What Do You Get When You Cross…

Mister Rogers

     

WITH

                                                                             

                                                                                Howdy Doody?

YOU GET

Christopher Kimball!

You know him....from America’s Test Kitchen.  And really, I’m not being mean. Mister Rogers is an American icon and Howdy Doody is a legend, so actually that’s a pretty nice comparison.

I’ve seen a couple of episodes and usually find it interesting. Chris poses a problem at the beginning of the show and then, in the test kitchen, shows us specific ways to overcome the challenges of that particular dish or recipe.

In this one, Chris talks about how difficult it is to roast a chicken evenly and have the white and dark meat done at the same time - all the while roasting vegetables in the same pan. He says the vegetables get all covered with schmaltz, which frankly doesn’t sound like a problem to me at all. But he wants a crisply roasted chicken and crusty roasted vegetables.

He shows us an example of a chicken which has been undercooked on the bottom. The vegetables in that pan look stewed. 

He gets help from Julia Collin Davison in the Test Kitchen. First she tells us about the vegetables. They should all be "hearty" and cook at approximately the same time. I was beginning to think this was a little too basic, when she suggests using shallots. Well, of course! Why didn’t I ever think of that? I’ve roasted every vegetable imaginable and I’ve never roasted shallots. I save them for more delicate sauces or occasionally salad dressings, but roasting halved shallots is a great idea.

I suppose telling us to cut the carrots so they have the same “girth” (i.e. the thicker half should be cut in half lengthwise) is an important point, but the word she uses is so unattractive that I just keep picturing pudgy vegetables. Oh, and she WEIGHS the vegetables. Not on camera, but before. She has 12 ounces of each vegetable. That’s kind of annoying. We’re not making pastry, but I DO understand this is a TEST kitchen.

Julia tosses all her vegetables in vegetable oil. (I didn't know anyone used that anymore except for carrot cake and, actually, olive oil can go in that too.) She adds fresh herbs, seasoning AND sugar, which Julia says helps the caramelization. Of course it does, but isn’t that cheating? EVERYTHING tastes better with sugar, but shouldn’t we try to avoid it when we can.

Julia, with Chris watching eagerly, gets herb butter ready for the chicken. Then she grabs the chicken and breaks the bad news to us. She will be cutting the chicken in pieces, so they cook more evenly and finish at the same time as the vegetables.

Hold on a hot minute! I came aboard to learn how to roast a chicken perfectly. OF COURSE it roasts better in pieces, but that wasn’t supposed to be the exercise. Any ninny can cook chicken pieces, but I wanted America Test Kitchen’s spin (it sounds so patriotic) on A WHOLE ROAST CHICKEN.  

I’m quite disappointed. Julia gives us all the reasons why we should cook the chicken in pieces. It turns out there are a whole lot! In fact, she has me thinking that it would be insane to ever roast a whole chicken again, even though that's what I tuned it for!

According to Julia and Chris, this is why you want to cut up the chicken:

A whole chicken has more than 4 times the fat and juices coming out of it and landing on top of the roasted vegetables than the pieces do. (Again, I don’t see this as a problem.) One reason is because the back bone and wings are removed before cooking, which removes a lot of fat in the pan.

When you cut up the chicken, you also end up cutting off some of the skin and extra fat which cuts down on the fat and drippings.

There’s more air circulation around individual pieces of chicken, so they cook up much crisper. The moisture goes up into the air of the oven and not down on the vegetables.

In conclusion, chicken PARTS leave the vegetables underneath them much drier than a whole chicken does.

A few other notes: Julia uses scissors to cut through the back bone, which is much easier than a knife.

Julia doesn’t actually bother drying the chicken before she cooks it, she just lays paper towels on top, which absorbs the excess moisture. She turns the chicken over and does the same thing on the other side.

She cooks the chicken and vegetables on a sheet pan and not a roasting pan, because there’s more evaporation and it “allows for good browning”. The vegetables would stew more with the high sides of a roasting pan. (When I'm roasting vegetables alone, I always do it on a sheet pan, but I ALWAYS line it with foil.)

The Brussels sprouts go in the center of the pan for a little extra protection, because they brown more quickly. The same goes for the white and dark meat. The breast pieces go in the middle of the pan, the dark meat around the edges. (I usually place my Brussels sprouts cut side down, but Julia didn’t bother.)

