Trésors de la saison, a little howling, and some practical advice

Entirely unrelated to that elegant French phrase in the title, it's MRI week here at Moving Right Along.  I was supposed to be having an MRI of my pelvis right now, and another of my liver at 8:00 tomorrow morning, but it turns out that these require an IV, and guess what?  Two experienced nurses couldn't get one in me for love or money.  And I was relatively calm!  And not even screaming yet!  My tiny little deep-set veins simply couldn't sit still long enough to have holes poked in them, even though I sat breathing deeply in what I call 3/4 lotus position (unlike the full or half lotus position favored by two-legged yogis; Action Barbie just isn't MRI friendly and had to spend time in a closet).  So the upshot is that I get to go back Friday morning at 7:15, get an ultrasound at a department called "Interventional Radiology" to help locate a vein, get an IV placed, and then return to the MRI habitat and get all my MRIs done at once.  These lovely scans will help me choose whether to have more hopefully palliative surgery, e.g., to remove my big fat ovary and probably only my big fat ovary, or stop now and just let the disease take its course -- which it might do very, very slowly or very, very fast, no one can say.  (And no, in case you were in doubt, I don't want your advice on any of this, but thanks anyway.)

It's also menstrual week here at Moving Right Along, because apparently this is my year to have to undergo everything, even brain surgery, while either premenstrual or actually menstruating.  No one thinks I have cancer in my uterus or my cervix as biopsies have come out clean, so, alas, I have no excuse to have a hysterectomy, so I shall probably be menstruating on my deathbed.  Fantastic.  Should this in fact transpire, I've asked my true love to put "She died while menstruating" on my tombstone in the event he ever buys me one.  He has not committed to carrying out this wish.

All this and multiple apparently inoperable metastases, too!  Is it any wonder I'm exhausted?  I half snorted/half laughed out loud when esteemed correspondent Jeanne Sather at the Assertive Cancer Patient revealed that, as she discovered while participating in ASCO this year, "Researchers DO NOT KNOW what causes cancer fatigue."  It's funny because even those of us who have never done chemo or radiation could give them a big fat list.  Easiest study ever; just confirm the data by cross-checking the lists.  (I'll take my grant now, thanks.)   But the truth is, you don't have to have cancer or spectacular perimenopausal hormones to be completely worn out.  I hear having children is enough.

So regardless of the reason, what do you do when you have eight million children and/or eight million things to do including putting meals on the table and not enough strength you can count on having from day to day?  You cook in advance.

My friend Aura is the queen of this practice.  I also know a couple with eight foster children plus kids of their own as well, and they basically have two crock pots going all the time.  I think both households also sport really big freezers, too.

Usually this practice involves a lot of stews and casseroles, lots of nutrition packed into one dish.  But it's summer.  Who wants hot food in summer?  And who wants a hot kitchen?

Because I kind of expected this week to kick my ass from the very beginning, yesterday while doing laundry (another good thing to do in advance on those rare occasions when you are actually allowed warning that your life is about to suck a little) I got to work on exactly that problem.  Fortunately, because it is summer, we are also coming into our peak produce wealth for the year.  Fresh produce can take as much or as little prep as you desire to make it ready to go.  Wash your fruit and put it in a bowl in the fridge.  Wash your fruit, cut it up, and put it in containers in the fridge.  Mix some of it together in another container for ready-to-eat fruit salad that should stay yummy for at least a few days.

We have all kinds of fresh fruit, even starting to include locally grown fresh fruit at this point, and tons of fresh vegetables, practically all of which are available from local farmers.  This means if you plan it right you hardly have to cook at all.  And yesterday, finding myself with an hour or two of time and a tiny bit of energy, I only did a very little yet created or organized most of our food supply for the week.

The first thing I made was a salad.  It took maybe ten minutes, including washing the vegetables that didn't get peeled, and added no heat to the kitchen.

