Everyone has particular food routines when they’re sick. For me, recovering from a stomach bug means plain toast, white rice, and ginger ale. Once I’ve really turned the corner, I move on to Tony’s hot & sour soup and chocolate cake. Don’t ask me why, but when I’ve been without food for a couple days, I want strong flavors, and that peppery, vinegary soup always does the trick. For the cake, Tony used to run out and get me a slice of Just Desserts’ weekend cake (a triple-layer chocolate cake), but the bakery moved out of the neighborhood and nothing else has really filled the gap. This week, it occured to me that I was feeling well enough to make my own recovery cake.

Crazy Cake is the first cake I ever made. I think I made it with Libby, and I may be to blame for the salt-for-sugar debacle. The recipe is all over the place: in Peg Bracken’s I Hate to Cook Book (a fabulous book even for those of us who like to cook); in Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home (where it’s called, accurately, 6-Minute Cake; even in my fevered state, I had the batter together in half the time it took for the oven to preheat), and it goes by many names (cockeyed cake; vegan chocolate cake, which is also accurate, but less appetizing). All you need to know is that it’s good, quick, and plenty chocolatey. I don’t know why I don’t make it more often.

1 1/2 c white flour
1/3 c unsweetened cocoa
1 c sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

1 c water or coffee
1/2 c vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp vinegar (any old vinegar will do, though I grabbed a fancy red wine vinegar this time and it was particularly good)

1/2 c semisweet chocolate chips (optional, but what’s not better with some chocolate chips?)

Preheat the oven to 375.

Combine the dry ingrediants in an ungreased 8″ square or 9″ round baking pan. In a 2-cup measure, combine the water, oil and vanilla. Pour the liquid ingrediants into the baking pan and mix the batter with a fork until smooth (make sure to get into the corners so that you don’t get dry floury bites in the finished cake!). Now add the vinegar and stir quickly. There will be pale swirls in the batter from the baking soda and vinegar reacting. Stir just until the vinegar is evenly distributed. Sprinkle the chocolate chips on top. Bake for 25 minutes, cool a bit, and enjoy.

Skip Scoop. Unless of course you’re such a fan of Woody Allen that you want to see Scarlett Johansson act like Woody Allen. I love her, I really do (though I think I loved her more before she got quite so beautiful; check out Manny & Lo to see her as a tomboyish tween), but after an hour I got tired of her all ticks and jumpiness and had to flee.

March of the Penguins. Beautiful, informative, anthropomorphizing. Not a kid’s movie, but it doesn’t seem to have scarred Ben.

The Beach. Blue Lagoon meets Lord of the Flies. It’s very pretty and all (Leonardo di Caprio, the beach), but who really needs it?

Monster-in-Law. See, after three days stuck at home, sick, I’m scraping the bottom of the barrel. This is even worse than you would expect. Although I must admit that the last scene between Jennifer Lopez and Jane Fonda made me tear up a bit. But I still miss my mother-(never a monster)-in-law. Plus, I was feverish.

Once you become a parent, you pretty much say goodbye to the days of “enjoying ill health.” No more days on the couch with the TV on, drifting in and out to the lineup on Food Network, no more lying in bed with a box of tissues, a bottle of Tylenol, and a couple fat novels. No, once the little people enter the picture, you’re up and doing no matter how lousy you feel. I’ll never forget the first time I came down with a stomach bug after Ben was born; we cuddled up in a nest of blankets and towels on the bathroom floor. Occasionally, I’d haul myself up and get quietly sick, then lie back down and nurse Ben. Or last summer, which I think of now as the Summer Of Strep (4 cases in as many months), when I had to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge to get a throat culture and antibiotics, running a 101 fever and, once I got to the doctor’s office, hauling Eli along in the sling. It felt like a good day, in the end, because I’d only had to take care of one kid.

This weekend, though, as I deal with my mystery bug (is it a cold? is it a stomach bug? is it strep again? who really knows?), I’ve had a taste of those old days. Tony took the boys for 3 days straight, leaving me to watch a couple movies, read a couple books, and spend more time in bed than I have in ages. Last night, I even pulled Ben briefly into my slothful state, as we cuddled up together, eating chocolate and watching March of the Penguins (this morning, he gave Tony an accurate census both of chocolate pieces consumed and penguin deaths witnessed).

