Four Fun Things
Will you be watching Sense and Sensibility, which comes out tomorrow in theaters? The NYTimes review calls it “visually lovely, emphasizing the wide gulf between the stuffy world of manners and pecking orders and the wild freedom of forests and moors” with a “looser and more realist feel than many other Austen adaptations, which run toward the corseted side of things.” Sign me up.
We host a lot of overnight guests, especially teenagers, and my friend Mo (of four kids fame) suggested we get an extra twin mattress. How smart is that? Since it’s a real mattress, it’s WAY comfier than an air mattress (never again); it’s light enough to easily carry up and down stairs; and we just slide it under one of our double beds for storage.
What delicious dinners have you made recently? We made white chicken chili (gift link) the other night, and the boys devoured it. Plus, it was even better the following day for a work-from-home lunch.
Good news: Rothy’s clogs and mules are currently up to 25% off. I keep my cozy slip-ons by the door to throw on for neighborhood hijinks, like running to the grocery store, walking around the block with a friend, or watching my kids do wheelies down the street (“Look, Mom!!!”).
P.S. More fun things, and an anxiety trick.
(Chili photo by Christopher Testani for The New York Times; food styling by Simon Andrews.)
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Tags: fun things
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98 commentsYes! We have a twin mattress for guests and it’s perfect. We keep it behind an L-shaped couch so it’s not completely out of view… but it’s easy to move around and way better than air mattress.
Was craving baozi for no reason. I never eat them because I am GF and also am of German/Polish ancestry so no idea where that craving came from. But am GF so I made a GF bao filled with chinese chives and seared, chopped maitake mushroom (my favorite but oyster mushrooms work too). Turns out I made way more filling than dough so just now had an amazing GF toast topped with that bao filling and and fresh microplaned parm. Wow it was tasty. I had two large slices, lol.
I love it. I am Chinese and recently went insane over potato dumplings and kielbasa so our ancestors are both pleased.
That NYT white chicken chili is one of my favorite recipes! Their newsletter suggested serving it with rice and that makes it even better. Seriously one of those recipes that is greater than the sum of its parts! We are in a heatwave here in SoCal but it is on my list for when it cools off!
I don’t have a rice cooker because of space. And I get the issues people have with making rice on the stovetop and the hassle with measuring the water to rice ratios and the possibility of mushy rice or rice burnt to the sides of the pot. As a person of Indian decent I’m embarrassed to say that I cook rice like pasta and it never fails: fill up a pot of water no measuring and bring it to a boil and then just throw how much rice you want to make and boil for 12 minutes for basmati or jasmine and 35 minutes for brown rice, drain in a colander (like pasta!) and then dump it back in the pot, throw in a the salt and a little butter or coconut oil or whatever, pop a lid on it and let it steam in its heat until your ready for dinner. Fluff with a fork and Bob’s your uncle.
I use my rice cooker all the time but what a cool idea! I’m going to try it out with the basmati rice that we have. Thank you for sharing! :-D
This is genius!!!!! I’m going to try that this weekend!
I have a rice cooker but I’m not intrigued to try this tip because I am hopeless at making rice!
I meant to say I AM intrigued to try this!
I think you just changed my life.
Why would you be embarassed about boiling and draining rice? That’s the way it is cooked in households all over South Asia and this method is not exclusive to pasta. I have cooked rice this way for over 2 decades and don’t even put it back in the pot, as it doesn’t really need that. I drain in a colander and then place a clean tea towel over the drained rice. That soaks up excess steam and a few minutes later I have beautifully fluffed rice with every grain separate.
My Welsh friend cooks rice like this, then she lets it sit under a lid to “finish” cooking after it’s drained but still piping hot. As a Chinese American, it’s an unusual approach to cooking rice, I only know how to do it with a rice cooker, measuring water using my hand/finger. I get the notion that a rice cooker is one more thing on the counter or in the cabinet, but it is not a single use item. Rather, it can be a one pot meal cooker- you can set all sorts of uncooked meat and veg into the rice, flavor it, and set it to cook like a crock pot or pressure cooker. It’s great for small spaces, like dorm rooms and such!
