Monday, January 27, 2014

Monday Miscellany: Links for Your Viewing Pleasure on This Cold Day

"Monday Miscellany" posts contain lots of links to a variety of sources that I find interesting...

This is the SIXTH time our classes have been cancelled this school-year due to snow and/or cold! I'm pretty sure this is a record-breaker!  I hope you stay warm. Check your teachers' homework calendars--they're probably getting a bit worried now about how far behind we are...I've updated mine, and you don't just get a free pass this time (sorry)! But while you're stuck indoors, reading and doing homework, check out the following links to some cool videos.

Here's a video of Split Rock Lighthouse, taken by the Perfect Duluth Day Aerial Drone (Perfect Duluth Day is a great blog). 
Here's another video, featured on PDD, taken by Dawn M. LaPointe:  
And yet another, shared by PDD, showing the release into the wild of a rehabilitated bobcat (I'm pretty sure a Marshall parent was involved in helping this bobcat get healthy):  
And, finally, just so you can remember what summer looks like, one final video also featured on PDD, taken by Jim Richardson, who creates a lot of cool underwater videos of Lake Superior:
And...remember, the new season of BBC TV's Sherlock is being broadcast on PBS!  You can watch the first couple episodes here and here, for a limited time.

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Think About It Thursday, Installment One

Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial, Downtown Duluth
artstuffmatters / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND
"Think About It Thursday" doesn't seem to be as pervasive a meme as "Throwback Thursday," but it's out there, and here's my version.  

David G said the other day that he likes all the links in my posts. I hope you always check out every one of my links, but today's links are much, much more serious and important than any previous ones. I would say that they are related to the Mission of Marshall School, which, as you know, is "to educate students to become global citizens who demonstrate strong academic habits, respect, compassion, integrity, self-discipline, and intellectual curiosity."  


During our MLK assembly on Tuesday, I wondered how teachers could help Marshall students connect with the importance of Martin Luther King Jr's work and legacy, and my thoughts kept returning to a horrible and disturbing event in Duluth's history, the lynching of Elias Clayton, Elmer Jackson, and Isaac McGhie in 1920. No matter how hard it might be to confront it, this is information that every Duluthian needs to know. It's also information that needs to be treated with respect and responded to with compassion. (Warning:  one of the links in this post, the one below about the poem "Strange Fruit," has a photo of a lynching on its front page--none of the other links has such a photo up-front.)


It's easy to think of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr as something that happened far away and long ago, as something that isn't relevant here and now, but Duluth has its own history of, and current struggles with, racism. And I'm certain we don't deal with it enough in school.    


Here's an audio history of the Duluth lynching. There's also a fascinating collection of oral histories about it here. Minnesota Public Radio offers a really thorough eight-part series of stories about those events and about the creation of the Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial downtown (pictured above). You should read ALL of that series (they call it a six-part series, but there are two additional connected stories linked on that page).  

And then, there's this long but incredibly powerful article about lynching and MLK's legacy that you really, really need to read (I found out about it because one of my former students posted a link to it on Facebook). Along with that, I want to mention a poem about lynching, "Strange Fruit" by Abel Meeropol (also known as Lewis Allan), which became famous when Billie Holliday sang it. You can read one version of the poem here.  

Also, check out these articles from the Duluth News Tribune about an incident that occurred here in town on MLK Day this year.  

While The Race Card Project doesn't connect to the Duluth lynchings, you might have heard about it on National Public Radio, where it's become a regular feature:  check it out--it's really amazing. (You could even compose and submit your own Race Card.)

Please let me know what you think of, or what you learned from, these links in the comments (but remember:  respond with respect & compassion). We can also discuss these links in class, if you like.

Lorraine Motel, National Civil Rights
Museum, Memphis, TN

Finally, my "Throwback Thursday" image is to the right:  you can re-read about my visit to Memphis here and here. (By the way, Madame Greenan and I have submitted our proposal to present at the Lausanne Learning Conference next summer, and we should hear sometime next month about whether it gets accepted.) 

Confession:  Clearly, I'm using these memes (partly) as excuses for not posting anything about Martin Luther King, Jr on MLK Day, when I was very busy with end-of-the-semester grading!  

