Dave Schalton: Night of the Living Dave

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Some thoughts on cookin'

Cooking for Dads – the Single Dad’s Guide to Cooking on the Fly

"Cooking for Dads – the Single Dad’s Guide to Cooking on the Fly" is the by-product of an acrimonious divorce; the ensuing struggle to hold on to some semblance of a balanced family; and a strong desire to continue to be a positive influence and involved father in my children’s lives: the spice of life. The recipes herein are designed to appeal to kids and adults alike and are accompanied by a list of the tools (pots, bowls, utensils, etc) you’ll need to make them and how long they’ll take.

Cooking is fun and relaxing and it’s one of the simplest things we can do for ourselves and our children that shows them how much we care…

Rather than hustling the kids off to school in the morning with a toaster-pastry or a bowl of cold cereal, I’ve concocted quick, nutritious meals that help us start each day out as a family.

Reading this is a great first step toward waking your kids up in the morning with one of the warmest greetings imaginable: "What would you like for your breakfast this morning, darlin'?" And then getting on with making it just the way it’s wanted!

Step One.

Why YOU Need To Read This...

First of all because you’re not alone and you need to know that.

Secondly, because, despite your separation or divorce, you’re still a dad and you’ve still got a family – and you’ll have this family of yours until the day you die. So you might want to start thinking about making the most and best of it.

I’ve managed to get married and divorced twice – so far. Not that that was what I had in mind on those momentous trips down the aisle, mind you. But, as they say: "shit happens." Millions of us guys have been in the same boat: grappling with the same problems and questions and searching for the same answers, some of which, I hope, you’ll find lying within.

In an ideal world, there would be no divorce: you’d simply work things out and everything would… be… just… swell… and you wouldn’t be sitting there reading this wondering what the hell you’re supposed to do next.

But since you are, let’s think about a few things…

Unfortunately, according to recent statistics, more than half of us aren’t destined to live in an ideal world. There is divorce and with it, lawyers, and judges, and child welfare advocates and myriad others who freely intervene and interfere with what were once the very private affairs and details of our lives and families but which have now become the very public domain of the State.

The reason I bring this up, is because it’s NOT all about you! No matter who did what to whom to break up your marriage, your kids need you more now than ever. Unfortunately, for many of us, it’s exactly at this time that we feel the least able to be there for them. Getting divorced often hurts. It’s so easy to be hurt and bitter and pissed-off: picking up and dropping off your kids at what was once your house; only seeing your kids when you’re allowed too, getting written instructions from your ex reminding you of the details of the Court order – all of the things which keep open the hurt of this State-imposed fracture. In this artificial, imposed environment, the time you spend with your kids may remind you of what you’ve lost, creating feelings of self-pity, anger and despair. Unfortunately, decisions regarding our families and possessions are frequently made by the Court and are in direct conflict with our previous experiences, reality, and the needs and desires we projected onto our families. The kids are being pulled back and forth between you and the ex and they don’t have a clue about what’s really happening (or worse yet, they’re being lied-to and manipulated). You may feel that there’s nothing you want more than revenge or maybe you entertain the thought of just leaving them all behind or maybe (and worst of all) you feel powerless to make anything positive come from so much pain.

If, from reading this, you think I’m not too keen on the divorce system: I’m not – it’s ripping our families apart! For every meager amount of good that might be done for the individual man or woman in a divorce proceeding, there is an immeasurable amount of harm done to the family.

When I went to court for my first divorce, I expected to be an on-going part of my kid’s lives. I vociferously demanded the right to remain their father: an active, on-going presence in their lives, but the Court didn’t see it that way, the Court treated my children like property – to be divided as it saw fit.

So now, I want to take a minute of your time to talk about what we can do to remain an important part of our children’s lives, no matter what the Court says.

It’s been argued that, in general society, women have gotten the short-end of the stick since the advent of the big three religions: Judaism, Islam and Christianity – wherein the fundamental societal role of woman was reduced from matriarch to servant. This pervasive downgrade of the feminine role has tainted every decision all subsequent States have made during the course of societal evolution until very recently. Now, despite the progress women are making in Western society (where, by decree of law, men and women are now considered equal), the judicial system clings to lopsided, antiquated notions regarding the traditional roles and comparative value of men and women – dads and moms – within the context of family. Notions that hold that a man provides and funds the house a woman runs. But, realistically, who is the real care giver and nurturer in the modern family? Is it the dad, or the mom? Or is it the school or daycare center where the kids are dropped-off and picked-up? Or, is it some combination of the above? Despite the reality of today’s modern, twin-income family, the Courts continue to hold the parochial viewpoint of the mother (as servant) who requires State protections and the father as primary financial provider and little, if anything, more. The implied message the Court delivers is that mom is the heart and soul of the family and, as dad, you are not and have not been of any value to your children that didn’t originate directly from your ability to financially provide for them and their mom – that you didn’t and don’t have any valuable skills or insights as a parent that add to your family’s collective good and that any on-going involvement with your family granted by the Court will be based on your ability to pay for it.

