Menu:

  • Ravioli with Spinach
  • Salad
  • Little Ravioli for the Spawn

Feeds: 2 grownups with above average appetites.  One Spawn who, if believed, is never, ever hungry.

Equipment:

  • large bowl
  • salad spinner
  • 1 large pot, sufficient to boil ravioli
  • 1 large skillet, sufficient to wilt a load of spinach
  • cutting board
  • knife
  • wooden spoon
  • large spider
  • large serving bowl
  • large serving spoon
  • small serving bowl
  • small serving spoon

Ingredients:

  • coffee cup filled with water
  • olive oil
  • tomato paste (in the tube is really best)
  • head of spinach
  • 2 packages of fresh ravioli of your choice
  • 1 package of small cheese ravioli, the Spawn’s choice
  • two cloves of garlic
  • kosher salt
  • sea salt
  • lettuce of your choice (red leaf can keep things easy)
  • kalmata olives
  • croutons

Cocktail: The Manhattan

1.

Put a cocktail glass in the freezer.  Assemble and layout all necessary items (above). Get out the bourbon. I’ve been appreciating Bulleit lately.  Also, get out the Italian vermouth, bitters, Boston shaker, jigger and Hawthorne  strainer. Put ice in the bottom half of your Boston shaker.  And two measures of Bourbon, one of Italian Vermouth.  Three drops of bitters.  Put the top on the Boston Shaker and shake vigorously. Yes, yes. I know the rule for Manhattans.  Just trust me on this, okay?  Get the glass out of the freezer, open the shaker, put on the strainer and pour.  You really don’t need a maraschino cherry. The things have the half life of nuclear material.  If you have some nice brandied cherries, feel free to add ‘em but why get in the way of the alcohol.  Take a good pull on the drink, set it on the counter.

2.

Music.  You want something light and bouncy. Something that helps you move around the kitchen.  Something that includes the Great DJ from the Ting Tings because the Spawn so loves that.  The wedding playlist is good. And that was a wonderful day.

But, right, dinner.

3.

Get a stool for the Spawn. She can help wash the spinach and likes to. Remember to move the soap away because there was that time, when you weren’t looking, that she poured it into the spinach because, as she reasonably pointed out, soap is necessary if we want the spinach really clean.

Put the Spawn on the stool.  Get the soap back because she needs to wash her hands. Remind yourself to move it when she’s done.  Repeat “move the soap when she’s done move the soap when she’s done” over and over to yourself.  Take another drink of your Manhattan.  She’s done. Move the soap.

Take just a moment to be proud of yourself.

Help her pull the stems off the spinach leaves and put them in the bowl.  Fill the bowl with water.

Move the dishrag when she starts to use it to was the spinach leaves.

Tell her to carefully swirl the spinach and water.  Say “carefully” many times and try to use your best “I’m serious and a grownup but this is still fun to do together isn’t it” voice.

Take the spinach out of the bowl.  Empty the water and sand. Put the spinach back in the bowl to keep washing it.  Wonder to yourself why you think it’s such a freaking crime to by the pre-washed spinach.  The whole E. Coli thing has probably been worked out.  Empty the water.  Keep going.

Acknowledge, to the Spawn, that soap might keep you from having to repeat this.  But explain that you can’t actually use the soap.

Or the dishrag.

Or the dishwasher.

But wonder about that last for just a moment.  Manhattan.

Finally, get a dirt free bowl of water from the spinach. Put it, gratefully, in the salad spinner.  Let the four-year-old pull the handle.  She loves to do that.  Spin and spin.

Now, you have sliced garlic, clean spinach, a soaked four-year-old, good music and half a Manhattan.

Take just a moment to acknowledge that your life really isn’t that bad.

Fill the ravioli boiling pot with water.  Set it on the stove.  Don’t turn the fire on yet.

Put a nice glug of olive oil into the skillet. You want to coat the bottom but you don’t want to be ready to fry anything.  Turn the heat on to medium.

Tell the four-year-old to stop playing with the salad spinner. Realize that you didn’t even have to try to use that voice.  Somewhere along the way that voice became your actual voice.

