Domestic Bliss: A Recipe for Minestrone Soup

There are blogs, terrible novels and a good number of cooking shows that would have you believe that the apex of domestic bliss is this: Mama is in her cozy kitchen, children at her feet, preparing a nutritious meal for her family. She is calm, her hair is good. Perhaps her sweet son or daughter helps her to stir the pot. A cat and a pot of basil share a spot on sunshine on the windowsill. It smells like peaches and vanilla. Outside, birds chirp a little song. Come with me. Peek into my Monday. Let us cook this delicious minestrone together.

(I forgot to take pictures.)

MINESTRONE

Ingredients

Gather these from the supermarket in a hurry on your way home from work. Your husband has committed to getting your daughter from kindergarten. This means you have about an hour before they get home. Run! 

• 1/2 pound (about 1 1/4 cups) dried white beans such as Great Northern, picked over and rinsed 
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 pound pancetta (Italian cured pork belly, available at Italian markets and specialty foods shops) or sliced lean bacon, chopped
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 large carrot, cut into 1/2-inch dice
• 1 rib of celery, cut into 1/2-inch dice
• 3 garlic cloves, chopped fine
• 2 zucchini, scrubbed and cut into 1/2-inch dice
• 1/4 pound green beans, trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1/2 pound boiling potatoes
• 4 cups shredded green cabbage (preferably Savoy)
• 1/2 pound kale, rinsed, drained, stems discarded, and the leaves chopped (about 6 cups)
• a 28-ounce can tomatoes, chopped coarse and drained well
• 4 1/2 cups chicken broth (preferably low-salt)

• freshly grated Parmesan, garlic bruschetta , and dry-cured sausages as accompaniments

Pick me up!

Preparation

Get home. Good news: Noodle and Daddy aren't here yet! Bad news: there is cat pee in the hallway, AGAIN. Those filthy animals. Drape toilet paper across the mess. You have no time for this now. You have veggies to prep before all hell breaks loose. 

Despite having destroyed the hallway, the cats expect to be fed. Feed them. Try not to have a terrible attitude about it. Also try not to slice your finger open on the can again. Dammit, again!

Okay, okay. Focus on cooking. But first, you need to take off your suit jacket. Also the skirt. But no time to change anything else; stand in the kitchen in your pantyhose and blouse. Pretend this is empowering. Wash the vegetables while you read the recipe on your laptop; try not to drip water into the keyboard. This looks like a great recipe. Shame about all the steps. Why can't you ever cook anything simple, for Gof's sake? Stupid, stupid, stupid. Alright. No big deal. Multi-tasking. Women are awesome at multi-tasking, you read it on IFLscience or something. 

First step: Let the beans soak overnight. Ha! What kind of a**hole has time for that? You bought canned beans, like a boss. Go ahead and puree half of them now, because later there will be a toddler around, and putting toddlers and immersion mixers in the same space is basically like combining monkeys and guns. Ha. Yes. You feel very smug and organized for having thought of this. You'd totally say that if you were on your own cooking show. 

"Remember, everyone," you'd say, in your best Mary Berry voice. "Blend your beans before your child gets home! Would you leave monkeys in a room full of guns?" 

Next step: crisp the pancetta in a pot. Simultaneously peel carrots, chop celery, slice garlic. This is so totally under control. Add the veggies to the pot. You have four whole minutes to chop the next set of veggies. This is easy. 

The click of keys. "Hi babes, we're home!" says Alex. 

Uh-oh. 

"Mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy mommy!" says Noodle, racing down the hallway. She may or may not have a little sheet of cat-urine soaked toilet paper attached to her rain boot. 

From down the hall, the husband calls: "Wow, you couldn't clean this up?" You ignore him as he mutters and cleans up cat pee. 

"Hello my love! How was kindergarten?" you ask the Noodle, smiling. Aww. It's so great to see this kid. What a cutie. 

"Up! Mommy, up!" She says. You hoist her up. 

"Look! Mommy is making minestrone. That is a kind of soup," you explain, stirring the veggies. 

"Cheese?" she asks. 

