Tasting cups ... different brew methods.

Coffee and I? We’re old buddies. I grew up in a coffee-drinking family, who gathered every weekend day for a leisurely cup. In summer, we’d all sit on the sun porch — even before I started drinking coffee myself — and chat, sometimes inviting neighbors in with a friendly call out the window. Sometimes, we still do that.

My first cup of coffee was had at age 10. We were in Florida for Thanksgiving, and my vacation friend (she and I were always there at the same time every year) and I decided to be a little rebellious and have a cup from the free coffee bar. My family didn’t bat an eye, and I’ve been drinking coffee ever since. By the time I hit sophomore year of high school, I had my own gigantic travel mug that accompanied me to school every morning until I lost it in college.

Eventually, I cut back on my consumption. I mean, really, brewing a whole pot just for me? That’s a little too much. These days, I usually have one to two cups a day. Sometimes I have three, if I end up at the coffee shop to get some work done. Turns out, all the coffee drinking is a healthy move. My husband is now up to two to three cups a day himself, something supported by recent research that drinking a couple cups a day can lower the risk of prostate cancer in men. (Ladies, good news for you too: female coffee drinkers also have a lowered risk of developing breast cancer.)

A Starbucks in Seattle

But coffee drinking is more than a health move or a morning ritual: it’s a social thing. Coffee brings people together — neighbors over a morning cup, spouses at the kitchen table, co-workers in the latte line. There’s no secret why the term coffee klatch came into existence. Coffee is naturally friendly.

When was the last time you lingered over a cup, talking about whatever was on your mind? For me, it was this morning. When was the last time you and a friend met at a coffee shop for a quick chat – planned or unplanned? When was the last time you put on a pot of coffee to share?

If you haven’t done these things lately, you should. It’s worth it.

Given my love of coffee, you can imagine how excited I was about a recent adventure. A couple months back, I received an incredible invitation to attend Starbucks Coffee College in Seattle. It’s a once-a-year program where Starbucks invites a handful of writers and journalists to go behind the scenes at their company, seeing how they make coffee from procuring the beans to roasting to serving customers. I could barely contain my excitement as I lined up childcare for the kids and prepared to go (I may or may not have referred to it as “the mothership calling me home”).

Cate, enjoying a cup of coffee

Not only did I get to take this amazing trip and learn so much about coffee making, but I got to do it with my good friend Cate from Sweetnicks. (I mentioned this trip briefly when I returned, promising a few more details.)

As a journalist, this trip wasn’t just about fun though — it was about research and learning, both of which happened in droves. I came home with incredible amounts of information to fuel a year’s worth of coffee-related assignments. I have a notebook filled with pitch ideas for the websites and publications that I work for — and a ton of background information to get me started. That’s incredibly valuable, and I cannot wait to write them all — whether right here or for other publications.

Hands on a French Press

In the meantime, think about the socialness of coffee. Plan a coffee date, invite a neighbor in for a cup or just chill with your family over a freshly brewed pot. With our busy, technology filled lives today, it can be easy to forget about connecting on a personal, face-to-face level with people in real-life. But it’s important, and you should. Whatever you do, enjoy that time and have a lovely weekend.

In the meantime, who do you share your coffee experience with?

Disclosure: Starbucks provided me with transportation, lodging, food and training during my Starbucks Coffee College experience. They didn’t require me to write about them or do anything more than attend and follow their schedule. Anything I write here or anywhere else regarding the experience is my own personal opinion and not impacted by the free trip.

When someone does something amazing for you — whether it’s helping you shift the furniture in your house, helping you dig out from a massive snowstorm or something more subtle — it’s important to say thank you. And really, it’s a circumstance where words just aren’t enough. Actions mean more.

Cookies mean more.

I’m a little under the weather today, so I am not baking yet. But when I’m all better, I will be making a big, fabulous batch of cookies for my awesome neighbors. And I think it’ll be these Cranberry Chocolate Chunk Oatmeal Cookies, which are mouthwatering. They were my very favorite creation of Christmas 2010.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Homemade pasta with pesto

If there was just one carb to darken my doorway for the rest of eternity, it would be pasta. My kids request it nightly. I like it. My husband likes it. And there are endless ways to flavor and dress it. As far as versatile ingredients go, pasta is right up there.

