Thursday, March 3, 2022

I Remember How To Cook


 Y'all- I'm losing my mind. 

No, really. It's happening. Slowly. But yes. It is. Today I could not remember the word "criticize." I just couldn't. It's like things just get jammed in the file folder of my mind and I know they're there. I put them there. They've been there my whole life! But I can't retrieve them. 
And then eventually I do and I am grateful and go on to the next thing I forget. And it's not just words. It's the common things like walking into a room and having no idea what you were about to do there. Same with opening the refrigerator- what in hell did I need? 
Something. 
I do it with my phone. I pick it up and activate it and then wonder why I've picked it up in the first place. Was I going to look up a recipe? Check my messages? Google something of vast importance? Check the weather widget?
And that's a problem too. I check that widget at least four times a day, sometimes more because I NEVER REMEMBER WHAT IT SAID! I do, vaguely remember but for some reason I want those exact high and low numbers. Which is another sort of mental situation, I guess. 

And then there's the sort of forgetting that Mr. Moon and I both do (and he does all those other things too which gives us about one brain between us) which is to forget what the fuck we've planted in the garden. Sometimes we mark rows, sometimes we don't. 
"Oh, we'll remember!" 
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
See that picture at the top there? I am pretty sure that it's broccoli. But you know what? I thought, and my husband thought, that it was a collard plant. We have about half a dozen of them and we've been discussing why those collards have not grown like the others. To be honest, the leaves are quite similar in shape and in color and different varieties of plants can and do look very different. Somehow just saying the word "variety" makes me feel so smart. 
As if.
So a day or so ago I noticed that those "collard" plants were growing what looks suspiciously like broccoli. Did we buy broccoli plants? 
I guess we did. 

On to the Chinese Cabbage. Y'all- it's Napa Cabbage. Of course. There is no mistake. And I thought it was a variety of Bok Choy. 
Again, Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Well, at least I still remember how to cook all of these mystery vegetables. 


This is a nice pot of collards (yes, real collards), kale, and Napa cabbage with cherry tomatoes and onions. They are simmering in a broth that includes some of the chicken broth that I made last week with a chicken I roasted, balsamic and apple cider vinegar, a little olive oil, and Bragg's. It smells wonderful. 
I'm also going to cook some small river fish that Mr. Moon caught the other day on the Aucilla which is just about our favorite kind of fish. I believe they will be air-fried. And probably some cheese grits. Or hell, maybe just cornbread. Lately I've been making my cornbread with corn, jalapenos, and cheese. It is so damn good. 
As I cook these things, I give credit in my mind to the enslaved people who cooked and ate what the white people didn't- fish they could catch themselves, greens and tomatoes they could grow in their own gardens if they were given the permission to have them, and bread made from corn meal, not the white flour that graced the table in the big house. 
The poorer white people in the south learned to cook this way too. What we call "soul food" should probably be more rightly called "poor folks' food." 
Ironic, isn't it, that this cuisine has not only survived and is still a staple in many kitchens, and that it has even, in some places, and by some chefs, become elevated to a haute level?
And it all began in Africa. 
Ain't nothing haute about the meal I'm making and although I am using my fancy stove and an air fryer in its preparation, I could, and I swear this, make it on a wood fire if I had to. 

I suppose I haven't lost my mind completely yet. But as with everything else it's only a matter of time. 

Meanwhile, the low tonight is going to be...uh, let me check my phone...forty-five! 
Seriously, I had to check. 

Love...Ms. Moon




37 comments:

  1. I have noticed this same thing happening with me.

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  2. A year from now, you will not be sitting in a chair, rocking your head and saying, "Ga-ga-ga-ga-ga-ga-ga!" No, not Mary Moon. That will never happen to you.

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    1. Your lips to the gods' ears. I hate the thought of that.

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  3. Same here. Blank slate at times.....and it *could* be frightening if I / you let it be. Sobering to say the least. And yes, no matter what you *thought* you planted? You DID plant broccoli! LOL!
    Susan M

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    1. Yes. Here's another thing- two minutes after I've finished doing the Wordle, which I am pretty good at, by the way, I cannot remember what the word of the day was.
      Yes. I think we have broccoli.

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  4. I get that blank moments thing too, walk into another room and forget why, and I lose words too, when doing crossword puzzles, there are sometimes answers I just can't get, yet when I check the answers in the next day's newspapers, I could kick myself for not remembering. and just the other day I almost put my hot cuppa into the fridge instead of the milk.

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  5. I googled bridal wreath spirea and discovered here in Australia it is also called May Bush, a plant I know well and there is one already here in the community grounds, between the block of flats directly behind me and the one behind that.

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  6. Maybe I'm not supposed to love everything about this post and yet i do. It's so human and relatable, the forgetting and remembering, the checking and then checking again, just to be sure, we're all there with you, our brains are so chock full it's no wonder we have to sift around sometimes. But what I truly thrilled to in this post was your meditation on cooking the way you do, how soul food is so fundamental to American cuisine, how creatively it evolved, it all reminded me of that amazing netflix documentary "high on the hog." I think you've seen it? I don't recall now. But if you haven't you should definitely check it out. Big hugs dear Mary.