The thing is, though, despite how lovely — and I’m sure restorative–it has been to rest, I’d much rather be up and hanging out with the guys, clamorous arguments and all. Turns out the old days have gotten a little old.

I keep thinking that I’ll have a normal day to report on this project; maybe next month!

Dark o’clock I roll over and realize Ben is in bed with us. For the next couple hours, I sleep fitfully as his slow scissor kicks push me into the middle of the bed. I don’t know how Tony is managing to stay in bed. He must have the kind of gear climbers use to sleep on the sheer face of El Capitan.

5:40 Ben wakes with a little squeak and trots back down the hall to his room. I hear him shut the bedroom door behind him.

6:30 “Dah!” Eli’s awake. It’s my turn to sleep in, which means Tony goes to get him, brings him to me in bed to nurse.

6:45 Eli sits up and gestures toward sleeping Tony (how can he get back to sleep so fast?) like a pointer, every muscle taut. “Are you ready to go play?” I ask. He dives back onto my chest. That’d be a no.

6:50 Done nursing. Tony picks him up, and Eli blows kisses and waves as they leave the room.
I read an essay, roll over, and go back to sleep. I dream that midgets are breaking into our house and I’m offering them stuff if only they’d leave, but they keep rejecting my offers.

8 Ben comes in and says hi. I can’t move or even open my eyes. He leaves. I hear him go downstairs, and hear the happy terradactyl shrieks as Eli greets him. I listen to the zoo sounds awhile, then roll out of bed and go downstairs. Raucous play ensues.

8:30 Finally get to my breakfast. I serve myself more cereal than I need, knowing that Eli (who’s already eaten a big bowl of oatmeal with Tony) will mooch. We eat our granola and o’s together, then play with Ben.

9:15 Tony takes Eli upstairs for a nap. Ben pulls all the dining room chairs into train formation and we play train for awhile. It’s a commuter train, so I’m allowed to read the paper.

9:30 Ben sits down to an episode of Sesame St; I go upstairs to take a shower and get dressed.

10:00 Ben and I settle in to play trains.

11 It dawns on me that I have a cold. It also occurs to me that since Eli won’t nurse again till tomorrow morning, I could take some cold medicine. The mind reels — this makes having a cold kind of exciting! But I can only find some advil. Better than nothing.

11:30 Realize I’m feeling way too lousy to take the kids to the zoo as planned; Tony rearranges his day in order to take the boys and I climb back into bed.

2 Wake up, completely disoriented. If I’m in bed and the clock says 2, it must be the middle of the night, right? But it’s so bright in the room. I stare at the clock for several minutes trying to make sense of the situation. I don’t think I’ve taken a nap in a year.

3-something Tony and the boys return, but my cold keeps me on the fringes of the family for the rest of the day. We’ll try another Day in the Life report next month when I can fully participate!

I know I’ve posted this recipe before, but now I’ve taken such a pretty picture of the salad, I had to bring it up to the front of the queue. Plus, apparently now watermelon is so hip, even the folks at Design Within Reach are talking about it.

This is from Nigella Lawson’s Forever Summer. People might look at it and, mistaking the pale pink watermelon for lame supermarket tomatoes, think it’s a bad Greek salad, so just assure them that it is something delicious and new. They’ll be so pleased.

1 small red onion
2-4 limes, depending on their juiciness
3 1/2 pounds watermelon
9 oz feta cheese
1 bunch fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 bunch fresh mint, chopped
3-4 T olive oil
4 oz pitted black olives
black pepper to taste

Peel and halve the red onion and cut into very fine half moons. Put in a small bowl to steep with the lime juice. Two limes should do it, unless they seem dry; you be the judge.

Remove the rind and seeds from the watermelon and cut into large bite-sized, triangular chunks. Cut the feta into similar sized pieces and put them both in a large, shallow bowl. Tear off the sprigs of parsley so that it’s used like a salad leaf, rather than garnish, and add to the bowl along with the chopped mint.

Now add the onions (with the now oniony lime juice), olive oil, and olives, and toss gently so as not to break up the watermelon and feta too much. Add a nice grinding of black pepper and taste to see whether the dressing needs more lime. Keep at room temperature till serving.

Mary, over at Mom Writes, blogged about three things she can do that make her life easier and more pleasant, and her funny, useful list has got me thinking about how my expectations have shifted since having kids. There was a time when a productive day ended with half a dozen pages of my dissertation written (I was a slow writer), or a couple hundred pages of a novel read, or maybe twenty or thirty student essays graded. Those days generally included something homemade for dinner, a clean apartment, and time for a conversation with a friend.

