoes
green bean casserole (green beans, cream of mushroom soup, milk, and those weirdly addictive crunchy onion things)
cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, random garden herb blend, fresh cracked black pepper, salt
coconut milk
lemon juice

Other than adding enough water to make it the consistency we wanted, we didn’t fuss around with it too much. Just let it thicken and simmered it until we declared it done.

It was a hit! The end result was homey and warm and comforting and delicious. I was especially pleased with the salty-sweet theme. Mom, Dad, and I all enjoyed it, and I got to bring the small amount we had left over home to savor the next day.

If you’ve never made leftover soup, I highly recommend it. It’s a low-stakes experiment from which you may discover new favorite flavor profiles or combos.

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Day 31 – The Paprikash (Month in Review)

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home, Nostalgia, TV on November 1, 2023| Leave a Comment »

(From Season 7 of Grace and Frankie, episode 14 – “The Paprikash,” as viewed on my teeny tiny netbook)

I love this whole show, but this episode (this scene in particular) is easily one of my top five favorites. Grace calls her brother Jeffrey because she keeps trying to make her mother’s chicken paprikash recipe (which turns out to be her dad’s recipe) and it never quite turned out the way she wanted it to. But what Jeffrey wants to talk about is the dad he never knew because he died when he was four, which is a painful memory Grace would rather not revisit.

But Frankie has an idea.

Frankie: “I think there’s a way for both of you to get what you want. Grace wants the recipe and Jeffrey wants to know about his dad. So every ingredient you give Grace, she’ll give you a detail about your father.”

Grace: “Frankie, that is the most insane idea that you’ve…”

Jeffrey: “One quartered chicken.”

Grace: “He slept in the hospital when you had pneumonia.”

And they went from there, alternating memories of their dad with the food they both remembered from their childhoods.

I ugly-cried so hard.

This is what the food I grew up with and all my favorite dishes I’ve made since mean to me. It’s not just a pleasant taste or smell (although most of them are delicious). It’s inherently linked to the memories I have, sitting around the table or on the couch, in the kitchen or at a suitable distance so as not to irritate the cook.

It’s the soup Mom made when she came to Denton to take care of me when I was too sick to stand for several weeks.

It’s the kind eyes of the farmer at the market who snuck more Crowder peas into my bag while I was trying to pull it together after bursting into tears as I told him how my MeMaw always grew them in her garden.

It’s learning that I do like cherries after all and figuring out how to give recipes my own flair.

It’s being a little dissatisfied with most of the chocolate cake and steak I eat anywhere but the farm because no one makes them like Mom and Dad (respectively).

[Seriously – Mom’s chocolate icing – it’s like ganache and buttercream had a baby that got all their best genes. It’s fudgy and decadent and amazing.]

I may have run out of steam a little here at the end (it’s been a hard month). And there are hundreds more stories to tell, but you get the gist. When I think about what home means to me, there’s always food and drink involved in some way. Every place I’ve ever lived has its own menu with memories embedded firmly within it.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the stories and the food, and I hope you get a chance to eat wonderful things with people you love very soon.

We have food at home: 31 days of exploring the tastes I grew up with

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Days 28 & 29 – Favorite Takeout

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home on October 30, 2023| Leave a Comment »

I don’t know if the cheesesteak pizza was a thing at a Pizza Hut near you this summer, but it was quite possibly the very best pizza this particular chain has ever made. Just look at it. When I was young, I often had a choice of having my birthday party at Pizza Hut, My-T-Burger, or the skating rink, and I have to say – if this had been on the menu, it would have been Pizza Hut every year.

I mean, probably not. I was a strict hamburger (NOT sausage) or plain cheese pizza fan back in the day. This would have probably been too outside my preferred palate then. But now? I can’t even get excited about my standard spinach, tomato, and olive on a delicious stuffed crust right now. I’m still in mourning over the cheesesteak.

I try not to get takeout or drive-through meals too often. I feel sluggish and blah when I eat most of the things I can order through a mechanical box or online. I certainly didn’t grow up eating fast food on a regular basis.

But one way I’m different from most of my family and friends is that I live alone. And while cooking for myself is lovely and soothing and decadent, so is occasionally saving myself the trouble. Many people will answer the question, “What’s your favorite meal?” with “One I don’t have to cook,” and I feel that. Sometimes, it just doesn’t make the cut on the daily agenda. Some days, the best thing I can do to take care of my soul is drive through Whataburger for a patty melt (sans the sauce – it’s just too much).