According to the latest issue of consumer reports (is my nerd showing?), this method is also effective at lowering the level of inorganic arsenic in rice! So go forth and pasta boil your rice!!!
Pro tip on the mattress: put a fitted sheet on it while you have it in storage under another bed. this keeps dust / dander off of it and is super easy to change for a fresh one when you pull it out! That way you don’t have to vacuum it!
Yes, ma’am we certainly will be watching it in the movie theatre! It will be our Thursday morning mom group & also in honor of my upcoming bday. Many of these moms have littles so this is big deal to head out for evening. In preparation a dear friend is even reading S&S now. Female friendships are the best!!
I saw it with women from my book group as it’s been out for a while here in England. We all loved it but most importantly we all agreed that we should go out together as a group of moms more often!
I bought a cheap 8 cup Hitachi Chime-O-Matic 30 years ago and STILL use it! I grew up with mushy rice cooked stove top and it made me hate rice. When a Cuban friend showed me how to use a rice cooker, I was in love! 2 cups rice, 2 1/2 cups water or broth, a bag of frozen mixed veggies, a can of drained black beans and a spoonful of taco seasoning makes a meal. Zatarain Dirty Rice or Jambalaya rice mixes come out great too. I add the package recommended amount of water and throw in a can of drained pink or black beans and a cup of frozen corn. My kids can make dinner like this too. I’ve also done quinoa and millet in the rice cooker and they come out great. I use a ratio of 1 c. rice to 1 1/4 c. liquid to avoid the hard center in the rice grain but I know a 1-1 ratio is normally recommended. Do what works for you. Also the trick to buttery looking rice is a dash of turmeric. You won’t taste it but it gives a gorgeous yellow color. I add it to everything.
We have the same rice cooker, perfectly chiming a real bell 30 years on!
Ya’ll lost me at the rice cooker talk. After mine broke I just started cooking it on the stove again. My fun things: Brewers going to the World Series! Daughter home for college break and requested meal was Olive Garden (lol)! Darker lip stain from Rare Beauty. Flannel shirts.
GO BREWERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Brewers sweep to the series is healing the nation in ways we do not even yet understand. I’m not even a baseball fan, just a Wisco native but I’ve listened to announcer on the final catch at least 5x today.
I’m hoping for a Midwest series!! Brewers all the way! A Dodgers sweep was so satisfying lol
What’s the difference between a pressure cooker and a rice cooker? They both make rice so I’m curious to know why people would want both.
A rice cooker only cooks rice. A pressure cooker is meant for tenderizing meat AND other items.
@Sarah Levy, but a rice cooker doesn’t only cook rice. You can make a whole meal in a rice cooker! Just add meat and veggies into it and it’ll cook it all up, tastily.
I am a devoted Instant Pot user AND a devoted rice cooker user. I think the rice cooker makes better rice. (I also partly grew up in Japan, so I care about my rice texture. I do usually cook short-grained rice…) ALSO it’s a pain to clean the instant pot after cooking rice in it. (Not so much after cooking other things in it.) I used to have a Zojurushi rice cooker but recently switched to a Green Pan, which has a non-toxic nonstick lining. The Green Pan isn’t super-big (doesn’t work for making sushi for a crowd), but I’ve been happy with the rice I cook in it.
Vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie from NY Times – yum! We had spare potatoes and the last thing I wanted was another dish with roasted potatoes, so I did it up. Find the proper green lentils – you really want that texture. Recipe calls for 8 oz mixed sliced mushrooms; my grocery only had 6oz packs so I used one each of shitake, button, and mini portobello, and it was glorious. No issue with using more, just great mushroominess. Perfect for the stretch of colder days we had until it got hot again.