This salad includes:

• an entire bag of washed mixed greens from Applefield Farms, via Debra's
• half a cucumber from the same source, sliced and then cut down the middle to make little half-moon shapes
• a box of grape tomatoes, either Californian or Mexican, via Debra's
• two whole ramps (garlic greens), chopped small, from Hutchins Farm
• an entire kohlrabi, peeled and julienned, also from Hutchins
• about thirty English pea pods, shelled, also from Hutchins
• a liberal grinding of mixed peppercorns (100 turns of the mill)

Though it is true that under normal circumstances I could sit in one place and devour this entire thing alone, even without dressing, this will last us a few days, even with servings at every meal.  Energy levels allowing, I will also keep it going by adding more things as I obtain them or the week progresses.  I bought some corn at Hutchins today which should prove easy to cut off the cob and throw in.  Every time I add something, it becomes a slightly different salad, and that prevents boredom.

The second thing I made was sauté-steamed mixed summer squash with tomatoes and more chopped ramps.  It took maybe half an hour, including washing and cutting all the ingredients, but I made a whole heaping lot, which is the point of this post.  If you make less, it will take you even less time.  It did add some steam and heat to the kitchen, but nothing that wouldn't dissipate quickly in an air conditioned or well-ventilated home -- and by well-ventilated, I mean with cross-breezes and everything.

To duplicate this dish in your own kitchen, or riff of the general theme, start by coating the inside of a large sauté pan with extra virgin olive oil spray.  Turn on the fire to medium high (level 4 out of 5+"high" on my stove), then toss in two whole ramps, chopped as in the salad, and two or three large tomatoes.  Don't get too precious chopping the tomatoes, trying to get them perfect looking or even tiny; they are going to be cooked to mush.

Cover the pan and cook for ten minutes.  Raise the lid, then mash the tomatoes with a flipping spatula.

Then pour in a pound or two or three of assorted summer squash -- pattypan, crookneck, zucchini, whatever you like -- sliced about ¼" thick, and then cut in half again if the pieces are very wide.

If you are smarter than I am, you will either use a larger pan than I did or a smaller amount of squash.  You will need to be able to stir the squash pieces into the sauce created by the tomatoes, oil and ramps, and you will need to be able to close the lid of the pan in order to achieve steaming.

Cover the pan, then walk away for five minutes.  When you return, stir up the squash again, from the bottom.  The goal here is to just barely steam the squash, not cook it to mush.  The tomatoes got cooked to mush because they are sauce; summer squash cooked to mush is disgusting unless you're making soup.  Each piece should be a little tender and a little translucent, but not limp and/or transparent.  If your squash pieces are still practically raw at this point, put the lid back on for a few minutes, five if the pan is really full.  Next time you check, if only some of your pieces are cooked to perfection and others still undercooked, take out the good ones and keep cooking the rest until they are perfect, too.

When you are done, transfer the entire thing to a big bowl.  This dish is good warm or cold; I like it best cold.  And once again, this is several days worth of side dish for us, even with a serving at every meal.  With the level of nausea I have been experiencing lately, a bowl of this can even be a meal for me, very fresh and wholesome tasting, and it can also be added to the weekly salad bowl.

Now, the third thing I made yesterday was a delicious nectarine, peach and raspberry pie.

This is completely Melissa's fault because she told me she had just made a peach pie, and that made me remember that I had some peaches and peach-like substances lying around, and that made me really want one, too.  So this particular instance of baking with the air conditioning on thereby intolerably raising my personal carbon footprint is totally not my fault; blame Melissa.  Whom I love.  Whom I even love for inadvertently planting baking suggestions in my literally feverish head.  (And my true love isn't exactly mad at her either.)

Yes, while the labor part of this was maybe fifteen minutes, this did make the kitchen very hot for over an hour, but look.  Medical things and menstrual things require sweets; science says so; no you can't see a study from the NEJM.

It was either going to be a freshly baked homemade pie with store-bought crust and organic fruit, tapioca, sugar, and spices (four cups of mixed washed and chopped fruit, peeled as appropriate, 3T tapioca, 1 C sugar, half brown, ½ t cinnamon, ¼ t nutmeg, ¼ t ginger; mix it all up and pour it in a bottom crust you've poked holes in, then cover with a top crust; make liberal vent slits and sprinkle with turbinado sugar; bake 425°F 10 minutes, then 375°F for 30 more; cool and eat), or it was going to be a hell of a lot of Snickers' Bars -- which, I might add, would have gotten to my local purveyor's establishment via truck, so not very ecologically aware either, and that's without even bringing up the ingredients.  Or I could just down the half-bottle of Bailey's rotting genteelly among the marmalades in the refrigerator door (and might still, though it's far better over ice cream).  But instead (for now), after being unable to eat more than a single English muffin for breakfast and nothing else all day, and after being repeatedly stabbed and then given up upon by cancer nurses and having to reschedule the same activity to another day, I got to come home to a dish of cold and sloppy juicy fruit pie.