My days don’t end like that anymore.

When I was first pregnant, slowing down and frustrated at how little energy (mental and physical) I had, Tony would remind me that my to-do list needed to shrink down to one thing: Grow the Baby. I was working full time until 3 days before Ben was born, but tried to keep in mind that the main thing, despite my colleagues’ and students’ demands, was getting through the day with the baby still happily inside. After he was born, my to-do list didn’t change much, of course. Despite how much else I might have wanted to do, I tried to focus on that one big check box: Grow the Baby. And he grew, and now he’s been joined by a little brother, and during the first few postpartum months last summer, I was generally pretty satisfied by days that ended with both boys still alive.

Now, however, they are big strong taking-care-of-themselves guys of one and four. Betweeen preschool and a babysitter, I can rely on 3 whole hours without them each week. I have ambitions, well, maybe just aspirations… a column to write, a book to edit. And some days, between those three hours and other random hours achieved when Eli’s naptime and Ben’s traintime magically overlap, by staying up till midnight even though Eli wakes up at 6am, by checking email on my way to the dinner table and reading essay submissions while brushing my teeth, I get some real work done. And some other days, instead of getting anything done, I just get slapped upside the head (metaphorically, mostly) for trying.

So I’m trying to focus again on the little things. It’s not quite Grow the Baby anymore, but the balance is still tipped in favor of the little guys for now, and that’s ok.

Meanwhile, making a list for Mary’s blog was a good reminder of three little things I can do that add some ease and some pleasure to this life: I can bake a loaf of bread without breaking a sweat; I can change Eli’s diaper without taking his legs out of his footie pajamas; and I can pick up just about anything with my toes.

What can you do?

Despite being the daughter and granddaughter of gardeners–farmers, practically–I’ve never had a vegetable garden until now. And I love it. Now, don’t talk to me about your tomatoes; I live in foggy San Francisco. Even during this uncharacteristically warm summer, we’re not getting red tomatoes around here. But the chard and the green beans, they are thriving, and we are watching one single artichoke develop, a tightly closed purple fist in its forest of prickly green leaves. We’re eating out of the garden every night. And it feels like magic.

My new column is up now at Literary Mama. Go unplug your cell phone charger and then check it out!

Alright, as I reported last time I blogged about ricotta (do you suppose anybody has ever used that exact phrase before? ah, probably…), there are other ricotta recipes to try, and now I’ve tried another (from Suzanne Dunaway’s No Need to Knead), and it’s the one. Seriously, make this cheese. It’s easy. It’s quick. It’s delicious enough to eat by the spoonful. It will elevate your desserts and lighten your lasagne. I made this to spoon onto peach pizza, but I think we all wound up eating as much of the cheese, plain, as we did the pizza.

Here’s what you need:
1/2 gallon whole milk
1 cup plain yogurt
1/2 cup lemon juice
a saucepan, a strainer, some cheesecloth, and a large bowl

Here’s what you do:
Combine the milk and yogurt in a large saucepan. Bring to a simmer. Turn off the heat, pour in lemon juice, and let sit for an hour. No need to stir in the lemon juice — just pour it in and let it curdle the milk/yogurt mixture. Toward the end of the hour, get out your strainer, line it with cheesecloth, and set that over a bowl. Pour the curdled milk into the strainer and let it sit another hour, at which point it’s ready to serve (or refrigerate), or let it sit longer (you could leave it over night). The recipe suggests gathering up the ends of the cheesecloth and hanging the dripping cheese from your sink faucet, but I don’t think it’s necessary. You can save the milk that drips off the cheese and use it for baking, as I do, or pour it down the drain. If you want to get a little fancy, you could steep a cinnamon stick or some rosemary or something in the milk while it’s heating, but trust me, the ricotta is delicious enough to eat absolutely unadorned.

I am trying, and so far failing, to write an essay about watching Ben start to read. Since he dictated such a lovely succinct essay the last time we talked about writing, I asked him what he would say about the subject. Here’s his response:

Ben is learning to read words. He’s so proud of himself. We’re proud too. Whenever we play Scrabble and Caroline plays a word, and tells me to read it, I always just read it!

I just have nothing to add to that.