The New Normal - Hoisin Chicken Drumsticks

Thursday - my second full day of leave.  I miss my office peeps terribly, but it is still a tremendous relief not to have to go to court.  My physical, cognitive, and emotional struggles are real, and the current court environment only exacerbates my symptoms.  Best to recognize that and move along.

In the meantime I am trying to organize my thoughts and prioritize various tasks I included on my list.  I am an inveterate list-maker, and the worst part of coming apart at the seams was losing my ability to pull it all together by making a list.

Right now, I am engaged in a great inner debate regarding what to do with these chicken drumsticks.  My original plan was to roast them after marinating them in a hoisin marinade from my new Chinese Takeout Cookbook.  That recipe is intended for chicken wings, but the idea of meaty drumsticks appealed to me, so here we are.  On the other hand, I've been thinking of smoking them in the oven, using the mesquite oven smoker bag I picked up on sale a few weeks ago.

Okay, I think I see where this is going.  Hoisin Chicken Drumsticks it is.

While they marinate - I had a productive day.  First of all, I made some rules for myself:  Get up and out of bed at a reasonable hour; take medication and vitamins; put in dentures and earrings;  get dressed (it used to drive me nuts that my grandmother-who-raised-me always wore a housecoat.  I promised myself that when I grew up, I would always get dressed during the day).

This may sound petty, but I am trying to maintain some degree of normalcy.  Ha!

I made calls, I made appointments, I made salad, and  the marinade for the aforementioned chicken.   I made a shopping list.  I emailed Terry.  I hung out on Facebook for a while.  Just one more phone call and the dishes, and I am calling it a day.  My energy level is deescalating and I feel the beginning of pain in the back of my head.  Ha ha, left shoulder.  Left arm, pins and needles.  Time for a nap.

And so I slept on the couch with my little girl curled up near my face.  So nice to be able to rest when I need to.

The chicken is finished, and it is good.  Tasty, but a trifle spicy, which makes sense since this recipe is  really designed for wings.  Next time I would cut the cayenne pepper back to 1/2 teaspoon.

Hoisin Chicken Drumsticks, adapted from The Chinese Takeout Cookbook

4 pounds chicken drumsticks

4 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup hoisin sauce (I use Kikkoman brand)
1/4 cup white rice vinegar
2 teaspoons sesame oil
2 teaspoons Chinese five-spice powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

white sesame seeds (optional)

Place the drumsticks into a 9 by 13 aluminum baking pan. Whisk together all remaining ingredients, excluding the sesame seeds.  Pour over the drumsticks, turning them to coat with the marinade.  Cover and refrigerate for 4 to 6 hours.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Uncover the chicken and place in the oven for 30 minutes.  Remove from the oven and using tongs, carefully turn each drumstick, spooning the marinade over each one.  Return the pan to the oven for an additional 20 minutes; remove and sprinkle on the sesame seeds.  Return to the oven for a final 15 minutes until the chicken is well-browned.  If you like, you can finish it under the broiler after basting one more time with the marinade.

This has a very slight sweetness from the hoisin, but is in no way a sweet sauce.  I think I would like to serve it with a nice fried rice, maybe even a pineapple fried rice.

Pick Your Poison - Egg Salad and Garlic Bread

Wednesday - My first full day on approved sick leave.  It is hard to gather my thoughts about this and other things. My head is not working well, which is why the decision was made, not by me, but for me, by compassionate supervisors.

There is more to the story (isn't there always?) but now is not the time.

Today I have a bunch of forms from my human resources department that need to be downloaded, printed, and attended to.  I tried reading some of them yesterday, and again today, but the words were shuffling in front of my eyes and I could not extract their meaning.  Let's try this again tomorrow, shall we?  I also have to make an appointment for a CAT scan of my brain, but can't do that right now, either.

"This is your brain on spaetzle"

Having said all of the things I can't do, let me think about what I can do.  I can make egg salad, and I can prepare some more garlic bread.  I can also complete the blog post on spaetzle and publish it.  I prepared the spaetzle on Monday evening, a final remnant of happier times, ha.  More like a moment of calm between storms.

Does anyone still eat egg salad?  Or is there anyone who doesn't know how to make it?  All I really need to say here is that I love it - that I now hard cook my eggs in the oven, 350 for 30 minutes - that I break up the cooled and peeled eggs with my favorite utensils, my hands - and that all they need to taste perfect is mayonnaise (yes, Hellmans, why do you even ask?), kosher salt, and white pepper.

Can I tell you how weird it is to be sitting in my favorite couch corner and watching everyone else going to court?

So the egg salad is done, and I am working on the garlic bread.  I bet there is a whole generation, maybe even two, of kids who think garlic bread comes from the freezer section of their local supermarket.  When I first learned to make this back in college, we used garlic powder, which still works just fine, but I now use 4 cloves of fresh, 1 stick of butter softened to room temperature, 1 heaping tablespoon mayonnaise, salt, pepper, and some variation on Italian seasoning.  Today I went with a touch of cayenne pepper, basil, oregano, a little sugar to balance the oregano, and a dusting of grated Romano.  Wrap it in aluminum foil, shiny side on the inside, and bake at just about any temperature until the butter is melted and the bread is as crusty as you like it.

I love this bread.

And now my head is starting to hurt.  I tried to watch television at around 5 pm, but even when I lowered the sound, it hurt my ears.  Then I got annoyed at everyone on The Five for picking on Hillary Clinton.  I don't know what I expected, since they always pick on Hillary.  Then I got annoyed at Hillary, who I have wholeheartedly supported for years, for getting herself into yet another situation. Then I got annoyed at William Devane and his damn Rosland Capital commercials.  Then I tried watching CNBC - that lasted all of 30 seconds - and switched over to the Weather Channel for something totally non-political.  That got me depressed for all the people up north, who are facing something called Winter Storm Thor.