(Fine, there was no dish.  I ate right out of the pan, of course.  I did, at least, employ a fork.)  And this pie will last at LEAST through today, and after that we will still have two kinds of extremely virtuous sorbet in the freezer.  But meanwhile, because I planned ahead for unknown contingencies, even though the kitchen got a little hot and there was minor trauma today, in the end there was also pie.

Okay, Sara, you are thinking, that's all fabulous, but my family can't live on pie and salad and summer squash alone.  We need protein!  Who's going to cook that when I'm prostrate on my fainting couch and Cook has the day off?  Well, other people are going to have to step up, and you are going to have to let them, but meanwhile here's one of my all-time favorite convenience foods for an out-and-out omnivorous household that makes no bones about it (har har): a whole rotisserie chickens from the local fou-fou convenience store a block or so from my house, Concord Provisions.

About $11 or $12 apiece, these are naturally raised, sex-positive, hormone-free, feminist, free-range and well-read chickens with liberal politics who got to listen to Mozart while they were being slaughtered.  (It's extremely possible that I am lying about some of this.)  In this house, each one is worth two meals, cold or hot, plus cat treats, plus a big bowl of chicken salad, enough for at least two sandwiches or worthy of being thrown on two big servings of the vegetable salad above.  They are cooked in some kind of delicious sauce, encrusted with herbal goodness, and even have a lemon slice stuck in under the breast skin.  An inferior but slightly less expensive and still natural and still quite serviceable version is available at our local conventional grocery, Crosby's, and probably at whatever is your equivalent of that, and if I were still shopping at the local French bistro (which I stopped doing after hearing from an alleged eyewitness that the boss had publicly punched one of his female employees in the face), I could even get them organically grown.  They are everywhere, they keep for a week in the fridge, the meat can be reheated in pieces in the microwave or shredded or chopped for use in an assortment of different dishes, and thus they give you great versatility for the price without you having to lift a finger or heat up your house.  Best of all, someone else can even run to the store and buy one.

Tomorrow, if I find myself with the energy (even if it's only nervous energy), instead of sitting in my studio anxiously watching my newest needle hickies bloom in my arm and hand, I may haul out my tricycle and attempt the ride over to Hutchins, trying to get there at the opening in order to plunder the day's first picking of blueberries.  Wish me luck.

Comments

[jana]

Mouthwatering post, my friend!

I just finished baking peach scones (done late at night to prevent overheating house). Maybe we are on the same peach wavelength.

Last week I skipped an MRI completely (or perhaps just delayed it until it becomes an emergency) because of the IV issue. What a pain!! I am not super-scared of needles, but I do hate that my arms seem to have lost all their veins and getting an IV going is quite a procedure--typically involving numerous deep-probing pokes. Gah.

(And on a side note that will have me wondering why the hell I ever said this on the Internets, I've had this weird period synchronicity with my infection outbreaks that's really had me mystified. I think it's my body's way of making sure that all the drama is compressed into the shortest possible time window. Double Gah.)

I hope you get the blueberries tomorrow (but if not, peach pie is sweet solace)--fingers crossed for 'ya over here! :)

[Sara]

"my body's way of making sure that all the drama is compressed into the shortest possible time window"

Yes! And humiliation, too! Because lying around in a hospital johnny and occasionally having to toilet oneself in front of other people just isn't humiliating enough, apparently. It also needs to be messy. And being terrified for one's life? Not enough of an emotional slam all by itself, apparently! There must also be hormonal fluctuations, lots of hormonal fluctuations! And low-grade fever! And hideous cramps! Yes! Because otherwise, how would we know we were miserable, right?

As you said, gah.

I love, love, love peach pie, peach jam, peach anything. I think I actually crave baked peaches subconsciously at all times, so it takes only a very small suggestion and even a bag of frozen peach slices to set me off. Scones you say? Mmmm...maybe next... ;)

These were white peaches and white nectarines which taste more sugary, less purely peachy/nectariney, so the raspberries were an essential component of the flavor palette here. Pie needs a little tartness.

