Let me start on a positive note.  I have secured access to a camera!  While this still does not imply that I have the ability to competently photograph things, it does mean I can create images that legally belong to me.  That is exciting.  

For instance, last Tuesday I took a series of photos of the dinner I was making.

Unfortunately, it took me several more days to figure out how to upload them to my computer, and by then I'd kind of lost interest in the meal.  If I remember correctly, I served the lima bean stew pictured above, with garlicky spinach piled on top, and some good sourdough bread I didn't bake myself.  I did remember to buy butter for the first time in weeks, and we were all pleased about that.  All in all it was an okay, not great, workaday dinner.

I try to cook new recipes three times a week at least; last week it was four, because I had two simple egg recipes I wanted to try.  One night we had the "oaty-eggs" described at the link above, with honey and butter (I think some of us had jam instead), and a big fruit salad.  They were a hit, and simple as anything- especially since my gas stove, with its stupidly tiny burners, is terrible for heating a pancake griddle, and these egg pancakes simply worked.  They didn't stick at all and cooked evenly.  They weren't terribly filling, though, and everybody wanted more.  Next time I'll make more than two oaty-eggs apiece.

I also made the wasabi devilled eggs from the same page (am I really linking to Livestrong after watching The Armstrong Lie?  I can't bring myself to fault the whole community, though).  Conclusion: while wasabi might be a nice addition to classic devilled eggs, this particular recipe- which substitutes sour cream for mayonnaise, adds rice vinegar, and contains nothing remotely sweet- just didn't do it for us.  We found them bland and slightly bitter, and- though we were a little embarrassed to admit it- we missed the usual added sugars.

The fourth thing I cooked last week was... another white bean stew.  Cuban white-bean-and-pumpkin stew, as a matter of fact, which sadly was not as good as it sounded, perhaps because I couldn't find certain specialty Cuban ingredients (cachuchas, culantro), even at my nearby Caribbean grocery.  We ate it over white rice, with some broccoli on the side, green salad, and manchego cheese.  It was bland as all hell, and there were a ton of leftovers.  Some extra salt, and the miracle of flavor-mingling while sitting in the fridge for days, improved these beans over time, but I would not make them again.

Why did I make two different white bean stews in three days?  Well, we've finally arrived at my shameful secret.  Some people, even ones I respect very highly, talk about "cooking their way through cookbooks."  By which they seem to mean, "choosing a handful or two of recipes from a single cookbook, ones that happen to appeal to me, and cooking them one after another in a sort of mini-binge, then assessing the results."

I don't know anyone else who cooks their way through cookbooks the way I do.  (If you do, and you happen to be reading this, please speak up!!)  By which I mean, starting at the beginning and cooking every single recipe, in order, until I get to the end, even though at the pace of two recipes a week this is liable to take years.  (I said I make three or more new recipes a week: the third is generally an internet recipe that I've bookmarked because it looked appealing.  I keep a long list of these, and have a good year's worth in the queue.)

For instance.  Right now I am cooking my way through Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian (published in 1999- no trendy or timely cookbooks for me!  Less than three years ago, I finished a New York Times cookbook from 1961.  I did skip some aspics from that one).

It's hard to read the fine print in the picture, but at the bottom of that book it reads, "More than 650 meatless recipes from around the globe."  At two recipes per week, I will cook approximately 100 per year, so it will probably take me six years or more to finish this book.  Don't get me wrong, I like the foods in here, though Jaffrey does have a tendency to put too much liquid in her beans, recipe after recipe (I'm in the bean section).  But, I have a lot of cookbooks to get to.

Oh, wait, I just thought of someone who cooked through an entire cookbook- how could I have forgotten?- and she got ultrafamous for it.  The Julie and Julia chick.  I liked her book a lot, but more than anything it was because I couldn't believe there was a kindred spirit out there.  ...And, just now, in the process of going back to find her book and her actual name and her blog and so forth, I've (re)discovered that she also had difficulty finishing the aspics.  I swear I am not an (intentional) Julie Powell copycat!; I've been doing this since, I think, the year 2000 (maybe 2001?), well before I read her book, and it's not so much a project as an expression of a compulsive personality, I would guess.  Which is why I view it as my dirty little secret instead of something that will make me rich.

Regardless, you should expect to hear a lot about beans over the next months.

Again.  I need to get a camera.

When I open the refrigerator door, my cat tries to climb in there.  She likes exploring.  Yesterday, though, I had just been grocery shopping, and there was a big bag of raw spinach, barely tied closed, resting on the bottom shelf.  My cat made a beeline for it.  She nibbled on the leaf that was sticking out of the bag, then began determinedly pulling it through the hole and out onto the floor.  I helped.  She ate that whole leaf and, every time I open the refrigerator, she dashes in to grab another one.  Eventually I had to cut her off (can a whole lot of spinach be good for a cat?).  

