This Imperfect Plot

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September 30th, 2011

The operative word this week in the Brown Bag Challenge is the word Challenge. By that I mean it has been a very challenging week for lunches, mostly due to my own absentmindedness.

Monday
Monday started out strong: Avocado, tomato & cheese on thick slices of organic whole wheat Italian bread, with a handful of organic grapes and a small bag of Late July peanut butter crackers. My wife prepared this for me, but it required on-site assembly. I sliced the tomato and avocado and started building what turned into what I call a Zoinks! Sandwich. (If you don’t get that reference, you probably didn’t watch enough Scooby-Doo back in the day.) It was very good and wholly fulfilling.

Tuesday
Tuesday, on the other hand, was an utter failure. Not only did I not bring a lunch, but I also forgot to make a lunch. It’s one thing if you make it and leave it on the counter, but it’s something else entirely when you just plain forget about it. I felt like such a failure. How could I possibly live with myself after this? How could I face all of you on this blog, knowing that I let you down?

Hungry, I slinked into the Rodale café with my head hung low and built myself a small salad at the salad bar, avoiding all eye contact with the cafeteria staff and fellow diners. I had fallen so far and wasn’t sure if I could go on.

But as I ate my green leaves, I found hope. I thought back on the past month and began to feel an egg of pride hatching in my soul. And you know what? I had done pretty well up until now. I will go on. I will see this challenge to the end. Every hero must go through bad times, must fall from grace. And everyone loves a story of redemption. I will be that hero. I will redeem myself. I will see this Brown Bag Challenge to the end.

Wednesday
And yet our hero somehow manages to almost forget his lunch again, but at the last moment, he grabs from the fridge what he hopes is the remnants of last night’s chicken cutlets wrapped in foil. It isn’t much, but it will certainly count as a brown bag lunch.

It was a small lunch and I was very hungry and totally grouchy when I got home. Hunger always makes me grouchy. My wife asked why I didn’t supplement this measly meal at the café. But I was so grumpy that I couldn’t answer her—I just furrowed my brow and grunted. To make it worse, the power was out when I got home, so I ended up cooking dinner in a quickly darkening kitchen. Luckily we have a gas stove. I made tortellini with sausages and broccoli. It was good and we ate by an eerie combination of candlelight, flashlight, and iPhonelight.

Thursday
Of course I was going to have leftover tortellini with sausages and broccoli on Thursday. I set it all out on the counter—the container of leftovers, a glass bowl to heat it up in, a little bag of Locatelli grated Romano cheese, and piece of bread. You can imagine my surprise when I got to work and had no lunch. I had left it on the counter.

This time I didn’t feel so bad. I had, after all, made the effort of preparing my lunch. I ate another salad from the café and I enjoyed it with my head held high.

Friday
As I sit and write this final Brown Bag Challenge entry, I have a full belly of leftover butternut squash soup. I made it last night. I skinned and cubed the squash and brought it to a boil in vegetable broth. And then as it simmered, I added some halved Brussels sprouts. I caramelized some onions and threw those in too. I crushed up a few of our remaining Black Icicle tomatoes and chopped up a generous handful of fresh parsley. I thought I was done, but my wife had a good idea: Add the leftover tortellini and sausages that I forgot to bring with me for lunch. So today’s lunch contained yesterday’s lunch, sort of like a play within a play.

As this challenge comes to an end, I can safely say that I am a changed man. I will no longer just assume that I’ll grab lunch from the cafeteria. Instead, I will think about my mid-day meal more deliberately. I will exercise a control over my food intake that I had previously given away. Thank you to Healthy Eats for getting me to change the way I think about my food.

I’m taking part in the Brown-Bag Challenge, a month-long initiative to eat consciously and save money by packing a lunch each weekday instead of eating out. Join us here and share what you’re eating on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #brownbag.