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    1. Oh hell yes! I totally watched High on the Hog. It blew my mind.

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  7. That memory thing is do familiar and do annoying. Do you find you remember the number of syllables in the word or name, and the cadence, but can't het the actual word? Arghgh.

    You know -- daDAdada... reMEMbering, oh yes that's it.

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    1. No. Honestly, I just can't recall it at all from my memory. I find myself looking up synonyms on Google frequently.

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  8. Oh, Ms. Mary ... Every one of us of any age draws a blank once in a while! The older we are, the more frequent the blanks!!

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  9. And here I thought, well, maybe what we up north call Napa cabbage is what they call bok choy down south. After all, if they call a sweet red pepper a mango in rural Indiana (or at least they did several decades ago), who am I to lecture you about a bok choy being vase-shaped with thick brilliant white stems and deep green leaves? But apparently we're in agreement on that anyway.
    (There is an impressive variety of bok choy, but they're all unmistakably bok choy-ish.)

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    1. Yes. Very choy-ish. And as a plant in the garden they don't look a damn thing like Napa cabbage. They are very spread out instead of the erect vegetable we but in the store. So there is that.

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  10. I call my sister and tell her what I was trying to say and does she remember the word.

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  11. I hope you enjoy that food and have a sweet night. We are living in stressful times, I do not think you are losing your mind.

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    1. I hope you're right and that I am not losing my mind.

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  12. Oh goodness, I forget things like that all of the time. I'll be telling a story and I will lose my train of thought and can't remember what I was going to say. And I am always checking the weather on my phone but I have to keep checking and checking in case it changes... Goofy.
    Your cooking is a real talent, Ms. Mary Moon. Always looks so delicious and sounds so delicious the way you describe it.

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    1. Goofy- yes! I hear you.
      The one gift I will admit to is cooking. I ain't bad at that.

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  13. Speaking of forgetting...I had a hectic morning at work the other day (all mornings there are hectic) and I had about 10 things going on at once. So I made a phone call, and as soon as the woman on the other end answered, my mind went utterly blank. I had NO CLUE who I had called or why. It was so embarrassing! I mumbled something about, "Sorry, wrong number" and hung up, only to have to call her back five minutes later after my brain started working again. My point being, this happens to us all. I think you're fine!

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    1. Oh Lord. I have done that too. It's so weird. Perhaps that's why I don't call people anymore! I just text. But you can't do that at your job.

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  14. I definitely do all those things too, to varying degrees on different days. I have a terrible time remembering the names of some plants. I can never remember cyclamen or phlomis, both of which we have. And yes, I had a similar incident the other day where I could NOT remember a word, and I just had to step back and think about something else and then it came to me. Neurons are strange things.

    That's funny about the broccoli/collard. Maybe you have a rare hybrid of the two! LOL

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    1. Oh my god. Steve- that's one of the hardest things for me. The plant thing. You have no idea how many times I've had to look up Crocosmia.

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  15. I can't remember shit either, even everyday words. Drives me crazy and convinces me that I have Alzheimers:) Apparently it's normal but I hate it, makes me feel old.

    I've finally stopped believing I'll remember things if I don't write them down. MRI knows this. If they ask me to start a tough IV for them, they know I need to write it on my hand or it will be completely gone from my head. Sigh.

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    1. Get this- I wrote something on my hand a few weeks ago and when I saw it again, I had no idea what it was supposed to remind me of.
      Jesus.

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  16. I lose words all the time and five minutes before I'm ready to type it in the sentence it's in my head, when I'm ready to type it all of a sudden I can't think of it. All those other things too.

    And that is definitely broccoli. My neighbor planted some broccoli and one of the plants that grew is definitely in the broccoli family but it's some genetic throwback or something.

    I'm trying a new recipe tonight, cabbage roll casserole, basically everything except rolling it up in the cabbage leaves.

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    1. It is reassuring to know that others forget words too. Thank you.
      Yep. I think I'm growing broccoli.
      Let us know how the cabbage-not-rolls turn out.

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  17. The worst things is when you finally remember something - sweet relief - only to find out 5 minutes later you remembered wrong!

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  18. I'm with you on losing my mind. Like walking upstairs for something and then thinking "what did I walk upstairs for", so I walk back downstairs and then I remember. Or just needing three things from the store, getting two of them and then for the life of me not remembering what the third was! I think you're totally normal!

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    1. If I didn't carry a list with me to the grocery store I would not remember half of what I need. Sometimes I still forget things that are ON MY LIST.
      But I am proud that mostly I remember the list.
      Jeez.

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  19. That pot of Collards made me hungry, too bad we don't have Smell-A-Vision via our Computers so I could enjoy the Aroma, I'm sure it was Sublime! As for forgetfulness, it was bad before and just got more foggy post-Rona, I'm hopeful that's temporary Fog and not permanent? I can be proud for remembering anything anymore Mary.

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Tell me, sweeties. Tell me what you think.