Typically, we eat dried pasta. Heck, if you were to open my kitchen cabinets, you would find no less than five boxes of dried pasta. Go down to my basement and there is a whole tote of pasta (I stocked up during a great sale). It’s easy, and we like it.

But lately, homemade pasta has been on my brain. When I recently went to Minneapolis, I ate a delicate, tender housemade pasta that was out of this world. Every bite was creamy, silky bliss. Ever since then, I have been toying with the idea of making pasta again. The last time I made pasta was years ago, and I didn’t feel like the results were better than my favorite dried pasta, so I swore it off. But things change — skill levels, interests, desires … so this weekend, I did it again.

The recipe I used came from Vegetarian Pasta Cookbook, a cookbook that I’ve own for … a long time (and we will just leave it at that). It started like most pasta recipes do — flour and eggs. But it also had oil and water.

The dough is mixed together until it’s crumbly. Then, you turn it out onto a floured surface and knead it until the gluten breaks down and it gets smooth. It takes maybe five minutes of kneading to get it there. While I was working the dough, Paige came running in to see what I was up to. She, as is often the case, pulled up her favorite stool and stood to watch. I know she wanted to help, but being my first time, I decided to press on myself. Next time though, I would love to let both Will and Paige take a turn at knead (with just-cleaned hands, of course). It’s an interesting process to feel as the dough goes from crumbles and bits of flour between your fingers to an elastic-y ball of dough. The change in texture and composition is amazing.

In any case, one the dough is smooth, it’s stuck into a resealable plastic bag and left to sit for about a half-hour.

Once it’s all rested (and yes, that is an important step), the dough is rolled thin in a pasta roller into a sheet. Again, this could be a good place to get the kids involves — they could catch the sheets as they come out of the pasta roller and set them aside for cutting (natch, that’s the next step). I made linguine, using a pasta cutter attachment for my KitchenAid for this step as well.

Now, this is the point where I have gotten frustrated in the past — because when you are inexperienced in the art of pasta making, it all can be intimidating. But this time, I learned a few things. First, the dough needs to be relatively thin before feeding it into the roller for the first time — otherwise it will get stuck. Also, the dough that you aren’t rolling should remain covered so that it doesn’t dry out. And finally, the dough needs to be rolled thinner than you think you want it to be, because it will puff upon cooking.

In the end, the pasta was pretty good — tender, but not silky. Flavorful, but not perfect. The dough was firm — perhaps too much so — which made handling it a challenge as well.

So, no, this isn’t the perfect homemade pasta recipe, so I am not going to share it today. But I am on the hunt. One of the big things to come out of my pasta making was discovering that it’s not as intense a project as I remember it being. All in all, the pasta went from flour to plate in about an hour and a half, which isn’t bad for a lazy weekend day.

Do you make your own pasta? Have a favorite recipe? Share in the comments!

P.S. Love pasta? Johnsonville Sausage has recently launched Pastaville, a recipe contest using their Italian sausage. Head over to the site to find out how to enter — and yes, I will be entering soon too! Details on my entry to come …

I love this photo. Aren't they cute?

Every year, the kids and I (and often our friends) head to local farms for pick-you-own fun. This past weekend, that meant apple picking. The apple picking season generally starts in September and goes through early November here in Connecticut, so we are more than half-way through the season (and late by our standards). Fortunately, the day we chose was sunny, but neither too hot nor too cold.

Usually, holding the bag is a big source of contention. Everyone wants it (even though I really find it to be the worst job while picking — that bag gets seriously heavy). But, I must be getting smarter in my old age or something, because I stemmed the dispute before we even arrived at the orchard. How, you ask? Well, I told the kids the order in which we’d hold the bag … and explained the logic (the person who can hold the most weight holds it last; the person who can hold the least holds it first). As a result, passing the bag was without a single cry or screech. I can’t tell you how happy that made me.