It's not as hot here as it is where you are, but the humidity is already close to 80%. I shall bathe and see if I have enough strength to drag my butt through this sauna and up the big hill toward blueberry heaven. I'm pretty damn tired, though, so we'll see. Thanks for your good wishes.

[Sara]

Update:

Well, I fell asleep in the bathtub, so I guess that's that for today. Fortunately, there should be more blueberries tomorrow...fingers crossed...

[Leslie]

What a sucky day - except for the salad and pie. You make me want to go bake. Seems unfair to have all this fun and then have to go get poked more in order to find out more unpalatable news. feh :-(

Sending good thoughts your way.

[The Goldfish]

We seem to be living on salad and quiche at the moment; quiches are good for sticking anything in which is about to go bad. And we're having quite a bit of success keeping shop-bought lettuce going by slicing off the bottom and sitting it in a pot of water.

There are only two of us but a great proportion of the meals we eat are things we cooked in bulk, split up and froze. Or there are components; we have bolognese with vegetables and quorn ready any time we want spagbol, lazagne or similar.

I love the use of the word "zucchini" instead of the British "courgette". much prettier. But some of those squashes are unlike anything I've ever set eyes on.

Hope they find a vein at their next attempt. And hope you have more energy today.

[laurie]

Thinking of you lots, and lots and lots. Going to go eat something yummy and healthy now and think about you some more. Wish I could come over and distract you. ;-)
xo

[Leslee]

So much yuck and yum - though mostly yum. Hope the MRIs went okay, and hope the cooler/drier air is being good to you.

[Sugared Harpy]

"She died while menstruating"

Would you not want to be friends with the person? I WOULD.

HA! Pie! God, I love pie. I do, ahem, make my own crust but you can blame Julia Childs for that. Her recipe is supreme and I do it in the food processor. Carbon footprint? Mama and her friends need pie.

YOUR pie looks heavenly!!

(That sounds dirty.)

[Sara]

Leslie: Thank you. Pie makes everything better.

Goldfish: Yes, this is exactly the kind of cooking I'm talking about. And personally, I'm quite fond of Quorn, but I can't get my true love even to taste it. Also, what's funny to me here is that "courgette" sounds way prettier than "zucchini" to my ear because I grew up hearing "zucchini." It's all in what is exotic to the hearer, I guess.

They did in fact find a vein. Specifically, Vicky at the Interventional Radiology department found a vein, and she got it in one poke, and she didn't even have to use the ultrasound machine. She is magic. No one has gotten me in just one poke in, gad, years and years. No one. Not for an IV or injection.

All hail Vicky, Goddess of the Shining Needle.

Laurie: I just wish you could have come over and had a slice of that pie! :)

Leslee: Yes, so far, though there's been a lot of yikes lately, my life really is mostly yum. :)

Melissa of Sugared Harpy: As my true love has pointed out, it would be the headstone on the grave that would have no man coming within a hundred yards of it, ever. hahahaha

I used to make my own crust when I was younger and more patient and had a far bigger kitchen and my mother's power tools (e.g., countertop mixer). Now I live in a place with counters covered with stuff, the toaster, the cat food collection, the knife rack, coffeemaker, waffle baker, scale, blender, bread box, goodie basket, spoon pitcher, bamboo tester bottle, ice cream maker I still haven't learned how to use... There is no room for a countertop mixer. Until I have space for such a thing, and still space to actually roll the dough out as well, it's store bought for me. It comes out okay made without fancy electric equipment, but it's just not fun, and the store-bought is really good enough. I can't remember the brand I've been using right now, but it tastes fine and I think it's only mildly carcinogenic.

Pie is never dirty. Pie is pure. :)

[kathy a.]

oh, i'm late to the party! some lovely food you made, there.

(((( sara )))) the cancer sucks. the hormones suck. thinking of you.

[Donimo]

OMG, I want that pie! What an amazing post with all the pix and clear instructions. You feel like crap and have low energy, but you've put together a funny, clear and generous post. Thanks for that. The pie pix were a bit tortuous, though. Having a bit of a sugar craving right now and all I have in the house is chocolate soy milk. BORING.

I'm glad to hear about the nurse with the needle proficiency. I've had my share of missed veins and fluid going into the tissue... so I deeply appreciate the accuracy and skill you described. Could you pre-book her for any other needles??