Current favorite food EVER, which, frankly, who can blame her.

"No," you say. "No cheese. You had a snack at kindergarten. Let's wait until dinner."

"Wahhhh!" she cries. 

"Mommy has to chop some more veggies now, so I have to put you down," you say. You turn your face toward your husband, who appears to be dawdling. "MOMMY HAS TO CHOP SOME MORE VEGGIES NOW." 

"CHEESE!" screams the Noodle. 

Daddy appears. "No cheese," he says, to great wailing and gnashing of teeth. "You want grapes?" Grapes are okay. He has no comment on your attire, because standard.  

They disappear with a bunch of grapes, and you frantically chop: zucchini, green beans and...motherf***cker, potatoes too? Where is the peeler. Where is the peeler. There! OH MY GOD. Peel, chop. Chuck, stir. 

"Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy."

"Yes, darling," you say, as you pick apart a head of kale. 

"Cheese?"

"How about you go read a book on the couch with Daddy? Does that sound like fun?" you say.  What is that man doing? Is he...omg, is that Facebook? "ALEX!"

"Alex!" says the Noodle. "Alex! Cheese!"

"Daddy," you say. "Go play with your daddy." 

"Come read a book with me, Noodle," says Daddy. He holds up Good night, Gorilla enticingly. It is the current favorite. 

"Elmo?"

"No, a book." 

"Tubbies?"

"How about this book?" 

"Of course." Noodle toddles off. 

Chop the kale. You've decided to skip the green cabbage, because if there is one thing you've learned in life, it's that if you make a recipe that uses only "4 cups of shredded green cabbage" you will shortly thereafter have half a head of slowly rotting cabbage in the back of your fridge. "Don't forget," you tell the imaginary cameras in your imaginary giant, airy kitchen. "Kale and cabbage are basically the same thing anyway! Ahahaha!" 

Angelic giggles tinkle out of the living room, and Daddy is reading. You smile beatifically.

Add the kale to the pot, stir until wilted...Stir until wilted. Wilt. Come on. Wilt already. Oooh, you could go cut some basil why you wait, since you actually have some for a change! Oh. THAT'S wilted. And...did the cats eat some too? Oh. My. God. Daddy and Noodle have finished two whole books. Check on the kale, which is still kind of like the soles of combat boots. American kale wouldn't do this, you think. This is just some b.s. Austrian pseudo-kale. You should have bought the green cabbage. 

Little feet pad sweetly across the floor. 

"Mommy, book," says Noodle. She is standing by your feet with a book. Reading is really good for you and you should encourage it. Reading is probably even better for you than minestrone. Could this recipe take any longer? Seriously. 

"Why don't you read with Daddy, honey?" you say.

"Because I already read two books with him, idiot," says Noodle. She doesn't actually say that, but you can hear it in your head. 

"Look! Daddy is playing with blocks. Why don't you join him?" you say. Daddy clicks the blocks together, optimistically. (He's so great, you think, in a footnote).  

Noodle points her finger in your face. "I haven't seen you all day, because all you care about is going to work, and now you're ignoring me. You will not read me Hop on Pop even though when I say the word 'pop' your heart nearly does." 

What she actually says is: "UUUUUP! CHEESE!"

It is really very, very warm in the kitchen. And very cramped. And the floor is suddenly covered in something sticky. 

You breathe deeply and try to remain calm. You feel terrible. Toddlerhood is short and precious. The days are long but the years are short. Cherish this moment. Be in this moment. Do not think about cigarettes at all. Think about the precious, fleeting, beauty of childhood. You're going to miss this, right? Actually, you know you are. That's the f***ing tragedy of the thing. 

You pick her up. "Hi, lovely. No cheese. But do you want to watch me make the soup? You can help, okay?" 

Add the tomatoes--try not to cut your child while opening the cans! Now add the "broth", i.e. 4.5 cups of water and soup cube. Hey, remember when you used to make broth from scratch? Meditatively skimming chicken foam while This American Life ran in the background. You'd drink tea, and smoke cigarettes out the window. Oh my God I LOVE cigarettes. 