Most of my weekend fare has been warm salads and black bean tacos, and I’ve stayed reasonably hydrated. But Friday after work, even though I had food at home, I made a beeline for one of my favorite takeout spots right off campus. I ordered chicken fried rice and crab rangoon, and I ate it all with a cup of super sweet hot tea (a habit I picked up when I lived with Margat). It was excessive and awesome, and just what I needed.

I don’t know if I have a great point to make, but I do know that no discussion about the place food has in my life and in my home would be complete without at least a brief mention of how much I enjoy – one might even say require – the occasional drive-through. And seriously – that pizza deserves an award.

I hope you’ve had a great weekend, and I wish you a wonderful week ahead.

I’m talking about food that makes me feel at home this month.

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Day 27 – The Last Friday Five of the Series

Posted in 31 Days, Books, Food, Friday Five, Fun, Home, Mental Health, Nostalgia, Seasons on October 27, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Tomorrow, our Rise and Shine book club is discussing spooky reads and there’s a Halloween party in the evening. On Sunday, there is a book fair at a local bar and our annual Spiderdead show in the afternoon, and then I have an RLA interest presentation (the last one I’m giving this year!) early that evening. I’m definitely taking Monday and Tuesday off for what will be some much-needed and long-overdue downtime.

Here are five food-related/adjacent ponderings I’ve had this week:

I especially love this time of year because, while I do enjoy some spooky things and darker themes, I mostly just love how much cozier everything is. Cool weather (actual cool weather, not the “it’s no longer in the triple digits must be a cold front ha ha” phenomenon) is on its way in the next 48 hours. I will wrap up in a blanket with a cup of tea and a bowl of popcorn while I settle in to re-watch a soul-soothing show or movie any time of the year, but cool weather means I can do that without cranking up the A/C. Tonight I’m probably going to watch something hygge/homey/foodie from this list. My regulars are Chocolat or Under the Tuscan Sun, but the list reminds me of quite a few I haven’t seen in a while, and also how did I miss A Good Year?
Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree – I think I’ve found the genre I want to write. Cozy fantasy. This one was especially lovely to me because the main character is an Orc who decided to leave the mercenary life to open a coffee shop. I WANT TO LEAVE THE MERCENARY (I mean, Student Affairs, but sometimes it’s basically the same) LIFE TO OPEN A COFFEE SHOP. It’s like The Hobbit, but if Bilbo had just said, “No, thank you, but would you like another spot of tea?” instead of going on the adventure. It taps into my deep-seated desire to have a home that is so cozy and welcoming that I never want to leave and is also a place where I can feed people and watch their faces as they have those little moments of joy that a really good cup of coffee or delicious pastry can bring.
The main thing I like about joining Tertulia is all the discounts I get (and also I enjoy their co-op vibe). Another thing I like is that I get curated lists like this one in my inbox with recommendations to add to my home foodie collection. Alice Feiring’s To Fall in Love, Drink This has been on my TBR for a while. That may be my next Tertulia purchase.
I’m pretty good about keeping my pantry and freezer (and to a lesser extent, my fridge – sometimes some questionable things linger in there) reasonably stocked and cleaned out. When space is limited, it only takes a little swerve in the direction of either sparse or out of control to have me ordering takeout more often than I (and by I, I do mean my budget) would like. But occasionally, I get a wild hair and end up buying way more of one item than I need. Right now, I have so many canned beans in my apartment. I mean, as overages go, shelf-stable ones are my preference, but dang. I guess I’m having beans in just about everything I cook at home for the foreseeable future.
I really could have used a list like this when I was first starting out as a new-ish home cook. There’s lots of great advice and resources linked in here. It also sparked a bit of nostalgia through several moments when I thought, “I remember when I learned that!” It took me so long to figure out that “What are your favorite flavors and textures?” is such an important question for me when it comes to a meal plan that I’ll actually use (rather than one that I feel is a good plan I should want to use – very different things).

My long weekend is so close I can taste it. I hope your weekend is nice!

I’m writing about food and home this month.