The chicken comes out of a 475°F oven after only 35 minutes. Chris remarks that the pan isn’t swimming in juices. That makes me sad. How would I make a little sauce with nothing left in the pan?

Julia serves it up and Chris loves it. She "Mmm"’s a bit too much. IT’s not chocolate cake after all.

There was a lot of information in this episode. Too bad I didn’t care about roasting a chicken in PIECES.

              

Ina has some great quick videos on roasting a chicken. (Sorry about the commercials.) This first one is from 1999, where a younger (and so lovely) Ina starts by WASHING the chicken, which we really don’t do anymore. SHE uses a (huge) roasting pan and her chicken and vegetables look nicely browned. This is the recipe.

Here’s another video from Ina of her famous Engagement Roast Chicken. Supposedly this recipe helps things along in the romance department. 

             

Here’s what I do:

My Roast Chicken with Vegetables

Cut up 4 peeled carrots, 1 peeled yam, 2 onions or 1 white onion and 1 red onion, a handful of Brussels sprouts, halved and a peeled potato or two. Toss in a ½ teaspoon of Kosher salt and splash of good olive oil. Pour into a Pam-ed roasting pan. (Mine was pretty shallow and notice I took Chris and Julia's hint and put the Brussel sprouts in the middle.)

 

Place the chicken on top. Slightly salt both sides of the chicken.

Roast at whatever temperature you wish. 400°F. if you have more time. You may need a good hour and a half. OR if you have less time, roast it up to 450°F. I split the difference and did this one at 425°F. for about an hour and 10 minutes. And then I put it under the broiler for a minute and a half...but only because I was taking a picture for you.
 

When it’s done and the breast registers 165°F, remove it to a board and cover loosely with foil. 

With a slotted spoon, remove the vegetables from the pan and keep warm, uncovered, in a baking dish.

Pour all the juices from the pan into a small saucepan. Add about 1/2 cup of stock (vegetable or chicken) and a ¼ cup of white wine or orange juice. Bring to a boil and simmer uncovered for 2 minutes or so. Reduce it more if you like. Taste for seasoning and serve as is. OR you can add 2 teaspoons of any vinegar you like to give it a little zing. Allow it to boil for one minute with the vinegar.

Sometimes I add in a few fresh cherries with the stock at the beginning. They go nicely with the chicken.

             

Happy Mother's Day

Nice children sent me flowers. I love flowers!

             

 

Last week we made a pre-Mother's Day visit to Longwood Gardens and we couldn't have picked a more magnificent day. MANY different varieties of tulips were in full bloom. I didn't even know tulips came in that many colors or shapes.

I hope it's been great day for all those special mothers out there. Here are more pictures than you could ever want to see of purdy flowers! (Sorry this slideshow takes so long to load.)

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Ina Gussies Up Apple Tarts And Surpasses Her Own Record For Butter Usage

Barefoot Bistro

Apricot Butter 

Apple Tarts

Cinnamon Honey Butter 

Chicken Liver Mousse Mirabelle

French Mussel Bisque 

Herb Butter
Lemon Butter

Roquefort Butter 

About that butter record, I don’t have any hard numbers on Ina’s PREVIOUS butter practices, but her proclivity for this fat is well-known. I’ll let you know at the end of the post the jaw-dropping amount that slipped through her fingers in this episode.

This show was an older one about bringing “French bistro ideas back to East Hampton”. We’re lucky Ina didn’t just skip town and hop on a plane to Paris to visit her favorite bistros.

She starts with a mussel bisque. 3 pounds of mussels get soaked in water with a bit of flour and then drained. Ina says they drink the mixture and “disgorge” the sand. And she makes sure the beards are off. (I suspect her fancy fishmonger did that for her. If you’re responsible for that, grab hold of the beard tightly and always pull it off TOWARD the hinge.)

Most folks don’t bother with flour (or I’ve seen cornmeal too). Here’s an easy explanation of how to clean mussels.

Ina cooks the mussels, covered, in a mixture of 1½ cups of boiling water and 1 cup of wine for 5 minutes.

Separately, she makes a base of onions, leeks, carrots and garlic, which she cooks in butter with salt and pepper. She adds threads of saffron at this point too, which is interesting. Nine times out of ten, saffron is steeped in liquid and THAT gets added to the recipe.

