Living and Thinking and Carrying On

Things I've been thinking about, lately:

1) Decentreing whiteness (and heternormativity) and how so many (white, heteronormative) people get so bent out of shape as soon as they're not the focus of like, everything.  It's like, seriously?  Have some chill for once in your damned lives.  The number of assumptions that get made on a daily basis by white people about what the cultural touchstones should be has been really chafing me lately.

2) Further to the above, I've been thinking about how annoying white moms are on the internet.  I mean, as was rightly pointed out to me, "that's on you." Haha!  That's true, I don't have to go looking for anxious, spun up, privileged intensive mothers who are going to make my blood boil with their neuroses and anxieties and constant need for validation from randoms.  But sometimes...I come across it and it makes me SO ANGRY that capable women are choosing to be oppressed and neurotic about the dumbest s**t, that I just can't even.

I got into it with this woman on my twins forum who was basically ready to fire her nanny because of some small infraction (the woman's son wouldn't let the nanny leave because he wanted to hold the nanny's umbrella and so the nanny told him to go take a bite of an apple and then she would let him hold the umbrella and when he went to eat the apple, she snuck out - this of course led to a chorus of [all white] women freaking out about how "deceptive" a practice this is, etc.,) and then of course the conversation spiraled into these wackadoos and their wackadoo expectations for the less privileged (almost universally), women of colour (ditto) who look after their children for not very much money at all.  These employers expect gold-plated service but certainly don't pay the amount that you would assume if you expect your caregiver to basically have a Phd in child psychology, or be an exact proxy for the parent.  There's a different between a caregiver and a parent.  There are huge structural differences between the (often vulnerable) people we pay to look aft our children and us.  It sucks, and you know what, lady?  Some people have real problems.  Why don't you go to Emergency a few more times because your kid has a "strange rash."

Further to the above, someone posted this thing on Facebook that was women's stories of being "assaulted" in child birth by medical practitioners who performed c-sections "without consent" and where women were "shackled" to fetal monitors and "strapped" to hospital beds and "forcibly" coerced into one "medicalized" procedure or another.  My immediate reaction was, that this whole thing of women thinking they know better than medical professionals about what's safe and natural for their children is what lead to the anti-vaccine movement?  I ended up running it by my midwife friend who had some smart points - namely, there's a difference between trauma and assault.  Lots of births can be traumatic - she said that she even found my birth, with the twins, traumatic, but that there is a fundamental difference between trauma and assault.  Like, having to have your baby's collarbone broken so that they can fit through your pelvic opening is super traumatic.  Labour and delivery is such an intimate experience that it's kind of already poised for trauma - you're dealing with life and death!  I think it's wonderful that evidenced-based decision making and women becoming their own health advocates is more and more of a thing, however, we need to strike that balance and dichotomizing the issue so that you have midwives on one hand and evil, military-industrial complex OBs on the other doesn't really sense.  As I was looking into this, I saw that some people use the term "birth rape" which is hugely problematic.

3) I have so many thoughts on the Ghomeshi trial, which is obviously a flashpoint for feminists.  I think ultimately, I feel like I can support and believe women who have been the victims of sexual assault and at the same time, feel like he is absolutely guilty in the court of real life, but that also, the judge's verdict does not constitute a miscarriage of justice.  I don't know how the courts will reconcile the fluidity of consent with the necessary standard of guilt required by the law, I don't know that the courts are the place to do this, even as they are so much a necessary piece of the larger framework.

Right now, I have a kid who likes to strum his junk like a guitar and thinks it's hilarious to do so in mixed company.  I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that and how to manage that, in a way that preserves his innocence and still doesn't allow the calcification of misogyny.

I recently read Chester Brown's The Playboy, which is a comic that was originally published in 1990 and was reissued.  It details Brown's (author of Louis Riel, among other comics) anxiety and guilt around masturbation and purchasing Playboy magazine.  The Dotytron and I both read it, and even though we both agreed that Chester Brown, as a person, is kind of gross, the Dotytron thought that Brown does a good job of honestly representing the shame spiral that happens for adolescent boys faced with the driving compulsions of their desire.  Like, apparently it feels like your brain kind of shuts off and your primordial lizard brain takes over when you're masturbating and then when it's done and you've had an orgasm, then shame comes flooding in.  Shame at what?  He (the Dotytron) posits that the shame is rooted in how quickly the lizard brain takes over and how subsumed the person is to it - like your desire to masturbate is so all-consuming that you're embarrassed and how you let it control your life.