September 23rd, 2011

At the end of week 4 of the brown bag challenge, I have a few observations to make:

1. I eat a lot of pasta.

2. I will often forget about packing my lunch until right when I’m walking out the door in the morning.

3. I somehow managed to lose that Pyrex bowl. I may have left it in the little kitchen up here on the second floor.

4. I may have lost a little weight, too. I’ve been fastening my belt in the second position for a while now, but on Monday, I had to move to the third hole.

5. According to the Internet, the holes in a belt are just called belt holes. They have no special name.

6. I am slightly disappointed that belt holes don’t have a special name.

Here’s my recap of the week:

Monday
Fusilli with sweet potatoes, sausages, and various other veggies.

Tuesday
Here’s the thing about Tuesday. I packed my lunch, but I never ate it. You see, my wife had a meeting in the building, so she brought the kiddos with her. I entertained the girls while she had her meeting, then we went out to a local coffee shop for lunch. So I give myself credit for packing a lunch of leftover pasta, but I give myself a fail for not eating it. I had a tasty sandwich of salami, asiago cheese, and some kind of special relish from a place called Baked in town.

Wednesday
I ate a leftover cheeseburger. Technically, it was a patty melt. What’s the deal with that? A hamburger on a bun is called a hamburger, but a hamburger on slices of bread is called a patty melt. I don’t get it.

I didn’t pack anything else so I was starving by the time I got home. Starving.

Thursday
I found another leftover hamburger in the fridge. This one had a bun. I also brought some leftover potato wedges. Sort of like steak fries, I guess. And a cookie.

Friday
Another bowl of Fusilli with sweet potatoes, zucchini, onions, broccoli, and Italian sausages. And a cookie.

Sorry for the lack of images. Hopefully, next week I’ll be better at snapping photos of my food before I eat it.

I’m taking part in the Brown-Bag Challenge, a month-long initiative to eat consciously and save money by packing a lunch each weekday instead of eating out. Join us here and share what you’re eating on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #brownbag.

Tags: brown bag challenge, lunch

September 19th, 2011

Planting a fall crop and seeing the seeds sprout is like experiencing a mini-spring. The onslaught of autumn can be overwhelming if you let it. Fall is beautiful, what with the crisp air and colorful leaves and all, but let’s face it: the implication of autumn is nothing more than winter. Cold. Dark. Winter.

Ah, but the planting of a few seeds in late summer gives your garden a new lease on life. Or at least a seasonal sublet.

With this in mind, let me introduce you to the vernal soldiers of the fall: my kale seedlings.

Tags: fall, fall planting, kale

September 16th, 2011

I read somewhere a long time ago that if you want to start a new habit, you have to repeat the behavior 12 times before it will likely stick.

Well, I’m not quite there yet. I have only packed my lunch 10 times in a row. But I feel good about it. I am confident that I’ll complete this brown bag challenge and make it to the end of the month. And who knows—I might just continue to brown bag it after that, saving trips to the corporate cafeteria for special occasions and dire emergencies.

Last week, I mentioned that one of the unlooked-for benefits of packing every day was that our fridge didn’t fill up with orphan leftovers and moldy containers of last week’s suppers. But this week, I report on the downside. My wife and daughter would usually eat some of those leftovers for lunch and this challenge has been depriving them of some quick lunches. Hmm…what to do, what to do.

Here’s my Brown Bag wrap up for the week:

Monday.

Another leftover i-oy: Fusilli with spinach and sun-dried tomatoes. In this picture, you get a glimpse of how I sometimes spend my lunch break: reading Paul Krugman in the Times and compiling a list of semi-obscure holiday tunes to record this year for the annual family Christmas record.

Tuesday.

Leftover Frittata. This meal was inspired by a recipe in next week’s Garden to Table Newsletter.

Wednesday.

A roast beef sandwich with horseradish, cheese, and a tomato from the garden. And a side of organic grapes. This is a leftover sandwich because my wife actually cooked the roast the night before. Local, grass-fed beef. Plus a cookie from Kimberton Whole Foods.