Occasionally, you may see a recipe where the saffron is toasted before using. But the stuff is so unbelievably expensive that to get the most out of it, I’ve always dissolved or soaked it in liquid. Ina kind of splits the difference by cooking it to the butter before any liquid goes in. I would still definitely soak it first, maybe in the mussel broth, and then add that to the bisque.

Ina cooks those vegetables for a long time to completely soften them. She tells us how much better saffron threads are than saffron powder. (I’ve never actually seen saffron powder. I thought people just used turmeric instead for a saffron-y color without the distinctive taste. But don’t do that here!)

Next Ina chops 4 tomatoes from a big can of San Marzano tomatoes. She says she first had Mussel Bisque when she was cooking her way through Mastering the Art. I didn’t know she did that! She adds the tomatoes to the softened vegetables and cooks that for a minute. 

By the way, I searched through Mastering for a bisque recipe that used saffron and I couldn't find it. The Bisque de Homard À L'Américaine has no saffron and the Soupe aux Moules does have a touch of curry powder AND egg yolks and cream, but no saffron. 

Ina removes the mussels using a spider to keep all the sand on the bottom of the pan. She strains the cooking liquid through cheesecloth to catch any sand and adds 2 cups of it to the pot. She says she’s going to discard the rest. Wait, don’t do that! She also adds the rest of the bottle of Pinot Grigio that she used, so that’s one bottle minus one cup...which would be 2 cups. She simmers that for 5 minutes. Is that too much wine, I wonder?

Ina takes all the mussels out of their shells by removing one side of the shell and using it to scoop out the mussel. (She says don’t use any closed ones.)

Ina says whenever anyone asks them about their favorite restaurants in Paris, she and Jeffrey surprise people when they say they prefer bistros to big fancy restaurants. And she says she always orders mussel bisque if it’s on the menu.

Ina adds the mussels to the broth over low heat with 1½ cups of half and half, which “never made anything taste worse”. Funny. And then a cup of heavy cream goes in, which Ina defends by saying it IS a French recipe. She seasons it and adds chopped fresh parsley. She tastes it. It’s good, really good.

Okay, I know we’re replicating bistro food today, but I would cook the vegetables in olive oil. Or maybe half oil and half butter. Or maybe just a tablespoon of butter. And I would definitely save all of that broth and substitute it for some of the cream. Instead of a total of 2½ cups of cream and half and half, I might use just ½ cup of cream and the rest stock, clam juice and wine. It would still be good, especially if you cooked the vegetables a long time as Ina says to give them that sweet, delicious flavor. And you wouldn’t be assaulting your arteries with quite as big an onslaught of cream. Just saying…

Next Ina visits her friend, Chef Guy Reuge, in his Stony Brook restaurant, Mirabelle, where he’s going to show her how he makes his Chicken Liver Mousse. Ahhh, here is one source of all that butter. For one pound of chicken livers, he uses 2 sticks of butter. I love his super strong Frensssccchhhh accent, even though he’s had his restaurant here for 30 years.

Chef Reuge seasons the chicken livers with salt, pepper and quatre épices, which Ina pretends not to know anything about. It’s a spice mixture and he gives us his own recipe for it here.

Chef sautés the chicken liver in grapeseed oil. (I love that oil! It has a super high smoking temperature so you can fry with abandon.) Then he throws in sliced shallot, sage, sprigs of thyme and sliced garlic. Next he takes the pan off the heat and pours in some Cognac and returns it to the heat. “Uh-Oh!” Ina says as the pan bursts into high flames.  He says he takes it off the burner so he doesn’t burn his moustache. I just love French chef humor.

Chef Reuge takes the pan off the stove and strains the contents of the pan to “remove the excess blood”. He places the chicken livers in the fridge, because he wants to process them when they’re ice cold. Meanwhile, he deglazes the pan with Marsala and Port.

He puts the cooled livers into a food processor with the deglazing liquid (isn’t that a bit hot and won’t it defeat the purpose of chilled livers?) and a half pound of completely and beautifully softened butter. That looks like Plugrá to me. He processes it until it’s smooth and puts it through an upside down tamis. Ina is very impressed with his equipment and his method. Me too.

It comes out smooth as silk, Ina says. Chef puts it a plastic wrap-lined terrine and then refrigerates it again. He serves a slice with cornichons and 4 microscopically thin toasts. (I would need about two dozen more to be happy.) They taste it together. They love it and Ina can’t wait to make it for Jeffrey.