We have stored twin mattresses under our bed for fifteen years. They are zipped up into bedbug & dust proof mattress protectors. It keeps us always ready for overnight guests.
according to feng shui we shouldn’t store things under the bed – it blocks the flow of chi. what are your thoughts on this? For years I have stored NOTHING under my bed and now the robot vacuum vaccuums it daily. I know its a huge compromise in city apartments.
I once heard someone say (tongue in cheek): “You know you’ve made it in New York when you don’t have to store anything under your bed.” I don’t believe in feng shui, which works out for me because there’s 1 possible place to put my bed, and 1 possible place to put the kid bed (unless we want a bed in the corner that vibrates when the radiator kicks on or off). If I had to take feng shui into account I might have to get bunk beds with my husband :P
Hi, Malena – Came here to say this, too. Don’t store anything under your bed! But then, I live in a large house, and the only overnight guest I have is my 38 year old daughter, who has a dedicated bed and bath here.
We have two large crib mattresses left from baby days and they work well for our kids! There was a leak in their room last year and I had room to fit one crib mattresses left on either side of my bed for them. But mostly we use them to jump on or build forts. Move over, Nugget play couch.
Yes! We used our crib mattress for sleepovers well into elementary school. We called it the buddy bed.
To answer Joanna’s question in the comments: a rice cooker is my vary favorite appliance! I have a Zojirushi fuzzy logic one that is as good as the day I bought it 16 years ago, and has gotten near daily use so it’s worth every penny. It makes perfect rice, but is also great for oatmeal, congee, mixed grains. A great book to get excited about rice cookers is Beth Hnesperger’s The Ultimate Rice Cooker. yours, A rice cooker evangelist
The Neuro Fuzzy is the best. My favorite trick is to reheat the rice from the fridge in it on quick cook and it’s like it never sat a minute too long.
Just requested The Ultimate Rice Cooker book from the library. I am now ready for rice cooker adventures! Thank you, Sarah.
My sister and I each had trundle beds growing up, a drawer under our beds would pull out with a mattress ready to roll for sleepovers. It was the best!
same. my mom built in beds that fit under our single beds, plus a roll-up mattress for the floor so when overnight adult guests came, they slept in the bed and my sister and I slept in the trundle beds. my sister slept in the gap between the wall and the bed – it was 2 feet wide. insane. but actually so much less work and so much more fun than having an actual guest room.
I had one of these too! So great for sleepovers! But a tad embarrassing when it also hosted me and my husband on visits home. But better than an air mattress, I suppose!
The extra mattress is such a brilliant hack! We do the same thing for my boys’ room – they have a bunk bed and we tuck the extra mattress right under it. Also! My teenage daughter has an ikea trundle that can also become a queen bed which is a double bonus!!
Rice cooker was given to me as a gift 16 years ago. I love it. I make rice sometimes 1 every 3 months and sometimes 3 times in a month, but it’s easy and makes perfect rice every time. Also, if people eat dinner at different times, keeps the rice warm.
Re rice cooker – we used one for years then switched to making rice in a pressure cooker. The rice was just as good and it’s one fewer appliance on the counter.
We also switched to a pressure cooker (instant pot brand) for rice when I couldn’t get a replacement pot for my zorujirushi rice cooker. The rice is almost as good and for us it’s good enough.
We have an old ikea toddler bed mattress that has come in SO handy over the years! We adults even sleep on it camping!
Air mattresses can be great, but you have to splash out for a nice one with a built in pump.
We had an extra mattress at some point and ended up putting it on the floor of my daughter’s room. She’s spent so many hours over the years doing gymnastics routines on it, in addition to kids sleeping on it during sleepovers. Would recommend if you have the space and a kid who is excited about it!
Awww I love that!
I use a plain old pot with a lid on the stove when I cook rice, it works fine. I often pay a bit more to buy fancy organic varieties of rice. I was never much of a rice person before I started doing that, now I really love it. Other fun things have been lighting my little ghost lamps for Halloween, the tv show Small Prophecies, and baking peasant bread.
https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1021943-lemony-chicken-feta-meatball-soup-with-spinach?unlocked_article_code=1.E1E.jKop.GAtt1lAOmeEP My family ate this all up and declared it a new favorite. It is fast and healthy. We highly recommend!
thank you, Michaela! this sounds delicious
oooh, making this tonight! Thanks for sharing!
