Snow Day and Hummus

It snowed last night. It snowed about seven inches, which, in the big picture, is not that much considering some of the days we had last year and what Minnesota got today. I do tend to get overwhelmed by the snow, but I do my best to calm the hell down and not to freak out all the time. Sometimes the Crazy Lady comes out, but I think it's probably entertaining to some of you, especially my sister, so I'm okay with it.

My friend Lacy says that living in Wisconsin and getting through the winters probably makes us hearty. I love that. I'm sure that all the shoveling and pushing cars and trudging through knee-deep snow would help to build muscle and strengthen something. I don't know; your core? Your spirit? Something. Unfortunately, I had almost none of that today. My new downstairs neighbors are big proponents of "throwing money at the problem" and thusly hired somebody to come plow our long-ass driveway. I mean, it's really long. You know what? I am fine with this. That's totally cool; I'll just stay inside whilst somebody else does the work. No problem. As I waited for the four stout men to show up and plow, I thought I'd make some hummus. So many people ask for the recipe, and although I can't give measurements (seriously, it's all just adding stuff until it tastes good), I can provide some pretty pictures of the process!

Here are the basic ingredients: canned chick peas, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, and salt. Some people use dried chick peas, but you have to soak those overnight, and then you have to plan ahead and lately, I can't plan beyond the next half hour, so canned it is! You can buy tahini anywhere - it's basically a sesame seed paste (my dad uses it like peanut butter!). The garlic, as my dear friend Jess pointed out, should probably be fresh, not jarred like this. But I was snowed in, man, and I had zero fresh garlic. Anyhow, the ingredients:

You should probably get a Magic Bullet if you want to make hummus quickly and with little clean up. Food processors and blenders work just fine, but the Magic Bullet has a much better infomercial, I'd be willing to bet. Have you seen it? I love it so much. I've seen it at the very least 50 times. You should definitely watch it. Oh hey, here it is!
Part Two is here. "Dinna's always a production!" says the young actress dressed as an old lady with fake cigarette ash. "Yuck, I hate broccoli!" Grown ass man...But I digress. Back to the hummus! Drain the juice from the chick peas, but keep it somewhere - you'll use it later.

Dump in some tahini. I'm so bad at estimating, or guesstimating, if you will (do you know "guesstimating" is a word? Spell check didn't even underline it! Wow), but I think it's somewhere between 3-5 tablespoons.

Throw in the lemon juice, some garlic, and some salt. I can't give measurements because I think it all depends on how garlicky you want it, how salty, etc. You can probably add your own spices at this point too (a lot of people like cumin), but it's really good this way, with nothing else added!

This is the hummus when it's basically done. I put it through the ole Bullet for quite awhile to make it as smooth as possible. At this point in the process, I also pour in the liquid from the canned chick peas little by little to help moisten it. You don't want to put in too much as it will get too watery. So be patient. And use discretion.

When you're done with all this, put it in a tupperware and refrigerate it for awhile before eating. So delicious!

Wonderfully enough, by the time I finished making hummus, the men from Mr. Plow had come. I mean, I assume every plow company is called Mr. Plow. Or the Plow King. Either way. Look what they did to the front porch!

And look at this beautiful long and sort of snow-free driveway! That driveway is seriously long. There was a good 5-6 feet behind where I was standing, and the driveway goes all the way back to those faraway trees, and then to the right and behind the house. So much to shovel...

I was in heaven when I saw this. It only took me about 20-25 minutes to dig out my car and shovel around it. This, compared to hours otherwise. Wooo! All of a sudden, I don't mind snow so much!

To celebrate a successful snow day, I had some booze with some cute star-shaped ice cubes. I'd been talking to my sister on the phone when she mentioned that she'd had a few tiny wine glasses of sweet vermouth this evening. This is something we always used to do when we'd go to Jiddu's (my grandfather) house on Christmas, before going to the big family dinner. It's customary to visit everybody in their own homes around the holidays. We'd go to his house and sit for awhile, eating candies and potato chips out of small glass bowls, and eventually, somebody would bring out a tray of these tiny wine glasses with sweet vermouth in them. Delicious! Cheers abu cheers, Jiddu!

Okay, to be honest, I didn't have any sweet vermouth. This is actually Amaretto; it was the closest I could get! Still delicious. And I have no idea how this got in my house. Who bought this?

Amaretto makes pretty pictures. Jess, did you bring this over last Nude Years? Thanks for the pretty booze.
One last thing about the snow day: boots everywhere. There are four pair of black boots sitting inside my front door. Four. Ridiculous.

You know what? Snow days make me feel disjointed. There ya go.

Dates. No, I Mean the Food Kind.

As a kid, I was a very picky eater. My mother would cook amazing Iraqi food, delicious salmon dishes, and flavorful, creative recipes of all kinds, and I'd eat fishsticks. On my birthdays when I got to choose where we went out to dinner, I'd choose Chili's or Applebees. For real, I would. Gross, eh? I think my father is still regretful about those meals, even 15 - 20 years later. Whoops a daisy!

I was always extremely resistant to Arabic food, or what I perceived to be Arabic food. My mother would make kibbeh, or "rice and gravy," which was basically white rice and red tomato gravy with meat and/or vegetables, and I'd pout and whine about it like a little baby. I was not a bratty kid, but this was one place where I really did it up. In addition to the beautiful cooking on which I missed out, there were lovely individual items that I hated on as well. My father always had a love for figs and dates, and believe it or not, I wouldn't even try either until well into my teenage years. What a fool I was...I cannot believe I missed out for all those years.

