hillvalley

No delay this morning. My drive took 5 times longer than it usually does, so I stopped at Starbucks and got a tall Vanilla Creme. Thought about getting a new tumbler, not that I need one, but they all have metal on them. How are you suppose to reheat your drink if there is metal on the container? Snack today was popcorn again and goldfish. For those of you who haven't eaten goldfish in a while, they now come in colors. Everything is colored these days. Lunch was a special treat. There was a cafe at the theater so I split a cheeseburger and a tandori chicken panini with my friend. I am not a big fan of Indian, so I wasn't thrilled with the pannini but the cheeseburger was great. Melted cheddar cheese, lettuce and onions.

This is my kind of thread. An almond truffle from Godiva and some Valentine colored peanut M&M's

Here's dinner!

I work at a local organic farmer's market and they would disown me if they knew I was even thinking about buying basil this time of year, For those of you who do not know your nation's capitol that well, we are notorious for freaking out about snow. Schools have closed with just a threat of snow. It's great! No Matchbox cheeseburgers? I am dying to try them.

I'm wondering the same thing. Is there a special skimming spoon? If so, what does it look like? This

This is a little wierd. I started craving fresh basil last weekend. By Monday, the craving was strong enough to make me check out the fresh basil at Whole Foods. Normally I would never think of looking for fresh basil in the middle of winter, but I also believe in feeding your body when it craves natural foods. (Anything you can cook without chemicals is a natural food. Spaghetti with a fresh tomato basil sauce is natural. Hoho's , sweet and sour gummy worms, cool ranch Doritos are not natural.) Whole Food's basil had brown spots on it. I was going to check again on Saturday. Now I definately am. That sounds really good, even if it doesn't do my stomach any good.

Dinner tonight is one of my favorites. I stopped by a local Japanese market (Hinata) and picked up some sushi rice and ikura (salmon roe). I already had the nori (seaweed) and natto (fermented soy beans). I also am having a bowl of miso soup. Washing it all down will be a bottle of POM Wonderful, which I am trying after reading about here. (Yeah me, that was my first link on egullet!) Here are two views of dinner and Counter clockwise, starting with the sushi rice, miso, instant dashi, ikura (salmon roe), nori(seaweed), natto (fermented soybeans), POM Missing from the picture is the tube of wasabi I just realized I forgot to include, soy sauce and ponzu sauce I would have used if I wasn't out. I use the nori to eat the rice, natto and ikura. Yummmm

Thanks to "No child left behind" paperwork I missed snack this morning so lunch was my first meal of the day. I had pork tamales from Whole Foods. Considering where they came from they weren't too bad. While spending the morning at the computer I drank Swiss Miss French Vanilla hot chocolate with a little coffee in it. Yes, it was as bad as it sounds, but I haven't found a good instant hot chocolate mix that uses water. Does it even exist? We ended the day a little early and gave the kids hot chocolate and animal cookies. Fabulous combination, especially when it is this cold outside. We are getting a little snow tonight. Keep your fingers crossed for a two hour delay!

Fennel tea? How interesting. Do you make it or is it something that you can buy?

I have all the chamomile around because of my stomach troubles, so I am trying to use it up. It's one of those things I buy because I think I am out of it, but when I get home I really have two boxes already! Peppermint is one of my favorites. I drink it when I need a boost or to get myself going in the morning. My favorite tea is a rosehips blend I got at Takashamiya in NY a year ago that somehow I made last for 8 months! It was soft and delicate. Just a hint of sweet. The clincher though what the great pink color that appeared when you brewed it.

It is soooo cold out side. Unless it is snowing, and I'm talking school's closed and the world is stopping for a day or two (or nine like last year ), I hate the cold. Can't sleep so I made some chamomile tea. I am so sick of chamomile but it is all I seem to have. Must get new tea. Must get new tea. Must get new tea. Forgot to mention, thanks to the Field Trip Gods, my Japanese feast has been moved up to tomorrow. I am very excited and spent the day teasing Eric that his snack was going to be seaweed. Eric would respond by pretending to gag and throw up all over my desk with a huge grin on his face. The kids are all bragging to the rest of our hallway that they like seaweed and sushi. They feel very grown up right now. It's an absolute riot! (Did I mention that I have a classroom full of drama kings and queens!) The Japanese feast will include: Seaweed Rice Crackers with seaweed around them Three types of oshinko (Japanese Pickles) Gari (pickled ginger) Tofu Nori furikake (rice topping made of seaweed) Soy sauce Hard candy that tastes like cola and looks like a thin long cigarette (Don't think I'll mention that during my lesson) Decided not to do raw fish. Some of the kids have delicate systems and it isn't worth the risk. I wanted to do udon (noodles) so they could slurp them, but I don't have the time to cook them.