This spurred a conversation about how to negotiate this, as the parents to three boys.  Is the shame and guilt necessary?  Does it have to be that way?  My favorite podcast, Pop Rocket recently had a sex-themed episode and two of the hosts, who are around my age talked about going into bookstores or the library and taking out the sex manuals and moving to a different part of the store/library and furtively thumbing through the pages.  HOW INNOCENT IS THAT?!?  Like, now, you can see the most depraved, disgusting, dehumanizing stuff with the right search string (or even a very wrong search string!).  How do you mitigate THAT? How do you make sure that your kid is processing and on some level, critically engaging with the stuff that shapes their sexuality?

Hell if I know.

Snapchat is kind of the best.

Last weekend was B-A-N-A-N-A-S.  But it was the kind of soul-affirming weekend that grizzled parents need sometime to remind us that we are multi-dimensional people with brilliant, smart, funny, dear friends.

Auntie Em got the twins these jackets recently and they are THE BEST.  Look at these guys!  It's almost like they get along!

I made a new friend!  At JJ and S's house, we were invited to brunch along with their colleagues, whom we had never met before.  At first, the Dotytron and I were like, "no new friends" and were kind of being sour pusses about it, but it turns out these people are AWESOME.  They live in our 'hood, they are both professors at U of T, they are funny, and the woman was automatic kindred spirit.  We are both obsessed with American Crime Story and Togetherness and she is just lovely and smart and their daughter is adorable.  This is a woman who described author Junot Diaz as: "His 'decolonial' love' shtick is kind of catnip for woke WOC" - a million heart eyes emojis.

 Corned beef hash is pretty much the best dish post-late-night dancing dish in the world.

That night I went to Pusha T with my buddy Merrick and it was everything this ol' gal needed.  Pusha T was incendiary.  The crowd was a beautiful multi-ethnic mix of hip hop heads and I got to dance my butt off and it was amazing.

Came home and Record Club was in full swing, which meant that I got to swan in, high off an amazing hip hop show and try to weasel my way in as the only woman in Record Club with my thoughtful insights into Kamasi Washington's album, The Epic.  Late night, and the next day the Dotytron was pretty ruined, so I made myself some corned beef hash and eggs, and then the Dotytron rallied enough so that we could take the kids to an east side indoor play space, which we love, because it's big and clean and the Dotytron and I can go head-to-head on the pop-a-shot game:

Twin A is terrible at this.

Our general modus operandi when doing stuff with the kids is to act like giant idiots and have all the fun while our kids tool around untended.  Half the time we take the kids to a playground, the Dotytron and I are challenging each other to weird parkour or rock climbing stunts while our kids give us the side-eye and other kids stand staring at us, mouth agape, because we generally cavort like fools.  Being able to be a ding dong around kids is very important.  Never lose your silly.

 Then on Sunday, our supper club of mostly high school friends met at Magic Noodle on Harbord. They do Northern Chinese hand-cut noodles in broth and some small shareable plates.  I got the brisket soup which was delicious, and the noodles were fantastic (nicely chewy), but the small plates were hit or miss.  In the top right of the picture above you can see there's a chicken dish which had this weird, mala-style Sichuan peppercorn based sauce that just tasted weird and funky.  We got this potato salad which was good, and lamb skewers (also good).  I don't know if I'd go again, especially given we're on such a ramen kick lately.  

 Quincess wearing his goggles.

Speaking of ramen, we took it easy this weekend and visited my grandma in Markham, followed by Sansotei with my mum.  This crew.

Sansotei why are you so damned delicious???

Some of what I'm doing on Snapchat - a van full of Peppas on the way to the pool.

 

My classic bin of beans made its first appearance for the twins this weekend.  It kept them quietly occupied and giggling for about 30 minutes?  Which is next level.  But then they started dumping beans everywhere which was annoying and inevitable.

Twin A double-fisting this disgusting breakfast concoction I force them to eat: steel cut oats, mixed with full fat cottage cheese, apple sauce, vitamin D droplets and hemp/flax oil.  It's so gross!  

 

Twin B singing the Totoro main theme in Japanese.

Twin A has a huge sweet tooth and loves all things cake, cookies, ice cream, chocolate, etc.  When we had Momma D and Ehmdo over for dinner last night, we took a break after finishing dinner to tidy up the kitchen, pack away leftovers, and open presents before the cake portion.  I popped my head out of the kitchen and saw that Twin A was still sitting in his high chair, so I asked Ehmdo to take him out.  She said that she had tried to do that, but he refused.  As it turns out, he was doggedly sitting in the chair because he was waiting for the dessert portion of the meal.  He sat there for 30 minutes, craning his neck to see the action in the living room, and refused to let us even turn his chair to face the living room.  Such a crafty little sugar butt:

Wanting to be involved, but wanting more, for cake.

