flur­ries

If you’d asked me yes­ter­day, I’d have said that our week­end break to West Sus­sex was just what the doc­tor ordered: all my ener­gy back after the last chaot­ic weeks in Lon­don, ready to fly off to Amer­i­ca to host our Christ­mas celebration.

That was yes­ter­day.  In the snowy, gor­geous, peace­ful countryside.

Today, we awoke to news that at least two of Heathrow’s five run­ways are closed.  Snow.  And so our pre­car­i­ous calm has been shattered.

As a Mid­west­ern Amer­i­can whose win­ters meant snow that fell in Novem­ber and remained on the ground until March, I am com­plete­ly flum­moxed by the paral­y­sis that takes over Lon­don and par­tic­u­lar­ly Heathrow when two inch­es of snow fall on the ground.  It’s as if every sin­gle win­ter, the occur­rence of snow takes every­one entire­ly by sur­prise.  “Wait, every­one, here it comes again, that white stuff!  For­get Keep Calm and Car­ry On, it’s time to Pan­ic and Freak Out!”

So I am tak­ing a deep breath and try­ing to feel that it’s per­fect­ly all right for my teenage daugh­ter to be strand­ed in St Peters­burg — her flight was to be tomor­row — and our whole fam­i­ly was to trav­el to Amer­i­ca on Wednes­day.  Will any of this hap­pen?  Or will my poor moth­er in law arrive at my emp­ty Con­necti­cut home to fend for herself?

Some­how this is all eeri­ly rem­i­nis­cent of the last school trip, in April, to Pom­peii… strand­ed by the vol­cano!  It’s enough to make you just stay home.

Home, for the last sev­er­al weeks, has been mad­ness.  There was the much-antic­i­pat­ed skat­ing show at Queensway, for which Avery and her skat­ing pal have been prac­tic­ing for near­ly a year.  It’s one of those respon­si­bil­i­ties of par­ents: turn up at your child’s event no mat­ter what, even if it will take place on ICE with no heat and last three hours, only 92 sec­onds of which will fea­ture your child.

So off we went, I leav­ing a cast-iron dish of slow-brais­ing shoul­der of beef and sausages and mush­rooms, repos­ing in a very low oven.  How nice it would be to return to a love­ly, hot din­ner after all that ICE.  And of course there was dra­ma.  Just after Avery’s piece was fin­ished — and she was love­ly! — there was a bump­ing sound behind us and in the dark and con­fu­sion, it took some time for us to real­ize that an elder­ly lady had col­lapsed.  First with a faint­ing spell, then falling into the mir­rored wall at the edges of the rink.

Only John’s phone would work, so of course he was at the front­line of the res­cue attempts.  “Look at Dad­dy, how good he is to help out,” Avery whis­pered, shiv­er­ing with cold.  It was a bit dis­con­cert­ing to expe­ri­ence just how long it took for an ambu­lance to come: should­n’t the rink have at least a para­medic on hand at all times?  I began to feel, as well, con­cern for my din­ner, and on a larg­er scale, for my house should my din­ner burn dry and catch the entire place on fire.

No wor­ries, all was well when we arrived home (plus the lady was revived and fine, I’m ashamed to say con­cern for her lagged a bit behind con­cern for my din­ner).  Do look up the recipe on the index and cook that dish.  It’s a total win­ner with every­one, and so flex­i­ble, as it turns out!

The fol­low­ing day Avery and I went with her friend Lille to a stun­ning­ly beau­ti­ful Christ­mas Car­ol con­cert last week­end at Holy Trin­i­ty Bromp­ton, a church adja­cent to the Bromp­ton Ora­to­ry in South Kens­ing­ton.  What a church!  The most var­ied group of parish­ioners I’ve ever seen in any church: young and old, black and white, from the obvi­ous­ly very posh to the lowli­est stu­dent.  And the music… a pro­fes­sion­al cham­ber orches­tra, the church’s own choir.  How I love to sing, and hard­ly ever get the chance.

What a hol­i­day joy!

No report of our lives late­ly can be com­plete with­out a litany of the many, many veg­eta­bles it turns out can be suc­cess­ful­ly roast­ed, and eat­en by my hus­band.  He is a pos­i­tive pros­e­ly­tiz­er on the sub­ject.  All of them sim­ply cut in half or thirds, driz­zled with olive oil and sprin­kled with chili flakes, then roast­ed in a hot oven for 35 min­utes.  Roast­ed fen­nel and parsnips?  Check.

Pep­pers, turnips, swedes and car­rots?  Definitely.

Beet­roots and cau­li­flower?  Of course.

And since woman can­not live by veg along, there have been so many heart­warm­ing hol­i­day­ish moments in life late­ly… there was the day I bought my usu­al week­ly “The Big Issue” mag­a­zine from my local guy, out­side the Tesco’s.  What a love­ly project that mag­a­zine is: employ­ing home­less peo­ple right off the streets, giv­ing them some sup­port, some pride in pro­vid­ing a real­ly nice read, and some respect from the neigh­bors walk­ing by.  “I almost bought one yes­ter­day, out­side Boots,” I assured him, “but I am loy­al to you.”  He looked a bit shy of me, but then reached into his bag and brought out a large square enve­lope.  “Mer­ry Christ­mas to you, love,” he said, “and thank you for your sup­port.” The card is signed “Dave,” so now I know.

