Fran's Table Episode 2 - What Do I Want for Dinner?

Sometimes my table is a mess and I entirely lack inspiration to cook or eat. But that's OK. Maybe the solution to my lack of inspiration is to reach out to someone. Maybe call or text or plop down next to someone I love and ask them "what do I want for dinner?" Because even if I don't get inspired to cook a fabulous, seasonal, homemade meal, I'll have connected with whomever I've asked that magical question. And that's the deal, right -- to connect. AND to figure out what the hell I want for dinner. On this episode, I have an expert to help me out -- my son, Charlie. Have a seat, join us at Fran's Table.

Transcript

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You know, there is not a thing wrong with eating your dinner over the sink or in front of the television, and I'm a big believer in grabbing comfort wherever you can find it. But in my experience of the world, it seems to me that the very best moments around food, around companionship occur at the table. So this is Fran's table, and I want you to come find a seat. There's plenty of room. Sit down next to me. And the thing about it is we may talk about food on account. It's one of my favorite subjects, but we may talk about other things as well, just like around a regular, you know, table where we have conversations and we connect and we learn about one another. So this is Fran's table. Grab a chair, let's go. I am sitting here and looking at my table and it's a mess. I mean, it's got stuff that needs to be tucked into one of three storage spaces. It's got a Windex refill and got some kind of bleachy bathroom cleaner. And then over there's the orphaned hotdog and hamburger buns, which I can't find storage space in my kitchen. Lemme see what else. It's got discarded bits and bobs of camera equipment. I have no idea why my nearly empty water trough, because my water bottle is really just that big, and at the center looking really awkward and alone is a tray upon which I usually place the salt cellar, the pepper grinder, and a little tiny bottle of hot sauce. But I have no idea where the salt and pepper escape to. And now that hot sauce is looking all dejected and alone. So, I mean, that's not much of a space for eating, right? Well, I share this because it's clear from the disarray on my table that I've lost my inspiration for cooking and consuming food. I mean, now I know it's only temporary, but it still feels like asked to face at least two meals a day and not know what I have, what I want to eat, and at what point I will finally eat it. I know in the morning I'll get my hit of protein. Now, specifically, that means two lightly scrambled eggs and a giant mug of tea out of my favorite Go cup. Lemme take a moment tell you about the Go Cup that my son found for me around Mother's Day a few years ago. This is a go cup that reads in delicate, Lacy script. Fuck itty, fuck, fuck, fuck. And you know, when he presented it to me with such genuine excitement, I really felt both seen and loved. So that go mug is gonna be filled with about 40 ounces of super strong half calf tea with two teaspoons of sugar. That's right. I said it too. And P. And while we're here, they're probably closer to a tablespoons, but at any rate, on top of that, a sploosh of half and half. So breakfast is done. Boom. Then what? I mean, I'm a big fan of eating seasonally, so I'm generally pleased to be guided by what I get at the farmer's market. Now, at this time of year, we're talking about, lemme see zucchini, a ton of tomatoes of all different stripes, a little bit of corn left just a tiny bit, but still there. Okra still, and a little bit of lingering basil. Still harder to find. But you know how the summer harvest often comes in these ungainly waves, avalanches really of bounty. Like one minute you're saying a prayer over the zucchini and finally hoping that it'll move from bloom to fruit. And then the next minute you're overwhelmed with an embarrassment of zucchini riches. Well, that's kind of how my cooking inspiration comes Poor in the case as it is now, not. So one minute I'm making you know, homemade pasta with a sauce of sied local tomatoes that are studded with a fist full of chopped fresh basil. And then the next minute I'm staring at a perfectly good pantry full of options and fantasizing about a shitty grocery store sandwich that will relieve my plummeted blood sugar, but do nothing for my overall wellbeing. So I go from one extreme to the other. So you'd think that since I've gone to great lengths to describe the dilemma of my waxing and waning inspiration in the kitchen, that I'd have some sort of solution in hand. I mean, I'm better than 60 years old, so I certainly have lived experience of this back and forth relationship with cooking and meals and eating, but of course I don't because this back and forth relationship with cooking and meals and eating will continue to be as constant and consistent as the phases of the moon. So, I mean, why do we care? Why am I even talking about this? Because I hear lots of people say that they just don't like food, that they won't cook for themselves'cause they