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Day 26 – Gross Things That Make Me Happy

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home, Joy, Nostalgia on October 26, 2023| 2 Comments »

I imagine most of us have those certain foods we love that would make others recoil in horror. Do yourself a favor – DO NOT google “gross foods” to come up with examples. If you must, satisfy your curiosity with this link but also don’t click on that if you don’t want to see some questionable and possibly revolting things (and I only say “possibly” because I recognize that what I might find revolting others don’t, because that list got a lot of yucks from me).

I mean, you do you, but I’m not eating anything that starts with “jellied” and ends with some animal part.

I will absolutely chow down on some chicharrones (aka, pork rinds), though. When the dining hall across the street from my office made them, I was delighted. They remind me of afternoons at my grandparents’ apartment. Mom stopped by several times a week to visit with her mother, and Granddaddy spent most of the time singing Marty Robbins along with his record player in the back room. And these salty snacks were readily available. One of my earliest memories with this set of grandparents was discovering that Smoky the cat really liked them, too.

Jello salads are also on my list of foods I generally enjoy that others often have on their iffy lists. This is another perk of holidays and potlucks – there’s always at least one of them. My absolute favorite is a lime green one with pineapple and cottage cheese (another food people seem to have very strong opinions about). I don’t even mind that it has pecans in it, but I prefer it without them. *sigh* It’s been so long since I had this treat. I may have to make some before the year is over.

I also really crave hot dogs every once in a while, as long as I don’t think too much about what they’re made of.

Most of the foods I love that others side-eye are ones that are strongly tied to memories of home and comfort, and I suspect that’s the same for most people. If I were to survey the folks in my office, we’d get nostalgic gushing about pickle loaf, hot Cheetos with bananas and milk, sucking the heads of crawdads, and various other dubious pairings and practices that, despite all odds, bring them joy. I may not be interested in trying (or reliving) them myself, but I like listening to others rave about their favorite things.

Speaking of suspect snacks, I think I’ll go see what I can find in the vending machine next door.

I’m writing about all kinds of foods – the good, the bad, and the ugly – that remind me of home this month.

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Day 25 – Sandwiches

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home, Nostalgia on October 25, 2023| 3 Comments »

I ate a lot of sandwiches in my childhood. As a food group, the sandwich has a lot going for it:

It’s fast and simple to make.
It doesn’t dirty up a lot of dishes/pots/pans in the process.
It is versatile, so it’s easier to tailor to picky food tastes than most things.
It can be as nutritious or decadent or anything in between as you want it to be.

We lunched on a lot of peanut butter (creamy) and jelly (grape). When it was cool outside, we got soup and grilled cheese with white bread and American slices (cut on the diagonal, the way nature intended). We also ate a lot of bologna and cheese, and my favorite way to do that was toasted in the toaster oven. It was fun to watch the slice of bologna curl as it heated.

There always seemed to be a jar of either chicken or tuna salad (or on occasion, their weird cousin, ham salad) made in the fridge. Mom’s chicken/tuna/ham salad usually included the same basic elements:

Hard-boiled eggs
Shredded (chopped? diced?) chicken/tuna/ham
Miracle Whip
Salt/pepper

Occasionally she’d put pickles in it, or celery and grapes if she was making it for her sorority or an adult luncheon of some sort. But for us, it stayed simple.

My favorite sandwiches, though, were special treats. They required a specific bread. I’m pretty sure it was a Mrs. Baird’s product, but they looked like the Wonder Bread Philly Cheesesteak rolls. White bread roll with sesame seeds. You take the bottom of the roll and layer thinly sliced deli ham. On top of that, you sprinkle shredded mozzarella. Put it in the microwave long enough to melt the cheese. Spread the top of the bun with ranch dressing (specifically Hidden Valley Ranch – accept no substitutes) and place on the melted cheese.

When I make a sandwich today, it’s typically on bread from Ravelin or The Market at UNT. The meat and/or veggie specifics vary, but there’s always some kind of cheese involved. It’s often open-faced (because it’s usually lunch and an abundance of bread makes me sleepy) or half a sandwich that I eat in conjunction with something else, like a cup of soup or a salad.

But my ultimate comfort sandwich is still that hot ham and mozzarella hoagie. Heaven.

What’s your favorite type of sandwich?

I’m writing about homey foods and comforting snacks this month.