Peanut Butter and Everything

Granted, this is an unusual week. We’ve got a fridge full of leftovers from the bar mitzvah. Mrs. Fussy is gone on a work trip somewhere. And yesterday the boy stayed home sick from school.

Of course, I didn’t know that he would be staying home until after I packed his lunch.

Every day the kids, bless their souls, eat the same thing for lunch. He gets a peanut butter and honey sandwich, some kind of fruit, and some kind of granola bar. She gets a peanut butter and honey sandwich, frozen mango, and frozen peas. Although when we have smoked veal loaf and sliced american cheese in the house, I’ll make Little Miss Fussy a sandwich out of those instead.

Had I known I was going to end up eating my son’s peanut butter sandwich for lunch, I might have chosen a different breakfast.

One of the leftovers from the bar mitzvah that I haven’t talked about yet, is the leftover slaw. I made a giant batch of purple cabbage, red onion, and radish slaw to go with the seven pulled pork shoulders. But less than half of what I made was consumed last Saturday night.

Good news for me! I love slaw. And I’ll eat it all the time. Even for breakfast.

Mrs. Fussy thinks that is gross, but my slaws aren’t the heavy creamy salads one might find the supermarket. Mine are lively and bright, with a punch of Bragg’s raw apple cider vinegar. And I’ll often make them spicy to boot. It’s like a wake up call to the digestive tract.

Occasionally to make a bowl of slaw eat more like a meal, I’ll enrich it with a tablespoon or two of peanut butter. Typically, these go better with more Thai inspired slaws, seasoned with fish sauce, garlic, and plenty of cilantro. But it works with more traditional slaws too.

Well, anyway, that was breakfast.

Because the boy wasn’t feeling well, I made him chicken soup with orzo for lunch. We sat down, and I told him the tale about chicken soup being Jewish penicillin. I’m sure he’s heard that before, but he claims that he had no idea about this medicinal properties of this beloved comfort food.

It made me feel good to sit and watch the steam from the bowl curl up into his nasal passages. Good enough to not mind having to lunch on the sandwich from his brown bag that never made it to school.

Since Mrs. Fussy is away, I was able to make a dinner for the kiddos that she has banished from the weekly rotation: peanut butter noodles. But the children continue to love it, and for some reason, I hadn’t quite realized that this would mean I would be eating peanut butter for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Ugh.

I suppose that’s fine. But I do try to eat a varied diet. Which isn’t to say that I won’t eat slaw with peanut butter every day for breakfast until my vat of slaw has been drained. That’s going to mean no morning kisses for the dad with slaw mouth. But hey, maybe I can finish the whole thing before Mrs. Fussy gets back from her trip.

It’s good to have goals. We’ll see.