Five Words To Thrill Any Mom's Heart.

Returning home from school yesterday, Darling Daughter uttered the five words sure to warm any mom’s heart:  It smells good in here.

I’ve heard the words before, but they never fail to give me a little thrill (or as my family used to say, “a pat on the popo.”)  To be honest, I’d be equally delighted to hear, “Hey Mom.  You know that advice you gave me?  Well, I talked to my friend today, and we worked it all out.  You were right.” 

“You were right,” however, isn’t part of the 13-year-old vernacular.  Come to think of it, “you were right” isn’t part of most adults’ vernacular.

“It smells good in here” is close enough.  (And for the record, any kid who walks in my kitchen and says those five words is absolutely entitled to use, without repercussion, the three words I detest, “What’s for dinner?”)

I’ve been cooking nearly all my life, including a culinary fiasco at age eight, which thanks to Mom’s intervention and Dad’s patience, did not result in a single trip to the ER.  It’s safe to say that a family-wide case of trichinosis could’ve turned me away from the kitchen for life.

Nowadays, cooking is just what I do – for comfort, for fun, for healing, for nourishment.  It always surprises me, then, when someone says they don’t cook.  How can that be?  You’ve got to eat, right?

Besides, cooking isn’t hard. 

That aroma that DD embraced yesterday afternoon?   It wafted from a dish with only three ingredients.  Heck, I’ll even spot you the salt and pepper.  That’s still only five ingredients, for crying out loud – boneless pork ribs, barbecue sauce, vinegar, salt and pepper.

Five ingredients, plus some steamed rice and a box of frozen peas -- voilà, a complete meal.  Not to mention a “Hey, it smells good in here.”

If I just keep working at it, "you were right" could be just around the corner.

Super Simple Boneless Pork Ribs

2-3 lbs. boneless (often called “countrystyle”) pork ribs

½ cup cider or white vinegar (don’t use the expensive stuff)

½ cup prepared barbecue sauce (any brand will do, I usually use “Bone Suckin’ Sauce,” because I like the label)

½ cup water

salt and pepper

Spray a lidded, nonstick skillet or saucepan with nonstick spray.  Generously season the ribs with salt and pepper.  Over medium high heat, lightly brown ribs (in batches, if necessary) on all sides.  Combine vinegar, barbecue sauce and water and pour over ribs in pan.  Reduce heat to low, put lid in place, and cook until done.  Check occasionally.  Should be fork-tender in about 1 ½ hours.  Serve with hot steamed rice or grits.

Season's Almost Over. Back to Laundry and Housekeeping and Cooking.

It still surprises me to say this, but baseball season is almost over -- and I'm sad.

I know.  For most fans, the season just began.  It’s so early in the Major League Baseball season that even the most hopeful fan can’t seriously ask, “How ‘bout those Cubbies?”

But I don’t follow MLB.  I follow HSB – high school baseball -- and only one week remains in the regular season.  One week.  Two games.  Fourteen innings.  Eighty-four outs.  To paraphrase Yogi Berra, it's over when it’s over.

When Son was little, he tried several sports.  Up in our attic is a box stuffed with little soccer and basketball “participant” trophies – the sort handed over to any eight-year-old whose parents are willing to stroke a check to the league and buy a pair of diminutive shinguards.

For Son, baseball’s the sport that stuck.  Seven years later, the trophies for those big-inflatable-balled sports share space with our Christmas decorations and a noisy family of bats (the winged kind).  The baseball trophies, on the other hand, including a pair of gargantuan Dilworth Little League championship trophies that nearly justified the construction of a trophy room Chez Wiles, still occupy the place of honor on Son’s bedroom shelves.

Those first few seasons nearly did me in.  Baseball devours a family evening or a weekend.  A game can last for-fricking-ever.  And with extra innings, for-fricking-ever and ever.  Amen.  Soccer and basketball, with their stopwatches and gameclocks and precisely-timed halves, snug right into a family calendar.  The Great American Pasttime contrarily laughs at the notion of “schedule.”  No time limit.  No neat little 10-minute periods.  No predictable Thursday practices.

Little League practices and games might be scheduled for Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday one week and Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday the next.  Where little Mia Hamms and LeBron Jameses might have to show up 15-30 minutes before gametime, little Derek Jeters are expected 60 minutes prior.  In baseball parlance, by the way, 60 minutes early translates into 75 minutes early.  If you’re on time, you’re late.

It took me an entire season – maybe two – to learn to relax and enjoy the games.  One reason, of course, was flat-out fanny-clenching fear for my kid.  Fear that he would be “that kid” – the one out in left field picking daisies and turning cartwheels.  The one who swats at the ball and twirls into a 360.  Or, worse, the one who hits the ball, but runs to third base instead of first.  I'd worry that he was never going to hit the ball.  And then, worry that he'd never hit it again.

If for one second on those back-crippling bleachers, I stopped worrying for Son, I’d then have to chase away my own demons: I could be doing laundry right now.  I could be catching up on bills right now.  I could be changing the sheets right now.  I could be cooking dinner right now. Instead, I’m being held hostage by an imposing man named "Blue" who wears a mask and makes lots of angry hand gestures, and a team of elementary-school-aged, bat-wielding terrorists with tight-fitting pants.