Congrats on getting the kids back in school! I don't know what public elementary schools are like, but I can't imagine that they allowed eating whenever they wanted. I went to private school too, but in high school we were allowed to eat in class. I figured the Japanese fed their children well. That's not a surprise. The teachers there must save a good amount of money if they have their lunch paid for. What about the administration and support staff? Do they get lunch too?

For the sake of Japanese teachers, I hope your schools are better than my elementary school's. How are the lunches? I (and a number of people I work with) have this fantasy of quitting our jobs and opening a catering company that specialized in bringing in lunch to teachers. Do they really use the term "uneducable retardeds"?

Kris, I forgot to ask before, how is Julia feeling? Dinner was take out. Tom Yum soup from a restaurant that specializes in Asian noodle dishes (Oodles of Noodles). I've also had a couple of Hoho's.

Keep posting. Really. Jenny's right. Keep posting. Your discriptions were wonderful.

Keep in mind a few things: a) It is a private school which means we have a larger spending budget than public schools. b) Since this is a special education school, we do things differently that most schools. We have to motivate and reward our students more than most children. c) Food is a subject that comes up with every student. It is a major part in our curriculum. Some students need help learning to eat. Some can only tolerate certain textures. Many have severe allergies. Others are on special diets. A few will only eat three or four foods. All need help holding a conversation around the dinner table. The kids do not spend their day eating. We have snack at a specific time, the same way we have lunch at a specific time. It's just part of our schedule. Some students are handed a piece of a cracker, or one skittle, or a goldfish, at regular intervals as a form of motivation. Many people work for a paycheck every few weeks. My kids just need their paycheck in smaller and more frequent intervals. Most of the kids at my school travel for at least 30 min. each way. An hour is not uncommon. That is a long day for any kid, but really long for my kids. That being said, we are also a school that loves to eat. Our job is hard, we don't make a lot of money and most people think we are a little nuts for working where we do. Candy and cookies and pizza helps. Feeding each other is one way we take care of ourselves and each other. I think it is important for me to note that I work in a very unusual school. My school is the last resort before institutionalization for many of my students. We are a specialized school, which allows us some flexibility that public schools do not have. What I experience is by no means an example for the rest of the special education system in the US.

Snack was popcorn again and animal crackers. I think I ate more popcorn than the kids did. Drank a lot of my Calm tea today. My students leave early on Wednesday so we can have meetings. Since I am doing this blog I was planning on going out to eat, to spice up my lunch a bit. I thought I didn't have to go to any meetings, but I was wrong. They moved our annual IEP* Season Kickoff up by a few weeks so there went lunch. I only end up going out about once a month, and really look forward to it. It is a real treat to eat a civilized lunch, where I don't have to microwave anything or remind 10 year old boys to eat their prepackaged, proccessed, flourecent, so called food. Remember what you were like at lunch when you were 10? I ended up with a steak burritto without beans but with guacomole. There is a local chain, California Tortilla, that makes decent burrittos (for DC standards which I am told are quite low). The meat isn't great and the rice is always just a little too crunchy for my taste. Since I had a meeting today I will take a moment to mention food and my school. Today was the first meeting of this size (most of the school) that did not have food. (The administrator who was in charge of the meeting was booed when she tried to apologize and I got dirty looks from some people as I ate my burrito. Less than normal though, because all the jewish mothers were relieved to see me eating again.) We are a very food oriented school. There is a lot more eating going on than you would think.... We have a great PTA who puts out food at any school wide meeting. Granted, they always put out the same food, but at least they feed us. Besides, most of their children take comfort in things that do not change, so in our world it makes sense. There are always: green olives, cheese cut up into squares, carrotts and brocolli with the same nondescript dressing/dip, almonds, triangle chuncks of some kind of salami fancy sugar wafers with chocolate in them and cookies that are long tubes filled with chocolate inside. The cookie is flaky and very thin. Drinks change each week, but there is always sparkling water. Now that it is officially IEP season.... Monday morning, in the office kitchen where students rarely go, some kind of candy will appear. Maybe a bowl of the mini Hershey bars sampler. Or perhaps a Costco sized container of individually wrapped twizzlers. Or a bag of Valentine M&M's (my favorite, of course). This candy will magically reappear regularly for the next 4-5 months. Over the next few months, that candy is what gets me through some days. *An IEP is an Individualized Education Plan. Every child who is ellegible for special education services has one. It dictates what the child is going to study next year. They are a necessary evil that used to just be a pain. For the last two years, of course, they have become even worse.

