Welcome to mama eats, a twice-weekly newsletter inspired by a simple + seasonal home life. This week’s post, a week of meals, is free to all readers. I try to provide as much free content as possible, however, this newsletter is a labor of love and I am a busy mama to three. If you have the means, and find value in what I share, please consider becoming a paid subscriber, which also gives you access to the growing archive of posts older than a month.
Hello, dear readers, and happy week-end to you. Today is Picnic Day, a well-loved tradition of an “open house” for the college in our little town- I’ve gone almost every year since I was a small child. After I send this to you, I’m off to pack up lunches (pasta salad) and snacks for the day as we’ll be out on bikes till dinnertime. Our week was honestly stressful, I had a lot of little nitpicky errands and deadlines that had to be done, some bad news, and it all took its toll on my mood- we all have weeks like these, don’t we. I am so glad it’s the weekend and a beautiful one at that. I aim to get all my summer vegetables in the soil this week for the garden- tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, basil and green beans are my top staples for the summer garden. I wrote a post several years back, that still holds true, of my favorite varieties and seed companies etc for the summer garden- here it is if you’d like to read.
This week in books, I finished Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend (book one of a series). I tried to read this when I was only a month or two postpartum and I was just so tired that my brain could not get into it at all. I’m so glad I picked it up again as I devoured it in a few days, it is juicy and intense, women-centered, compulsively readable- almost soap opera-ish on the surface, but with lots of literary/deeper interest right below. A lot of you told me there is an excellent video adaptation of this on HBO, which I’m putting on my list- I don’t watch things often, but I do love a good show or film from time to time. Afterwards, I read Landscapes by Christine Lai, which has been on my ever growing “to-read” list for a while now. It was almost completely different from what I thought it would be (post apocalyptic near future where the natural world has all but collapsed due to climate change)- it is that, but as more of the background setting/secondary story. The overt story is about destruction, persisting through grief, piecing life back together and making sense of the worst of human behavior- through the lens of art, memory, empathy. Quietly profound and deeply sad, I thought it masterful.
In food this week, there is a good mix of easy/basic and more in depth recipes to reflect the busyness of the week and also that some days, my 15 and 11 year olds will be cooking dinner. I think most meals are warm weather appropriate, as we begin to really warm up here in our little valley in California. There’s burgers, summer rolls, pupusas, pasta, pizza, chocolate cake and more…can’t wait to eat them all.
the meal plan
weekend prep: soak and cook black beans
Sunday: falafel burgers + sweet potato fries
Monday: gado-gado summer rolls
Tuesday: black bean pupusas with curtido
Wednesday: bean + rice bowls- black beans tossed with chimichurri, roasted sweet potato fries, mango salsa, rice, avocado
Thursday: 20 minute roasted red pepper pasta; arugula salad (arugula, olive oil, lemon juice, salt, parm)
Friday: pizza night- red sauce + mozz with green and black olives and a shower of arugula when it comes out of the oven. Dough recipe here. Green salad with pieces of dill tossed through, avocado, spring onions, vinaigrette.
Saturday: spaghetti con carciofi, side of peas sauteed with asparagus
weekend bake: 1 bowl gf chocolate cake
midweek treat: gf chocolate apricot and almond cookies
weekend breakfast: strawberry cornmeal pancakes
cocktail: chamomile strawberry gin daisy, a repeat from last week- we didn’t get around to making them
Let Rain Be Rain by Danusha Laméris Let rain be rain. Let wind be wind. Let the small stone be the small stone. May the bird rest on its branch, the beetle in its burrow. May the pine tree lay down its needles. The rockrose, its petals. It’s early. Or it’s late. The answers to our questions lie hidden in acorn, oyster, the seagull’s speckled egg. We’ve come this far, already. Why not let breath be breath. Salt be salt. How faithful the tide that has carried us— that carries us now— out to sea and back. from the anthology, The Wonder of Small Things: Poems of Peace and Renewal, 2023
ps- would love to hear how you are enjoying the newsletter thus far, and if you have any post requests or topics you’d like me to touch on in the future. Thank you for reading xx A
I love you blog posts and genuinely look forward to reading them each week. I savour and set aside time to read them. Thank you for sharing bits of your life with us. I enjoy it all!
Hi! I love the content you are sharing so far - thank you! I remember reading a blog post from you a long time ago about your more minimalist approach to birthdays and holidays and was wondering if you would be open to providing a more recent post (or posts?) about this approach. Thank you so much for your beautiful writing. 🥰