What a long way I’ve come.  I now bask in baseball.  I’m there early, I stay late.  I’ve got hand-warmers for games in freezing temperatures and freezer packs for games in sweltering heat.  I know what it means to “turn two,” “strike out the side” and “protect the plate.”  I know that the laundry will get done, the bills will get paid and, sometime during the week, a dinner will get cooked.  I also know that, in the course of the season, Son and Darling Daughter will eat their weight in Chick Fil A nuggets.

Turns out there's a limit to how many Chick FIl A Original sandwiches (no butter, extra pickles) I can eat, however.  Instead, I try to keep some easy-to-prepare, easy-to-eat food in the fridge, like Bacon and Egg Salad, Lentil and Feta Salad, and Black Bean Corn Salad.  This week, I had  a hankering for Pimento Cheese.  Given my distrust for sandwiches in general and mayonnaise in specific, I have to make my own.  This version uses lemon juice and cayenne to cut the cloying tendency of mayonnaise.  It’s great on wheat bread, celery sticks, crackers, or my favorite – a spoon.

One week, two games, 14 innings, 84 outs, and one fresh bowl of homemade pimento cheese.  I think I’m going to be OK.


Best Ever Pimento Cheese Spread
Growing up in Charleston, pimento cheese (or, as some folks pronounced it, "minner" cheese) sandwiches were served at receptions of every sort -- all fancy, on white bread with the crusts cut off.  Most people, though, would use the store-bought variety, which is probably what turned me away from pimento cheese for so many years.  This version, though, is flavorful and zesty and fresh-tasting -- worthy of any reception table, crusts and all.


6 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper (or more to taste)
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
fresh ground black pepper
2 teaspoons grated onion (optional)
10 oz. extra sharp Cheddar cheese, freshly grated (do not use pre-grated)
4 oz. canned pimentos, chopped


In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except cheese and pimentos.  Gradually stir in cheese and pimentos until well combined and moistened.  Chill for an hour or two, and use as a dip for celery sticks or a spread on sandwiches or crackers.

Everyone Has An Opinion, And In Mine, Reunions Are Terrifying.

When I was pregnant (well after Bill Haley and His Comets flamed out, thank you very much, but well before the sun rose on Green Day, or practically any other band heard on Sirius 26), I found all kinds of ways to dodge The Question:

“What are you going to name the baby?”

Even now, when I hear someone else – even a total stranger – being asked The Question, I want to shriek, “Don’t answer!  It’s a trick!  You’re about to have your bubble burst, your dreams shattered!  You’re exposing your tender and most intimately-considered plans to a gut-sucking, albeit cape-less, emotional marauder of comic book proportions.” 

No, I don’t think I’m overstating.

We hear stories of newborns named, unexpectedly, after obstetricians, nurses, and, if you ascribe to urban myth, hospital food.  Surely you’ve heard of the tiny twins afflicted with the unfortunate monikers of “Orangello” and “Limongello,” ostensibly for the gelatin flavors the new mom most enjoyed post-delivery?  Truth be told, who could blame her?  After all the baby-naming babble and umbilical cord snipping and opinion-injection of every English-speaking person on the planet – and perhaps a few Aussies – it’s easy to lose track of your own opinion.

Did I really name my kid ‘Orangello’?  Do I even like ‘Orangello’?  Didn’t I hear about a school bully named ‘Orangello’?  Wait.  Am I hungry?  Are you going to eat that chicken?  Can we have Jello for dessert?  Maybe banana-strawberry flavored?

High school reunions, it seems, evoke a similar reaction.  Everyone has an opinion.  And the current universal opinion seems to be that I’m a smack-talking, lily-livered, Scotch-drinking, feather-shedding chicken butt.

I recently wrote about my ambivalence – fine, call the spade by its name, “terror” – regarding my upcoming 30^th high school reunion.  I couldn’t believe how many people chirped up.   You have to go.  30^th is the best ever.  Everyone’s counting on you.  You’ll regret it if you don’t.

Holy cow.  (Or, as my mom’s husband says, “sanctified bovine.”)

I’m going already.  But until then, I’m working my butt off.  Actually, that’s not accurate.  I know you can’t “work” your butt off.  Nor can you “talk” someone’s ear off.  And saddest of all, you can’t “laugh” your ass off. 

I’ve tried. If all it took was working, talking and laughing, I'd be the skinniest person around.  And my friends wouldn't have anything to hook their sunglasses onto.  But I’ve tugged on those “fat jeans.”  Trust me, everything's still there.

I’ve got a few months to go, though.  I just need to work out more.  And eat better. 

This Black Bean and Corn Salad is a good start.  Easy to make, lots of protein, lots of fiber and low in fat.  It’s really, really good served as  a salsa with Fritos Scoopers, too.  But for now, I’m passing on Fritos.  Jello, too.

Besides.  I heard that Orangello might make it to the reunion.

Black Bean and Corn Salad With Lime Dressing

1 can black beans, rinsed and drained well

1 can sweet corn, rinsed and drained well

½ cup finely chopped red onion

½ cup finely chopped red bell pepper

juice of two limes (about ¼ cup)

¼ cup canola oil

½ teaspoon chili powder

½ teaspoon kosher salt

¼ teaspoon fresh ground pepper

1 avocado, peeled and sliced, or optionally, halved

Combine all ingredients except avocado.  Stir gently and refrigerate until well chilled.  Serve over avocado slices.