They depend on me...

Every night at 1am and 3am, I have one wish which will never come true: I wish men could breastfeed... (Translate: i wish my husband could breastfeed...) Whenever Sophia starts crying Ely would call me, "mama! I think baby needs to breastfeed!" Yes. Yes. I know she does...all the time... As I nurse Sophia, I cannot stop thinking about the fact that we, women, feed our offsprings. The survival of our species heavily depends on us. I look at Sophia, who almost doubled her birth weight in two months, and I am amazed by this very primitive (yet important) function of my body: feeding our babies. For us humans, feeding our offspring does not stop when our children stop nursing. The end of nursing is just one milestone. Parents are responsible for feeding our children for a very long time. In my family, the primary person to feed the family is, of course, mama (= me). I was looking at Ely's baby pictures, and came across a lot of pictures of homemade baby food and toddler food. Although I highly recommend to make your own baby food, I know it is not for everyone. It takes time and effort. Ely is now old enough to eat the same meals as ours, and her health continues to depend on me. The other day, a terrible thought came to my mind...what if something happens to me... Who is going to feed them? At the dinner table, I told my husband, "I have one wish. Can you promise me that the girls will continue to eat good home cooked meals if something ever happens to me?", "please do not feed them frozen and boxed food." Of course, my husband did not take me seriously, and said, "nothing will happen to you." I am not expecting  anything to happen to me. I was talking about the "what if" situation, and yes, I am serious. My husband knows how to cook. He makes good pasta with tomato sauce, and super juice, and some sandwiches, but he cannot raise our girls feeding on only those foods day after day. I told him that it would be nice if he can expand his cooking repertoire, and he agreed. He hasn't quite entered the kitchen to do so yet, but I am hoping in the near future we will have a cooking date in our kitchen.

Tequila Cilantro Pasta

This recipe was adopted from a recipe I received from my friend Lisa. The original recipe is called "Tequila Chicken Fettuccine". I make this without chicken and replace chicken broth with vegetable base broth.

INGREDIENTS:

1 pound dry spinach fettuccine

OR

2 pounds fresh spinach fettuccine

1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro reserved for garnish

2 tablespoons minced fresh garlic

2 tablespoons minced jalapeno pepper (seeds and veins may be removed) - I usually omit this because it becomes quite spicy for my daughter.

3 tablespoons unsalted butter (reserve 1 tablespoon for saute )

1/2 cup chicken stock (preferably homemade) - I replaced this with veggie base broth using Rapunzel vegetable broth cube. 

2 tablespoons gold tequila

2 tablespoons freshly-squeezed lime juice or lemon juice if you don't have lime 

3 tablespoons soy sauce

1/4 medium red onion, thinly sliced

1 medium red bell pepper, thinly sliced

1 medium yellow bell pepper thinly sliced

1 1/2 cup heavy cream

DIRECTIONS:

Cook 1/3 cup cilantro, garlic and jalapeno in 2 tablespoons butter over medium heat for 4 to 5 minutes. Add stock, tequila and lime juice. Bring the mixture to a boil and cook until reduced to a paste like consistency. This will take a while. Do not rush this step. You need to be patient. You also need to be attentive to the pot so that it will not burn. 

This is how it should look. 

Meanwhile cook onion and peppers, stirring occasionally, with remaining butter over medium heat. When the vegetables have wilted (become limp), add soy sauce and quickly toss and add reserved tequila/lime paste and cream. Bring the sauce to boil and reduce the heat to simmer, stirring occasionally. You don't want to continue boiling it as the cream starts to separate. Taste it and add salt and pepper if you like. Turn off the heat. 

Prepare rapidly boiling, salted water to cook pasta; cook pasta accoding to the direction. When sauce is done, toss with well-drained spinach fettuccine and reserved cilantro and parmigiana cheese. I this picture, I used spinach spaghetti. 

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Feeling grateful...

Where did the time go? It has been more than two months since I visited this space. What has been happening at our Makery? Not much in the kitchen or sewing department, but super busy welcoming and loving our new addition to our lives... Baby Sophia!! There has been a lot of challenges with her birth, my post partum, and everyone's adjustment, but I am happy to report that we are finally settling down. And "making" is slowly coming back to our lives...MY life. 

Today's post is not about making or cooking. It is dedicated to the amazing women I recently met, and the importance of a support system and community. 

6 years ago, I left Chicago where I consider it my second hometown to start a new life with my husband in Orange County. For the longest time, I had blamed him for uprooting me from my friends and family. Although I met a few very good friends in Orange County, I never felt that I had a community or good support system outside of my workplace. I often felt lonely and sad. All I had was my husband and later my daughter. But had it not be those few good friends I met though work, I would have been depressed or worse, and I am grateful for the friendship. When we decided to move to the Bakersfield area, I again had to make new friends and community. I am a friendly person, but I am more of an introvert and not the one to go up to someone and introduce myself. In fact, I met my very first friend because my husband took our three years old to a story time, and he started talking to her. Now, we became very good friends and our daughters became good friends.

She introduced me to a group of mamas in Bakersfield who regularly meet with their children to play and chitchat. But this group has become much more than a play date group for me. When Sophia was born two months ago, I had such a hard time trying to recover from giving birth, nursing, taking care of our three years old, and taking care of the household. My own family not being here, I had little support. My husband helped as much as he could but taking care of a three year old can be difficult. I was exhausted, depressed, cried a lot, and felt guilty that I was not doing enough for my girls. I became short with my three years old, raised my voice at her quite often, and cried later on because she did not deserve for me to be like that with her. Then, these mamas did something amazing for me. They got together and delivered meals for one full week! Each of them took turn, prepared the meal for me and my family, and delivered to our door. By the time they started the meal delivery, I was so exhausted, i was serving my family cans of soup for dinner. That is a warning sign for my physical and mental well being. One of my supervisors once asked me how I would know if I am deteriorating mentally. I couldn't think of anything because I often do not realize When I am tired or overworked until I explode (often toward my husband). Now I know. If I stop cooking and a can of soup is becoming my family dinner, watch out! So, these deliveries were a gift from the universe. Most of these amazing women did not even know me well yet. All they knew was that there was an overwhelmed mama (me) who did not have much support and needed help. All of the women are mamas of small children, which means their hands are already full. Yet, they did this for me and my family. 

Since then, I came to know these women better, and learned that many of them moved away from their family and community. Trying to build their own support system, they found each other. We meet a few times every week, let our children play together, and we talk about different things. I feel comfortable and supported. I am truly grateful for their friendship. I am still physically tired from nursing and running after My three years old, but I am emotionally more stable and mentally clearer. Thank you, ladies. Now it is time to cook!