Back at the ranch barn, Ina’s getting her table ready and, OMG, I thought she had taken a trip to Holland in high season. She’s standing amongst the most beautiful tulips of many different colors. AND she’s in her back yard!

Ina fills each vase (there are three) with only one variety of flower. They go on the table that’s been set with “raw Belgian linen napkins” used as placemats - “very modern” Ina says; white plates; and vintage flea market bowls on top. She’s also using new and vintage cutlery, which she mixes up on the table. I can’t tell whether each place setting is different (which I do when I run out of one kind of silverware) or if Ina is using different knifes, spoons and forks of different patterns at each place. I prefer the former, but I guess it’s kind of cool to do it the other way too. She finishes it up with plain white rectangularly folded napkins. No swans for her.

Her chairs look similar to the ones in the Jardin du Luxembourg, except theirs are green and Ina’s are white(ish).

Next Ina tells us about flavored butters. She gives us tons of recipes. The Roquefort butter looks particularly good. Truthfully, this is where all that butter comes in. But still it’s A LOT. Stay tuned to see how much.

Last, Ina shows us how to make a quick apple tart. I love that she tarts it up with an apricot glaze. This is a simple trick for giving any earthy fruit-topped dessert a sophisticated glow. There are several reasons for glazing. Number one is eye appeal.

Another reason for glazing is taste. It adds another layer of flavor. I like to add fresh lemon juice to my glazes too. Incidentally, you use apricot jam for apples and any yellow fruits and red currant jelly for berries. If you have mixed fruits, use apricot.

The third reason to glaze is to keep the fruit from drying out and looking brown. It keeps the tart looking fresher longer. 

Ina cuts apples (use small ones to fit better) and places about 6 slices on each rectangle of puff pastry. She uses thawed frozen pastry and doesn’t roll it out at all. She just cuts it in quarters.  

She sprinkles over sugar and dots the tops with butter. Ina grabs her sugar from a lovely clear glass vase. How pretty! But I like to have a tight cover on mine. She bakes them at 400°F. for 40 minutes. They look lovely.

Next Ina does her version of a glaze. Her glazing is completely and totally different from mine. And this isn’t the first time I’ve disagreed with her about this. She makes a glaze of ¾ cup of apricot jelly with 3 tablespoons of Calvados. She doesn’t strain it, which is okay, because she’s using jelly, which I can never find. She brings the glaze to a boil and immediately brushes it over the tarts, which are still warm from the oven.

I always use a HOT glaze over a COOLED tart. That way it doesn’t pool together in certain places, so I can’t explain her thinking here. She loves the finished product of her tarts and how quick they were to make. Ina wants to know how to say, “How easy is that?” in French. She should have asked her French chef friend.

Okay, here’s the butter count. Drum roll…this week Ina used a total of…NINE sticks of butter or two and one quarter pounds. That’s got to be a record. (I think my math is right…for all I know it could have been ninety sticks, but I don’t think so.)

Butter in This Episode
Apricot Butter  1 stick

Apple Tarts ¾ stick
Cinnamon Honey Butter  1 stick

Chicken Liver Mousse Mirabelle 2 sticks

French Mussel Bisque  ¾ stick

Herb Butter 2 sticks
Lemon Butter 1 stick

Roquefort Butter  ½ stick

I know I suggested lightening up the Mussel Bisque recipe earlier, but I still like Julia’s quote, “If you're afraid of butter, use cream.”

Pioneer Woman Celebrates A Good Kid’s Birthday Plus My Favorite Ina Game

Pioneer Woman with Ree Drummond 

Alex's Birthday

Iny's Prune Cake with Buttermilk Icing

Rosemary Focaccia

New York-Style Chopped Salad

Herby Ranch Dressing

Ice Cream Flower Pot Desserts

There were lots of repeats on the Food Network this weekend and I had no intention of watching Pioneer Woman. But what could I do when there was so much to say after I watched it for just a minute?

It was daughter Alex’s 15 birthday and “after a morning of ranch work with the family”, Ree was making her Great Granny’s prune cake for the birthday. Interesting choice. I do love prunes with chicken so why not in a cake? But for a 15 year old?

The kids and dad are working hard “shipping cattle”. Let’s not think too hard about that. Maybe they’re being shipped from one bucolic field to another. And, after all, if we’re going to eat meat, we shouldn’t look away from how it gets to our plates. (Although, of course, we can support healthier more humane ways of that happening…if there is such a thing.)

