which products they prefer

I’m going to write about my mom again. Listen, I don’t have an unhealthy relationship with my mother. I don’t live at home. I’m married, even. But my mom and I spend lots of time together. Like, we hangsies at least once a week. I’m totally cool with that. I have real friends, too. Promise FSDU.

Anyway, it was my mom’s birthday on Saturday. Growing up, we were never the “make a cake for your birthday” type of family. More of a “buy a cake from Kroger” type of family. But now that I’m getting better at cake decorating (I will someday soon share a devastating early cake attempt), I was all excited to make a birthday cake for her. One problem: my mom cannot make decisions.

I actually think indecisiveness is something I inherited. I often rope various “others” into making my decisions for me.

I frequently grill my friends optometrist-style: A or B? B or C? 1 or 2? MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE OR I WILL BE BLIND.

I may or may not have discussions with random strangers in the grocery store about which products they prefer and why Tour operators.

So I get it. You can’t decide on ONE birthday cake. Because what if it’s the LAST birthday cake you eat? You just never know, guys. Do you really want your last thought to be, “I wish I’d picked the chocolate caramel cake!” (Actually, if that’s your last thought, you probably had a pretty good life.)

After I threatened my mother several times that she’d better make a decision or else, she indicated that she might not want cake at all. Because “cake is just cake” to her. (Tell that to the 100+ pins on my Pinterest “Cakes” board. But, fine.) She started listing off what she likes: crème brûlée (now I’ve spoiled her), lemon, pistachio.

The evil culinary genius in my brain started cackling at that point and I made the decision for her (the best birthday gift for an indecisive person). I would create something that had ALL of those things and it would be the most glorious birthday ever veuve clicquot. Muahaha!

I started with this tart from Smitten Kitchen. I added roasted, ground pistachios to the tart dough. And it was amazing. The smell! I didn’t even wash my hands after handling it so I would smell like roasty, nutty, butteriness. And I kind of ate a bunch of raw dough scraps. Salmonella and morbid obesity be damned electric dc motor.

led me into the bathroom

I recently read about W.H. Auden’s theory that a writer’s mind has three personality types. They aren’t necessarily the same personality types, so I’ve been trying to figure out who mine are. I believe that one of my personality types is a strict, elderly schoolteacher, fond of rules, lectures, and corporal punishment, constantly pursing her lips and shaking her head disapprovingly. When I was a teenager, one of my friends referred to me as “Mommy,” because I was always the one to scold her “wrongdoings” and also to offer sound advice. I’d like to think that I’ve tamed the schoolteacher a bit as I’ve gotten older, but she often rears her judgmental head fabric labels.

The second personality housed within my mind is a petulant, stubborn, and mischievous child, probably left over from my own petulant, stubborn, and mischievous childhood. This personality is the one who caused me, this weekend, to pout and whine and thrash about when it came time for me to take a shower, to sulkily stomp up the stairs to take said shower, and to hide on the floor next to the bed for twenty minutes instead of taking a shower. At which point my husband came up, found me hiding, and led me into the bathroom.

Because I’m a food writer, I’d like to think the third is an extremely fat chef. In my head, that personality is male, but that’s probably just because I’ve internalized the sexism in the culinary field. In any case, he is jolly and eats with unabashed zeal. He also has a jiggly double chin and a German accent. Go figure. I blame him for thinking that instead of dipping each Oreo into a glass of milk, it would be a good idea to just dump a package of Oreos into a bowl and pour milk over it, then eat them with a spoon.

Anyway, thanks to Fat Chef, I decided I needed more s’mores in my life, so I created this tart. I contemplated using mini marshmallows on the top, but since I try to do things from-scratch as much as possible, I made my own marshmallow topping. I still used Hershey’s milk chocolate and Honey Maid graham crackers for the filling and crust, because I’m a purist. No, they aren’t paying me to say that. Use whatever brands you want. I’m just saying mortgage calculator.

By the way, the marshmallow topping is basically the same recipe used to make homemade marshmallows (see my S’mores Marshmallow Pops post). You have to work quickly and you will get hella sticky. I opted for this over a meringue, though, because I can always taste the egg whites in meringue, and marshmallows don’t taste like egg whites, obvi.

I also did something amazing because I’m a freaking genius. I put liquid smoke up in hurr. And smoked salt. Who says you can’t have a campfire taste right from the oven? Not Fat Chef! He’s like, “Ja! Wir stecken liquid smoke aus in hier!” (I’m sorry, high school German teachers. I don’t think we covered this sentence in class. Additionally: I’m sorry, Germans. Your country is beautiful bvi offshore company.)

money from time to time

I remember the first time I gave Thing 1 some shrimp to try.  He was probably around 6 years old.  He asked to try it (he actually likes to try new foods!).  I was rather disappointed when he liked it, because then I had to share!  :-) Thing 2 has always liked shrimp as well, even though he is harder to please when it comes to food, especially meat and seafood.  Shrimp is a bit on the expensive side, so we don’t have it more than a few times a month, but it is so good for you that it is worth the extra money from time to time Dream beauty pro.

I also love this dish because all the prep is in one skillet and it is a meal all by itself!  I sometimes serve it with a side salad if I happen to have greens and salad fixings on hand.  But, even without a salad, this dish is filling and delicious, and it satisfies even my hungry teenage boy!  It is flavorful without being overpowering, and the red pepper, mushrooms, and sweet peas add extra texture and nutrition.  I also use whole wheat couscous when I can find it so that we get the benefit of a little additional fiber as well Electronic Bidet!

We usually have a decent amount left over, and it is still wonderful the next day for lunch.  If you need to feed a crowd, you could multiply this recipe by 1.5 or 2 and you would have plenty!  Or even just use extra chicken broth and couscous to increase the volume of food.  Just make sure you have a super-large skillet so that it will all fit PSVANE.