Thursday.

Another excellent chicken soup. With corn, sweet potatoes, carrots, broccoli and who-knows-what-else. My wife makes good soup.

Friday.

I swear this was a bowl of tortellini. With a red sauce made from Eden Organic crushed tomatoes, strained tomatoes, & tomato paste, cooked with onions and fresh parsley from the garden. I was so hungry today that I simple forgot to take a picture until it was all gone.

I’m taking part in the Brown-Bag Challenge, a month-long initiative to eat consciously and save money by packing a lunch each weekday instead of eating out. Join us here and share what you’re eating on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #brownbag.

Tags: brown bag challenge, lunch, organic food, tomatoes

September 12th, 2011

That’s it.

I give up.

I’m done.

I’m going to rip everything out, scatter grass seed, and never garden again.

Or at least that’s how I feel. In a word: defeated.

Was it the weather?

First there was the super soggy spring. Then came what felt like months of blistering heat, followed by weeks and weeks of hurricanes and rain.

Or was it the dark armies of garden pests—the wilt-wielding cucumber beetles, the nectar-of-life-sucking squash bugs, the alien Mexican bean beetle larvae that transform into skeltonizing oversized yellow-spotted merchants of death? Or perhaps it was the stupid plodding stink bugs or the colonies of swarming ants. Did I mention the slugs? And forget about the green worms on my broccoli.

Forget about it—I’m done.

I’m guessing the weather had at least a little bit to do with my bugs. These swings in temperatures and conditions undoubtedly caused my poor plants much stress, and as we all know, stress affects overall health. Once the health of your plants is compromised, your garden falls easy prey to those garden-wrecking hexapods from hell.

I thought I had a handle on the bugs, what with my daily diligence of leaf inspection and insect-smashing. But once the rains set in, my routine collapsed and it all veered toward oblivion. And now I just want to rip it all out, plant grass seed, and be done gardening forever.

But there is a garden in my heart and I know several things:

Next year will be better, or at least different.

And:

To garden is to have a hand in Creation, to be a part of the giant wheel of the world.

Bugs and all.

Tags: cucumber beetles, garden pests, squash bugs

September 8th, 2011

One week ago today, I started packing my lunch, instead of buying my lunch from the café downstairs. My first lunch was a glorious chicken salad sandwich made by my loving wife. My subsequent lunches have been reconfigurations of leftover dinners.

Friday, September 2, was leftover homemade chicken soup with lentils and vegetables.

Monday was a holiday.

Tuesday was leftover Pasta Fazul. That spelling looks weird to me, but then again, I’ve never tried spelling it before. It’s my mother-in-law’s recipe and it’s good. A little Locatelli cheese and some red pepper flakes and you’re all set.

Wednesday was leftover i-oy. What? Yep. I-oy. That’s what my wife’s family calls aglio olio. Maybe it’s a regional dialect thing, but whatever it’s called, i-oy is always good. I made this one the night before with onions, beans, garlic, basil, parsley, and tomatoes from the garden. Plus I added frozen organic spinach, broccoli, and peas. I also made meatballs from some local ground pork. Again, a little Locatelli and some red pepper flakes and you’re good to go.

Of course, I forgot to take a picture of the i-oy, but I did manage to remember to take a picture of the homemade cup cake I had for dessert.

When I heat these meals up in the microwave, I use a Pyrex bowl. I never put plastic in the microwave, because I’m sure that microwaving plastic leaches all sorts of toxins into your food.

And today, I had another chicken sandwich. This time made by yours truly, so it wasn’t quite the sandwich event that last week’s was, but it was still pretty good: Leftover chicken cutlets with a slice of cheddar cheese on multigrain bread. I brought a whole avocado and a tomato and sliced them up right on the spot.

Why do i like the Healthy Eats Brown Bag challenge? Yes, I’m saving money. Yes, I have complete control over what I’m eating. But there is something else: the dinner leftovers aren’t piling up in the fridge. Our refrigerator is sort of famous for being the place where leftovers go to die. So the surprising benefit of the brown bag challenge? A cleaner fridge.

