I'm making Jamie Oliver's Perfect Roast Chicken this evening (a shout out to my husband for his terrific balcony summer herb garden!) and contemplating leftovers.  I am starting a full-time job later this week for the first time in two years, and the prospect of making five lunches a week--every morning--is daunting.  I proposed that I ought to memorize Amanda Grant's beautiful book on lunchboxes for kids.  My husband suggested simply that I might be more strategic about cooking in advance.  He is something of an expert in efficiency, and on this count, he's right. That said, even writing ... [READ MORE]

Babyman came home from daycare the other night totally keyed-up.  Maybe it was the music class they had this afternoon (his FAVORITE) or maybe it was the hundreds of fellow Giants fans he got to see making their way to the game ("Giants hat! Giants shirt! Lincecum! Hey, batter, batter!"), but he was going strong when he barrelled through the door demanding to "See it, mommy cook?" This weekend my husband and I made one of our favorite, most luxurious meals: the Bruce Aidells-inspired matambre, which is a rolled flank steak stuffed with prosciutto and breadcrumbs and spinach and basil (oh, ... [READ MORE]

Breakthrough at the dinner table this week!  Babyman ate a plateful of cauliflower and asked for more! I hadn't been posting much because truthfully I've been feeling a wee bit discouraged about Babyman's persnickety habits of late.  I mean, there's only so many quesadillas a lady wants to make.  But as is often the case, he was poised to surprise me. It was CSA Wednesday, meaning that I came to home to my box of produce on the kitchen counter.  My husband was running late and Babyman was entering his 6pm witching hour, so I was getting a little desparate for fresh distractions.  "Do you ... [READ MORE]

As previously mentioned, fruits and veggies aren't exactly Babyman's cup of tea these days, which is ironic since our CSA is supplying us with so many vegetables!  I did some reading on getting kids to eat fruit & veg and lots of people recommend smoothies.  (Oh, by the way, this segment on the Today Show caught my ear this morning while I was packing lunches.  I've been buying a lot of frozen berries for the smoothie experiment.  Going to pay more attention going forward.) I've had limited success with smoothies--Babyman wanted nothing to do with the most recent batch and I wound up ... [READ MORE]

I made fish sticks for Babyman for dinner tonight, which is actually one of my favorite things to cook for him and I don't do it nearly enough.  These fish sticks are one of those enduring favorites that, much like avocado, never seems to go out of style despite his changing tastes. I was going to use white fish (tilapia or sole) but I found myself at the best-kept-secret fishmonger in San Francisco, Gigi's Sotto Mare in North Beach, which is a restaurant with a little fish retail business on the side.  Gigi's just got a catch of wild salmon from the Columbia River, and it was so gorgeous I ... [READ MORE]