And the snowy day when I walked to pick up Avery at school, for­get­ting my umbrel­la.  I stood out­side the gates get­ting wet­ter and wet­ter, when I felt a hand on my shoul­der.  “My dear,” said a very Greek voice, “you must not stand here.  You  must come wait for your daugh­ter in my car, while I wait for mine.  Come.”  I fol­lowed him cau­tious­ly, a big bear of a man.  We sat in the steamy inte­ri­or and he said suddenly,

“Is she your only child?”

“Yes, she is.”

“Mine too, and I have put every­thing I am, and every­thing I hope for, into my wish­es for her future.”

“So have I,” I said, “and some­times I wor­ry that it’s too much for her.”

“I also, wor­ry this,” he said.

“But I don’t think any child ever died from too much love,” I said, and he pat­ted my hand and said, “I have con­clud­ed this as well.”

We intro­duced our­selves and exchanged sto­ries about school, then I saw Avery in the dark and jumped out, thank­ing him.  I looked back to wave at him and he point­ed to a girl walk­ing toward the car.  “That’s my daugh­ter,” I could lipread.  I put my hand on Avery’s shoul­der and smiled, and he smiled back at me.

And the next time I was chat­ting with Dave over “The Big Issue,” I was clasped in an enor­mous down-coat­ed hug.  “Kris­ten, my friend!” and it was Angelus, the dad from that wet day.  “This is a nice lady,” Dave said and Angelus said, “I have rea­son to know it.”  That is Christ­mas, to me.

And on these cold Christ­massy days, what we all need is a warm, sus­tain­ing din­ner to keep us going.  Do you fan­cy these?  My friend Karen can report that they are deli­cious, as she cooked them over the weekend!

Moz­zarel­la-Stuffed Meatballs
(serves 4)

1.5 pounds mixed beef, pork and lamb (or veal, or just one meat)
1 egg
1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1/4 cup milk
large tbsp Ital­ian seasoning
large tsp gar­lic salt
8 leaves basil, chopped
1 large ball mozzarella
3 tbsps olive oil
4 cloves gar­lic, minced
1 white onion, minced
1 large plus 1 small can whole toma­toes, squeezed
salt and pep­per to taste
grat­ed parme­san to garnish
spaghetti

Get the meat to not-freez­ing-cold temp. Mix the egg, milk, bread­crumbs, sea­son­ings and basil in a large bowl. Add meat and mix thor­ough­ly. Form into hol­lows in the palm of your hand, adding a dol­lop of moz­zarel­la to each and form­ing meat around it. Tuck it in where nec­es­sary, rolling as best you can to keep moz­zarel­la inside, form­ing about 10 balls.

Heat olive oil in heavy skil­let. Fry meat­balls gen­tly on one side till brown, then using a com­bi­na­tion of spat­u­la and tongs, turn them each over to cook on the oth­er side till brown. Trans­fer to a plate and cov­er to keep warm.

Fry gar­lic and onion in remain­ing oil, scrap­ing up bits. Pour in toma­toes, squeez­ing as you go. Sea­son to taste, and cook for about half an hour, stir­ring. Then gen­tly add meat­balls to the sauce. Turn heat down LOW LOW LOW and sim­mer for an hour or so, longer if you can, stir­ring a few times.

Gar­nish with cheese and serve with spaghetti.

These were my reward for a long cou­ple of days prepar­ing for the Pre­view and the Sale of Lost Prop­er­ty at Avery’s beloved school… fran­tic pur­chas­ing of all aban­doned cloth­ing, jew­el­ry, train­ers, and the occa­sion­al bizarre item — a sleep­ing bag? a pair of bounc­ing bum­ble­bee anten­na on a head­band? one year there were six large choco­late fish wrapped in foil — what fun.  Lots of girls wear­ing Christ­mas hats and burst­ing into spon­ta­neous car­ols as they stand in the lunch queue.

And an inno­va­tion for your next roast chick­en: try stuff­ing a big flat mush­room under the breast skin, then push­ing in after the mush­room some but­ter into which you’ve mixed some chopped rose­mary… delicious!

With the “Nut­crack­er” play­ing in the back­ground, the tree twin­kling in the win­dow, a warm­ing fire in the fire­place and a savoury pan­cake with my chick­en, home is very cozy indeed.

Delia Smith’s pan­cakes, with fill­ings by me

(serves 4)

8 slices streaky bacon or ham, cut in small pieces

6 oz/165g plain flour

pinch salt

3 medi­um eggs

10 oz/300 ml milk, plus 5 oz/100 ml water

3 tbsps melt­ed butter

a lit­tle extra but­ter for cook­ing pancakes

hand­ful chives, minced

4 oz parme­san cheese, coarse­ly grated

Saute the ham/bacon until crisp, and take out of the fry­ing pan.   Sift flour and salt into a medi­um bowl, then crack eggs into the flour and begin whisk­ing, scrap­ing the sides as you go.  Add the milk-water mix­ture grad­u­al­ly, whisk­ing con­stant­ly.  Scrape sides wtih a spat­u­la and whisk one more time.  Just before you’re ready to cook, add the melt­ed but­ter and whisk again.

Melt but­ter in the fry­ing pan you used for the bacon or ham, then when hot, add the bat­ter and ham and chives, and cook on one side until bub­bles appear, then turn over and sprin­kle the cheese.  Cook until done, then roll up and divide into 4 serv­ings.  So sim­ple, so savory.

I think I can avoid it no longer.  I’d bet­ter go on the British Air­ways web­site and try to find if Avery’s flight will in fact leave Rus­sia tomor­row.  That hur­dle crossed, I can turn my mind to whether we’ll get away the fol­low­ing day, and then to pack­ing up the Christ­mas presents, with all the faith in the hol­i­day that I can muster.  Wish me luck.