Re: rice cookers. I grew up in a house where we ate rice daily and always made rice in the rice cooker. (I now make in a pot bc I don’t cook it as often). Some people swear by the fancy zogurushi rice cookers — which are nice, but if you’re just looking for consistently good white rice — any basic rice cooker works great, even those 15-20 dollar ones you find at like CVS or Marshall’s etc.
A rice cooker is life changing.
YIKES, that brown rice measurement is suppposed to be 1 and a 1/2 C rice. Sorry! (one and a half)
I don’t have room for a rice cooker, ’cause I keep and instant pot on my counter at all times. I have no real oven, but I am on my 3rd Breville Smart countertop oven, in 17 years. (it is the Cadillac of toaster ovens, it does EVERYTHING!). Courtesy of Alton Brown, I bake my rice in my Breville and it comes out complete PERFFECTION Every. Single. Time. ! 1/2 C brown rice (our fave). 2 !/2 C water. ! TB butter (or olive oil). ! tp kosher salt (i use 2 tp of chicken bouillion). Bring water to a boil, add salt & butter, pour it over the rice, which you have placed into an 8″ square baker (glass or ceramic). cover with foil (double regular or heavy duty if you have it.) 375 depgree oven for an hour. THAT IS ALL!. I swear, it truly is great, without fail. Not sure about timing for white rice. It is the easiest thing ever, and I used to fear rice like the devil. We eat it often through out the week, I freeze it flat in a gallon ziploc, and break off pieces as we need them. I’d actually love a rice cooker (or thought I needed one) but truly have limited space, and this works beautifully! Set & forget. ;)
I bake it in my oven and it’s so easy. I also bake my polenta these days. It was too hot here for baking last week and I made coconut rice in the instant pot and it was delicious. People do love their gadgets, and seem very happy with them, but our small kitchen has made me very particular about what to stock.
Wow, thank you: the baking of the rice is brand new information for me & I am…Here! For! It! (with the exception a rice pudding which is a jammy vintage)
I love my Breville! I have only had one Breville for 17 years! The buttons are a little sticky now but it still works and is my favorite appliance. Everyone should have one!
This is one of my favorite ways to bake and eat rice: https://ottolenghi.co.uk/pages/recipes/baked-mint-rice-pomegranate-olive-salsa
I’ve actually had some great nights sleep on an air mattress (and more importantly, all the space under my bed is already being used for storage!)
Minimal effort dinner: “Naught Fries” or “Naughty Tots” (it’s all in the marketing to get kids to eat things here): Frozen fries or tots, baked, then topped with loads of cheese and popped back in the oven to melt, served with or topped with (my pref) barbecue baked beans or just a can of beans heated with loads of BBQ sauce. Ketchup or ranch on the side is good too. Anyway, it’s more than the sum of its parts. Throw in a bagged salad and call it dinner. ;)
I don’t envy anyone trying to outdo Kate Winslet or Emma Thompson (and director Ang Lee). It’s the 1995 version for me, and nothing else!!!
Sarah, you and me both, sister. I agree with you totally and will only add: Alan Rickman 4ever.
I love the 1995 version too (and I fully agree about your “Alan Rickman 4ever” addition, Karen) but I have still been blown away by this new version (already in cinemas in Europe). So beautifully shot, such great performances from the actors, and a great deal of laughter too, in a true Jane Austen spirit! I highly recommend it :-)
Yes, Alan Rickman.
The new movie opened yesterday in my Midwestern town and I went to see it and was not impressed. Had hoped for better but sometimes a remake just can’t hold a candle to the original. And was not one of those impressed with the messy stringy hair.
Agree have seen it and was not impressed at all. Somehow the director made it … boring? I thought the actors had little chemistry. Why bother trying to top Kate Winslet/Emma Thompson/High Grant/an Rickman if you aren’t actually going to say anything interesting?