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday

You're probably all familiar with internet memes like "Wordless Wednesday" and "Throwback Thursday," and so on, but for a social media latecomer like me, they're still rather new, so I thought I might try my hand at using such memes now and then on this blog. I wanted to start with "Wordless Wednesday," but it's pretty hard for me to be wordless! I'll stop writing soon and just post my photo (which is anything but wordless)! (Tomorrow, I'll follow up with a "Think About It Thursday" combined with a "Throwback Thursday.")  


At the entrance to the National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, TN


Saturday, January 11, 2014

Tater-Tot Hot Dish!

Hot Dish on a stick at the State Fair
massdistraction / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND
[Thanks to Matt W for helping me solve some technical problems with this post!]  

Hot Dish is enough of an Upper Midwestern phenomenon to have its own Wikipedia entry and to give rise to high-end restaurants like Haute Dish in Minneapolis. Hot Dish can even bridge the seemingly immense chasm between political rivals, who come together yearly to trade recipes in a friendly contest. The very name "Hot Dish" carries such power that, as Mr Chernov says, it doesn't even seem to matter what's in it--we'll eat it! At the State Fair, you can eat Hot Dish on a stick:  ask Mr Lockhart--he's tried it! I like to think of Duluth in particular as a hot-bed of Hot Dish aficionados, perhaps because Bea Ojakangas, Duluth's most famous cookbook author, wrote The Best Casserole Cookbook Ever


As Mrs Ojakangas points out, you don't really need recipes or a cookbook to make Hot Dish. All you need is the basic formula of protein + carbohydrate + veggies + sauce + topping:  bake until brown and bubbly. Hot Dish is one of the joys of living in Minnesota, and no winter-time comfort food can surpass the Big Daddy of all Hot Dishes, in which the carb is the topping:  the Tater-Tot Hot Dish! (As Mr Risdon says, it contains all three food groups: meat, potatoes, and vegetables!)    


But let us pause for a moment to consider our terminology... Should "Hot Dish" be written as one word or two? (Spell-checker, as Mr Chernov points out, says two.) Truthfully, I'm not sure I care:  go with your preference, but then be consistent. Should "Hot Dish" be capitalized? Well, I think of Hot Dish as a proper noun, just like Snow Day! Are the words "Hot Dish" and "casserole" interchangeable? Of course not! Ms Ball says that a Hot Dish has noodles and tomato sauce, while a Casserole contains a Cream Soup, but I think what you call a one-dish meal baked in a glass, ceramic, or metal pan depends entirely on the poetic principles of alliteration, assonance, and consonance! So, for instance:  
          Mattson:  I think I see some Tater-Tot Casserole over there! 
          Nygaard:  No, you must be mistaken--that's Tater-Tot Hot Dish.  
The lovely combination of assonance and consonance in "tot" and "hot," which work together to create a simple internal rhyme, is just as appetizing as an orderly arrangement of perfectly-browned potato nuggets resting atop a layer of gooey goodness...  Similarly:
          Mattson:  Is that Kidney Bean Hot Dish on the table?  
          Nygaard:  No, it's Kidney Bean Casserole, thank you very much! 
The "k" in "kidney bean" combines so nicely with the hard "c" of "casserole," that Kidney Bean Casserole just rolls right off your tongue, which is why you should never speak with your mouth full! However, I reluctantly present the exception to the rule:
          Mattson:  Are you bringing Tuna Hot Dish to the potluck? 
          Nygaard:  No!  Nor am I bringing Tuna Casserole, because they're both disgusting! 
          Mattson:  But I like the crushed potato chips on top...
These are conversations that only Minnesota English teachers can have. If you go off to college somewhere far away, no one will know what you're talking about when you reminisce about Hot Dish. You'll have to school them on the subject. (In the meantime, you can practice by educating Madame Young about Hot Dish, as she has no idea what it is! She might find this video helpful, in all sorts of ways!) 