For the birthday dinner I roasted two chickens, made gravy, roasted potatoes, roasted cauliflower, and roasted brussels sprouts.  It was an all-oven meal:

I also made this cake, which is known as "The World's Best Cake."  It's Norwegian in origin and features two duplicate layers of butter cake, with a layer of almond-flecked soft and marshmallowy meringue adhered to the cake, and the two layers held together with whipped cream.  I think next time I might add some sliced strawberries to the middle layer, but otherwise, it might not be quite the "world's best" cake, but it's pretty damned delicious.  I've posted the recipe below.

Other things I've eaten/made lately:

I made Smitten Kitchen's spaghetti pie (which is based on cacio e pepe) and I thought it was kind of meh.  I used good fontina and the cheese flavour was kind of pungent but the overall dish was bland and the baked spaghetti texture just wasn't a good fit.  We had this with a classic chocolate cake (I used this Food52 recipe), which turned out good, but not as fudgy as my go-to devil's food cake recipe and the frosting was only so-so.  Still on the hunt for the perfect quick and easy chocolate frosting (not buttercream).  This cake was adapted from the classic Hershey's chocolate cake recipe and I honestly think the Hershey's is better.  Can't improve on that.

Breakfast burritos: scrambled eggs with spinach, piled in a large flour tortilla that's been spread with refried beans (I made mine but easily could be canned), with some grated cheddar.  Rolled up burrito style and then pressed on a panini press and served with tomatillo salsa, sour cream, and guacamole.

Ribollita - basically a version of minestrone with kale, and lots of vegetables and plump canellini beans.  Topped with a very necessary dollop if Italian style salsa verde (parsley, mint, garlic, capers, etc.) and big slices of my sourdough bread with grated parm, toasted for dunking.

Yellow dhal with coconut and muttar paneer and brown basmati rice.

Leftover Micelli Monday taco meat became a giant taco salad - a whole heap of greens, diced tomatoes, sliced black olives, tossed together and topped with the taco meat, optional beans, guacamole, salsa, sour cream, and crunched up tortilla chips for extra texture.  

The Big Yam is obsessed (OBSESSED) with pulses of all shapes and sizes.  Good thing this year is the year of the pulse, according to the WHO.  This is an oldie, bacon-braised lentils, atop a bed of baby spinach, and breaded, fried pucks of goat's cheese to be smeared on crusty bread.  It's a go-to meatless meal.

My St. Paddy's day meal.  Once I started baking corned beef, I've never gone back.  I smear it with a paste of brown sugar and grainy mustard and then bake it in a foil packet until tender. With champ and roasted brussels sprouts and maple carrots.

This was the birthday bundt cake that I made for my mom that she didn't care for.  The recipe (from Baked Occasions) had me right up until I was supposed to mix a portion of the batter with cocoa powder and chocolate and use that to make the dark tunnel.  I dunno, I think I just like a classic, pound-cakey kind of bundt cake.  The chocolate-coconut tunnel was kind of dry and crumbly and tasted neither chocolately or coconutty.  I wouldn't make this again.

 Fin.


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The World's Best Cake
Serves 10-12, technique adapted from Sweet Paul Magazine

10½ tablespoons (1 stick plus 21⁄2 tablespoons) butter, softened

1 2⁄ 3 cups granulated sugar, separated

1 1⁄ 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

5 large eggs, separated

1⁄ 3 cup whole milk

1⁄4 cup sliced almonds

1 cup heavy cream

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F, with a rack in the middle position. Line 2 8" round cake pans with parchment paper. Grease the pans and the paper.  The original recipe recommended using metal pans over glass. I had metal pans so that's what I used so I can't comment on the glass.
2. Beat the butter and 2⁄ 3 cup of the sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer until light and creamy, about 3 minutes.
3. Add the flour and baking powder and mix well on low speed.
4. Mix in the egg yolks and milk.
5. Scrape the batter into the baking pan (the batter will be thick - I used an offset spatula to spread it).
6. In a large clean bowl, beat the egg whites and the remaining 1 cup sugar to soft peaks. Spread on top of the cake layer. Sprinkle with the almond slices.
7. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until the meringue is golden brown and puffed. Cool on a wire rack in the pan. Gently unmold one of the cake layers and place cake-side-down on a serving platter.
8. When the cake is cool, put the cream in a medium bowl and add some vanilla extract (I used 1/2 tsp. of vanilla bean paste). Beat to medium-firm peaks with an electric mixer, about 3 minutes.
9. Cover the cake on the platter with the cream. Gently unmold the other cake from the baking pan.  Place the other half, meringue side up, on top.
10. Let the cake sit for 1 hour in the fridge before serving.

Lucky Button

Feeling like a very, very lucky button this Sunday morning.  We've got a funk mix on the stereo, we had a delicious Sunday Breakkie of Dotytron buttermilk pancakes, bacon, and a mixed-berry banana smoothie and we've got a lazy day of mostly nothing ahead of us.  As far as Daylight Savings Spring Forwards go (the worst of the Daylight Savings), we're doing okay with being robbed of that extra hour so far.

This weekend has been absolutely splendid.  I met my friend S for coffee before the ROM with the Yam on Friday and we had a nice, long one-on-one chat that was absolutely delightful and heart-warming.  She is such an incredibly talented artist and she is so committed to her craft and so inspiring to be around.  Her heart is so big and talks with her always mean getting to the heart of the matter - no b.s., no boundaries.  

The ROM itself was a bit of a bust, but a learning experience nonetheless.  The Big Yam was completely enamoured with the fish tank they have, which wasn't really worth the cost of the $15 admission for me.  He's too young.  I have to remember that.  I don't usually plan high-concept outings but then I feel pressured because so many other young, urban parents do.  I gotta trust my instincts.  The ROM isn't particularly fun for young kids, either.  As far as museums go, it's not that hot.  Children's museums and the Science Centre are way better for the under-5 set.  He was just as happy to sit outside the ROM eating a hot dog watching construction across the street and then taking the subway home.  I will say though, that I feel lucky to live in downtown Toronto.  We have access to the AGO and the ROM and it doesn't take us more than half an hour by public transit to get there.  When he gets to a certain age, it's going to be so much fun raising him with a huge metropolis at his fingertips.  

Friday night I had an awesome, side-splittingly funny International Women's Day evening with SMcKay and Lolly.  We went to Pacific Mall and got frozen yogurt and then went out for a delicious Chinese food dinner and they got to experience the wonder of Asian food value-for-dollar.  I think the price of dinner blew Lolly's mind, even if she did white person out and tip an egregious 20%.  The Dotytron's Record Club went until 2am.  It's so cute.  I love the concept and I'm glad he gets to do it.  The four guys get together, listen to an album and then drink and eat nibblies and talk about the record and associated music.  It's such a great outlet for him and the boys in the Club are a good crew.  

It was the Dotytron's first time hosting, so it was B's first time at our house.  He was really impressed with our dead-end street.  In his words: "You can't put a price on that!"  I have a few friends who are making their first forays into home buying in Toronto and it makes me feel so lucky that the Dotytron saw what he did in Lil' Ugmo.  We got really, really lucky.  In the price we paid and in all the stuff we dumb-lucked into.  I didn't think a dead-end street would be so awesome, and it is.  When you have kids?  It's the best.  Our street itself is the cutest.  Our neighbours knocked on our door yesterday afternoon and asked if the Big Yam could come out and play.  That's the kind of Jane Jacobs/Sesame Street type thing that I love about small towns like where my sister lives, and I never would have imagined that we would luck into living on a street where stuff like that happens.  It makes me so happy that the Big Yam will have the opportunity to grow up in this Norman Rockwell-y type setting in a big urban centre.  Yesterday was the first real warm day we've had - the day that signals the beginning of spring.  Thinking about walks to the beach in the summer, or playing in the splash pad or the park or the outdoor swimming pool THAT'S AT THE BOTTOM OF OUR STREET makes me feel so grateful that the Dotytron convinced me that Lil' Ugmo was the house for us.  It was the most solid call he's ever made.  We decided that he can coast on that for the rest of his life, and the only thing that will get these daps taken away from him is if he makes a call that causes us to lose the house.  Pretty fair, I'd say.

Then we had a Supper Club dinner at Momofuku Daisho.  I had pre-ordered us the Bo Ssam large format meal, which serves 8-10 and costs $240.  That's the base price and then any additional drinks, food, tax, and tip are added on top of that.  Here's the menu:

The Dotytron and I shared an extra dish of the halibut cheek crudo, because I love crudo.  The crudo was sliced a little thick for me, for a fish like halibut cheeks.  It would have been better if things had been sliced thinner.  It wasn't as nice as the crudo at Porzia.  The toppings for this crudo were kind of unimaginative (caper berries, fried wonton crisps, some thinly sliced white radish) and there wasn't any lubricating element like oil, or acid to bring all the elements of the plate together.