What a sweet man to go get you your blueberries. Commercial berries have no flavour at all. I'm sorry you're dealing with so much hard stuff. Small things like bursting, fresh blueberries help just a little bit, no?

[Sara]

Thanks, Kathy A. Yeah, all that sucks, but pie remains one of the great goodnesses, as are fresh veggies in summer. :)

Donimo, yes fresh, local, organic blueberries are still magic and make everything better. And yes, I will be asking for Vicky again in the future. I am hoping not to have to go back and have another MRI before March 2009 when, if I'm still alive and not apparently dying yet, I shall be going in for another brain checkup. I hope she still works there!

If you are able, you might try making pancakes using chocolate soy milk sometime instead of regular milk or plain soy. Mmm...fried chocolate tinged batter...not boring. :)

I hope you've soothed your sweet tooth by now.

[elizabeth]

I have noticed a history of food posts, which I am assuming is food as comfort and practical, or maybe you like eating? Usually the mad rush FOR the certain types of food ends with menstration, or does yours keep going?

I just had to post because honestly no one really talks about the bio aspects of being ill or disabilities or illnesses and that is one of them, and like the rest of the Medico Machine, we sick people are supposed to be robots I think and not have bio issues which might slow down an MRI (like having a seizure).

I say this becuase I was in the disabled toilet yesterday and people kept coming to see if the "big nice empty toilet is free" (how AB people view the disabled toilet) and I used to be the "get in, get it done fast and get out type" now with autonomic retention and a non, functioning bowel, things take...longer, so I feel like screaming at the feet waiting, "Look Parkinson's has it and so do I, I have to live with it and now so do you." Which actually I might do if they pulled me out of the MRI with a nice menses blood stain on the hospital gown. Sorry, this was sort of a side topic to your food thing, but one I could relate to and since no one talks biology, and you did, sorry, can o worms opens on YOU!

[Sara]

Elizabeth, there is no talking about life or why to keep it without talking about food. I say this even as my own digestion and strength deteriorate. Fact is, I'm still here, and regardless of how much I can eat and digest myself, maintaining the food supply here is still part of my job as the member of this household who doesn't leave the house for nine or ten hours a day to bring in the cash that pays for it all. So this post explains part of how I'm managing that, and I hope it and some of the comments others have offered will not only help people celebrate, nay, wallow in all the beautiful and healthful edible treasures of their own lives while they are present and still accessible to them but also give still other readers some useful ideas.

I feel no can of worms. I do have a funny story for you, though, not funny "ha-ha," more funny in a "yeah, huh" kind of way. While visiting the POOI last month, it came to pass as it often does that I had to avail myself of the restroom. Since it is a POOI and not a regular hospital or a restaurant or other ordinary public venue, there is a certain awareness in place, and so all the restroom stalls are handicapped-accessible. However, the toilets are the kind which flush automatically when something passes in front of a strategically placed "eye."

Where I come from (California), it is (or was) illegal not to offer flushable, hygienic paper seat covers if you have a public restroom. No such law is in place in Massachusetts, and when I pointed out how disgusting I found this to a longtime resident, she was quite perplexed and wanted to know why. However, as I said, at the POOI a certain consciousness of possibilities is in play, so there are paper seat covers on offer in the restroom stalls.

To use a toilet, I have to take off not just my pants and undergarments but also my artificial leg. It is strategically intelligent to do this while standing in front of the toilet, poised to sit. However, it takes so long to do that that the automatic eye mechanism will flush the toilet two or three times before my ass hits the seat, and thus it is almost impossible for me to use a hygienic paper seat cover in the posh, fully accessible restroom unless I take off my pants and underpants, take off my leg, and then unfold a paper seat cover and plaster it to my ass before sitting down.

While complimenting both the accessibility and the presence of the paper seat covers, I pointed this out to a fully-limbed, able-bodied POOI worker emerging from the other stall. "Huh," she said. "I never thought of that."

"Of course not," I told her. "No one thinks of these things until something happens to make them think of these things, like, for example, actually becoming disabled."

It's just how things are. And you're right; it's because there just isn't enough open talk about how all that works. We're always talking about access, but I think we need to talk -- and get others to think -- a little more about evacuation, too!