Morel, the State mushroom.
No, I won't tell you where I
found it!
So, back to Tater-Tot Hot Dish (and just for the record, Mr Mattson hates it!). The typical TTHD consists of a fairly bland, gray mushy mix of browned hamburger and some canned vegetable (green beans seem to be the most common), bound together with a cream soup of some kind, Cream of Mushroom being the reigning favorite. This mixture is topped with a random scattering of frozen tater-tots and then baked. (Let's see who's paying attention: What is another, rather amusing, name for Cream of Mushroom Soup's important function in a Hot Dish? Answer in a comment!) In other words, TTHD is really just a variation of Green Bean Casserole, with hamburger and in which the tater-tots replace the French's Fried Onions.  
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhou3vdlmdjTv8Y6GnQY9cZOes_c1DyoGEGrXNSJOD_up9l7iOK85oVF2hGxjHlRhO7-Qi3q93IX6r_4l0E4LH5URufhp60rpUNMYkaHmud7fGcxrrrwNyYvmQi0ZI5uE2B_OWir9q5ZzJB/w140-h104-p/IMG_2632.jpg
They were delicious!

Variations which are highly seasoned, include a greater variety of vegetables, eschew the ubiquitous Cream of Mushroom, or showcase carefully-arranged tots (lined up "like soldiers," according to Madame Greenan's mother), are often considered, by the church-basement potluck crowd, to be unusual, heretical, perhaps even un-Minnesotan. Some families, like Mrs Fishel's, argue about whether or not to add cheese. Ms Powell outlaws green beans, and Mr Anderson includes lima beans! My TTDH is probably pretty un-Minnesotan.

Don't get me wrong--I love Minnesota. There's nowhere else I'd rather live, although I didn't feel that way when I was your age. (As an angsty teen, I even altered some pro-Duluth bumper stickers to express my feelings--you can see them in my classroom.) But having left Minnesota for a decade and then returned, I now love it even more and can see it from both a native's perspective and an outsider's view-point, which makes it all the more interesting and beautiful. 
Don't put Amanita muscaria in Hot
Dish--it's toxic!

Much as I love Minnesota, however, I just can't stand Cream of Mushroom soup! I do love mushrooms of all kinds, but Cream of Mushroom soup contains nothing resembling any actual mushrooms I have ever met. And in all my walks through the woods, I've met a few mushrooms. 

My taste in food runs the gamut from high-brow to low-brow, so I am not (as an anonymous colleague of mine purports to be) "too good" for tater-tots! (Perhaps she would prefer these undoubtedly healthier "grown-up" tater-tots, or the gourmet de-constructed version of TTHD from Haute Dish!) But I have far too much respect for mushrooms to encourage the purchase and consumption of Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup. 



Warhol-inspired soup cans
bubbletea1 / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA
I realize these may be fightin' words, as Cream of Mushroom has a devoted following, but I'm willing to stand behind them. Cream of Celery, on the other hand (Amy's or Health Valley), is a noble substitute, the under-appreciated cousin of Cream of Mushroom, in my opinion! In the world of Hot Dish, the otherwise-ignored celery is a vegetable of major importance; it plays a starring role in many Hot Dish recipes, and it is tough enough to withstand highly-industrialized mass-processing methods. In any case, I prefer my Campbell's soup to be of the Andy Warhol variety, hung on the wall or sold at Target as a commemorative objet d'art.

I make my version of TTHD with a yellow sauce or a red sauce; sometimes, I even make both versions in two halves of the same pan (it's a bit tricky, but it can be done)! 



Some of my ingredients
For the yellow sauce, I have sometimes used Cream of Celery mixed with Creamed Corn, either homemade or the Green Giant frozen kind, which for some inexplicable reason is no longer sold in Duluth (though it might still be available in Cloquet). I make Creamed Corn by pureeing half a bag of thawed frozen corn with some diluted sour cream (real or non-dairy) and mixing that with the remaining corn kernels.  




Lots of color!
But my favorite yellow sauce base is butternut squash soup, from a can (Amy's) or a carton (Imagine or Pacific), and then I usually add frozen corn (Ms Powell would approve) and kidney beans to the hot dish. I call this my "Three Sisters" version of TTHD. The orange soup, yellow corn kernels, and dark red beans really brighten up a dish that is often visually unappetizing. Kidney beans show up a lot in my hot dishes, perhaps because I grew up eating my mother's delicious Kidney Bean Casserole, which Ms Ball would call a Hot Dish, because it's made with pasta and tomato sauce. (Let's see who's really paying attention:  Ask Chef Korach about his favorite way to eat kidney beans and then describe it in a comment!) 