Now when I see dates, I feel like I'm home. My father speaks about the date palms in Baghdad and how they grew everywhere, and the fruit trees in the backyard of his parents' house, and my heart swells with love and pride and sadness, all at once. To be able to reach up and pick a fig out of a tree as you sit in your backyard reading...can you even imagine? It makes me want to cry a little bit. And so, I am incredibly thankful for my father's persistence (as well as my mother's patience) with my eating habits over the years, and happy that I now, finally, have so much love for dates and figs. See here for further evidence.

I was going to go grocery shopping tonight, but then it started raining really hard and the tornado sirens went off, so I stayed home. Somewhat short on food, I searched my fridge to find some satisfying Dinner Two ingredients (Dinner One was Special K Red Berries and almond milk when I got home from work at 5:15. Classy). I spotted the giant plastic container of dates my father had given me the last time I was at home, the bag of walnuts I bought at the Co-op the other day, and a container of Greek yogurt. It was totally a "HEY GIRL" moment. Meaning, I got real excited.

When Christopher visited me last fall, he seemed to make masterpieces out of practically nothing, at least in terms of food. I remember this dessert he made, poached pears with dates, honey, and cream.

I mean for real, it came out of nowhere. And it was amazing. So, I decided that Dinner Two would be date-based tonight. Please note, I used FANCY dates. That's right, I only eat fancy things.
Dates look like small, fat turds. Or giant raisins. Or both. Whatever gets you excited.
Now, for the extremely technical description of how to remove the pits and put in the walnuts:

1. Wash your hands real good.
2. Dig your fingers into the dates, making a lengthwise opening.
3. Pull out that damn pit.
4. Stuff a walnut back in there.
5. Wash your hands real good again. Probably clean underneath your fingernails for date guts.

Beautiful! Now, here's where my parents would usually leave it and put the dates on a nice plate to serve to guests. But I was in the mood for more ingredients, so I got out the Greek yogurt. Greek yogurt is really good; it's creamy and thick and not sweet. Plus it's full of protein, but I'm more concerned with the deliciousness. Although my father would probably criticize this part, I went ahead with it anyhow. He's a purist, you see, and he has extremely strong opinions on the treatment of fruits. A direct quote from him: When you want to mock lovely fruits, you put chocolate on dates or cheese on figs. This is an insult. Yeah. He is adamant about this. Sorry, Dad.
I drizzled a bit of honey on top of the dates, although it was totally unnecessary because they are incredibly sweet already. But it was a nice touch. It was like there were two different sweetnesses, but they blended together really gently and smoothly.
Dip the honey-covered dates and walnuts into the Greek yogurt, and you got yourself a snack! Yow! Thanks, rain and parents and food that was in the fridge! You made it a good night!

March 28th Weather

Saturday Mar 27 Partly Cloudy High 58°F Low 37°F Precip 10 %		Sunday Mar 28 Showers High 48°F Low 32°F Precip 40 %		Monday Mar 29 Sunny High 50°F Low 32°F Precip 0 %		Tuesday Mar 30 Partly Cloudy High 55°F Low 36°F Precip 20 %

Now that's funny. I'll write more later.

I can see the lanai

I really can. Almost all of the snow is gone and I can see the majority of the wood, and the table and chairs are uncovered. How romantic! Come over, and we’ll have a totals sexy night. We’ll sit together at the table and drink glasses of wine and watch the moon and stars, and listen to the crickets chirping in the night. The colored christmas lights will twinkle against the darkness, and we’ll look into each others eyes and we’ll know that this is all we need.

Well, except, the seats are all wet. with more than water...dirty water. They’re, like, soaking wet. It will make your pants wet, and you’ll look like you peed. And remember that time I put the garbage out there because I couldn’t get to the trash cans because of all the snow? Well, there are remnants of that garbage, chewed up and discarded by squirrels. It looks like pieces of fruit and soggy papers...maybe the Shopper Stopper. Maybe 8 different Shopper Stoppers. And actually, the wet wood kind of smells like it’s rotting. Ooh, that can’t be good.

Whoops a daisy. I don’t have any wine. I only have what’s left in a handle of Fleischmann’s vodka...probably about a cup and a half, which has been in my freezer for about a month, next to some old waffles. And not a mixer in sight. Will this do?

Is it a total buzzkill that about half of those lights won’t turn on? Yikes...sorry, dudes. Sorry about that. I’ll try to help you not bump into anything or trip as you walk through that garbage.

Well, I guess it’s more about the company, right? The sexy company with sexy results. Is it still sexy when you make me laugh and i cough violently and uncontrollably, right in your face? Is it still sexy when I ask if we can cut the bullshit, go inside, and watch Friday Night Smackdown? Do you mind that I find it almost impossible to wear pants anymore? What about the fact that my already short attention span has lessened to about a 20 - 35 minute time span? Is it offensive or hurtful when you’re whispering beautiful and flowery words to me, and all I can think about is recipes for non-dairy macaroni and cheese, or what order I’ll put the songs on my next mix cd? Is it?

Well, I’m sorry about that. That’s what the winter has done to me, my friends. It has turned my formerly Sexy Results into Somewhat Sexy Results with a Few Exceptions and Probably a Lot of Buzzkills. With the promise of laziness and delusion. And the inability to concentrate on what you’re saying.

Still, I can see the linai. That’s something, right?

And by the way, it’s not self-deprecating. I still find myself charming as hell. I hope you will too. And maybe I’ll just put this blog up on a personals dating site.

Omg. I’m kidding. I’m awesome. Who doesn’t want to get with this??