Cookbooks on the Shelf Part 2

So, why did Mia's post about Canneloni from Laurel's Kitchen (p. 235) get me to finally begin posting about the book?

Because Canneloni is what El Esposo and I had for Christmas dinner 1982.

It was before he was El Esposo and it was the first Christmas we spent away from our families. I was in college in Walla Walla, Washington (yes, it's a real place, someone whose kid is in college there was even in an NPR story today about healthcare for "kids" after they graduate college). It was my junior year and in the previous two years I had learned that Walla Walla was the place they meant when they invented the phrase "you can't get there from here." Especially in winter--you can't get anywhere from there. Try to fly out and your plane gets fogged in and they have to bus you elsewhere to get you on another plane much later than you planned, missing all connections, etc. Try to drive out and you get stuck in "the pass" due to snow. Try to find someone else to drive you out and they get regular gas put in their diesel tank and then you are stuck in Weed while the car gets fixed and the travel-mates you found by student center bulletin board are all ready to kill each other. So you can see why, by the third year, I stopped trying to get out of Walla Walla!

But back to the cooking. I decided to make something fancy--an all day cooking affair--for our Christmas dinner together. So I made the Canneloni. I even have pictures...ok...three trips downstairs for three different photo albums and I haven't found them. I know we have them, but can't find them just now so can't share....darn it! I did find pictures of cooking the thanksgiving turkey from that year...
Just pretend this is Canneloni!
Same people, same kitchen, same year, just a few months earlier and not the right dish! But who could tell from these blurry pictures of pictures, so just pretend...


Anyway, back to the canneloni. It was a lot of work!! Definitely worth it! I remember feeling very grown up for making something so fancy. And I also felt sophisticated for having something so different from the normal Christmas dinner. And didn't I look sophisticated in my furry orange robe? I loved that robe. There has never been another one quite as good! The chronology of my robes in the 30 years since I started college could be a post in itself!

The Canneloni post got me thinking about my Laurel's Kitchen adventures, but that Christmas dinner wasn't the first LK holiday dinner. The year before, El Esposo and I had spent Thanksgiving in Walla Walla and I made Minestrone (page 166). Looking at the recipe now, I know I improvised. I'm pretty sure I didn't use whole wheat noodles. This was Walla Walla in 1982! Likewise, I didn't use whole wheat berries or soy beans. I do remember it was very good, although I didn't make any notes on the recipe the way I did with some others.

For example, I made the High Protein Granola (p. 117) quite often in college and afterward, and I have notes that sesame and sunflower seeds are optional, as are nuts and chopped dry fruits. I didn't put any notes about the torula yeast, the rice bran polishings or the toasted soy nuts. Probably because it went without saying that those would be left out! On Sarah's Sourdough Pancakes (p. 119) I have a note, "good to make ahead and put in the oven to warm while finishing other things." I don't remember why I thought that, or what other things I would be finishing when making pancakes, but I do remember making these for EE. The Tabouli page (p. 155) is splattered and well used. Yum! (I made Tabouli in the 80s? Wow! No wonder my family thought I ate weird food!) My other favorite was Piroshki (p. 238). I remember making these often with the chard filling and other improvisations. During my junior year, when I lived in the little house made from a garage on West Poplar Street, I tried to always have some of these in the freezer. (Really? I did that??? Wow, I am impressed with my junior-in-college self!)

Well, that's enough for now. Since this post has gone on long enough, I guess you will have to stay tuned for Part 3. Meanwhile, I am getting inspired to cook some long forgotten foods!