As for the apples, usually I cook with them right away, but this time, we’ve just been eating them. Will wants to make an apple pie, which we will probably do sometime this week. But other than that, we’re snacking on them (we found some tiny apples that are the perfect size for the kids — those have been in lunchboxes all week). Turns out that I forgot how good an apple can be.

Notice Paige double fisting ... she ate so many apples.

Typically, we apple pick twice in a season (last year was an anomaly with three trips to apple orchards). I can’t say whether that will happen this year, given our late start. It’s possible that we might go again in November, if the weather is nice like last year.  But whatever ends up happening, it’s okay. The kids and I had an awesome time together at the orchard. Ultimately, that’s all that matters.

People ask me: Why do you write about food, and eating and drinking? Why don’t you write about the struggle for power and security, and about love, the way others do?

They ask it accusingly, as if I were somehow gross, unfaithful to the honor of my craft.

The words struck me, because they are something I have pondered much over the years … and, with slightly different words, I am often asked about as well. After beginning as a newspaper reporter who focused on crime, punishment and politics, my career took a dramatic shift when I traded that for food writing. It seems like a fabulous writing prompt. So, here it goes …

Why I Write about Food and Eating

Crafting an answer to this question is much like the chicken and egg debate: which came first? My interest or my passion? My intent or the strong pull? The need or the want? It’s really hard to say.

But at its most basic level, I write about food because it’s happy, life-affirming and something enjoyed by many (myself included, of course). While food politics can polarize us in unbelievable ways, food itself brings people together — families over Sunday dinner, friends for a birthday celebration, coworkers for lunch. Food is something we need to survive, and also take pleasure in enjoying.

Of course, there is more to it than that. I began writing about food because I needed to do something other than writing about people at their lowest lows. Becoming a mother changed me, and I could no longer stomach the ins and outs of researching, interviewing and reporting on crime, punishment and politics. (And although the final one is a separate topic than the first two, it is more closely related than it appears.) Sure, I wrote plenty about urban development, an admittedly less macabre subject, but it didn’t lessen the need to find a new writing passion.

But writing about food wasn’t just an out for me — it was a whole new outlet. It allowed me to explore my craft in a way I never had before: with passion, feeling and emotion. While journalism is dry, food writing is explosive. The creative surge that comes with describing a tender, irresistible souffle was a greater pleasure than anything I’d experienced in writing before. It was, to borrow a phrase from Trent Reznor, the perfect drug. Once I started, I couldn’t imagine giving it up.

Moreover though, my passion is about the eating. More specifically, eating together. Food has, throughout my life, brought me together with my friends and family. Wings at a favorite bar. Shared platters of wat and tibs, served with warm injera. Olives eaten off fingertips. Bowls of sizzling Bi Bim Bap. Perfectly seared steaks. Creamy risottos, brimming with artichokes, herbs and olives. Food is love.

Food has its dark side too – the stories of hunger, of school lunches that fail to nourish, of waste and pollution, of life-threatening allergies … and I don’t shy from that aspect. It would be grossly unfair to write about the joys of food and eating without acknowledging the challenges and dangers too many face. Those are important and necessary pursuits in a food writing career as well.

But when I write about food, most often it’s about nourishing and the enjoyment factor. Those are, without a doubt, my favorite aspects about the pursuit. Writing about food, by extension, just makes me happy.

Readers, I am turning this back to you: If you are a food writer, why do you write about food? If you are a food writing reader, why do you read it? Share in the comments!

Do you remember what it’s like to be a child and hear the music of the ice cream truck grow louder and louder as the truck nears and passes your house? I do, because even though I am 30, I still relish in buying a little something from one of the infamous trucks.

When the ice cream truck rolled by today, I tried to resist the urge to run after it. Will really wanted to though. When it stopped nearby, idling as it served customer after customer, I tried to say no … but I wanted ice cream as much as he did. So, next thing you know, Shawn and Will were headed out the door to grab some cones.

Hey, it’s summer. And sometimes saying yes is so much better than saying no.

Have a wonderful 4th of July.

Happy birthday to me!

