Risotto with Friends on our Street

I am happy to report that I made the risotto following a recipe from Real Simple, and because our neighbors, Ashley and Nikki, took our daughters for the better half of the afternoon, I made enough for all of us and carried it over to their house. It is so quaint and very European to have your neighbors become your friends and do these impromptu visits with them, and to cook for each other, because you feel like cooking a large batch. The key to risotto is that you add onions to melted butter, toast your rice a bit in that buttery mix, and then add a large cup of wine, or two. So the first thing that goes into the rice is the wine. You then add small batches of broth and let the rice absorb it, one half-cup at a time, and you can even stir the rice, which creates the characteristic risotto texture. Some people don't like their rice sticky and are averse to risotto, but no such picky people live on our streets, and even if they were, it's risotto, so you have to have it a bit mushy. If it's not sticky and gooey enough yet, in the end you add a lot of cheese to it, and then ham, green peas, and then you are left with this gooey gloppity glop, which is delicious and creamy and soothes your soul. It was perfectly fit for this rainy, crazy April Sunday. And the same Pinot Grigio that I used for cooking went just perfectly with it. The only problem was that the broth I used was particularly salty, plus the ham was salty, and thus, the end result was a bit over-salted. Next time I will use just half of the broth and the rest will be just plain water. Even the kids liked it, but of course, they liked Ashley's home baked brownies a bit more. Oh, well.

After cooking this "all day" on Sunday, I finished preparing for the Mock Trial this morning and it went just fine... but it was during the lunch hour, so I was hungry and became very thirsty by the time I had to speak, and it sounded like I was exasperated when the judges asked me questions, when the real trouble was that my throat was dry and I got winded with so much talking. After the trial, I quickly warmed up some leftover risotto, and had a fine afternoon, with creamy mushy yumminess in my tummy. Life is definitely better with risotto.

Nagyi, This Is For You

It was the second anniversary of Nagyi's departure, and it is not getting any easier. This year, the anniversary also coincided with Good Friday, and then Easter Sunday coincided with Abigail's fourth birthday (she is our younger daughter, if you didn't know that yet). So on Good Friday I attempted a Cioppino, thinking that Nagyi never had the luxury of seafood at the grocery store in Hungary. I am so very lucky living on the California Coast, picked up some king crab legs (cost an arm and a leg, which Nagyi would NOT approve) and some tilapia filets, and used the cioppino mix from the jars right there. I don't know why I got so lazy, I should have made my own sauce, because the soup came out fine by me... but Abel (my husband) and my mom (she lives with us) thought the soup had a funny aftertaste. As a result, I have more cioppino in my fridge than anybody in the house cares for, and it will go bad if not finished by tonight. But guess what, I have to attend an event at school, put on by Anne-Marie, something about unenumerated constitutional rights, as we have a policy of attending each other's association events. Alas, I will not eat at home tonight. (Anne-Marie will have sushi served at the event, which is great, and if Abel and the girls eat the seafood, we will all smell like fish tonight.)

And I spent Saturday editing an article about the corporate governance of Chinese Listed State-owned Companies, so I had to take it easy the next day. For Easter Sunday and Abi's Birthday, I warmed up a precooked Ham, opened a can of chipotle chiles and mixed two of those with three tablespoons of light mayo, which came out really spicy and went nicely with the ham and the thinly sliced boiled eggs. We added some vegetables, and cooked jasmine and forbidden rice, and mixed the two together (the kids loved it!), but really, the main attraction was a hit: ham, eggs, with chipotle mayo. Having a Birthday Party on Easter Sunday was enough reason for us to watch three movies, and for me to top it with a House, M.D. episode, skipping any studying.

The movies worthy of mention are Family Law, from Argentina, which inspired the theme of this Blog, and Mi Familia, by Edward James Olmos, which was simply great. Seeing Argentina made me more homesick than seeing East L.A. made Abel... Yes, Budapest is a lot like Buenos Aires, case in point is the movie Evita, which was made entirely in Budapest.