The Bo Ssam - a 6lb slow roasted pork shoulder served with lettuce leaves, white rice, pickled cucumber, 12 oysters, and a chili sauce, some kimchi, and a ginger-scallion sauce for making rolls.

Overall, I wasn't overly impressed with Daisho.  I thought the service, for a "fine-dining" establishment was really poor.  When the Dotytron and I walked in, we were told there was a 2 hour seating limit, which hadn't been made clear to me when I made the reservation or at any of the multiple points of contact the restaurant made to confirm the reservation.  Then, even though we were clearly waiting for the rest of our party to arrive, the server was like, "Well, your bo ssam is ready, and it's at its peak of perfection now," and I'm like, well what the heck am I supposed to do about that?  That's not MY FAULT.  What kind of restaurant expects to throw out a giant hunk of meat as soon as you sit down?  It's just poor and it set a bad tone.  The Bo Ssam was delicious, I have to admit.  The fat was nicely caramelized and the meat tore off in fat-soaked chunks.  The menu at Daisho was uninspiring, overall.  If the crudo and the service was any indication, I wasn't impressed and I had a hard time, looking at the menu, thinking of other dishes I would have ordered, had the Bo Ssam left us with any room.  The room is beautiful, but I'm in no hurry to go back.

Our company was wonderful, as always.  It's a mix of high school friends and some other peeps.  I love them all.  They are all so worldly, and interesting, and passionate, and brilliant conversationalists - it's just so nice to be surrounded by your smart, funny, accomplished friends, ya know?  Half of them we went to high school with and the other half are friends of friends and we all share a love of talking around good food and drink.  My friend L works at Hot Docs (her job is incredible) and was talking about starting a Documentary Film Club.  I love all these clubs!!!  It's like all these mini-salons with people I love.  What's not to like???

We have so many disparate groups of friends that it feels like we never get to see any of them as much as we'd like.  When we do, I'm reminded of how lucky I am to be surrounded by so many brilliant, talented, bright young things that love us as much as we love them.  So lucky.

Now we have the whole day to lazily prepare for Mexico.

Happy March Break, all!

Fin.

Lucky button

What a weekend!  It was exhausting but filled with good food, friends, fun, so ultimately, I can't complain, right?

Friday night's dinner: wieners & slow cooker baked beans!

Friday night's dessert: pumpkin pudding with sour cream topping - like a pumpkin pie without the crust.  This was a bit of a let-down.  I now know that part of the intrinsic pleasure of a pumpkin pie for Karl Lagerfeld, Esq., is the juxtaposition between flaky crust and creamy filling.

We skipped Chinese school to clean the house top to bottom and prep for Friendsgiving.  So I made us a little treat of leftover puff pastry scraps turned into nuttela-filled turnovers.  Delicious.

Friendsgiving version 2012 was a monster success.  11 adults, 2 toddlers all crammed into Lil' Ugmo for a night of 9 bottles of wine and near the end, tumblers filled with ice and rum.  It was epic!  We had 4 dips: carrot, hummous, white bean, and squash, with pita and sliced baguette.  Cheddar sage breadsticks.  Blue cheese-stuffed proscuitto wrapped prunes, baked until gooey and sizzling.  Fox's cheesy potatoes.  A carrot, cabbage slaw with sunflower seeds.  Roasted beets.  Brussels sprouts.  A fresh cranberry sauce and a cooked cranberry sauce.  I was responsible for the turkey (which turned out perfectly, might I say), and gravy and stuffing and a pumpkin cheesecake for dessert.  It was lovely.  I cooked the stuffing in a wide, shallow enamelled cast-iron casserole which meant that all the lovingly hand-torn bread pieces got all craggy and crispy.  Just take a look at that feast!  We shared stories and laughed and caught up and had intense policy discussions on participatory democracy.  It was everything I dream of in a gathering of friends.  I felt very, very lucky.