"Soup!" says Noodle. 

"Do you love soup?" you ask. Foolishly, self-indulgently. "Does this look yummy?"

"No!" she says. "No! CHEESE!"

Breathe more.The Om Shanti part of your brain wins out against the part that desires to put your face through the wall. But it's a close call. 

Your arm is breaking with 11 kg of toddler, but hey, you're almost finished. Check the recipe. Scroll down. Hm hm hm. Ah yes. 

Cover the pot and simmer...for an hour? AN HOUR? This kid will be asleep in an hour! 

The Om Shanti part of your brain is no longer winning. You mysteriously want to actually...cry? Is THAT this feeling you are feeling? Ew. Unacceptable. You are a professional. Also a domestic goddess. There are no problems. There are challenges. And challenges have solutions. 

"Would you like some cheese and bread?" you ask. "And, um, this nutritious carrot?"

"Cheese!" she says happily. And cheese for dinner it is. 

Look into the camera with a knowing smile and a wink. "And remember, if you wish to avoid any fuss you can make this soup a day ahead. Just refrigerate and re-heat! No one will ever know the difference."

***

P.S. This recipe from epicurious.com was actually totally delicious, and even the Noodle liked it...the next day. Highly recommend. 

P.P.S I seriously have no idea how other people dis-attach their small children (plural! I have only one and can't manage!) from their legs while they are, for example, wielding large knives or manipulating hot fat. Please tell me your secrets. 







  

No But Really. Ten Things I Actually Wish I Had Known Before I Had a Baby.

There are a lot of lists on the interwebs of things new mommies wish they had known before they had a baby, and I have read and liked (and "liked") many of them. They are all full of truths, practical advice, encouragement, and hilarious observations. However, I do feel a little bit like these are all actually things I did know about having a baby before I had a baby because before I had a baby I read a lot of lists about things one wishes one would have known before one had a baby. You dig? 

Back when I read a lot of books about babies.

Unless your pre-birth reading is confined to a certain well-loved tome that rhymes with Schmut to Schmexschmect When You're Schmexschmecting (which I read cover-to-cover, obviously), you'll already have been told to just effing relax and schmexschmect the unexschmected. 

Therefore, here is my contribution to the genre. Behold. Ten things I actually wish I had known before I had baby. 

1. Relax. Babies are ignorant as s***. Your average newborn has the face of yoda, the unfocused middle-distance gaze of a sage, and the eye motions of an ancient land tortoise. This may give the false impression that your young hatchling is yet imbued with supernatural wisdom, a residue of a past existence that dissipates as we grow into clunking, hormone-driven adults. 

Actually, babies don't know anything about anything. That gaze is a result of their terrible vision, and the strange stillness is because their wimpy limbs are no match for gravity. I'm not saying they're dumb. They're as smart as any of us. But their ignorance is an oceanic thing, guys. In fact, it is astonishing how quickly they actually manage to learn, you know, absolutely everything. "This is a red cup," I say, holding up a red cup. Think about all of things they have to learn before they can even understand that sentence, and that's assuming their color vision has already kicked in. 

So much wisdom.

What does this ignorance mean for you in practical terms? Well, first and foremost, it means you should be impressed as hell when your kid stands up ten months later, picks up a tiny piece of crud off the coffee table, holds it up to you, and says, "Ba ba dis dis?" and then gives it to you. And then makes the baby sign for milk. I mean, for gof's sake, it's amazing. But secondly, it also means that if you occasionally stub your toe and let loose a string of sailor-like invective in front of your two month-old, it really doesn't matter. And it also doesn't matter if, in those first three wonderful and lonely and awe-inspiring and sad months, you sometimes need to start crying and then while away the long long hours by watching Judge Judy with your snoozing child on your chest. 

Seriously, it doesn't matter at all. You don't need to read her The Economist out loud every night, even though you totally can, because she does not care. Well, not yet. Later it gets tricky. 


