Happy hour with Jacob

Trying to take a spontaneous picture with my Fort Worth family is an impossibility—they all three take wonderful pictures, and they can’t resist posing. Tonight I missed the action shot I wanted. So here’s a posed picture in which Jacob looks quite glum about the artichoke his mother is pointing too. A few seconds earlier, when I didn’t have the phone in my hand, he was laughing and saying, “It’s really good.”

The amuse bouche

While Christian labored over a hot stove, Jordan, Jacob and I had a happy hour. Jacob had another assignment to cook something French for his language class. Previously he did a credible croque monsieur, and for tonight we found directions for an amuse bouche that was nothing more than goat cheese rolled into a ball and then rolled in chives. Somehow that didn’t translate—and it ended up goat cheese with chives mixed in and then spread on baguettes slices. Good, but not I think what a true French chef would serve.

I had gotten an artichoke with my Saturday groceries—and what looked like the smallest container ever of hollandaise (not cheap—I really must master making it at home again; I used to do it beautifully, but now I don’t have a blender nor the confidence). Christian doesn’t eat artichokes, so we added that to our happy hour.

When Jacob was little, I bought bottle after bottle of “kid wine,” carbonated white grape juice. I thought he had long outgrown it, but tonight he asked plaintively if we couldn’t have kid wine again. Jordan objected that it’s too sweet but guess what—it will go in my shopping cart next week. That’s what grandmothers are for.

The amuse bouche was good, but the artichoke was a learning experience. Jacob went from refusal to try it, to trying one leaf without the Hollandaise, to trying the sauce and then, with a sheepish grin, said, “It’s really good.” After Jordan extricated the heart and divided it, Jacob recorded on his phone that hereafter he gets the entire heart every time. We did not agree to that. But I have added another artichoke to my Tuesday order for imperfect veggies.

What most delighted me was that Jacob, not at all an adventuresome eater, tried something new and ended up liking it. I’m afraid I’ll badger him with this incident every time I want him to try something new. I can hear myself harping, “Remember the artichoke!”

I was grown before I ever had an artichoke. I remember my mother and I once tried to cook a package of frozen baby ones—but we didn’t know to put Hollandaise on them, and we didn’t know what to do with them. I suspect they ended in the trash. I’m not sure who taught me to like fresh ones—it may have been my brother’s ex-wife. But now I think they’re a wonderful treat, though I admit they are in part a vehicle for the Hollandaise.

I told Jordan we’ve done a bad thing, teaching Jacob to like them. My mother didn’t encourage me to eat avocadoes for a long time, because she didn’t want to share (my dad didn’t eat them). Now we have to share, but he cannot have the whole heart. I’ll stomp and throw a hissy fit.

As long as we're talking about food, here's our dinner tonight: pork tenderloin in a cream/mustard sauce, wonderful roasted potatoes with chives and Parmesan, and a green salad. Christian outdid himself as usual. The potatoes particularly hit home with me.

Another gloomy day, and Sophie is reacting to the weather by snuffling, sneezing, and spitting up. Ah, spring in Texas.