Winter...like in Iowa

I have vowed not to post again until I could come up with something either witty or wise to write. As it has been almost a month, I guess either this blog comes to an end or I renounce my vow. Zut.

Weather report: Snow and sub-zero temps.  Again.  I guess it's weird being just fine with this weather. It beats 90 degrees in the sunshine any time.

Fashion report: long pants, boots, sweaters and big, warm coats, hats and mittens.  Still.  Anything less = stupid...or being a teenager.

Homeschooling:

Reading (just finished a read-aloud for 3rd grade Native American studies; "Indian Captive"), fabulous read! I forcibly signed the two youngest up for the reading program at our library. This is the program that I boycotted when the two oldest were young, back when I lived my belief in reading for reading's sake. With the introduction of video games in our lives, reading has taken  a backseat and I'm having none of it. Bribery it is; they have one week to complete the month-long program. What can I say? The prizes are good.

Writing; cursive and printing, English mostly, some French and a smattering of Spanish. I think Cate is learning Runes or Swahili this week, along with the German she is pursuing consistently. 

Arithmetic; the two girls, 12 and 17, have the pleasure of a weekly math seminar with our excellent math tutor. I attend too. I am almost up to the level of my 12-year-old. Determination WILL trump math phobia.

Geography and History: water has been our favorite topic the past few months. After Cate spent a week on a tallship, we were all curious to know more about our national waterways and islands far away. Last week, the Straits of Gibraltar were mentioned while learning to spell and not spell the word "straight". (Danggit, English is a tough language to spell.)  From there, we talked about other "ways through the continents," and the creation of canals to make that feat possible.

This weekend at the library I found a great documentary on the Panama Canal that we are watching this week; "A Man, A Plan, A Canal." The narrator is David Mccullough; an American author, narrator, historian, and lecturer, whom we know and love as author of books such as "Cathedral", "City" and "Mosque". Do you remember how many lives were lost in the first years of the largest construction project ever? Do you know how they resolved the problems that were killing workers? What the conditions were of the laborers and of the engineers? How about how it was changed from a digging to an elevation endeavor? Do you know the original name of the country of Panama?

Duncan, 15, is able to chime in on the dinner table discussions, as this is a topic he has been studying in school. He likes to be outraged about (and report on) the slave labor used, the horrendous conditions, the French failure and other unsavory aspects of the Canal. It's great to have a teenage perspective on the world; justice and defense of the underdog.

We baked an unpopular dish for our Native American study unit; corn pone. Charles insisted on making 2 versions of it; the unsalted, unsweetened dish that Molly Jemison of "Indian Captive," discovered upon her first breakfast among the Seneca, and the version her mother would have made back home, before she was kidnapped. The second version was delicious while hot, but lingered as a leftover. Clearly, my children have never known hunger. It was great corn pone, as corn pone goes! Recipe below.

We've been going to the Y to run around, swim and play basketball. It has honestly been consistently colder than the deepest level of  Dante's Inferno around here for way too long. I love sitting inside, by the fire, watching the snow fall, but it does not make for good outdoor play weather. The gym membership has been a blessing this winter.

Wisdom; none of my own, but brought to you by Rumi, the 13th century Sufi poet I've been reading for an evening class. He has something to say on every topic. Here are a few, from Goodreads. 600 more can be found at this link.

 

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.”
 

“Today, like every other day, we wake up empty

and frightened. Don't open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down the dulcimer.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.”  

And one last gem,  really more appropriate for a Friday than for mid-week;

"Sit, be still, and listen,
because you're drunk
and we're at
the edge of the roof."

-Rumi

Corn Pone

11/2 cups cornmeal
11/3 cups buttermilk or yogurt with a little milk
1/4 cup shortening, melted
3TBSP. vegetable oil
2 eggs, beaten
11/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup sugar or honey

 In a cast-iron skillet, heat the vegetable oil. Heat oven to 370.

Mix together; cornmeal, salt and sugar (unless omitting these last two for Indian authenticity). Add in buttermilk, melted shortening and eggs (add honey now, if you choose this option). Stir/whisk 2-3 minutes.

Remove skillet from heat for a minute, pour batter into skillet (watch the splattering of hot oil, this is an adult job.) Turn off heat, put skillet in oven, bake 20-25 minutes until done. Try to remove before the edges become black. This indicates burnt pone, not the best. Enjoy with a hot drink!

SSK: stinky, smelly knitting

My kingdom for a lemon. I am pretty sure I should not be knitting on this sock I'd like to finish up, but I wonder if I will have a problem with my keyboard as well? My children have seen something new today and I have learned a skill I swore I would never need to know...fish gutting.

I picked up a couple of lovely fish while shopping today, along with some Guerande sea salt; the brown, sticky kind I can't find at home. As I was contemplating tonight's dinner, I suddenly turned to my husband with a worry; "Honey, if you buy fish at the grocery store here, do they clean it before they sell it?" My fish were all wrapped up and even sealed in a special fish bag, which was new to France. I only ever bought fish from my fish monger at the market, who knew better than to give me fish with innards, or later from the mother of a fisherman who sold the entire morning's catch before 10am each day in our little sea side town. She very kindly cleaned it for me as well. Ever since that fateful night, about fifteen years ago, when I began to prepare dinner and my husband was called away to fix someone's computer, I always remembered to ask for pre-cleaned fish and headless poultry. That was the night that I ran, panicked, to the neighbor's apartment, with my fish and all its parts, having tried unsuccessfully to stick a knife into it to get them out. My neighbors and husband, never let me live it down. I solved that little dilemma by always making sure it was done before bringing it home. Pierre was sure there must be some sort of law about fish being sold in grocery stores without its insides, and besides, he had work to do. I filled the casserole dish with salt, took the fish out of its two bags and braced myself. They were just as beautiful as I remembered, bright eyes, plump flesh with nary a slit, rip or rent. Oh boy.

I grabbed a knife and held my first victim over the garbage can. As I cut and cleaned, Aragorn clamored for a turn. When he realized that this was tonight's dinner, he got excited, revolted and called in all the others to see. They all watched in fascinated revulsion, then took turns covering them up in sea salt. Dinner will be delicious, accompanied by a little Riesling white wine I bought for $3.60, steamed rice and fried tomatoes. Cheese and bread, then fruit for dessert should be perfect.

Now to get my hands de-fished!

The recipe for the fish, a dorade royale or grise, translated by different sources into different things; sea bream being the one that came up most frequently. I'll try to get a picture of a fresh one in the next couple of days.

1) Clean the fish, rinse with cool water.
2) Line a dish with coarse Guerande sea salt or closest equivalent, place fish on top, cover with more sea salt.
3) Bake for 25-30 minutes at 350.
4) The salt will form a crust that peels off; peel and eat.
Bon appetit!