2. Be prepared with some baby stuff, but rein it in, Imelda. Look, you are obviously going to buy some baby stuff before the kid arrives. For one thing, you will actually need some things immediately. Moreover, that late pregnancy urge to nest and feel prepared is totally overwhelming and must be sated. But for gof's sake, if at all possible, don't overdo it. Get the baby furniture, get a buggy and a car seat, buy some cute room decorations if you must, get one (1!) package of diapers and a set of bottles, have a couple outfits and a ton of cloth diapers for wiping up drool, and then, if you can, buy nothing. Nothing, I say. There are two major reasons: 

Noodle and her daddy, surrounded by some of our
many many many baby-related possessions

One: You will need stuff that is not the stuff you think you need. Par example, I bought about a month's worth of perversely expensive, organic, argan-oil soaked baby butt wipes in a fit of lunacy during my last trimester. And then lo and behold I was told that newborns should have their buns wiped with warm water-soaked cotton pads. I purchased a fancy baby-wearing cloth, which I used precisely three times before realizing I am not nearly devoted enough for this crap and vastly preferred the convenience of a Baby Björn. As it turns out, I was just as lazy as a new mom as I was before (see next point). Plus, until I actually had the baby in hand, as it were, I didn't really know what features to look for when baby shopping. (Pro tips: Too many buttons suck. Buttons down the baby's back suck. Materials other than cotton or wool suck. Baby clothes that require hand-washing, no matter how cute, should be banned.) 

Our generous relatives gave us so many baby clothes. 

Two: Having baby stuff to shop for will give you something to do. Don't ruin the fun beforehand! When you are quietly losing your mind in the first couple months after the child is born, and desperately trying to think of reasons to leave the house (newborns are pretty useless at the playground, ski slope, swimming pool or local bar), shopping for baby stuff presents a magical opportunity for an excursion. It checks so many boxes. You get to indulge in a little shopping therapy even though your own body still looks like one of those deep sea creatures after it's been dredged to the surface. Plus, if you haven't already purchased every damn thing your kid could possibly need for the next three years, it's necessary! You need these little outfits and crib liners and baby-wearing devices! Trust me, it's way more satisfying to stroll around the fun stores with your slumbering wiener than it is to stroll to the grocery store (again) for yet another package of diapers and Q-tips. 

3. You are still going to be you. All your wonderful and terrible qualities will remain with you. You'll try to exert more control over them, you will work on being more patient, you will try to be less messy and more organized, but ultimately you're still just YOU. Your existential fears and doubts, your penchant for gin and cake, your desire to be pretty. So will your sense of humour, your smile, your intelligence and your ambition. I found that my baby gives me a lot more motivation to be a better version of myself, but she certainly doesn't make it any easier to get there. 

4. Your areolas will return to their previous shape and scope. Y'all know what I'm talking about. Give it a few months.

4. In fact, ALL your bits will return to their previous shape and scope. Well, my belly still hasn't. But you know what I'm really talking about here. Give it more time than you'd hoped. 

5. Your baby politics may change, and that's fine. If you were previously against public breastfeeding, for instance, feel totally free to change your mind. My attitude prior to breastfeeding was that women should be able to breastfeed in most public places, if they do it discreetly and bear in mind that there are some spaces where it is simply not appropriate. My attitude once I was actually breastfeeding was that everyone can kiss my butt, this baby's hungry now and I'm not going to make her eat her dinner in the toilet. What, you've never seen a boob before? 

Another example: I used to think that the reason I would want to go back to work was because I would be bored at home. God, I was a snob. It can be boring sometimes (a lot?), but mostly it is a freaking slog. Hello? Coming up with stimulating things to do with your baby(ies) all day long while creating nutritious meals and handling the unreasonable expectation that you'll do all the household shopping and chores because you have "nothing else to do?" Yeah. No. Super drag. I'm stoked to go back to work soon because any environment where you can tune out for five minutes, earn money by speaking to adults, and have a regular sense of achievement sounds like a little bit of a relief. Obviously, working can also be a patience-testing slog, but at least if you're having a bit of a bad morning you don't have to feel so guilty about it. I now believe that women who work and women who stay home have it rough, because we so often get saddled (no matter what we do) with more than our fair share of shopping, cooking and cleaning--and this seems to happen even when the intention is to split that stuff fifty-fifty. Feminism hasn't won yet. 