just fell outta love with food. Now by the way, I'm married to a person who does not like food. I mean, he would be so grateful if someone would already go ahead and invent a food pill. So, you know, I understand that indifference to food and meals and the preparation of meals, and as much as I'd like to preach, the joy of cooking and all the benefits thereof, some days it just doesn't work that way. But what's my saving grace? You know, I get outside myself, I ask someone else what I want for dinner. Okay. During much of his college experience, our son lived by himself in apartments that had pretty decent kitchens, and roughly this was great, three or four times at least a week, he'd call me and start the conversation, not with hello or, Hey, mom, what's new with you guys? Instead, I'd hear this familiar voice ring out with a, what do I want for dinner? I loved those conversations. Now, not only because I got. To get glimpses into what he likes to eat or how he likes to eat, or what he can cook these days. But those exchanges also inspired me. They got me out of whatever rut, a routine might have been settling into my kitchen. I mean, Charlie's a big fan of rice, and so I'm increasingly curious about rice dishes because of him. I mean, he loves a legume, so I'm reacquainted with my fondness for a pot of beans. And Charlie is by far the biggest spend thrift in the family. So he's pretty disciplined about using what he already has in hand. I mean, he's pretty disciplined about the use of his personal energy too. So if he can save himself a trip to the grocery store, he will now, that's not to say that my suggestions for his dinner menu were ever, were often heated. I mean, sometimes it just came down to a flip of a coin between chicken and rice or pot stickers or whatever else was on this slab. But here's the thing. Even just a call about what one of us wanted for dinner was an opportunity to connect. You know that I'm all about connecting around food. So that's really the whole point of this rumination about what to do when we're uninspired about food, and it happens and it will happen again. But just because I don't feel like cooking or have no idea what I want to cook, doesn't mean that I'm now officially one who does not cook, or I'm now officially one who relies just on convenience food because that's what I've been doing for the last however many days. Or weeks or even longer, I've discovered that I can connect with food with the magic of providing food that's satisfying or soothing for myself or for others, just by asking the question, what do I want for dinner? Now, the solution is not a magical mantra. I think it's instead just that magical question. I mean, when was the last time that you texted your best friend from college? I mean, check in. Ask them what you want for dinner. You'll find out what they're eating, whether they're cooking and eating in, or maybe they found the ultimate convenience food that might even be healthy. I mean, you might hear about their own travails with food and inspiration and cooking. And in my world, when I ask Dusty, the one who wants the food, pill, that question, what I I want for dinner. He is very kind and he humors me pretty consistently. And you know what? It's still a way to touch base at the end of the day, so I ask again, what do I want for dinner here to discuss? This is an expert, my son, Charlie. Okay, Charlie. So our primary point of connection, it seemed during at least the last couple years of your college experience, was over the question, what do I want for dinner? Now, I'm not saying that was meaningful to you, but I'm saying it was meaningful to me. And I'll tell you one of the reasons why I'm even talking about it on this little podcast, and that is because it actually inspired me because. Like nine times outta 10. I'm thinking to myself at the end of the day, what the hell do I want for dinner? So this is a dangerous question'cause they say don't ever ask a question to which you don't want the answer. But, um, was that ever useful to you? Was it just the asking of the question that prompted you to think of it to, I mean, I've already, I think I've already decided that very few of my suggestions were helpful. Well, what did that question mean to you? I mean, it was originally birthed from absolute choice paralysis. I, yeah, I'd simply, I was like, I got, my two options are dinner or death and I, I made a decision you wanted to live. So I mean, it did become a habitual enough that I was like, okay, I'll probably call mother tonight, figure out what I want for dinner, and then if there's any daily updates, we can just chat. But there wasn't like some deep seated meaning by the initial call. The initial call was simply, oh, dear God, it's already 7:00 PM and I have to eat. I'm ravenously hungry. So now do, do a lot of your friends, you know, you know, I'm, I'm not saying that this would be true for all of them, but do some of your friends actually cook like regular meals or did people just sort of like. Do the snack thing throughout the day. What percentage of your friends when you were in college, like actually cooked a meal for themselves? Like