Happy New Year 2015

Big Brother planned out our New Year's dinner menu with me yesterday: short ribs (he likes braised meat dishes for festive meals), broccoli and brown rice.  Grapes would be for dessert like we have every year in line with the Spanish tradition of las doce uvas de la suerte. While playing this afternoon he reminded me that he was going to help me cook and that we were going to need appetizers to help us along. Before starting the short ribs, we put out dates, raisins, roasted chickpeas, green olives and some jamón serrano. 

The first step in preparing dinner tonight was getting Baby Brother's seperate pot of short ribs on the stove.  His were made with homemade turkey stock, rosemary, carrots, celery and kale.  We haven't introduced red wine, tomatoes or bay leaves yet.  Oh, nor onion.  We will be doing a skin test to onion at our next allergist visit. Onion is on the top of my scary list. No garlic was used this time, as we no longer keep it in the house or cook with it.  

While we didn't make it to midnight to eat our grapes, Big Brother insisted that he'd be old enough next year.  I loved that he helped me with each step of the short ribs as well as stringing the grapes on the popsicle sticks.  

Tomorrow we will have leftovers for lunch with sweet potatoes and sautéed spinach. Whatever sauce is leftover will be combined with some crimini mushrooms and sautéed kale to be thrown on top of a bowl of polenta.  Are we ready to introduce corn to Baby Brother?

Baby Brother Turns 2

waffle Birthday cake with Baby Brother's favorite toppings

Today we celebrated Baby Brother's second Birthday.  Big Brother was overly excited about building the waffle "cake" we had planned together for this morning's celebratory breakfast.  We decided to top the waffle tower with Baby Brother's favorites: wild blueberries, coconut flakes, hemp seeds and maple syrup.  Baby Brother loved his special and yummy family Birthday breakfast.  He shouted "hooray" when we sang to him and kept asking for "more" singing and "more" blueberries. These waffles are the same ones we make every Sunday morning.  Since Baby Brother and I are now avoiding eggs, we keep them out and instead add a giant scoop of apple sauce. After breakfast, we opened up gifts and then took a ride in the cardboard box boat which Big Brother had been working on the past few days in preparation for his little Brother's special day.  

here is the boat being finished up for Baby Brother's Birthday ride

and then later on for dinner, we had one of Baby Brother's favorite meals.  It happens to be Big Brother's most requested meal as well: grass-fed steak, sweat potato fries and broccoli.  We are loving the new placemat that Grams and Pops sent. Check out the squishy persimmon and seasonal citrus.  

Saturday Lunch

I look forward to Saturday mornings. There is no place I'd rather be at 9 am than the farmer's market. When I get home, I feel energized and hungry for a giant salad made up of what I found that very morning.  On the side, we always have rice, lentil and spinach pancakes fried up in coconut oil.  Right now,  I am loving salad greens with seasonal citrus and crunchy radishes and cucumbers. And a handful of sprouted pumpkin seeds and roasted chickpeas take these simple salads to the next level. The highlight of this week's Saturday lunch was Baby Brother crunching on cucumber slices along with the rest of us.   We had a rocky start with introducing cucumber this past summer.  The two times we gave him a piece of cumber, he got several hives on his belly and a red rash around his mouth.  So we stopped giving him cucumber until this past week. We were bummed that we couldn't share a family favorite.   Can you believe that he stole one from my plate the other day and that I had to fish it out of his mouth half-chewed? Papi, who named me "allergenista" because of how seasoned I am with allergy safety, was shocked. I had made a huge mistake in leaving my abundance bowl at the edge of the table with allergic Baby Brother so close by. I was terrified one moment and totally relieved 30 minutes later when my little guy showed zero reaction.  So something good came out of this major allergy error.  Thank goodness I didn't make the same mistake with cheese or Big Brother's glass of cow milk! As a result of the non reaction to the stolen cucumber slice, we decided to give him cucumber with dinner the following day.  He has since tolerated cucumber every day this week.  

Baby Brother's lunch without cucumber

Both Brothers eating cucumbers.  Big Brother loves cucumber
towers drizzled with olive oil and lemon juice

A plate of spinach, lentil, rice pancakes in the middle of the table
for us all to grab

Baby Brother's cutting board can now include
cucumber.  No need to slice on a separate
cutting board to avoid cross-contamination

Our Thanksgiving Meal

carving our local, heritage turkey from Tejas Heritage Farm:
olive oil, rosemary, satsuma and real salt

"Abundance", "feast"and "enough" are words that have been swirling around in my head lately. They are particularly loaded with meaning for me during Thanksgiving.  Is it still abundance when there are so many restrictions?  Do our allergic restrictions make me feel like I don't have enough comfort food and in turn not enough joy?

This year, there was enough food at our table.  It was a feast: A turkey, and a mighty fine one in fact.  There were salads and cranberry sauce and sweet potatoes and even pumpkin-lucuma ice cream.  The food was local, simple and homemade. We had a bowl of squishy persimmons and freshly picked satsumas. We even had a pot of turkey stock going the following day to help nourish us during the flu.  

I told a dear friend that I would refocus and live in the present: this meal would be delicious despite all of the ingredients left out.  

Perhaps I should start to feel proud instead of sad and nostalgic.  We eat pretty well despite so many food allergies.  

In order of appearance: 1) homemade cranberry sauce 2) Baby Brother eating
along with the rest of the family 3) Big Brother eating on his second helping,
4)turkey soup with veggies and rice pasta 5) allergy friendly waffles with 
chicken sausage and homemade cranberry sauce 6) bowl of persimmons
and assortment of oranges 7) Boys making me turkey soup