No no. Not MY birthday. My wife's.
In her world, my wife treats her birthday as a National Holiday. And not the North American "made up" ones that are created simply to round out the days off we get throughout the year. I'm talking about one of those old world, Chinese or Bolshevik celebrations that involve complex ceremonies and animal sacrifices. Entire villages gather in the public square and stand mute, facing East waiting for enlightenment from an unseen God. Those who avert their eyes, even briefly, are delighted to be beaten with sticks for their lack of faith.
The people of those villages have a fleeting understanding of the conviction the likes of which my wife has for her birthday.
This is not a critical assessment of her views. Far from it. I quite respect her devotion to treating herself special this one day a year. She, of all people, deserves it. She works very hard as a wife and mother, and a patient caregiver to the legions of snotty, screaming, toy scatterers she is charged with caring for.1
I have always struggled to contribute to Tannis' birthday happiness, but have more often come up short. I am not the best event planner or gift-giver. I find all to many of my gift ideas are tainted by what I think I would like to receive. And whenever I have tried to plan an event, it is often undermined by forces beyond my control. To make matters worse, she is excellent at these efforts. Her ability to plan and orchestrate a day is carried out with military precision. Although, instead of battle fatigues and a cigar, she does it with a stylish outfit and an iced tea.
This year was going to be different. It all started when I went to Canadian Tire to buy light bulbs. I walked past a post-Christmas sale display of kitchen appliances and saw an electric frying pan. Exactly what she has asked for. And before you judge me too harshly for appliance shopping for my wife for her birthday, trust me, an electric frying pan is one of the least offensive things on her shopping list. In past years she has asked for a mop, and a vacuum. So, gleeful in my find, I purchase the frying pan.
The next gift was an impulse purchase that I wasn't too sure about. I started the day shopping with the kids looking for a few baking items that, as it turns out, are only available from a company that does not ship to Canada. The birthday was only a week away at this point, so I decided that negotiating a borderside shipping proxy was going to take too long. So back in the car we hopped and head to Best Buy to check out another purchase option that I had thought of.
I don't need a voting button on this blog to know that the penis-based readers are nodding approval at my new choice of repertory in which to shop, where the penis-less readers are likely recoilling in horror. But I hadn't thought of this purchase strictly alone. I have been trying for a couple of years to put together a portable computer for my wife to use out of parts of non-functioning end-of-life systems from the office. And last year, just when I thought I had a working system for her, it died a quiet death after only 3 uses. She wanted a light-weight computer that she could use to check her e-mail and such while on the main floor, or up in the bedrooms. Enter: the HP Mini Netbook.
I was nervous to present it to her, thinking that she would find he screen to small, or the keyboard too diminutive. But as it turns out, she couldn't have been more pleased. Since opening it and configuring it, she has been using it almost constantly. Anybody that reads her Tweets knows that she has really been enjoying it. Technology FTW!
The last component was the birthday dinner. I have planned this type event in the past with varying degrees of mediocrity. Don't get me wrong, we have always had fun. But we always have fun, it's what we do. I would like just once to have her come home after one of these dinner outings and run upstairs to flop in her bed with her diary and catalog all of the swooning that she did that evening and then calling all of her friends to relate the tale. Last year we went to Homers Greek restaurant for dinner(moderate win), followed by glow in the dark mini-putt(measurable fail). I was hoping to find an event that would engage the kids, but I lost sight of the goal. This is Tannis' day.
This time I decided that I would take her out to dinner and invite a few of her friends. I made some calls, and got RSVP's from Nat, Toshya, and Ange. Nat (via Jacques) informed me that there was a Geocaching Pub Night at the Round Table that night. So I decided that to be the venue so that it would be easier for a few of our other friends to join her for drinks or dinner if they wished.
It is always a challenge to get my wife to do something on a schedule that isn't her own. But the fact that we had a reservation made it easier to be on time and it worked out perfectly. The surprise she showed on her face was worth all of the planning. And we had a wonderful dinner with some exceptional people.
I am lucky to have this woman in my life and look forward to celebrating many birthdays with her in the future. I already have a few ideas for next year...
1If any of the parents of the children in Tannis' care happen to read this, understand that I am not talking about your child. YOUR child is the epitome of grace and manners. There is not a quieter or healthier child on the face of God's earth.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Recipe - Pumpkin Curry Pasta
Had my mom coming over for dinner, and needed to come up with some unique gastroanomaly to serve. She's always bragging to me about how when she goes to my brother's place, they dine on these crazy delicious and adventuresome dishes like Hamster Cheeks in Brown Butter, or Roasted Goose wearing a sweater knit out of bacon.
A quick survey of the fridge comes up with an odd ingredient ... pumpkin. What can I do with you, my friend? I had once tasted a pumpkin ravioli that was very nice, but the supper hour was fast approaching and pasta takes too much time. Perhaps another style of pasta? Somewhere in the pantry is a bundle of squid ink spaghetti. But I quickly determined that the combination of blackish-gray spaghetti noodles with an orange sauce would become the grossest looking thing to ever grace a plate. I opt for mixing some cavatappi and ricotti noodles together as we have one serving of each of them remaining. Grabbing the 2 boxes of pasta and the coconut milk I needed for my sauce, I head to the cooktop to see what I can produce.