you did chicken and rice a bunch that qualifies as a meal? I don't know. I'd say they all would, but it's is, I don't know the consistency. Okay. But I'm confident that all of my friends could cook food for themselves. Some of them might have liked to more than others. Yeah. And there was a lot of snacking, but all of them were, were able to, should the, should the desire strike or the need not to perish, sometimes that's not enough. Yeah, yeah. That's true too. Yeah. I was saying too earlier that, you know, I, I, it doesn't matter that I like to cook, I'm still gonna rely on, you know, the grocery store sandwich from time to time just because, you know, it does what it needs to. That's it, it does what it needs to. It's oftentimes not that expensive and it, it's just like, it's pretty good. Yeah, it is. It, it hits the spot sometimes. Did. Are you at all curious, moving forward and not having anything to do with, you know, our connection over that, you know, age old question. Are you at all curious about cooking as you, as you grow older and sort of move into your own life? Or is it still, is it just always gonna be one of those things where I need not to perish today, so I guess I will eat food. Yeah. There's never gonna be as much of like a artful passion around cooking. It's more, I mean, there are things that I like, so I'm like, I should figure out how to cook that because I like it, but it's not as much. Oh, I just, I want to cook. I need to express myself via food. Okay. That's fair enough. Okay. Now I have another question though that's kind of related to that, but, but tangentially, you know, one of the things you know, I'm really passionate about is life around the table, which I understand is ironic because I spent the first part of this little episode talking about all the crap that sits on the table often. Um, but I do think that. Even like a humble meal or even an uninspired meal is improved when I actually sit down and eat it at a table, whether I'm reading, which I often do, like for breakfast in the morning if I'm doing something more than scrambled eggs or like, you know, around the table with even you or your dad or someone, Margie, when she's here, but. But maybe that's just me. Do, do you, what do you think happens when people sit down to a table, even for an uninspired meal? I mean, yeah. It, it, I don't know. It, I, I get the allure of sitting around a table because it is like a communal gathering, and if it's with, with your family or, or a close group of friends, like, I like it. I just haven't thought much on the deeper meaning of it. Yeah. But I gather that it's, you know, it's, it's. It, it, it just acts as like a gathering hub, you know? Mm-hmm. We all need to eat, so we'll sit down, we'll have a meal, we'll chat, and then, and it's only heightened if it's a good meal, you know, have a nice, hearty meal. Well, and it's funny because when I was, uh, you know, single girl and living on my own, I, you know, I ate at the table more out of convenience. I mean, I feel like I, I feel like I'm kind of with you. When I was a wheel la I, I didn't think much about eating at the table. You and father simply said, dinner time, come to the table. And I was like, okay. And then it was like, oh, we're gonna do TV trays instead. And I was like, now this, this is the high life. So I'm kind of with you that it, it before. I was like cognizant of my existence. The table was just kind of like, oh, you eat there. It is what it is. There's nothing deeper. But then like once you grow out of like, oh, mom and dad are these dictators, and you're like, you know what? I kind of like my family. Once you reach that point where you're like, you know what? Those guys are pretty cool. Then the family, then the dinner table's like, okay, no, we're just hanging out. But I feel like before when I'm like five and under and I'm like, can I like. I dunno. You just tell me No. And I'm immediately like, okay, so we're not friends. Cool. I assumed you guys liked me. I guess I was wrong. I was wrong. So at that point the table was a prison. Yeah, I totally get that. Well, and for a lot of people, you know, eating alone at a table is also deeply uncomfortable. Oh, not me. So, no, really? You don't mind sitting at a table when you eat alone? No, when I troll out of my room at 2:00 AM. Sometimes I'll just sit at this table and eat whatever's in the fridge, in the dark while playing on my phone. Oh, dude, I love this. I love this. And I'll like consume, like if I have a sandwich in the fridge, I, it's a little bit unsettling. I just sit there and I'm just, and I consume the thing at record pace. Oh, I'm thinking that while watching. Just something on my phone and absolutely downing. Sometimes it's a water, sometimes it's a soda pop. It really depends how wild and wooly you're feeling. Exactly. You know, if I need to go to bed after said 2:00 AM meal, it'll be water. If I'm in it for the long haul, I'll live a little, I'll have a sugary drink. Oh my God, I love this image. I've, that sort of makes me feel good knowing that I'm upstairs, you know, slumbering peacefully and absolutely cocked, and I am down