BEAUTIFUL COOKING WATCH ONLINE

This thin, spiral sausage in the middle is the kind my grandmother always used to serve us when she was alive. People often assume that having one Italian grandmother and one Jewish one, I must have been around great cooks and food my whole life. I always joke that my Italian grandma only knew how to make about four things (though she made them well!), and my Jewish grandmother mostly makes things that come from a box. ;)
Be that as it may, Nonie would cook this wonderful sausage for us on Christmas and Easter, and probably any other Sunday dinner, along with ziti in tomato sauce (known as gravy to Italian-Americans...not sure why other than maybe because it was cooked with meat in it) and her delicious homemade meatballs. We'd also have a salad, somewhat for appearance's sake, since it generally contained iceberg lettuce and carrots peeled to within an inch of their lives (basically, all the sweet, good part was peeled away, with the core part left). So she wasn't a vegetable person- the rest made up for it. :) We'd also have local semolina bread (which would be my breakfast if I stayed over with her, along with a little bit of salted butter). I think she usually had some Italian hors d'oeuvres out for my parents, like roasted peppers, though I didn't eat that stuff at the time. Such wonderful memories...we still talk about the fact that my dad was the first person she ever met who would actually EAT the onion she used to cook in the gravy for flavor...she may have also made bracciole in there... Once, Dad reached to begin eating before everything was ready, and Nonie smacked him on the hand (quite possibly with a wooden spoon)! In wounded pride, he looked to my mom for sympathy- must have been a tough call for her. We laugh about it now.



My battery was dying, which means that the display was involuntarily off, and I didn't get to see any of these pics til after I had taken them! The exposure seems a little strange too, but not sure.

New year's day was spent at Chad's townhouse, where we basically had an all day hang out & eat fest.

Much of the "eat" portion was handled by Micki, who just kept making food all day. Salad, some thing with cheese and tomatoes, cake. She was like an old Jewish mother. Or an Italian mother.

She was like some ethnic mother. Only young. And not a mother. And far more attractive.

Next she'll be trying to set me up with a nice Jewish girl.