It was also good because leading up to it, the Dotytron and I hadn't been in the best of spirits.  His long-dormant Record Club (of which our Discerning Coyote friend is a member) was resurrected on Friday night featuring Nas' Illmatic.  So they drank 40s and beer and Hennessey with the end result being that the Dotytron didn't stumble home until 4am, and this is AFTER he missed our stop on the streetcar and had to be awoken like your garden-variety late night public transport drunkard.  Saturday was ROUGH, for the both of us.  I hadn't slept well.  The Dotytron's favorite glass broke.  I accidentally left a pot on with my butter-wine basting mixture while we went for a walk and we came back to a smoke-filled home with a burnt-beyond-recognition pot.  People were late for dinner.  It was tense.  But as we gathered up spent wine glasses at 1am and surveyed the scene, there was nothing in us but gratitude for our lovely circle of Supper Club friends.

Sunday morning's breakfast is a favorite of mine - leftover stuffing pan fried in little cakes topped with poach eggs.

Momma D came over and joined us for breakfast.  Of course, we followed this up with a PIE PARTY at JJ's house.  She made us empanadas (not pictured, sadly) and I made baked brie puff pastry hand pies (also not pictured), and the Discerning Coyote made us a deep-dish Chicago pie which I instantly want to go out and replicate:

And then...and then because meals at JJ & S's are nothing if not gluttonous extravaganzas...we had THREE different pies for dessert.  Chocolate cream (JJ), apple (Discerning Coyote) and sweet potato pecan (me).  Oy!   We were smart enough to split the spoils so now, in addition to a fridge stuffed to the gills with turkey stock, and turkey dinner leftovers, I also have leftover pumpkin cheesecake, 1 pumpkin pudding, and remnants from 3 pies.  Lordy.

Tonight's dinner: sunchoke soup w/ leftover breadsticks, pita, and dips.

Pumpkin cheesecake.

So, so, so good.  

As I was driving to JJ's house yesterday with the Big Yam in the back seat, we stopped at a stop light. There were no street cars in sight.

The Big Yam: "Mama?"

Me: "Yes?"

The Big Yam: "Street car.  In my head."  *taps forehead*  "In my head."

!!!!!  LOL!  So funny.  The little guy and his mind movies.

Fin.

Hot Docs

Well, one of my favorite Toronto times of the year is here and I couldn't be happier.  Last year, doing Hot Docs with a 6 month old Big Yam was a bit more of a pain, but this year we're making it to 4 out of our 5 features, and we're only missing that one because of a conflicting, equally awesome engagement.  I think that's pretty solid.  Academic Book Club has also scheduled a Hot Docs outing on Wednesday, so I'm actually going to 5 docs, total. 

We've seen some pretty good ones - recaps below.

Krisis GR2011 - The Prism has one of the worst titles I've ever encountered (so unwieldy!), but an interesting, though superficial, premise.  The Greek-Canadian director armed 14 people in Greece with cameras and taught them how to use them.  Over a year, the footage was uploaded to a site and from all those photos, the documentary was made (interspersed with interviews).  What results is a ground-level look at the effects of Greek's debt crisis.  It was pretty interesting - if only for the fact that it reinforced that students (the ones most passionate about the protest) the world over are always young, idealistic, and woefully ignorant of macro-level understandings of economics.  Ha!  It just seems like a giant mess over there and you have a confluence of factors: history, poor government, lack of fiscal foresight, etc. all colluding to make it a giant mess with little hope for resolution.  This film screened with a "short" documentary called Yugo, about the eponymous Yugoslavian car and the closure of the factory.  This doc was about 28 minutes too long had a weird overwrought dramatic tone that we thought should have been comedic but wasn't obviously so, and was the boringest.

Made In China follows one year in the Jinyuan garment factory, a small-to-mid scale operation reeling from the effects of the global recession.  Orders are down, and so the owner/manager (Old Liu, pictured above) struggles to stay afloat and pay bills, mirroring the experiences of the people who work for him, putting in long hours and living in cramped dormitories.  The movie was filmed in a purely observational style - which made it seem a little long - some of the scenes got repetitive and it could have used a bit of editing - maybe 20 minutes could have been cut without an appreciable difference in the film overall.  The movie is heartbreaking - it shows how every person as part of the chain (minus the people selling and profiting from the selling of the goods produced) is in a bind and there's no easy answers.  We came away from that movie once again feeling how lucky we are to be born in Canada.  There's a family working for 2000 yuan a month, and one of the more heartbreaking scenes is when the husband opens his paycheck and wonders aloud, "but we only took 2 days off last month! What's the point of working so hard when you make so little?"  It's such a complicated scenario.  So yeah, I could make an effort to only buy Canadian, but what does that accomplish other than strangling the manufacturing industry in China and putting more of those people out of work?  One thing I did resolve was that the Big Yam is not going to get an easy ride.  He has to know what goes on in the greater world and how darned lucky he is and he better not give me any lip about it, either!  Otherwise, I'm going to make him sleep on a steel cot with only a thin tatami mat and then we'll see what he thinks about his lot in life.  The movie also touched on some of the generational issues that occur within these families - with children resisting joining the family in the sweatshop trade and how Confucian ideals are being tested as China continues to evolve.  

