Getting Our Camp On

Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone

That line from Joni Mitchell's Big Yellow Taxi perfectly sums up how I felt last summer with not being able to travel. When you got from hopping on a flight once a month for long weekends across Europe to basically not leaving your backyard, it puts things in perspective. At the end of Summer 2020, I knew I couldn't do another one like that. Enter camping.

All throughout winter we casually talked about getting a camper. And in February, we traded in our Subaru Outback and Mini Cooper convertible for a Jeep Wrangler, thinking of all the summer adventures we'd be able to have. What we didn't realize was (1) the Wrangler doesn't really have great towing capacity, limiting our choices dramatically, and (2) everyone else in the known universe decided they wanted to go camping this summer, too, and now there's a six month wait (at least) on the small campers our car can actually tow. 

So now we're back to talking about traditional car camping. 

When we moved to Ireland, we sold off all of our gear, so now we have to start from scratch, and every time I think about climbing in and out of a tent, the longing for one of those adorable (and crazy expensive) teardrop trailers with wet bath and kitchen grows and grows. Still, before we invest that kind of cash in something we don't actually know if we'll make sufficient use of, it seems like a smart idea to figure out if we still like camping. Growing up, that was the only type of vacation my family ever took, but I'm 43 years old now, and sleeping on the floor holds far less appeal than it once did. 

I'm curious to see how this all plays out. 

Read More

#CoronaCooking: Beef Koftka and Hummus with Tzatziki and Pita

Generally speaking, we are homebodies. We don't really go out all that much, and when we do, it's usually for lunch or a weeknight dinner maybe once every couple of weeks. Cooking at home is my jam, and at first I was undaunted by this quarantine. Cooking at home every night would be easy, I thought. Bring it on, I crowed. Well, here we are on day who-knows-what, and I was finally running out of inspiration. Not so much because I don't have multiple cookbooks to sift through, or thousands of recipes pinned on Pinterest, but because supplies are dwindling and unless I want to have a panic attack in the middle of the grocery store, I'm forced to make do with what's on hand. This generally translates to a lot of pork because apparently every time I went to Costco between October and January I bought a four pack of pork tenderloin for some reason. See also: ground turkey and beef - things we don't normally buy for ourselves except, somehow, in bulk.

Yesterday, after being on our fourteenth day of quarantine (we've only left the house for walks around our small town neighborhood), we were going a bit stir crazy and I decided I needed to get out for a longer than normal walk. This was around 3 p.m., and I realized midway through I had no idea what I was going to do for dinner. I knew I had a pound of grass fed ground beef defrosted in the refrigerator, but the only thing that came to mind was a baked ziti with meat sauce but we've eaten a lot of pasta these past couple of weeks and I was not thrilled about another carb bomb sitting in my belly.

As we rounded a corner, Alan said, "What about those lamb kebab things we like, but with beef?"

It was a lightbulb moment.

We had a tub of tzatziki in the fridge, and olives, and two pitas. Harkening back to my days of grabbing lunch at San Francisco's Oasis Grill with my former co-worker Alex, I also knew we could spice things up with a little bit of harissa paste. All told, we had the makings of an excellent dinner. The only problem? I'd never made koftka and had no idea how to. A quick google search revealed that there really wasn't much to it. In fact, it might be the easiest recipe I've pulled off the internet in awhile. And sure, my plating skills leave much to be desired, but at a time like this, I'm going to focus on substance over beauty. (You'd understand how much so if you saw my four inch roots.)

For those who care, this is the recipe I used:
Beef Kofta Kebabs with Tzatziki from The Modern Proper

And yes, theirs are much more aesthetically pleasing than mine. There is a reason I'm not a food blogger. 😉

Read More