Joanna, I’ve used my trusty Zojirushi Neuro Fuzzy 5.5 cup Rice Cooker (NS ZCC10) for 16 yrs! It still works well, but I decided it’s time for an upgrade and ordered an induction heating rice cooker (NW QAC10), also from Zojirushi. Some of their rice cookers are almost as expensive as a basic refrigerator, but they last for a looong time and I highly recommend them.
I have twin mattresses under both my queen beds and they get so much use! Right now, one of them is in my living room–I chucked it down the stairs during last week’s Southern California heatwave, when it was too hot to sleep upstairs. I’ve even put them side-by-side in my office to make an extra guest room with an (almost) king size bed.
We’ve been using our instant pot to make rice for about 10 years now. 1:1 ratio of water to rice, manual setting for 4 minutes then wait for 10 before venting. Perfect every time!
Wow where is that gorgeous blanket from? The one Anton is snuggled under!
I came to the comments to ask this too, please!
Looks like the Dreamweave Waffle Throw Blanket from Brooklinen
Here’s my latest minimal-effort dinner: 2 cans garbanzo beans, drained 1 can coconut milk a scoop (to taste) of Mekhala green curry paste splash of Bragg’s or soy sauce 2-3 cups of frozen veggies Put it all in a pot, heat it up, eat. If you want to get really fancy, you could serve it over rice.
this sounds great! curious re rice, does anyone have a rice cooker? do you love it?
We have a rice cooker—love it. We have a cheap one and I want to upgrade to a nicer one one day, but our cheap one has been around 5 years! It’s a great hosting tool—easy to make a bunch of rice and something to go on top in the instant pot or Dutch oven. Also love it to quickly steam vegetables. Easier to clean than a pot and makes yummy, easy rice. We probably use it 2-3x a week.
I use my instant pot as a rice cooker. It does a pretty good job! My favorite part is that I can set it and walk away.
We just got a Hamilton Beach Digital Programmable Rice Cooker & Food Steamer. I wasn’t ready to try an instant pot, too many memories of crock pot meals I didn’t enjoy as a kid, lol. So far program it to make steal cut oats overnight, set it before work to have rice or quinoa ready with dinner, and steam veggies. I read that you can make fried rice by throwing everything in the rice cooker so I’m psyching myself up to try that next.
I have a small rice cooker and absolutely love it – especially since I can start the rice literally any time and it keeps it warm until we’re ready to eat. Consistent. Easy. 100% slam dunk.
@Joanna Goddard, yes to rice cooker, you’ll never look back!!!
@Joanna Goddard – a mini rice cooker on the counter could be great for hungry teens (can make oatmeal too!) The Aroma brand makes 1-2cup ones and mini cooker designs can be sooo cute. Bigger ones take up a lot of space, so unless you’re eating plain steamed rice as a staple, I’d skip and just use an enamel cast iron pot that has other uses and is also the preferred vessel for rice pilaf.
@ Joanna re: rice cooker – YES! Bought my hubs one for his b-day. We got the Neurofuzzy and love it! He just made sushi rice with collard greens and onions in it last night – yum! It is amazing for just setting it up and not worrying about it until you are ready to eat. Doesn’t take up space on the stove, easy to clean and very versatile. Ours came with a steaming basket which we have yet to use. I believe you can cook a variety of grains in there besides rice (quinoa, farro, etc).
I used to have a rice cooker and I probably still would if my kitchen were larger! It’s super convenient if you want to have the rice cooking while you do other things. Unlike making rice in a pot, you don’t have to think about turning it off.
We loooove doing this meal too! We typically do red curry paste but will need to try green! Jo, we ADORE our rice cooker. We use it at least once a week! We have the Zojirushi Electric Rice Cooker
I used to be anti-rice cooker thinking “well I own pots! Why do I need a rice cooker? Especially living in a small space” but I got a Zojirushi and have never looked back. It is so easy to just set it and forget it while everything else is happening AND it plays a cute song when you start and end cooking haha
20 years ago, my then-husband and I were puzzled about how to make rice on the stove without burning it all the time. So he asked at his workplace, which was staffed mainly by people from Japan. They all looked at him with amusement and said, “Rice cooker!” I’ve never looked back–perfect rice every time!