For the red sauce version, I use tomato soup, from a can (Progresso, never Campbells) or a carton (Imagine or Pacific), with the usual green beans (but always frozen, never canned--sorry, Ms Powell!), and sautéed baby portabella mushrooms. Traditionalists may think that using tomato soup as a base is rather unorthodox, but most folks like ketchup with their tater-tots, and tomato soup gives the Hot Dish that ketchup-y flavor... 

No matter which base I use, I always include sautéed onions, garlic, red pepper flakes, black pepper, and Italian herb mix. As a vegetarian, I do not, of course, include meat in my Hot Dishes. I do often include fake hamburger or fake sausage. (Go ahead, get the snide remarks about meat substitutes out of your system!) Sometimes, in other experimental versions of TTHD, I use canned chili beans or baked beans (the vegetarian kind, without pork or bacon) as the binder. If I want to be really fancy, I include asparagus. 



Ready for topping
Now, let's get serious and discuss the tots. We all know that TTHD is really just an incredibly-efficient and delicious tater-tot delivery system. We pretend we're eating a balanced meal (right, Mr Risdon?), but what we really want is lots and lots of lovely, crispy tots. Chef Korach, who once "worked for a company that brokered Ore Ida Potato Products," tells me that in the "early 80's, Minnesota led the nation in tater-tot consumption," most likely because of our collective fondness for TTHD. 

To ensure the proper texture of the precious tots, we must limit the amount of sauce (don't drown them!), and if we include cheese (real or non-dairy), it should either be mixed into the sauce or layered underneath the tots--it should never be placed on top! (I realize lots of folks pour their sauce--right from can--over the still-frozen tots, letting gravity pull it down through the Hot Dish filling as it bakes, but I just can't approve of that strategy!) I highly recommend partially pre-baking the tots:  that way, they stay crunchy (and the oven is then thoroughly pre-heated).  

          A soggy tot 
          is not a tot 
          I want to eat!      
Because I didn't have quite enough "soldiers," I only made
some of them stand up, so my tot-to-filling ratio is a tad low.

To guarantee the largest quantity of tots per serving, we must use full-size tater-tots (no mini-tots, says Ms Powell) and the proper pan. No matter what it's made of, the pan must offer a large surface area, so it should be wide and shallow.
If the pan is too tall, and the tots are too far down inside it, then the tots will not brown properly, shielded as they are from the oven's heat, and in such a deep pan, the ratio of tots to filling is likely to be terribly disappointing. Arrange the tots carefully, in rows or circles, packing in as many as possible. If you really want to improve your tot-ratio, take some advice from Madame Greenan's mother and make your "soldiers" stand at attention, rather than letting them lie down! 

You didn't know TTHD was so complicated, did you?  

Some Minnesotans might say that Hot Dish is a way of life, and they wouldn't be wrong. A good Hot Dish can absorb all the little tidbits and leftovers you have in your fridge, freezer, and pantry. Perhaps if more folks made Hot Dish more often, Americans wouldn't waste so much food. When I made my TTHD today, I used up some leftover celery, half a bag of corn, half an onion, half a poblano pepper, half a bag of fake burger, and what was left of a package of sun-dried tomatoes. People think of Hot Dish as consisting solely of processed and convenience foods, and certainly the industrialization of agriculture after World War II gave rise to it, but Hot Dishes have come a long way since then, and there's no reason you can't utilize all that produce from your garden or the farmer's market by re-inventing an old favorite.  

Most people associate Hot Dish with potlucks, church suppers, and funerals, all of which are important ways of building community, even if they also often feature "bad coffee, folding chairs, and passive-aggressive family conflicts," as Ms Weaver notes, or "curious Jello salads that inevitably have bits of carrot in them," as Ms Kiero remarks. I'll bet that in every country in the world where folks experience winter, people make some kind of Hot Dish and get together with family and friends to eat it. And even long after you leave home, memories of all the terrible and wonderful Hot Dishes of your childhood will sneak up on you with a powerful nostalgia. --Just ask Ms Knudsen about her childhood memories of Fiskegrateng! So, dig in! It may not always look good, and you might think you won't like it, but as Luke P said the other day about TTHD, once you start eating it, you realize you like it!


