Look what we made!

I’m a child of the 70s and 80s which makes me 1) old and 2) able to remember a time before a lot of processed and pre- packaged foods. That’s not to say that those things didn’t exist. Kraft mac n’ cheese was a much loved (if infrequent) treat as were Swanson’s chicken pot pies, hot dogs and potato chips.  But my mom, whose Chinese roots (via Hong Kong) mixed with the hippie, DIY ethos of the time made sure that most of what we ate was homemade and nutritious.  I can’t always vouch for the deliciousness.   Check out my old meatloaf post for a description of how my mom riffed on the classic American dish to varying degrees of success.  This was also the era of carob bars instead of chocolate and health-food store peanut butter made of freshly ground peanuts (and nothing else) instead of JIF or Skippy which contained a whole lot of salt and sugar and tasted how peanut butter SHOULD taste).  But looking back now, I realize how lucky we were to grow up in a house where food was something you cooked and not just retrieved from a box or heated up in the microwave.  I credit my parents with making me the eater I am today and the cook. Today all these years later, I’m proud to carry on the tradition of preparing as many home cooked meals as I can and I think it’s having an effect.  Judging by the way my kids eat, I’m happy to say they’re little chips off the old gluttonous blocks (me AND Shefali, who’s no slouch in the eating department).  I’m also seeing glimmers of a real interest in cooking.  First daughter Kaya loves to watch us cook and help out when she can. Second daughter, Mona, not yet two, lacks basic motor skills but if her man-sized appetite is any indication, she’s going to be a beast in the kitchen.  It’s fair to say that both girls have spent a good portion of their lives in the kitchen because that’s where we spend most of our time. And so it only felt natural to start making videos with them. After all, Kaya’s been part of this blog and in these videos since she was just a baby.

So for her first video where she is an active and willing participant, we decided to make something pretty easy but really good. In fact this is Kaya’s favorite for breakfast: granola.  I basically took a recipe from Alton Brown and made some of my own little tweaks (a little less salt, more oats, coconuts and almonds) and the results have been uniformly GOOD!!!  But don’t just take my word for it. Take Kaya’s.

Here are the ingredients:
3 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 cup slivered almonds
1 1/2 cups dried coconut flakes
2 tbsp chia seeds
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp maple syrup
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup of dried cranberries.

And here’s how we do it:

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Homemade Grape Soda!

When I look back on my childhood I have to say it was pretty sweet.  That has more to do with the love and affection of my parents rather than the presence of sugary treats or beverages in our pantry.  Yeah, my mom was the type who bought carob chips instead chocolate, who baked zucchini bread instead of cookies (thankfully the carob never made it into the zucchini bread, because I actually really liked the zucchini bread).  Occasionally we could have orange juice  – the frozen concentrate kind that you mixed with water – but pretty much never would we get soda like Coke or 7UP.  It was only at my neighbors’ house across the street (they had a swimming pool, cable TV and they had ColecoVision. would I get to drink such sweet nectar because  they kept their cupboards stocked with all sorts of soda. They even had the mini cans!  These were the best because they were small enough for a kid to mimic a “mug” by placing the thumb on the top of the can and the pinky on the bottom and  holding the can shaka style. It’s like “Yeah, I’m drinking from a mug that’s actually my hand!” It just didn’t get much cooler when I was seven. I guess I lived a pretty sheltered life. Pardon the trip down memory lane, but all this is to say, I didn’t get soda much when I was a kid and when I did, it was a real treat. I did’t really have much of a taste for Coke, gravitating to the more “healthy” options of 7UP or ginger ale (my parents’ food indoctrination ran pretty deep).  But when there was a can of  Welch’s grape soda on the table – forget it. That was my jam!

All these years later, I still have a thing for grape soda.  But I’m an adult now – at least age wise.  And I’m a cliche.  I have two young kids whose sugar intake I limit like a dictator  and I’m also one of those annoying food oriented (though never mistake me for some newbie hipster foodie) DIY types who likes to make my own food stuffs and blog about it – yeah, even more annoying.  So, imagine my delight when I discovered that the house we moved into a couple years ago had a grape vine growing along the fence in our front yard that borders our neighbor’s driveway.

Front yard grapes

I have no idea what kind of grapes they are but I do know that they’re delicious and as they ripen they go from tart to full bodied and sweet. Our yield this year was pretty good, so I thought, why not take the juice of these lovely grapes and make a concentrate of grapey essence that I could add to the seltzer water which I annoyingly adore (I was also an early adapter of and proselytizer for the Soda Stream). So that’s what I did. And you know what? It’s way better than Welch’s – as it should be because this was a whole lot more labor intensive than going the store and buying a can or case of Welch’s or Fanta. And less sugar? See, Mom? I’m still listening.

Here’s how I do it: