It really Is So Much Better Than My Mom's

It is goulash.  I'm feeling nostalgic this week and wanted some hearty rib sticking comfort food. Thick and rich tomato sauce with ground beef, clinging to tender but firm pasta. Yeah, that wasn't exactly how mom made it. I've mentioned before the hot dish my mom called goulash was little more than hamburger, cooked tomato juice, and elbow macaroni.  DD#1 reminded me that sometimes she would use the macaroni from the boxed mac and cheese, and sometimes leftover Sloppy Joe meat-getting crazy on all of us! Her's was cheap, filling, but no spice, no flavor, and nothing I really wanted to add to my families dinner table.  I loved my mom, but spice was not her thing.  Mine is just as easy, if not quite as cost effective, but close if I buy bargain staples. Here's my sort of recipe.

Goulash-Sam Style

 12-16 ounces pasta-depending on how many your feeding and how saucy you want it
1 # ground beef
2 15 ounce cans diced tomatoes
1 6 ounce can tomato paste
course ground pepper
garlic (I use garlic powder because I always have on hand)
Italian seasoning
salt to taste and for pasta water

Cook pasta to directions,  
While water is getting ready, brown ground beef, breaking up in little pieces, salt and pepper to taste.
Drain fat, rinse if you really want the fat out-I don't
Stir in tomato's, tomato paste, and bring to a simmer.
Add spices-at least 1 1/2 tsp of each=more to taste.
Keep bubbling gently until pasta is done.

Once pasta is done, drain, then mix all together in the pasta pan. Put the cover on and let all the flavors meld about 10-15 minutes,  Serve.   My camera was not workung but I found this free picture that looks just like my version.

I'm now at five in my Blog Every Day November challenge.  Look for this on a Twitter feed near you. #BEDN

Picture from globe-view.com

Simpler Times-Perhaps: Part 4, Vacations

When my kids were young, vacationing was simple. Now we have to manage passports, and the right ID, ground transportation, and making sure we capture all the highlights we can to justify the cost of the trip. This is not a complaint, because I like my traveling, and feel the planning ahead of time is part of the fun. Back then, vacations were all road trips, and were short, a few days at most. We also had to have a loos schedule. It is hard packing things for babies,toddlers, and preschoolers and as a new mom, hard to feel like a vacation when you are on constant vigilance to make sure they are safe, which is why a few days at most worked for us. Of course , it was a money thing as well. There just wasn't any money to do more than a a couple nights. We would book at a discount hotel, finding the best deal we could.  We made sure it had a pool and scouted out parks in the area so we could make the most of the time away. It was simple.  

We packed a cooler and tote bag to keep expenses low and make sure we had ready food for hungry kids that would be off schedule from their normal routine.  More often than not, we made sure the hotel had a free continental breakfast. That breakfast paired with the cooler, was plenty to get us to an early supper where we dined with other families with young children and senior citizens at a budget chain restaurant, with a coupon if possible.  I would look in the Sunday coupons the month before our get away and clip the Applebees, Ruby Tuesday, Olive Garden, and any other coupons for restaurants  we might run across.  While discount, and chains, these were fine dining when you are financially strapped young parents.One more silly bit of nostalgia I miss, is the end of kids menus.  No more puzzles and games to play before the meal came,  No more special kids cups, and little toys that would be lost by the end of the trip, but treasured for the next day. 

Once we scored a deluxe three day, two night package, off season, in a real hotel in Duluth that included dinner and drinks in the carousel restaurant on the top floor.  The restaurant rotated very slowly, reviewing a look by the end of dinner of the whole city.  DD#1 got called "mam" when her chair was pulled out for her by the host, and both kids were served kiddie cocktails with umbrellas. Needless to say, her pretend play later in the week included pulling chairs out for her dolls and stuffed animals at her little table and calling them "mam".  DS thought a lot about the mechanics of the carousel, wondering if it went faster, would our food fall off the table, or would the force keep it in place? He later experimented with cups and plates on a Sit-n-Spin. What's the sign of a good vacation for kids? When they take the vacation home with them in their mind, not in stuff. 

After checking into the motel and going for a swim, we would find the points of interest, talk to the kids about where we were, things they might relate to, and spend the day out and about new surroundings. Heading back to the motel for another swim, we would have an early night in bed, letting the kids first watch something on Disney channel or cartoon network, a bonus treat because in those days we did not spend money on cable or satellite. It was a banner motel stay if they had free HBO, and once the kids were asleep, DH and I might watch a grown up movie, and have a glass of wine or beer.  If nothing on, we would have an uninterrupted chat, knowing the exhausted kids would not wake up needing something.