Dig in!
I'd like to thank all the folks who chatted with me about TTHD or who sent me their thoughts via email--their contributions made this post so much better than I had planned! I hope faculty, staff, and students (past and present) will continue the conversation in the comments. Meanwhile, I wonder which Hot Dish I should make next week:  Wild Rice Hot Dish? Seven Layer Hot Dish? Thai Curry Mac & Cheese? 

Sunday, January 5, 2014

Cooking Through the Cold (& Two Blogging Challenges)

Queen Vic's current blossom (#6).
She's had more than 1 per month!
According to Intellicast. com, the low temperature tonight should be twenty-something below zero (with wind chills much lower, of course), and for the first time since the 1990's, the Governor closed the schools statewide because of the cold. So what I am doing with this unexpected long winter weekend? Cooking, of course. 
Pickles!  Check out my favorite blog about pickling.
I made my first-ever batch of refrigerator pickles with asparagus, zucchini, and okra, so I might write a series of posts on pickling, since I'd really like to learn how to make all kinds of pickles.  (My mother makes great pickles, and I'd really like to master her beet pickle recipe!) And I'm still on a lentil kick, so brace yourself for another Middle-Eastern-inspired  recipe. (I'm working my way up to an Indian dish that uses black lentils, so there will probably be one more post in my lentil series!)  

I think most folks crave some comfort food when the temperatures drop, and the dish I'm making today definitely qualifies as comfort food. I predict that when you go off to college, you will miss certain foods that make you think of home or your family. I also predict that you will have the urge to cook some of those foods. Will you be able to?  


Blogging Challenge #1:  Learn to cook one of your favorite foods, and write a blog post about it (complete with pictures of your process). Many of you have already written about your college search, but you haven't written much about how you will prepare yourself to deal with college life. This is one way to do that. The dish you choose should be one you don't already know how to make. Perhaps you can get a friend or family member to help you learn how to make it. You might have relatives who would really love to have this chance to teach you how they make a dish they are famous for. There may not many more opportunities for you to spend this kind of quality-time with your family before you enter the next phase of your life, so take advantage of second semester to do this!  


Today, I'm making Koshary for the first time (also spelled Kushari, Kusherie, Koshari, etc. There seem to be as many spellings as there are recipes!). It's an Egyptian dish, and like all comfort-foods around the world, every family has its own recipe, and people argue about the "right" way to make it. This dish has gained some fame among chefs and foodies in the West since the Egyptian Revolution as various writers/reporters taste it and then pass on recipes.  


All the variations of Koshary include lentils and rice with fried onions and a tomato sauce. (It's very similar to Mujaddara, another Middle Eastern lentils-and-rice dish).  Koshary is a bit complicated, because each element of the dish is made separately, and they're all mixed together (or sometimes layered) in the end.  Here we go!



Nice and brown...
First, I got started on the onions, since they take the longest. I used two and a half large onions (one yellow, two white), and I think I should have used more. I chopped them up and started frying them in butter. Some folks like to have crispy fried onions with this dish; others use softer, carmelized onions. I made the latter.  Carmelizing onions takes a long time--you have to be patient to let them get really brown and sweet. Every now and then, you have to stir them around and mix the brown stuff on the bottom of the pan (there's a fancy French name for that stuff!) into the onions.
Granny's wooden spoon
A wooden spoon is perfect for this--you can scrape up the sludge (I mean, fond) without damaging your pan. I think every cook should have at least one wooden spoon--I have a few, including one that belonged to my maternal grandmother.  I don't really use it, but I like having it in my kitchen... 


While the onions were cooking, I started on the other parts of Koshary. For the rice, I used white Basmati rice because that's my favorite kind. I always cook white rice in the microwave, in an uncovered glass bowl, and it comes out perfect every time. I can no longer remember where I encountered the formula below, but it's never failed me.  