Oh dear God in Heaven, now subpoenas have been issued for Hillary's private email communications while Secretary of State.  I am so damn tired of Clinton scandals.  I am also tired of Congressman Trey Gowdy's hair-do.  He reminds me of the Bob's Big Boy statue.  The man has had more hair-do changes than Cher.

I am not, however, tired of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.  It seems I have picked my poison, at least for this evening.  But wait!  The Magic are playing the Phoenix Suns.  And the dill pickle soup went down just fine.

Life is good.  Different, but good.

Just Before the Storm - Spaetzle

Monday - If egg noodles and dumplings got married and had a child, it would be spaetzle.  Spaetzle is the German name for these cute little egg dumplings, while in Hungarian cuisine these are referred to as galuska or nokedli.  A rose by any other name and all that jazz.  My husband's Hungarian Grandma Blanche used to make something called "nuckaluck" (my spelling) which I presume was the same, or similar.  I don't know how Grandma Blanche made them, but I do require the services of a spaetzle maker.  Non-electric, inexpensive, indispensable.

Spaetzle

2 cups all-purpose flour

4 extra-large eggs

2 teaspoons kosher salt

white pepper, to taste

water, as needed (about 2 tablespoons)

butter for the cooked spaetzle

non-stick spray

Fill a medium pot 2/3 full and set on the stove to boil.  Add a good amount of salt to the water.  Spray the spaetzle maker with the non-stick spray.

In large bowl, place about a tablespoon or two of cut up butter.

Put the flour into a medium bowl and with a wooden spoon, make a well in the center.  Crack the eggs into the well, and add the kosher salt and pepper.  Start mixing the egg and flour together with the wooden spoon until well combined .  Add a little water as needed to make a smooth, but sticky batter.

Position the spaetzle maker over the boiling water, and let gravity push the batter through the holes of the spaetzle maker while you slide the holder back and forth, into the boiling water. Cook the spaetzle for at least five minutes, until they are tender, then remove from the pot using a slotted spoon.  Let the excess water drip off each spoonful, and then add to the bowl with the butter.  Continue until all of the spaetzle has been removed to the large bowl, and then add another tablespoon of cut up butter and stir gently so that the spaetzle is lightly coated with melted butter.  Season with more salt and pepper to taste.  You serve this plain, or as the recipient of a tasty sauce.  Enjoy.

Good-bye, yellow brick road

Tuesday - And in the end, fibromyalgia won.

It is going to take me a little while - hours, days, weeks - to process the last day.  But I believe that everything happens for a reason.

I'm not trying to be mysterious.  I am on sick leave for now, at least until I can resolve my health issues.  I have a few more tests coming up in the near future.

In the meantime ... well, I don't know what I am going to be doing.  Trying to de-stress, I suppose.  Now there's a plan.

The Whole Megillah - Hamantaschen (Cookies for Purim)

My son reminded me that Purim begins at sundown on Wednesday, March 4, and I have yet to bake a single hamantaschen.  Oy, if I'm not careful, somebody is going to come along and take away my balaboosteh designation.  Can't let that happen.

Cory as Mordecai, circa 1997, giving advice to "Queen" Esther

I have two hamantaschen recipes, and this is my favorite, as it is closest to the cookie-like dough I grew up eating in New York.  Purim is a rather happy holiday, and we Jews are not only permitted but encouraged to be rowdy.  The adults can get verschnickert, while the kids can buzz around on excess sugar.  The important thing is to yell "boo!" whenever the villain's name, Haman, is spoken during the reading of the Megillah, and to eat a lot of hamantaschen.

Urban Baker Hamantaschen (adapted from Joan Nathan)

2/3 cup (10 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons) butter, room temperature

1/2 cup sugar

1 extra large egg

1/2 tsp. vanilla

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, sifted

1 tsp. baking powder

a pinch of kosher salt

Filling choices: Prune (lekvar) and apricot are the fillings I grew up with.  Poppy seed (mohn) is very traditional, and raspberry has become very popular (and delicious).  Solo brand puts out all of these fillings, which are much better to use than preserves or jams which do not hold up well during the baking process and will leak from the seams of the cookie.  Nutella, that cocoa hazelnut mouthful of joy, is another filling that works well.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Set aside. In the bowl of your food processor fitted with the metal blade, cream butter and sugar together.  Add egg and vanilla.  Slowly add dry ingredients.  Mix thoroughly until the dough forms a ball.  Wrap dough in plastic wrap, and chill for at least 3 hours or overnight.

Roll out dough on a floured work surface to 1/8″ thickness (I cut the dough into quarters, and rolled out each piece between sheets of wax paper.  Worked like a charm.)  Cut circles of your dough. with  a 3 inch round cookie cutter. In the center of each circle put a small amouth (scant 1 teaspoon) of filling.  Resist the impulse to overfill the cookie.  Dip your finger in some water and run your finger around the outer edge of the dough. Fold into a three cornered shape, allowing some of the filling to show. Line your baking sheet with a silicon baking pad (silpat), or parchment paper, place the hamantaschen about 2 inches apart, and bake for 14-16 minutes or until the outer edge is golden brown.  Remove from the baking sheet with a metal spatula and place on a cooling rack.

Hopefully, I'll have some photos to share of freshly-baked hamantaschen once I get around to actually baking them.