This past weekend, I celebrated my 30th birthday. Wow. It’s unbelievable to write or say those words. I remember when my mom turned 30 and we showered her with “Over the Hill” gear and balloons … she took it with grace. Me? I wouldn’t have. Thank goodness no one did that.

While I have long been a “age is just a number” kind of person, turning 30 is a really big deal for me. I’m not in my 20s anymore (well, duh!). I am one year from my 10th reunion for college (and no closer to that graduate degree that I dream about than I was a year or five years ago). It makes me catch my breath a little.

Many friends, who are a little older and wiser, have offered up little pearls of wisdom, trying to make me see that this birthday — this change in number — is as good as any other. They tell me that 30 was their best year, and that the 30s are easier since you aren’t floundering trying to find your direction. When you are 30, you are more established and not fighting as much to be taken seriously.

But 30 … it’s such a number. I am farther from childhood now. That frightens me.

Still, I am the same person I was a few days ago. All that’s changed is my age. And maybe being 30 is a good thing …

If nothing else, the past year has been an amazing transformation. One year ago, I was so stressed out. My biggest freelance writing client had just laid me off and I was looking for a new gig – fast. That stress left me worried, anxious and barely able to enjoy anything. Meanwhile, my car was being repaired from a car accident on the last day of school (oh, what an ordeal!). And it rained nearly every day that month, making the summer of 2009 a year without tomatoes for my area. Still, I vowed to make 29 a good year, and I did.

In the past year, I have been blessed with wonderful clients and great writing assignments, all while watching my kids grow and mature (knock on wood for that!). They are so smart, so sweet and so wonderful. We’ve traveled around the northeast and had so many wonderful experiences. It’s been a good year. And my 20s? They were awesome. And as my friends often remind me, I accomplished a lot.

As I enter my 30s, I can say that I am happier and more secure and confident than ever … and it feels good. So, here I go. I’m 30.

Tomorrow – A fab Citrus-Black Bean Salad with Two Peppers.

Aside from this, this was an okay week for spending.

What Happened: Last week, I started using a mostly cash-only spending plan. This week I continued that. We did our grocery shopping as planned last weekend. I ended up breaking it into two days, with one day being a Target (dum da dum dum!) day. We needed some bigger supplies, so it cost more than other weeks. I’d share exact numbers, but I just can’t remember right now. After groceries, we had about $80 left.

Of course, my grocery shopping was majorly flawed this week. For one thing, I forgot to actually buy everything on the list, which meant I had to make a midweek stop at the store. Even with that stop, I still forgot to buy some things. SIGH.

On a good note though, I made a smart choice this week — passing up take out on a busy night for a trip to the grocery store for what we needed. Honestly, I wanted the homecooked meal more anyway!

Also, I used my Amex card this week once or twice for clothes, since it’s summertime and I have finally lost enough weight that I need clothes to fit. As Cate always tells me, it’s a good problem to have. I also used my debit card to pay for tickets to see Shrek Forever After with Shawn and the kids. It was a really cute movie that we all enjoyed — and totally worth seeing. We went to the matinee, which was $6/ticket … a big savings over the normal $8.50/ticket.

It wasn’t a perfect spending week — but then, what week is?

Another thing that happened? I found a big snafu on a bank statement. A few months back, I opened a savings account for Paige to save for her tuition for school. Under the Uniform Trust to Minor Act (a Connecticut law, though other states have their own versions – either called the Uniform Trust to Minors Act or the Uniform Gift to Minors Act), a parent can save for a child for any expenses whatsoever and usually with no penalties for having low balances, etc. However, Paige’s account was getting hit with service fees for having a low-balance. Knowing that this shouldn’t be, I immediately phoned the bank this morning and after a bit of discussion, got it resolved. It just goes to show that you really need to pay attention to your bank statements … mistakes happen (in this case, the account wasn’t properly labeled as a custodial account), and with a little effort you can get them fixed.