"Perfect" rice formula
Today, I added a couple bay leaves and three cloves to the rice-and-water mix. When the rice was done, I didn't open the microwave:  I left it closed for five more minutes so that any leftover liquid would be soaked up by the hot rice. After that, I removed the seasonings and set the rice aside.
Finished rice
 


Next, while still keeping an eye on the onions, I cooked the lentils.  I used French green lentils again and cooked them with whole cumin seeds and a number of sweet spices:  star anise, mace, cinnamon, allspice, and cloves.  I added another few bay leaves. (I bought a package of fresh bay leaves recently and popped them in the freezer.  Fresh herbs are supposed to be less powerful than dried ones, so I've been using them liberally lately.)  I also added some fresh chili pepper (not enough, as it turned out).  When the lentils were just getting soft but still holding their shape, I drained them and removed as many of the whole spices as I could find. (I wasn't able to find the cloves and allspice berries, so I'll have to be careful not to bite into them as I eat lunch next week!)
Seasonings for the lentils


When making something like Koshary, you quickly end up with a lot of dirty dishes, if you don't clean as you go. My mother taught me that tip, and indeed, it makes cooking easier, especially in a small space.


Some versions of Koshary include pasta and chick peas, so that was my next step. Often, for this dish, the pasta is browned in butter before it's cooked, and I wanted to try that. 
Browning the pasta
I used ready-cut spaghetti, a pasta shape that's handy for soups and hotdishes, but almost any kind of dried pasta will work. (Note to self: do a post about tater-tot 
hot dish!)  I did the same thing with the drained, canned chick peas, and when they were done I mixed the rice, lentils, onions, pasta, and chick peas all together.  
Brown and white protein and carbs!

The last step was the tomato sauce, which should be spicy-hot, garlicky, and tangy. I started with canned tomatoes and added a number of seasonings:  garlic, ginger, cayenne pepper, chili powder, and cinnamon. Then I added golden raisins and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar for sweetness and tang. 
Seasonings going into the sauce.


This simmered for quite some time, but when it was ready, I dished up the lentil-and-rice mix into my leak-proof glass lunch containers, and added a portion of the sauce to each, along with a few cilantro leaves. I thought it looked pretty good!  You'll see me eating it during lunch next week. I tasted it when it was done, and I thought it needed a bit more heat, so I added a splash of hot sauce to each portion before I packed them into the refrigerator.  
I own five containers, just in case we have, you know,
an actual five-day school-week!


I've written thirty-three blog posts now, I think, and yet I always feel like I should do more. Most of you have fewer than ten. I'm not sure I can sustain this level of posting throughout the rest of the year (maybe I can, but I'm not sure).   I've been trying really hard to model for you what I want you to do. There's a way of blogging called "blogging without obligation," and it was invented by a blogger to counteract the guilt many bloggers feel when they haven't been posting much. I'm putting the BWO badge on my blog today (you can see it in my sidebar). I'd like you to earn your chance to do the same!


Blogging Challenge #2: When you've posted ten more times (and that means ten well-written, meaningful, substantial, semi-connected, aesthetically-pleasing, and carefully-proofread posts, complete with titles, links, labels, & captioned photos, dated after January 5, 2014), you, too, can put the BWO badge on your blog, and after that I won't bother you (much) about blogging anymore! Earning your badge will be worth 50 points! From among these ten posts, I will want you to choose, portfolio-style, your three best posts (give them the label "portfolio"), and those three posts will be worth another 45 points.  


For English 12 students, I will schedule some in-class blogging days, though not nearly enough for you to rely solely on class-time for this (& we won't have any class-time for this in AP!). I will continue to give "blog-walking" (reading and commenting) assignments to all students, even after they earn badges. I may also ask badge-earners to help others by giving suggestions/ideas for posts. I may still ask certain students to showcase other good work on their blogs (and those showcase posts won't count toward a badge). Posts in response to Blogging Challenge #1 may count toward your ten.


If you plan to do a Capstone Project, you must earn your badge before Projects begin (otherwise, you'll have until the last day of classes). Some of you will want to document your Project on your blog, and you can do that post-badge! Some pre-Project research may be included in pre-badge posts--see me if you want to do that.


I found these magnetic poetry masterpieces on the metal bookcase in the corner--despair & hope in close proximity!

Hang in there, people!  It's 2014, and the end is (if not yet in sight, then at least) imaginable!