But hold on for a sec. Let’s consider this ranch scene for a moment. One of my favorite games is putting Ina in imaginary settings where she would be ever so out of place. 

Let’s imagine Ina and Jeffrey herding cattle out yonder in Oklahoma…in their twin BMW’s. Would they have the tops down? And would Ina have a jaunty bandanna tied around her neck? She would probably make the best of it by making lots of friends and mixing up a pitcher of lemon drops to serve to the ranch hands. “How easy is that?” (OH! Ree’s ranch hands are teens and younger…Never mind.) Would Jeffrey bring his work with him or would he help Lance barbecue a side of beef for dinner?

And what would Ree do if she found herself at Ina’s? Would she wander around the Contessa’s spread, thinking how many cattle could live out in back forty? She’d probably gaze at Ina’s pantry with the longing of someone who has to drive 45 minutes to buy a bottle of vanilla.

Anyhoo, back to earth. I don’t want to be difficult, but just in the initial few seconds of Ree’s first recipe, she’s given me plenty of things to harangue her for comment on.

PW is taking her flour from a bag with the edges folded down. That’s a smart way to avoid catching the cup of the rim of the bag, but it’s a dumb way to store flour. Get yourself a large plastic container or wide-mouthed jar that can hold a bag of flour. Do the same with the sugar. You’ll save the equivalent of 4000 woman or man hours over the course of your life by not having to fiddle around with a measuring cup in a bag of flour - edges folded down or not. (I admit that time estimate may be just a bit off…depending on how much baking you do.)

Next problem. Ree adds a teaspoon of nutmeg to the cake batter. It looks like she’s gotten it from a bottle. It could never taste as fresh as newly ground. There’s no reason not to have a few nutmeg berries (they're actually called "seeds") in the cupboard. They honestly last FOREVER. Really. Plus most recipes don’t call for that much, so it’s a cinch to grate a small amount. Unless you’re making eggnog in bathtub-sized batches, grate fresh nutmeg every time you use it.

Ree does take the time to sift her flour, spices and leavening. Honestly, I mostly just stir them up (if they’re lucky), but I also don’t compress my flour as I take it from the container.

For the wet ingredients, Ree mixes sugar (it’s not a wet ingredient, but never mind. I’m just happy she’s taken it from a big jar…Yay!) with 3 eggs, a big teaspoon of vanilla and a cup of canola oil. WHY doesn’t she use safflower oil? You know have I thing about canola oil, plus I despise its taste.  (You could also substitute some applesauce for the oil, if you wanted to lighten it up.) She mixes the batter with a little whisk. I would definitely use a fork.

BTW, if you always keep the fork in contact with the bottom of the bowl as you’re beating, it will NEVER splash over the sides.

The wet ingredients get mixed into the dry ones and then Ree stirs in a cup of buttermilk and adds the prunes. She readied the prunes by cooking them in water until soft for about 8 minutes and then draining and mashing them. Frankly, wouldn’t even chopped up prunes be good?

The batter goes into a well-buttered 9 by 13 glass dish. For some reason, Ree feels she has to justify the size of dish she’s using. She says others have made the cake too thick or too thin and this one will work just fine. Hmm. We’ll see about that. It does look kind of flat before baking. Maybe she SHOULD have used a different pan. It bakes at 300°F. for 35 to 40 minutes. That’s low. Definitely make sure your oven is preheated if you’re using such a low temperature. Ree says. “Grandma Iny was adamant. Do NOT overbake this cake,” (which would be hard at that low a heat anyway…)

I HATE baking stuff at 300°, except meringues, which might be baked even lower. I find that cakes and brownies take FOREVER and they never really cook in the middle.

Ree moves on to Iny’s icing. She stirs together a cup of sugar and a cup of buttermilk in a medium saucepan. Then she adds butter, baking soda and just a bit of corn syrup and vanilla. I don’t approve of adding the vanilla at this point. Add it after the sauce or icing has come off the stove.

Ree says to use a candy thermometer to check the temperature because she doesn’t want it to go as far as the caramel stage. She “stops the cooking process before it gets to the soft ball stage”. She doesn’t tell us what temperature that is, but I will. 235°F. is the beginning of the soft ball stage, so take the sugar mixture off the heat right then or JUST below that. Remember it keeps cooking after it’s removed from the heat.