here just. Absolutely feasting, living that high life again. Hell yeah. Well, it's funny because, um, the other thing that I really want to, like talk about later on with, with other folks too, is what you do when you don't like to eat alone. Now, I'm glad to know that you, because I've always loved eating alone, even at restaurants, and, you know, I've, I've only traveled alone a couple, three or four times. But, oh my God. That's like the best thing is when I get to go to a restaurant and I usually have a book with Marie, but these days you can have like a phone, but that feels rude to me still. But that's'cause I'm of an age and you just, you get to eat at your pace and you don't have to think of anything to say and you just read. Now, of course when I'm with your dad, sometimes it's the same luxury. I mean, we don't necessarily have, you know, scintillating conversation. Oh. When you get to people watch too. You know, oh, see, I'm not people watching. I'm fine eating alone. I've never, I, I've never really been like, oh, I need company while I eat. But I am the opposite where I'm exclusively playing on my phone. If I'm eating alone at a restaurant, I mean, I'll take headphones and I will just play on my phone and it's beautiful. And now sometimes I don't, people watch, I do eavesdrop. There are some wild conversations. There are sometimes it's my favorite when I get sat behind a business lunch, Uhhuh. Ooh. See, either I just hear fun things about their project or at the business lunch someone gets scolded. No. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. People get in trouble at business lunches and I'm like, Hey, you tell'em I'm not. I'm not delighting in someone else's suffering. Oh, I am. No, I, because, but I'm still saying that these conversations and I'm like used to whip Jonathan into shape because he's, from what I've heard of this conversation, God, Jonathan is clearly not pulling his weight. And Allison and HR are sick of it and I think Allison and HR needs to take charge and offboard Jonathan right now.'cause he's clearly not shaping up. Is that for real? I don't remember the names, but like I remember I listened to a whole business lunch where like this dude was getting absolutely scolded because he was not carrying his weight and this was very clearly an important project. And they were like, I need you to step up. You need to do your job, God. And he was, and then he was also trying like. Little trickery. They were like, I, I, they saw through his tricks. I don't remember exactly what was happening, but they were like, Hey, this is you. This is not good. And I was like, this is, wow. I'm so glad that I went to lunch by myself at like noon 30 on some random Thursday. Oh my God. And it was great. I wish I'd been there. I'd have been like shushing the rest of the table so I could listen in. But that's terrible. But you know, actually that, that also sort of speaks to the point though, is that I think. Sometimes and perhaps mistakenly so, um, people in a work environment are, uh, sure that having those kinds of conversations around a table will somehow ease. That, that message I, I'm not sure that's true, but I think it speaks, speaks to the power of food. I also feel like it mitigates reaction.'cause I'm less likely to freak out if I'm in a full restaurant. Oh, true. I feel it's kind of like the breaking up with someone in a quiet restaurant. Oh my god. I don't know how morally corrected it. That's dastardly. That's awful. No, but that. So we're not about the morality here, we're just trying to make sure the dark side of life around the table. We're just trying to make sure that Jonathan doesn't flip out. And if we're, if we're in Taqueria El Paso, then Jonathan's a lot less likely to freak out. Oh my God. Yeah, that's true. Well, I'm, I am Mary freaking sunshine. So I'm gonna look at the, the lighter aspects of this, and I think food softens the blow maybe a little bit and it mitigates the response. But if I'm given something. Drowned in queso and then told, you're dragging your feet, you're fired. I'm be like, can I finish this meal? And is said Meal still on the company card, right? Because in which case, I would like some more guacamole, please. In which case I accept this firing. I will be taking dessert. You owe me at least this much. Oh my goodness. Yeah. Think about it as early severance. Oh my God, I really did take a dark turn. But that's our life around the table. I mean, I will say too, um, you know that I sort of like the whole question of. You know, bringing the sort of realities of life to the table if for no other reason, because then you do get to kind of laugh about some of that stuff and it mitigates it because you're eating queso, which helps. But I also feel like that's, that's such a one-off that, that's not a normal occurrence. I, I, yeah. Not only am I, I'm not always going out to restaurants by. And when I am, I'm not always hearing business lunches that end poorly for poor old Jonathan and, and become Allison's problem in hr. I mean, Jonathan wasn't doing his job. Not my fault. Yeah. Uh, yeah, you're right. Well see. I kind of digressed from the