Yesterday we saw Ping Pong which is precisely the antidote we needed.  It's ADORABLE (and has my name written all over it).  The doc follows 9 different seniors (over 85) from around the world who go to compete in the Senior's Ping Ping World Championships held in China.  So many characters!  OLD PEOPLE!  Suffice to say, it's hilarious and I also simultaneously teared up about a million times.  It was heart-warming to the max.  It just goes to show you - becoming old isn't easy.  You gotta have some fight, competitive zest, and gumption to make it!  One of the women was 89 and suffered from dementia following the passing of her husband of 40 years.  She stopped eating, started to forget things, would get confused and show up at the bakery at 11pm expecting it to be open.  Recognizing that she couldn't live by herself anymore, she moved into a retirement residence and discovered table tennis, which in her words, "brought me back."  So f**king cute!  I can't recommend this doc, enough.  Is it sentimental?  OF COURSE IT IS, IT'S ABOUT OLD PEOPLE, YOU HEARTLESS A**HOLE!  Is it maudlin?  OBVI!  Will it still make you laugh and feel good about the world?  YES!  So get to it, already!


We had an impossibly full weekend.  Momma D had the Big Yam for a sleepover on Saturday night so the Dotytron and I checked out Banh Mi Boys, this restaurant doing updated Asian-Latin fusion and updated Asian mash-ups that's been getting big buzz lately.  

Of course we ordered more food than was necessary/consumable.  We had kimchi fries (twice fried crispy frites with kimchi, mayonnaise, and pulled pork on top), a squid taco, a chicken taco, a kalbi beef banh mi and a pork belly banh mi.  The tacos use a Chinese crispy pancake for a shell and feature the meat, some hot sauce, and a cabbage slaw along with pickled daikon and carrot.  The banh mi feature your protein choice inside a soft French-style bun with the pickled daikon and carrot and hot sauce.  We didn't try the bao.  I really like the bread they use for their banh mi, they're very soft, and don't have the crust that your Chinatown version has, but I thought that overall, the tacos took the day.  The banh mi were a little too bready (I don't like it when the bread to meat ratio is off - which is why we didn't try their 3rd option for food - the bao) and the meat was a little stingy.  What I love about banh mi traditionally is the slick of salted butter and the pate they spread on the bread to keep it moist.  This was missing that and thus tasted a little dry.  The banh mi are also priced at $5.99 each, whereas the tacos are $3.99 and are just as filling.  Plus the "taco" shell is a great vehicle.  The squid was super-tender and flavourful.  You kind of lost the kalbi beef and pork belly taste in the banh mi versions.  I would definitely go back for tacos and kimchi fries and indeed, am looking forward to a return visit!

Sunday we had brunch at Momma D's when we picked up the Big Yam.  She made us waffles and English bacon, which was a nice treat because we went for a run in the morning (for the record: the Dotytron held me back).  Then we saw a doc and then we met up with our Supper Club at Libretto Danforth.  We all shared a heap of appetizers and pizzas and it was all very, very good.  The Big Yam was a champ.  He basically sat in his high chair for 3 hours and was calm and cute and very personable and chill.  He didn't need to be entertained and he only started squawking when I wasn't giving him his food fast enough.  He LOVES the gnocchi fritti there (as do we!) and he ate about 2 slices worth of pizza.  He also ate the proscuitto off another slice.  I was really proud of how well behaved he was.  Three hours of compliant behaviour basically means he can handle your typical Chinese banquet meal, which is my goal.  I'm going to try very very hard to not be the parent who has the kid who runs around the restaurant and who has to whip out an iPhone or something to keep my kid entertained.  If that's your model, then great!  I'm glad that works for you, but it's not necessarily the kind of behaviour I want to foster in the Yam.  

So...this week is bonkers.  Regular work, regular life and then Tuesday night Dotytron is doing his music stuff, Wednesday night I have Academic Book Club - Hot Docs edition, then Thursday night is Academic Book Club proper.  As the Dotytron said, this week is going to be: "Monday - what's going on? Friday - how was everything?"    