6. Time flies, but also it doesn't. Everyone tells you that the first year goes so fast, so take a lot of pictures, keep a diary, and cherish every moment. Etc. Predictably, that is true. Actually, I found myself thinking a lot about time in general after the Noodle was born. And by time, I mean life, by which I actually mean death--my own, my husband's, everyone's. Including my daughter's. The impossibility and total certainty of it. You know. The beauty and horror of everything. Rainbow of the salt sand-wave and all that. That type of thought. Does that sound morbid? But it's true. I thought about those things a lot in the first few weeks, in particular. As a friend recently told me on his birthday, "Ah, the inexorable march toward death. I'm with the Buddhists on this one. Don't get too attached to life, because boom." Life is short--take a lot of pictures; post them on Facebook; maintain a sense of dark humour about the castles we build in the sand. 

This seems SO long ago.

On the other hand. Be prepared for some days to draaaaag on. I mean, wow. It's an almost nutritious kind of boredom, the kind that spurs creativity and insanity, dog-days-of-childhood-summer-boredom, the kind you rarely enjoy after the age of, like, twelve. One second plodding after the other. As your baby breastfeeds you sing yourself a song of sixpence, run through your mental grocery list, daydream about something or another, come back, and only three minutes have passed. It's insane. Just to clarify, though: you're still going to accomplish mighty few of those DIY and crafting projects you planned. 

7. You should start believing in vibes. Because your baby can feel them, and will react accordingly. Not just the vibes you think you're sending just by acting calm and breathing deeply, but the ones you are really sending. Unlike adults, they cannot be fooled, so it's time to get esoteric with your inner self, man. That sounds stupid, and certainly I used to think it was, but I swear. Emotional energy, vibes, all that nonsense. When it comes to baby-whispering, it's so real. 



8. Louis C.K. gets funnier. Maybe this is just me, but I used to think he was kind of gross, and I didn't much like that he called his kids assholes just to get a few laughs. Now I think he's hilarious. I mean, he's still a jerk. But while his kids are probably not going to appreciate any of it, they should know that their daddy is super funny.

9. You may give in to electronics and noisy toys. I don't care if you live in a hut under a rock in Siberia and ply her with a steady diet of hand-crafted wooden blocks and fabric books. Show that kid a cell phone one time and she will be hooked for life. And you will love it. Writing emails and the tyke is underfoot? Pass that baby a cell phone and buy yourself fifteen solid minutes. Also, do yourself a favor and buy some of those blinking, beeping, totally obnoxious toys. On a long car ride, you can tune out the circus sounds. A screaming baby is so much worse. 

10. The only desire that having a baby fulfils is the desire to have a baby. A professor at Boston University told me this (or something like it), and of course it is something I knew before I had the baby--but now I have one I feel the full force of this truth. Being a mother is something I have always wanted. It is an ambition I always had. And now that I get to be this perfect baby's mom, I am filled with new purpose, my life feels layered with new meaning, and there is nothing that brings me greater joy. 

However. It has not supplanted to any degree any of my other ambitions or interests. I still want to see my professional life go further. I still love to read and write and craft and cook and drink beer with my friends and talk about politics. I still want to learn how to keep plants without killing them. I would like to travel more. I want to understand many branches of science better. I want to stay on top of technological innovations. I want to write this blog. I want to be healthy; I want to be pretty. I want to be able to dress well when the situation demands it. And so on.  

Having a baby just makes it harder to do all of these things. Obviously there is less time and money for each of them. If we have more kids, it'll be even harder. Alex and I just don't have space or time any more to do some of the things we used to like, like nerding out on weekends with kilos of pottery clay or working on soapstone carvings. But being parents, I think, makes it more important to try to do what we can. I want to show my daughter that you can be a mom and have a job but also have good friends and pursue your interests and be fabulous all at the same time. Okay, that makes it sound like I'm accomplishing the above, which would be a lie. I'm sitting here in boxer shorts in an apartment that looks like Dresden in 1945. But the point is to strive for all those things, right? 