Meanwhile, she rejected the bite of wildly expensive ribeye steak that I saved for her.  She doesn't care for fish.  She also doesn't care for cheese, or popcorn, or any of the other things former cats of mine have considered delicious treats.  Leave a bit of lettuce on the cutting board, though, and she's on her hind legs trying to swat it to the floor with her paw.

Jill Ortman-Fouse replied:
"I fully support and encourage our children's advocacy efforts and hope they continue their courageous battles to protect our world and future. The pilot project for the recyclable trays being launched at a school besides Piney Branch was a slap in the face to the community. Again, we should be on the cutting edge of such efforts. As it is, we are behind all the counties that surround us, as well as the other large school systems."

Ortman-Fouse makes an excellent point (that the children who fought so hard for this change are not the pilot's beneficiaries), and- more importantly- seems to be up-to-date and conscious of the evolving situation.

As for the other candidates, Edward Amatetti and Shebra Evans, I can't find any record of either one taking a position on the lunch tray issue, though Evans attended a public meeting in 2012 where it was discussed (and hence is likely at least aware of the question).

Personally, I'm going Jill Ortman-Fouse, and my daughter informed me yesterday that my choice was the same one approved by well-known Young Activist Club alumna A.B., whom I respect a very great deal considering that she is barely 13.  No, scratch that-- I respect her a very great deal, period.  She will be president if the Takoma Park community has anything to do with it.

So, children, pester your parents to make their vote based on candidates' position on sane lunch tray usage.  You have a lot of power.  Most parents don't know what the hell is even going on in your lunchroom (what do you mean, there isn't an actual kitchen anymore?).  They're not there.  It's up to you to inform them.  

And remember, as soon as you're old enough: VOTE.

It's Sunday morning.  Last night my husband and I splurged for our anniversary and ate at a classic area steak restaurant.  I had a huge ribeye, priced at $31.99.  (Also, a mixed salad; side dishes of mashed potatoes and creamed spinach, which were both even better than the steak itself; a glass of cabernet; and chocolate mousse for dessert.)  Did I mention the ribeye was huge?  I only ate half.  (Same with the chocolate mousse, which my husband finished off for me.)  I brought the other half of the steak home, for the express purpose of enjoying it this morning.  Steak and eggs.

Sliced and reheated on the griddle, it was still enough to share between the both of us.  I fried us a couple of eggs apiece, over-medium-ish, cut our last hunk of Fonzy melon in half, made toast.  (I keep forgetting to buy butter, but we had three pre-packaged pats that I stuck in my purse after our trip to the diner on Friday night, along with my leftover biscuit wrapped in a napkin.  No, I don't have a delicate little appetite, restaurants serve you too much food.  And I hate to waste anything.)  The toast was bland, some Arnold's affair I bought at Snider's,  claiming to be whole-grain.  Everything else was delicious.

No, I didn't take a picture of this meal, because a) it never occurs to me to take pictures of anything, b) I don't have a camera of my own, even a cell phone that takes photos, and c) this post was utterly spontaneous.  I opened a draft without the slightest idea what I might say, only that I wanted to somehow introduce the site before launching into my next post, a highly specific discussion of a particular issue in some local elections.  That seemed a jarring way to begin, but perhaps steak and eggs are stranger still.  One thing is clear, however.  I need to develop the capacity to take photos.  If nothing else, it would make my mother so happy.  Also, I wouldn't have as many moments like yesterday's, when, after an exhaustive image search,  I chose a mundane Washington Post-owned photo of two empty lunch trays sitting side by side, one cardboard and one styrofoam, and priced the cost of using said image on my website... $1660.  This was a shock.  Being nothing if not honest, I walked away.

So, this is an image-free first post, which reflects my true nature, but is not in line with current trends.  Images, I promise, will be forthcoming.  I'm excited, in a way, to have a site without a clear plan, one that can change and grow without betraying its purpose.  The title came to me, though, as I was using the restroom (swiftly, efficiently) for a moment in the middle of my waitressing shift.  See, eating is everywhere in my life.  It is the mission of my workplace.  It is my preoccupation as an adventurous home cook and a lover of grimy diners and refrigerated sushi.  Any political issue that centers on food or agriculture tends to get my attention, especially if it has to do with the school lunch program.  I read books on nutrition and try out different fad diets, but only if I'm convinced they're healthy.  Grocery shopping is one of my favorite things.  What are we doing tonight for Father's Day?  Why, going out for dinner, of course.

There's nothing unusual about this.  While we may, in our modern arrogance, pretend that eating is no longer the very center of our existence, I would submit that we are totally wrong.  As our food culture becomes ever more complex (PaleoEthiopianTwinkies?UnagiGlutenfreeGeneralTso'sMastercleanseMrPibbFarmer'smarketSmithfieldRawfoodSourpatchkids), we are still animals.

As one of my daughter's favorite teachers would say, eating is important indeed.