I’m taking part in the Brown-Bag Challenge, a month-long initiative to eat consciously and save money by packing a lunch each weekday instead of eating out. Join us here and share what you’re eating on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #brownbag.

Tags: br, brown bag challenge, leftovers, lunches

September 7th, 2011

Funny how a long weekend can seem so short. All it takes is rain. And more rain. And more rain.

I’ve been meaning to plant my fall crops  for a few weeks now, but you know how that goes…earthquakes, hurricanes, rain, more rain, birthday parties, work, more work, and so on…..it just gets away from you.

But Saturday morning, I found some time and some clear weather to prepare some beds and plant some seeds. Here’s what I intended to plant:

In the end I only planted eight out of eleven: beans, spinach, turnips, carrots, mache, and 3 types of kale. I felt it was too late to plant the peas, and I wasn’t really into planting chard this year.

Here’s a 4×6 bed of carrots, with a Black Icicle tomato plant in the corner:

Carrot Bed

I’m excited about the mache. I’ve never grown it before. I’ve never eaten it before. But from what I’ve read, we might be eating it well into winter.

Mache Bed

I am also very excited about my turnips. I planted turnips last fall, they overwintered and went to seed late this spring. This is my first real venture into saving seeds. (See my earlier blog posts about turnips).

Turnip Bed

I will refrain from posting pictures of  the beans, spinach and kale—after all, how many pictures of dirt do you need to see? I think three is plenty.

I’ll keep you posted on the progress. I hope all this rain hasn’t washed my seeds out.

Tags: fall planting, rain, saving seeds, turnips

September 1st, 2011

Lunch is one of the most important meals of the day. It’s in my top 5 for sure. Which is why this brown bag challenge might be, uh, challenging for me.

Here’s the thing: here at Rodale, the café is pretty amazing. The food is always fresh, usually local, and mostly organic. I’m totally spoiled. Here’s a screen shot of today’s menu.

So why would I want to pack my lunch every day for a month? Two reasons come to mind:

• It’s an exercise in self-discipline and self-sacrifice. I will become a better person by packing my lunch.

• I will save money. The café isn’t SUPER expensive, but it adds up. Plus, if swipe my employee card, the money comes right out of my paycheck, so I hardly ever pay in cash. It’s easy to forget that this food is costing me money.

I admit, though, that I loathe the idea of having to prepare a meal in the morning before work. I did this every day for years when I worked in the electrical and solar trades. In my early morning pre-coffee fog, I would throw together the saddest little lunches you’ve ever seen. And then these lunches would sit in my truck all morning until it was time to eat and they would be wholly unfulfilling. So when I got to Rodale, the café was an oasis of goodness.

This morning, however, something wonderful happened: My wife offered to make my lunch. Now, you have to understand that she doesn’t just make a sandwich—she builds a sandwich. She takes such care with each ingredient. Her every action is deliberate. The result is an amazing testament to good food made with real love.

So my first day of the challenge, I will have the pleasure of eating a chicken salad sandwich (local, organic, free range chicken of course), with onion, tomato, and parsley from our garden (picked this morning), on multigrain grain bread. Plus, a handful of organic grapes, a box of raisins, and a piece of leftover blueberry cake that my wife made for my daughter’s third birthday 2 days ago.

I’m probably more excited about lunch today than I’ve been in a long time. So thanks to the Good Eats people at the Food Network for challenging me in such a way, and thanks to my wife for making this incredible meal.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some eating to do.

(wondering now if the other challenge should be to not eat lunch in my office.)

We’re teaming up with fellow food bloggers to host a Brown-Bag Challenge, a month-long initiative to eat consciously and save money by packing a lunch each weekday instead of eating out. Join us here and share what you’re eating on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #brownbag.

Tags: brown bag challenge, food, lunch