original question though, which was, what do I want for dinner and now. Charlie, what do we want for dinner? Brace yourself. What do, what do I want for dinner? Because you had one of those famous sandwiches. For lunch just now. Didn't you just have a sandwich? A sub? Yeah, but I don't think I'd call Subway famous. You can't use that. Well, okay, so the subway, okay. It's not like, you know, we're trying to, do we have a Jimmy John's brand deal? No. Are we gonna get in trouble for saying Subway? No, we aren't. We can. No, you're right. We can adlib it in. That's true. That's true. No, we'll stick with that. Name a sandwich and I'll endorse it right now. Let's pick your favorite. Okay, so you've, you're full of, uh, you're full of subway and, um, I ate leftovers'cause I'm the good girl. It's not my phone or leftovers were bad. They were not bad. And by the way, I had some leftover jambalaya and I got kind of the recipe for that from Kobe Captain Kobe's Cajun cooking. Are you trying to get me in trouble with Captain Kobe? Maybe a little. Maybe a little. So anyway, so we've got, we can't do that and I've just discovered that jambalaya is a really, really, really good thing to do. Like when you have some really good like meats leftover, like we had grilled chicken, that's better when you like start from scratch and you have Boston butt the way he does it. Oh my god, Kobe, his jambalaya is so good. But anyway, so we can't do that. So. Uh, let me see, what else did we do earlier this week? We had fried chicken yesterday. We had, what the hell else have we had this week? I, I damnit we, oh, I made, um, uh, the, um, what are they called? Denver Cut. Um, their chuck, boneless Chuck rib. I, I know chuck. Um, steak. That was pretty good. So we've had red meat. Um, and we've had a lot of chicken recently. Can red meat? We've had chicken, we had pork. Oh, I had the Boston butt. Yeah, we had pork. We've had all, all the proteins. We had all manner of meats. So either we just, and I had lackluster chili last week. That was my bad. So either do we repeat a meat or We give vegetarian tonight. Okay. Vegetarian. What do we, what? What kind of vegetarian you want to do so we're not repeating a meat. Well, I mean, we can, but I'd have to go out and get something. Oh, that makes things more difficult. Yeah, I don't like that. Yeah. What about if we do like some sort of like a bean thing, like a, some sort of a either chili thing? Well, chili, I'm, I'm, I'm not gonna want vegetarian chili, if I'm being honest with you. Yeah. What would be good? Vegetarian? I don't know, like breakfast for dinner. Okay. Now granted. I'm full of a nameless sandwich right now, so I don't know, but like the idea of breakfast does sound really good. Okay. That being said, if I have it within the next like three hours, I'm liable to perish. Yeah, no, for ob for opposite reasons. Um, would it be savory breakfast or sweet breakfast? Prob, I don't know. I could do either really? Like, I could do a pancake. Pancake. What about french toast? I, uh, yeah. Or, uh, we also have that waffle maker. Yeah. But a pancake and waffle are the same thing. Okay. If you put pancake bat in a waffle maker, you, you get a waffle pretty much. No. The same. It's not actually the same. What's the difference? Vanilla? No. Um, there's a little more fat in the waffle maker, and it's a little egger. Okay. If I put waffle mix on a griddle, I'd get a pancake like it's, it is the same. Okay. It's the shape. Because if you put pancake mix in a waffle iron and gave it to some rando, they're gonna be like, that's a waffle. I think the amount of people that'd be like, well, this has more egg. So I think you've actually lied to me. You're, you're adequately and appropriately mocking me. Okay. So it would, it could be either savory or sweet. Okay. Well, I appreciate once again the deliberation over. What do I want for dinner? Always. Thank you, Charlie. Well, there you have it. That's a fairly typical Charlie conversation with me. Wheezing in the background, getting tickled about whatever it is he's roofing on. But where we started in that conversation, although I am primarily responsible for digressing, was the whole concept of. Keeping at it with food, even when you're uninspired, it's just an inspiration for the day and, or maybe the week or maybe the month, maybe it's been a bad month. So just stay with it. And maybe one way for me to get out of my food funk is to connect, talk to someone outside of like my own head, you know?'cause I talk to myself a fair amount as I am right now, as a matter of fact. Um, and ask someone else. What do I want for dinner? And uh, maybe you'll be the lucky one that I call or text and ask what do I want for dinner? But you know what I'm really asking. How are you doing? Well, I'm asking what do I want for dinner too? But I also want to know how you're doing. So let's connect and let's land at a table sometime soon. Thanks for listening. I will try to do another podcast, another episode, um, sometime soon. But in the meantime, I'm glad you had a seat at the table. It was fun having you here. Have a good night and good luck with that dinner choice.