Before I had a baby, I thought it would be noble of me to relinquish some of my hobbies for the kiddo. Now I feel exactly the opposite. No one (dads or moms) should let anyone tell them that being a parent means it would be selfish to maintain their other interests. I don't want to pursue my own interests to the detriment of being a good parent, but it's hardly a zero sum decision. And I think giving up my other interests entirely would make me a pretty terrible role model. Right?

At one point I would have found everything happening
in this photo alarming. Not anymore!

11. You will eventually stop googling striking baby behaviours all the time. And stop worrying about whether you are going to break your child. Eventually. Or am I just more neurotic than most people? I read so many books while I was pregnant, and for the first few months after her birth I was constantly on the interwebs doing searches like: "3 wk baby punches self in face ok?" or "2 mo baby burping normal range day" or "4 mo baby fed cake frosting likelihood death adult obesity". Also I'd go check on her milestones. Like, I wasn't concerned if she hadn't achieved them, but I needed to know. 

Now I don't even look unless it really does seem like an emergency. For instance, the internets would probably say that the Noodle's lack of teeth at her age is totally weird, but I am now calm in the knowledge that she probably has milk teeth and that they will eventually emerge. Well, let's hope so, anyway. 

For any parents out there, what do you wish you'd known before having a baby? 

UPDATE: And by ten, apparently I meant eleven. My ability to count has also failed to improve with motherhood, more's the pity. 

The Parents Were Here

Grandma and Puffes Noodle

My parents were here, so of course I have been drinking.  This is not a reaction to them. This is simply the organic result of having free babysitters who are happy as little clams to bounce the baby and stuff her full of pureed carrots. 

They came last Thursday, suitcases bursting with beautiful baby clothes and toys and books and candy (that's for the grownups around here, who apparently are believed to have the dietary preferences of six year-olds raised in an American food desert), to spread merriment and good cheer around our humble abode. Hooray! And then in the wee hours this morning they left. Sorrow.

Luggage McNoodle and her dad

The trip was a great success. On Saturday we drove out to Peilstein to wander around the 7km "Erlebnisweg", but about two kilometers into our walk the sky darkened and it began to drizzle, so we turned around. The last kilometer or so we were walking into a freezing, hurricane-like wind through shards of frozen rain, which was sort of adventurous and magical until the Noodle (understandably) decided she had had quite enough thank-you-very-much and lapsed into a low-level grousing combined with repeatedly smacking her father about the head. 

Granddad in the woods

Weather notwithstanding we managed to gather a big bag of Bärlauch (bear leek, or woods garlic) and before driving home we warmed ourselves up in a Heuriger with beer, diverse pork and knödel, so we can't really complain. 

It's always good to have Noodle's grandparents around. Our baby had the time of her life because she got to be carried around all day long and there was always someone around to play peekaboo and wake up with her at five a.m. (thanks, Dad!). Alex and I could leave the apartment with nothing in our hands (hooray!) and even go on dates with each other, can you imagine, including to the cabaret. I've had three separate low-level hangovers in six days--great success! My mother spent her time campaigning hard for grandparent of the year, reading books, shaking rattles and singing nursery rhymes over and over and over again. Also she has rearranged my pantry in her usual wonderful if totally inscrutable way. 

Slightly manic mama and her indignant, pink-cheeked offspring
dry off after walking through the driving rain.

My poor father, however, did not leave Vienna unscathed. He went out on an innocent 9 a.m. hunt for sausages on Monday morning and ended up getting punched in the face by a flying street sign, which had been dislodged by a tremendous gust of wind. Sadly for all of us scroungers at home he didn't file a complaint or otherwise extort the responsible shopkeeper. Such a nice man. As of yesterday the bleeding had stopped and the swelling has gone down, so that's good. He has refused all offers of ice but has been eating copious amounts of ibuprofen and appears to be recovering well. He is a beacon of manly suck it up-ness. Stiff upper lip and all that...get it? GET IT?  

Battle scars.

Come again soon, Mom and Dad! We miss you already.