I dropped about 2 tablespoons of pumpkin into approximately 3/4 of a cup of coconut mik. I played with that ratio till I got the pumpkin intensity/color I was looking for. How to season this? Im not sure if it was due to the influence of the colour of the pumpkin, but my mind immediately jumped to curry. Problem is, aside from olives (more on this later) and beer, curry is the one thing that my wife doesn't like. I gave it much thought. I really tried to think of something else. But like a drunk reaching for his favorite bottle, it was muscule memory that guided my hand to the curry jar.
But I really didn't use much curry. Just enough to give it an essence of a land that, to the best of my knowledge, has never grown a pumpkin. Maybe a half teaspoon of medium yellow curry powder.
*taste*
Not bad. Needs a kick. How about some sort of spice? I remember a Thai green curry paste I had in the fridge. Yes! I put in a pea-sized granule, as I know this stuff has some legs to it. Perfect. Rootiness of the pumpkin, smoothness of the coconut, aroma of curry #1, and the heat from curry #2. But it needs something more...
Sweetness.
What do I use for that? Brown sugar? Molasses? What would my brother do? Hmm. He would have had sugar cane flown in from Hawaii the week before. My options are more regional. Honey! I grab the lavender honey and give the sauce enough to just round out the sweetness. I decide that I had best mix this together ahead of time and serve it "pasta salad" style. It was very nice. And even my wife had a small second helping! And I'm willing to bet that if I went home right now, that the leftover portion that we put in the fridge became her lunch.
I served it with tilapia fillets. I heated up the broiling pan ahead of time, dusted the fillets with a simple lemon pepper, brushed with olive oil, and did them in the oven. This preparation was fine for the family, but mom deserved something better. I decide to do a tapenede of sorts. Olives, lemon, olive oil, russian mustard, and cashews. I originally tweeted this recipe with pecans, I think. I am correcting myself now. I mashed this all together and put it on a couple of the fillets. Winner. It was delicious.
To round out the vegetable content, I sauteed young asparagus in olive oil I had flavored with garlic. Take that Kris!
It was nice to have the company of mom for a fun meal. Soon she'll be back in Regina. Maybe there's time for one more inventive supper...
A quick survey of the fridge comes up with an odd ingredient ... pumpkin. What can I do with you, my friend? I had once tasted a pumpkin ravioli that was very nice, but the supper hour was fast approaching and pasta takes too much time. Perhaps another style of pasta? Somewhere in the pantry is a bundle of squid ink spaghetti. But I quickly determined that the combination of blackish-gray spaghetti noodles with an orange sauce would become the grossest looking thing to ever grace a plate. I opt for mixing some cavatappi and ricotti noodles together as we have one serving of each of them remaining. Grabbing the 2 boxes of pasta and the coconut milk I needed for my sauce, I head to the cooktop to see what I can produce.
I dropped about 2 tablespoons of pumpkin into approximately 3/4 of a cup of coconut mik. I played with that ratio till I got the pumpkin intensity/color I was looking for. How to season this? Im not sure if it was due to the influence of the colour of the pumpkin, but my mind immediately jumped to curry. Problem is, aside from olives (more on this later) and beer, curry is the one thing that my wife doesn't like. I gave it much thought. I really tried to think of something else. But like a drunk reaching for his favorite bottle, it was muscule memory that guided my hand to the curry jar.
But I really didn't use much curry. Just enough to give it an essence of a land that, to the best of my knowledge, has never grown a pumpkin. Maybe a half teaspoon of medium yellow curry powder.
*taste*
Not bad. Needs a kick. How about some sort of spice? I remember a Thai green curry paste I had in the fridge. Yes! I put in a pea-sized granule, as I know this stuff has some legs to it. Perfect. Rootiness of the pumpkin, smoothness of the coconut, aroma of curry #1, and the heat from curry #2. But it needs something more...
Sweetness.
What do I use for that? Brown sugar? Molasses? What would my brother do? Hmm. He would have had sugar cane flown in from Hawaii the week before. My options are more regional. Honey! I grab the lavender honey and give the sauce enough to just round out the sweetness. I decide that I had best mix this together ahead of time and serve it "pasta salad" style. It was very nice. And even my wife had a small second helping! And I'm willing to bet that if I went home right now, that the leftover portion that we put in the fridge became her lunch.
I served it with tilapia fillets. I heated up the broiling pan ahead of time, dusted the fillets with a simple lemon pepper, brushed with olive oil, and did them in the oven. This preparation was fine for the family, but mom deserved something better. I decide to do a tapenede of sorts. Olives, lemon, olive oil, russian mustard, and cashews. I originally tweeted this recipe with pecans, I think. I am correcting myself now. I mashed this all together and put it on a couple of the fillets. Winner. It was delicious.
To round out the vegetable content, I sauteed young asparagus in olive oil I had flavored with garlic. Take that Kris!
It was nice to have the company of mom for a fun meal. Soon she'll be back in Regina. Maybe there's time for one more inventive supper...
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