I love kitchen gadgets of all kinds but the zojirushi rice (and farro, quinoa, oatmeal, etc) maker is definitely top-five.
I never had a rice cooker until I married my Filipino husband. He was appalled I made rice on the stove, and I have to say: I am a convert! We have the most basic aroma brand 3 cup rice cooker and a giant rice dispenser (he insisted we only needed the most basic one bc that’s what they always had growing up). And we use it all the time and it’s so easy! Also, if you don’t already, rinse your rice before cooking until the water runs clear. Makes a huge texture difference .
My rice cooker is the one item I regret losing in my divorce! I could buy a new one, but now I’m not cooking rice almost every night for my ex and two wonderful stepsons (who are now grown and on their own). If you are a household that eats/makes rice at last once a week though – totally worth it!
I used to swear by my rice cooker and used it faithfully for more than a decade, but when the relationship was over and he got the rice cooker, I never actually missed it. For me, making rice in a pot is just not a big deal. But! Get one if you have the space and you think you’d like it! You can always try a used one from the thrift and then give it right back if it’s not your thing. I guarantee they’ll have one or two (same with an air fryer!)
We use our rice cooker all the time, a basic one that we’ve had forever. But I just learned that there is a Persian rice cooker that makes tahdig that I might not be able to resist.
Had a zojirushi and adored it but – gasp – it died after about five years. Motherboard shorted or some such nonsense. We are vegetarian/vegan and consume a ton of rice. I toughed it out for about a year and a half just cooking rice on the stove and recently bought a cuckoo and it works just as well as the zojirushi (minus the song). Everyone in the house is back to super rice consumption. Rice cooker for the win for me.
As a long term devotee to cooking rice in a saucepan, improved by my then boyfriend teaching me the knuckle measurement technique (reader I married him), we recently bought a rice cooker. We have a small kitchen with limited bench and storage space so went back and forth on this purchase. But it has been life changing. We 50/50 the cooking in our house and my husband now makes most of his meals in the rice cooker. They are delicious. Mushroom risotto, yakiudon, gyuudon, a salmon and rice dish have all become regular rotations. 10/10 recommend a midrange rice cooker that you can cook full meals in, as well as plain rice!
B B – would love if you might share your rice cooker recipes for Mushroom risotto, yakiudon, gyuudon… these sound AMAZING! Never would have tried these in a rice cooker.
Had a rice cooker, but now use the instant pot. We cook 4x the rice and then freeze 3 separate 1 cup cubes for future meals, using Super Cubes.
I was anti rice cooker until last month. I visited my aunt in Hawaii for a month and used hers (from the 1970s, no joke) a ton. It converted me. I bought one as soon as I got back. It just feels easier, and the rice doesn’t come out mushy, it doesn’t boil over, it’s easier to clean. The one I got is very basic but has a steamer basket for veggies, so I can make a quick, easy lunch or dinner all in one pot for minimal cleanup. We don’t have a dishwasher so that’s everything to me!
Yes to a rice cooker! I am a minimalist when it comes to kitchen appliances – probably because I am the cleaner upper and my husband is the cook. But earlier this year after having just one too many burned on rice pots to clean, we bought one recommended by Catherine at Weelicious and it’s been a dream. Not only is it a breeze to clean, but everything that comes out of it tastes like it was cooked by a pro in a restaurant. I feel spoiled every time he uses it to cook, which is not quite daily for us, but multiple times a week for sure.
Yet another plus one on the rice cooker. I have a very basic one (on/keep warm) from zojirushi. I just make rice or quinoa in it but still we use it more than all our appliances except the kettle and the toaster. It’s so simple, I love it. And I always use 2:1 water to rice, I know others use less but personally I find it is better that way. Each to their own.