Happy May 1st!
The month of April came and went. It was L’s birthday month and we spent the weekend on the Connecticut coast, where I took pictures of sea snails. And it was a busy month. Things started opening up here in New York City and things started picking up at work for both of us. In my running to-do list, I kept copying, ‘Write for April 1st’. And then April was over.
Today I made avocado toast for breakfast (with goat cheese scrambled eggs, a house favorite) and chicken fingers for lunch (homemade herbed breadcrumbs). I’ve been thinking a lot about ‘why’. Why I do what I do for a living, and why I love cooking so much. I think it’s because cooking is a constructive process-- you are making something, creating something, and at the end of twenty minutes, ninety minutes, or nine hours, you have something to show for it. Better yet, you have a product that makes people happy. I mean, it makes me happy to eat it and L has never complained. Perhaps it would be different if I were a top chef in a five-star kitchen, catering to unhappy diners with distinguished tastes. But for now, my sense is that cooking=food and food= happy people.
For herbed breadcrumbs, take 4-5 slices of whatever leftover bread you have. We had half a loaf of peasant bread that I had bought earlier this week to make croutons, as well as several slices of side soda bread from Irish pub takeout. I put them in the toaster oven for 8 minutes on ‘Toast’ (or somewhere around 410F). That gives me the right amount of color and crispiness. I took them out and pulsed them in the Vitamix until you have tiny sandlike pieces and larger flaky pieces. I added a tablespoon of parsley from our garden that I had hung to dry from last summer and pulsed some more. Then I put the breadcrumbs in a dish to use for breading, or as a topping for creamed spinach.
Why do I do surgery? Yes, it’s first-season-of-House cliche, but I want to help people. I certainly am not doing this for my own health. The pay isn’t bad, and there is the prestige of it all, but you end up with unhappy customers once in a while, no matter what you do. Maybe they’re the same people that become unhappy diners, and there’s that same person in every industry?
Why do I write? To breathe, to think. Right now, I have an idealized notion in my mind that as a writer, you don’t have to cater to a customer. You don’t have to make anyone else happy but yourself. But then reality sets in. You write for an audience, don’t you? An editor, a publisher. And there will always be a few unhappy diners in that bunch.
If you have questions about undergoing colorectal surgery, check out this Facebook post from Mount Sinai Hospital. They interviewed me and my colleague, Sergei Khaitov. I will point out, I kept calling him Dr. Khaitov on the video even though I use his first name in real life, but he could not seem to make the switch and kept calling me Carmen. This happens a lot in our world. For whatever reason, women do not get called by their professional titles and it is a personal pet peeve of mine so I point it out at every opportunity.
One new interview you may have missed: I did a mini-sode for Colon Cancer Awareness Month on Hey Poopy.
To make our favorite scrambled eggs, take four whole eggs, 1 cup of egg whites, and a tablespoon of water and whisk it in a small bowl. Put a non-stick pan on medium-high heat until a little olive oil shines. Add the entire bowl of eggs and stir, keeping the center wet and folding in the dry edges. Add 1oz (or more) of goat cheese, crumbled, into the eggs, and keep stirring. Take the pan off the heat just before the eggs are completely done, about 2-3 minutes in. I like to add a little Mrs. Dash seasoning and top with fresh chives. Serve immediately on top of sliced avocados and buttered toast.
In other news, I am now in three different writing groups: one for Narrative Medicine out of the University of Toronto, one for Herstory out of Long Island, and one that I started on my own, a writing group called Writing Group. It’s a lot, but having a community of like-minded people has been very exciting. We shall see if anything comes of it! I have been trying to decide between an MFA in Poetry or Fiction or an MS in Narrative Medicine… as if I need more degrees.
Anyway, until next time, be kind to each other and be gentle with yourself.
And always go black tie!
that's why i like cooking too! it's a creative process and you get this "product" at the end that is delicious! (most of the time). we both like art & creating, so it makes sense we also like cooking - its putting some of this and some of that together and then there is something new/different at the end!!