Add to that the Dotytron got surplussed this year (from both his jobs!) which means that he will definitely be teaching someplace else next year.  Postings come out tomorrow...le sigh.

Tonight I made us a Mughlai chicken curry and eggplant bhurta.  The chicken curry featured a million different spice blends employed at various stages (one to marinate the chicken, one to fry in the pan, another bundle of whole spices to simmer in the sauce) and a sauce enriched with milk blended with cashews, almonds, and saffron.  We ate this with brown rice.

Fin.

Friendsgiving

Super-successful Supper Club - Friendsgiving edition. We had cheeses and baguette to start, alongside these prunes wrapped in proscuitto and baked which were so freakin' fantastic that I'm afraid I definitely and unrepentantly ate more than my share, good manners be damned. For the main course we had turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, cheesy mashed potatoes, asparagus, brussels sprouts, cranberry sauce, a fresh cranberry relish, and some pumpkin rolls. For dessert my sweet potato pecan pie, some ginger molasses cookies I baked and shortbread that our friends brought. Stupendous!

The age difference between Master T and his friend D is only 12 weeks but it seems like light years. D is walking confidently and his vocabulary is extensive. Even his babbling has the cadence of speech and his motor skills are pretty advanced...well...advanced compared to the Big Yam, who makes up for in happiness what he lacks in developmental milestones. Awww...poor little tuber root.

We went swimming and did our erranding and a day of laundry and house stuff yesterday, culminating in a delicious Sunday supper of mustard glazed, thyme breadcrumb coated roasted chicken thighs on top of braised leeks, potatoes and celery root mashed with roasted garlic, maple glazed carrots, and oven roasted purple brussels sprouts. It was pure fall harvest time Sunday supper and I loved every minute of it.

I took today off of work because I suspected that the Big Yam might have an ear infection - his nose has been a geyser for the past week and he's had a raspy cough. No fever, but I noticed he was scratching at both ears. Our doctor said that his ears looked borderline - slightly inflamed but not full borne so we were advised to just chill and see how he does - especially because he's been eating and drinking this whole time and he hasn't presented with a fever. Apparently ear infections can be viral and bacterial, but the research suggests that 80% are viral, which means you just have to let them go away on their own and that doctors are now realizing they might have been over-prescribing antibiotics. Since the Big Yam has been symptomatic for over a week, it's likely that he's on the tail end of an ear infection and he's fought it on his own. I wouldn't have taken him in except for the fact that he woke up at 1am last night and was crying and inconsolable. We brought him into bed with us and he was very sweet - falling asleep on top of the Dotytron and smooshed in between us - if he did that all the time, I'm pretty sure the Dotytron would reverse his co-sleeping opinions. He's already more pro co-sleeping than I am and all it would take is a smushball Big Yam sleeping session to put him over the edge.

I'm taking the time to work on high priority things like his Halloween costume (and spend time with him, of course.)

By request, I've posted the recipe for the apple cake that I've made a few times.

Fin.

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Definitive Moist Apple Cake

6 apples (I would use mutsus or golden delicious), peeled, cored, cut into 1.5" chunks

1 T . cinnamon

5 T. sugar

2 3/4 c. flour

1 T. baking powder

1 t. salt

1 c. vegetable or canola oil

2 c. sugar

1/4 c. apple cider, apple juice, or water

4 eggs

1 c. chopped toasted walnuts (optional - I definitely omit these)

- preheat oven to 350F. Grease a tube pan (image attached below. I use an angel food cake pan with the removable bottom - because of the large amount of leavening in this cake recipe, I'd be wary of using your standard bundt cake pan in case it overflows - the cake rises a lot).

- toss the apple chunks with the cinnamon and sugar and set aside.

- in a large bowl, whisk together the oil, the eggs, the juice or cider, and the sugar. Stir the dry ingredients together in another bowl and add the dry to the wet, stirring until incorporated.

- spread 1/2 of the batter into the prepared pan. Add 1/2 of the apples over top, top with the remaining batter, and then the apples (the amount of batter will appear thin - and it will be hard to spread and get good coverage - this is okay. The batter will rise. I generally wet my fingers slightly and smoosh the batter around to cover everything.)

- bake for 1 1/2 hours (approximately) or until a tester comes out clean. Let the cake cool in the pan for about 10 minutes then flip the pan over onto a plate. Wait for the cake to drop down, then remove the pan, sandwich the cake with another plate, and flip it over again. Dust the top with icing sugar, if you like.