Take a big drink of the Manhattan.

The pan is hot now. Put the garlic in.  You have the coffee cup of water nearby, right?  As soon as you smell the garlic — two minutes probably — pour the water in so that the garlic doesn’t burn.  Add two big squeezes of tomato paste.  Use the wooden spoon to mix the two.  Put the spinach leaves in the skillet.  Sprinkle a healthy (ha!) amount of kosher salt over the top of the spinach.

Add some sea salt to the ravioli boiling pot.  Now, turn the fire on high.

As the spinach gets wilt-y and the tomato paste water starts to steam, turn the heat down to medium low, put the lid on the skillet.

Work with the toddler to clean the lettuce for the salad.  Have her help distribute the salad into salad bowls.  Tell her she won’t
possibly eat that much salad.  Have her remove some of the lettuce from her bowl.  Recognize that you just encouraged your carb loving, salt hungry Spawn to NOT eat salad.  Have her put the lettuce back in. Tell her she can always eat as much as salad as she wants. Add the olives and the croutons to the salad.  Put it on the table with bottled dressing because no one uses the same thing.

The Spawn gets the salad spinner clean, clean, clean.

Peek into the spinach skillet, give it a good stir around.  Lid back on. Turn the fire down as low it will go.

Laugh at the Spawn, on her stool, dancing to Elton John and Ru Paul.  Give her a kiss on the top of the head just because.

It’s not just that your life isn’t that bad.  It’s really pretty good.

Give the soap and the dishrag back to the Spawn.  Tell her she can wash the salad spinner. Tell yourself that you will not correct her or help her.  You will just let her do it.  Tell yourself that in your firmest “Now listen to me voice.”  And then turn that up a notch.

When the water  is boiling like crazy, add the 2 packages of grown up raviolis and a glug of olive oil.  It’ll probably take them 9 minutes to cook.  Set the timer.  You’ve had 3/4 of a Manhattan and that’s a strong drink.  Nine minutes always goes faster than you think.

Watch the spawn wash the salad spinner. Think about the water shortage.  Which leads you to the economic crisis. And then your own set of worries.

Another drink. Maybe you should use cheaper bourbon.

Resolve to not use cheaper bourbon. Give up Manhattans before you go to cheaper bourbon. It’s not like the bourbon you are using is that expensive anyway.

The buzzer is going off. See?  Nine minutes goes by fast.

Use the spider to get the ravioli out of the boiling water.  Don’t move the pot. Don’t turn the fire off. Put all the ravioli into the large serving bowl.

Put half the package of small ravioli into the still boiling water.  Set the timer for 5 minutes.

Turn the fire off under the skillet. Dump the spinach and all the garlicky, tomato paste-y juicy goodness onto the ravioli.  Give it a bit a mix with the large serving spoon.  Set it on the table.

Tell the Spawn to stop washing the salad spinner. Not a correction really. Tell her to go potty and THEN wash her hands. Say that last part again.

Acknowledge that her hands are clean now but that they won’t be after she goes potty.

Tell her she can change her soaking wet shirt.

Call The Spouse to the table.  Recognize that this means, no matter what else has been happening, that a load of laundry must immediately be switched and some folding of clothes has to happen.

The time it takes one Spouse to fold of a load of clothes is equal to the time it takes one Spawn to go to the bathroom, wash her hands, and change out of the soaking wet shirt.

Take just a moment to be proud of yourself.

The buzzer is going off.

Use the spider to remove the small ravioli to the small serving bowl.  Small glug of olive oil. Quick mix and that’s on the table too.

Spawn and Spouse are done and there. Ready to eat.

Polish off the Manhattan.

Water crisis, bad economy, people hungry. It is, and there is no way around this, going to be a long winter.  Hell, a long year.

But now, in your kitchen, right now.

Right now, you have a kitchen that smells good, music you like still moving you around, a dinner that looks satisfyingly more elegant and harder than it really is, and the pleasure of a drink you like with a decent bourbon.  And you have these two people.

4.

The three of you sit down to eat.   Realize that right at this moment, your life isn’t just good. No matter what else is going on the world. In this instant, your life is perfect.