What’s Next: I adore being on a mostly cash-only spending plan. It really makes me pay attention more to how I spend and what I spend on. So, that is continuing. This week, I upped my withdrawal to $220 due to the extra supplies needed, but for the upcoming week I am going back to $200. Also, I am continuing to squirrel away my extra change for our upcoming vacation. Some readers suggested not spending any change at all … as much as I love paying with exact change, I love the idea of saving more by using whole bills so I am going to try that.

Changed Saved for Vacay This Week: $2.13 (ALL WEEKS TOTAL: $4.16)

Photo credit: cohdra from morguefile.com

As a freelancer, I don’t receive paychecks on a predictable schedule. So, sometimes I go for weeks without receiving checks. Other times, like this week, I receive several all at once. And even with the best efforts, it can be daunting to not want to send a little of that money.

What Happened: The week started out ok. The kids and I planned and shopped for the week. I tried the personal allowance thing … um, yea. I need to think harder about what an appropriate personal allowance is since I spend that plus some.

On Saturday, allowance in hand, I bought lunch for the kids and I … and learned an important lesson about value. We went to a popular chain deli, where the bread is fab. I thought it would be a nice treat. The lunch we got was simple: two sandwiches, two apples … and it came to $15. Had we bought somewhere else (like the deli around the corner), we would have had two much larger sandwiches for $10 or less. And the worst part? I really wasn’t wowed by the sandwiches we had. It’s important that when you spend on a budget, like I am trying to, that you factor value into the equation. Next time? We’ll head to the corner deli … or just make lunch at home.

Further, I had to withdraw more money to cover a school expense, so I spent additional money this week that I hadn’t intended on.

Also, due to a scheduling conflict for tomorrow, I ended up having to do some shopping on Thursday to prepare for the weekend. I knew this was coming, but it didn’t occur to me to prepare for it. So, that was an obvious planning flaw.

Spending: Obviously, my spending was on the high side of things this week due to planning issues. Fortunately, I did save a lot as well. Had I planned for and controlled my spending a little better, I would have saved more though.

What’s Next: I won’t be doing this week’s shopping until Sunday, so I have a few days to evaluate how I will spending in the coming week. I am seriously considering trying all cash this week — with a small but realistic personal spending allowance built in. What do you think, should I try it?

Photo credit: gracey from morguefile.com

In the past nine weeks:

• I cut my spending in half.
• I’ve wasted way less food.
• I’ve planned most of our meals, and usually follow that plan.
• I’ve put a lot of money into my saving account.
• I’ve bought way less unnecessary stuff.

So, what about this past week specifically? It was a mixed bag.

What Happened: I planned all our dinners and shopped for food on Saturday. However, my plan – which was more rudimentary than usual – left too much openness and I didn’t follow it closely. In fact, I changed up most of the meals. Some were minor changes, but others were major. It’s clear that my meal plan needs to be recipe-based, not just idea (“pork tenderloin and potatoes!”) based.

Breakfast was less of a struggle, although I am still seeking ways to make it an easy, healthy meal. One step will be to buy more fruit, as we go through fruit very quickly when it’s on hand. Also, I need to pay a little more attention to lunches as well.

Spending: I kept my spending down this week, which was good. But I didn’t totally limit it to the weekend — on Monday, I indulged in a coffee drink (half price!) and we ordered a pizza on Wednesday when I lost all desire to cook. Stress is a definite impediment to My Spending Diet. When I start to stress, I spend.

What’s Next: A few weeks ago, a reader mentioned that they give themselves an allowance for the week. That way, when they have the urge to splurge, they can use their cash to do it and it’s already budgeted in. This week, Cate also pointed me to a really interesting article about doing a cash-only diet. I love both ideas.

This week, I am going to factor in an allowance for myself. When I want to buy a coffee or whatever, I can use that money … and when it’s gone, it’s gone. This will give me more control over my budget.

As for the cash-only plan, I like the idea, but will have to think about it more before I make any decisions. When Will was a baby, I did cash-only for awhile and it was effective in controlling my spending, but hard to manage since I didn’t always feel like the grocery bill was predictable. Still, now that I know what I spend, going cash-only could be a little easier. Of course, then I would lose the Amex points that I love to cash out …

Have you ever gone cash-only?

Photo credit: Alvimann from morguefile.com