These were simple, but fun and memories that I still have, though I am sure the kids remember little.  In pictures though, I have pictures of a two year old and a four year old, smiling ear to ear climbing on a boat in a Lake Superior park, happy to be let loose to play and climb. I have similar smiling pictures from later trips to Florida, Mexico, Jamaica, and the Bahamas.  At the time in life, I doubt they would have had any better time at those more exotic of locales, and I doubt I would have either.

While I love traveling, I don't want to get in the habit of thinking all get aways have to be in an airplane, in fancy digs, with a jam packed itinerary. Young children force by age, and by expense, to make things simpler, but not less enjoyable. Now though, with no little ones to think about, I still get to decide how special an event, a day, or a week is. I can decide with what and when to fill my cooler and where to head. Like then, I'll make sure it has a bottle of wine.  

Simpler Times-Perhaps: Part 1, Memories and Nostalgia

I've been in a nostalgic mood this week.  The realization that not only is my youngest in high school, but that she will soon be learning to drive, looking at colleges, and then we truly will be empty nesters is hitting me.  Joining that realization is the fact that DD#2 turns twenty five, and DS will be twenty-seven on his next birthday, the age his dad was when he was born. I've said my own pending 50th birthday is not bothering me, but perhaps I am a bit in denial.  I have a longing for days of old, the simpler time in my life.  I read Rivulet's posts at $12 A Day, with stories about how she spends her time with her sweet little guy, and I sometimes well up remembering my kids when they were small and just discovering the world. I remember when every experience was new, and I was this amazing person that introduced them to these wonders. 

I'm nostalgic for my own childhood, and the memories of my youth spent with family and friends. Monday is the second anniversary of my sister's death, still unbelievable to me 24 months later.  It was eventually determined to been have caused by an aneurysm; completely out of the blue, no health issues, no warning signs whatsoever, the day before her 56th birthday. November was her birthday month, my mom's birthday month, and my own. My mom died five years ago, the day after her 83rd birthday, the day before my own, and Thanksgiving that year. I don't need a psychologist to help me figure out where the flood of emotions are coming as November approaches. Both these woman in my life had hard lives in their young adulthood. Both were parents too young, without what I now understand, any great resiliency to what becoming a parent would mean. My sister was a teen mom, and my mother just had so many kids, six by the time she was 29 years of age, one after another, with four more coming in her 30's. Both became in time, good mothers, caring and doing whatever it took to raise healthy kids with opportunities for bright futures of their own. 

As I type on a lap top computer, using wireless internet, drinking coffee made in 60 seconds from my beloved Keurig, I  have embraced modern technology. While I have romantic view of days of old, I am not naive enough to have forgotten the challenges that came with those days. Still, even though we have hundreds of digital scans of photos of my mom and my sister, siblings and my children, and I can pop in a CD and scroll picture to picture, reliving my life with theirs feels so much more tangible looking through photo albums at yellowing pictures. Looking at the two potholders, one pink, and one blue, hanging on my kitchen wall, adorned by my two older children's hand prints more than 23 years ago, I want to touch the outline of their fingers, and pretend I'm holding their little hands. In this month of Thanksgiving, I am acutely aware of the blessings I have.  Having nostalgic memories is one of those blessings.  While I might be glossing over the challenges, knowing my past was more good by far than hard, is a gift.  

Take That

I recently learned of an expression from my daughter that girls use to describe their infatuation with a famous person or band.  Fangirl, used as a noun and a verb or adverb, as in "Do you like One Direction? I'm such a fangirl." or "I saw Joe Mauer at the Mall of America and I went all fangirl when I got his autograph."  I grew up in the 80's, the height of pop music and the beginning of all the boy bands which gave ample opportunity to fangirl out.  While I think a little music crossed the Atlantic, I was not aware at all of the group Take That until I became a fan of the sitcom Miranda.  Miranda and her friend Stevie, more so Stevie, have an ongoing bit that includes Gary Barlowe, front man for the group. I had heard the song Back for Good before in an episode of Reggie Perron, but knew nothing of who sang it. Now through the power of YouTube, I was able to find many versions. Let me tell you, had I known about them, I would have been playing this song in endless loop on my cassette player.  So, in honor of my new found discovery of being a fangirl, I am sharing a little video new to this American girl.  Oh to be 21 again!