interesting you said this. my mom taught regular classroom(how would YOU like to have your mom for your second grade teacher?!!) for 30 + years and she always had cheese, crackers, peanut butter and apples for a snack for the students since she saw a drop in teaching ability about 10 am - day started at 8:15. now of course the peanut butter would not be allowed. We are still allowed to use peanut butter. There is one classroom that can't, but the rest of us are fine.

Thank you. We use food a number of different ways, but snack is snack. The kids have very long days and get hungry (so do the teachers!). Everyone in the lower school has snack in the morning. Many of my kids have fast matabolisms because of their disability so they have to eat more often. Others don't get enough to eat at home (if they get breakfast) and this is our tiny way of helping. Some students have food as reinforcers (rewards). Saying good job or giving a sticker doesn't always mean anything to some kids, but food does. If they complete a task they are given an M&M, or a little cookie, as a reward. It can backfire on you though. I have seen students who started the year as angels turn into monsters when they realized they can get candy for acting up. This is a simplified explination of a topic that special ed. teachers could go on about forever. With our higher functioning kids we use food as a reward too, but in different ways. Many of the kids yesterday ate the sushi because they kenw they would get to try Japanese candy afterward. If the whole class has a good day (known as an all star day) then once in a while they will get a surprise. When we were studying Europe it was Nutella on toast.

I decided to treat the nausea with a nice Burgandy 1/2 bottle I had. I am a serious light weight. Two glasses at the most. And that is a lot. Unless I am cooking with it, or have someone to drink it with, buying more than 1/2 bottles is a waste of good money and wine. I don't know as much about wine as I would like to, other than I like burgandy and chianti and crisp white wine. Didn't help my stomach, but I didn't think it would and now I have a nice buzz. Tomorrow morning however, could be rough, if my students have changed their minds about the seaweed BTW, does anybody listen to Beth Orton?

You're positive he wasn't supposed to eat those things? There is still a ton of chocolate around the school and so today at lunch I tried to give him a truffle. He pointed his finger at me and said "Go away Ms. Hillvalley, you go away!" and then he ran away. One can only work so many miracles in a day.

This is our snack selection in the classroom. For those of you not familiar with kid food, starting on the left: Cheese curls, goldfish, hard pretzels on top of the goldfish, cheeze its and last but not least animal crackers. mise-en-place for last night's meal Scallops with shallots and ginger and spinach. Tasted much better than it looked! Now I just have to figure out how to make the pictures clear. Thank you Jenny!!!!!!!

Forgot about dinner, but that's because it hasn't happened yet. I take medication that causes some pretty bad nausea and it is acting up tonight. Had a couple of the wings I picked up at Fresh Fields today, but couldn't eat finish them. Sometimes if I eat through the nausea it helps, but not tonight.

It's more eating for one than cooking for one that is hard for me. If I actually cook something, I try to make enough for lunch tomorrow. Fish/seafood is the only thing I really one cook without making more for another meal. Eating for one sucks. Take a pack of Oreos, or a box of the cereal I have been craving. When I buy it I either a)eat all of the package/box, etc. or b) end up throwing it away because I got sick of it or it went stale. I end up wasting more food than I would like, especially when tuition is due. I also buy most of my meat/poultry from either Whole Foods or Eastern Market. One of the Whole Foods near my house has a great meat counter and I can buy as much as I need. Eastern Market is a smaller version of Redding Terminal (I think) on Capitol Hill that I hit a few times a month. They have a great poultry stand, the steaks are not to be believed and there is a cheese stand. Again, I can buy as much as I need. During most of the year I get vegetables from an organic farmer's market right near my house. I worked there this year, which was a great experience, and helped out with their price. There are common food things that I don't have. I rarely have milk, eggs and more than one loaf of bread in the house at the same time. They spoil too quickly, and I hate bread from the freezer.

I am so jealous. 42 whole minutes to yourself? We don't have a lunch room for the lower school so everyone eats in their classroom. It is by far one of my least favorite parts of the day. Wednesdays we can go out, if we don't have a meeting. I am planning on it tomorrow.