The icing looks really foamy, which is from the baking soda. That will make a softer mixture which will be easier to pour.

Ree takes the cake out of the oven. It does look really thin. The kids and dad come home. Ree says to pour the icing over the cake right when it comes out of the oven. (The only reason I can see to have a cake that thin, is that there’s more real estate to benefit from that yummy icing.)

Ree puts one candle in and lets Alex blow out the candle. She cuts the birthday girl a piece of cake and serves it on a pretty yellow plate. No garnish? Not even a berry or two? Eh! I used to give my kids a beautiful breakfast in bed for their birthdays. (Don’t be that impressed. I made THEM do the same for me.)

Next we see Alex with her friends opening birthday presents. She IS a sweet girl and I like how she says she loves everything with lots of thank-you’s. That’s good training and it DOES take a lot of that. (Before my kids’ birthday parties, I used to practice situations of what to do if the birthday kid hated something or if he or she got duplicates. So we had a secret signal and whenever I put anything on top of the mantel - so it would stay pristine and unopened - that was their sign that we’d exchange it for something else AFTER the party. BUT they had to be gracious in that moment.)

There are a few other things that I appreciated that Ree DID do. She proofed her yeast before mixing up her focaccia dough. Actually, it was good that she MADE focaccia dough in the first place. I do wish, though, that she had thrown some whole wheat flour in there.

Oh, I spoke too fast. She’s losing me again. After the dough is mixed and risen, she says, “I LOVE sticky dough.” NOW we know she’s a poser. Sticky dough is necessary sometimes, but does anybody really LOVE it? It’s a big pain.

Ree kneads half the dough with fresh chopped rosemary. (The other half is being put away for another time.) She drizzles olive oil on a baking sheet and put the dough on top. She drizzles over a bit more olive oil, covers it and lets it rise for another hour.

I also like that she’s making a real ranch dressing with lots of fresh herbs. 

She chops chives, parsley, basil and oregano. C’mon Pioneer Woman disparagers, THIS is a perfectly good recipe. No tricks or flourishes, probably just like your grandmother made (if she had ever heard of ranch dressing.)

Actually, it may be a little gloppy. Mayo, sour cream and buttermilk with herbs, vinegar and Worcestershire sauce. Now I can’t decide what I think. Is it garbage or homemade goodness? (…which I know can be the same thing.) Basically, they’re eating white bread (with rosemary and lots of olive oil) with a salad doused in mayonnaise. Maybe that isn’t so great.

Well, these kids get an amazing amount of exercise, so I guess they can have any salad dressing they want.

Ree finishes the focaccia by putting fingerprints all over the top, adding more olive oil plus salt. She bakes it at 400°F. for 30 to 40 minutes.

Ree is making chopped salad because she and Alex had it in New York where it was chopped up tableside. So PW is pulling together lots of ingredients for the girls to have what they want. The girls pick their fixin's and PW chops them up with two knives on a big cutting board and then dresses the salad with the ranch dressing. Not a bad idea, but the only protein is hard boiled eggs. And there are so many other healthy things she could have added -shredded red cabbage, snow peas, edamame. And, seriously, why couldn’t she have added some seared chicken breasts and/or grilled shrimp? AND where is the bacon??? Maybe Alex doesn’t eat meat? Good luck to her on the ranch.

Dessert is weird…for 15 year olds. Ree serves up pound cake in flower pots with chopped up Oreos as dirt. Remember the dessert that Friday’s (I think) used to have (maybe still does?) on their kid’s menu? It was called Cup O’ Dirt and it had gummy worms and chopped up Oreos over pudding. 

Ree starts with a clay flower pot (she didn’t even say it should be clean OR new…ew) She puts some disks of bought pound cake on the bottom that she had cut out with a cookie cutter.

Next Ree sticks a straw the height of the flower pot into the middle of the cake. She spoons in softened ice cream right up to the top of the pot and freezes them. Just before serving, Ree puts gummy worms on the top and covers them up with ground-up Oreos. A very pretty Gerber daisy gets stuck into each straw as a final flourish, and, voila, a dessert fit for…an eight year old.

 

But you know what? I’m not going to give her a hard time, because what mother doesn’t want to keep her kid young forever? For all I know, my son is still eating Cups O’ Dirt, but he probably wouldn’t want it publicized all over the place. So let’s pretend for Alex’s sake that dessert was a bit less jejune.