That is bullshit.

The way to keep this crap from ruining your life and destroying your family is to build your new life around you and your children. The kitchen can be the focal point of that rebuilding and the loci of your home-life with your family.

This is when you really need your children and your children really need you: they’re going to need you to step-up and be a real dad, not an "Uncle Dad".

An Uncle Dad is what you’ll become, if you’re not careful about managing the activities you plan and the time that you share with your kids now that you’ve dumped, or been dumped by, mommy.

Here’s how to recognize an Uncle Dad: it’s Saturday morning and Uncle Dads all across the land take the kids to MickeyD’s for breakfast. The Uncle Dads sit there at plastic tables, alone, detached and brooding: drinking crappy coffee from disposable, styrofoam cups. Meanwhile, the kids play in the box of balls and climb through the tunnels to avoid their remote and embittered daddies – what a treat! Next, it’s off to the movies for a popcorn and cola lunch in the dark and then, finally, on to the combination arcade/theme-park-pizza-parlor to round out another spectacular family day with daddy.

He’s learned the lesson of the Court: spending money makes him a dad – the more he spends the better dad he is!

But he’s not an involved father.

He’s an amusement park with a driver’s license!

The message the kids pick up is that he doesn’t want them at his new house (mommy got the old house) and he really doesn’t have a clue about what to do with them: they may even think he doesn’t care about them anymore.

Don’t let your pain, anger or frustration allow you to become an Uncle Dad.

Instead, try picking, or getting the kids up in the morning and making something fun to eat. Hang-out over breakfast, in your new kitchen, in your new home. Involve them in what you’re doing and talk about how they are and what they’ve been doing in school or daycare, watching them and listening to them. This will go a long way toward making and keeping things "normal" for them (and you). You don’t want to make them think that you’re not willing or capable of actually caring for them, because you are.

It’s taken me a long time to figure this out (to the extent that I have), and "Cooking for Dads" is the result – my gift to you and your family.

"Cooking for Dads" is the by-product of an acrimonious divorce (who’d guess?); the ensuing struggle to hold on to some semblance of a balanced family; and a strong desire to continue to be a positive influence and involved father in my children’s lives: the spice of life.

When we (my now ex-wife and I) separated, we had two sons who were 2 and 5 years old, a five-bedroom house full of furniture, a complete kitchen and a well-stocked bar. I got a restraining order slapped on me, her bills dumped into my "in box" and the boys two weekends a month: she got everything else.

I moved in with a friend and hit yard-sales and the Salvation Army Store for furniture and dishes. I didn’t have much money (what with lawyers, child-support and all) and had to start out pretty simple in the kitchen. I didn’t have anyone to turn to who could offer advice on how to plan and prepare meals that would fit into our lives, schedules and budget, so I made it up as we went along. Aside from the occasional train-wreck, things have gone along pretty smoothly.

It’s because of the ensuing experiences in getting and keeping our lives together that I’ve decided to write this blog "Cooking for Dads – the Single Dad’s Guide to Cooking on the Fly."

Incidentally – If it’s revenge you crave, there is nothing more gratifying than being informed by the ex that the kids have told her they’d rather celebrate every holiday at your house because the food is so much better than at hers! So much for revenge being a dish best served cold!

Cooking is fun and relaxing and it’s one of the simplest things we can do for our children that lets them know we care…

Rather than hustling the kids off to school in the morning with a toaster-pastry or a bowl of cold cereal, I’ve concocted quick, nutritious meals that help us start each day out right.

I’ll share with you the tips and tricks I’ve learned to make the meals that will help bring and hold your family together.

Jump-starting the Day: the Joys of Breakfast

Caution! As a cooking dad, it is imperative that you get yourself a cup of coffee prior to attempting to cook any of the recipes in this part of the blog!

Cooking is an expression of individualism and there are myriad ways to approach it. You can cook "by the book": measuring everything carefully (often very useful in situations where making a lot of something is the goal), or you can just add stuff ‘til the recipe looks right – (pretty useful for those situations where only one or two of something is desired).

However, it’s pretty hard to successfully cook something without measuring if you don’t know what the finished recipe is supposed to taste like. It’s important to get to know a recipe by following the directions, measurements and methods so that you achieve the desired results. Once you know how what you’re making is supposed to turn out, go ahead and make as many changes and substitutions as your heart desires.

Breakfast foods can run the gamut from fruit to full-blown multi-dish meals – of course it really depends on what you and your kids like, how much time you’ve got to spare and what foods and/or ingredients you’ve got on hand at any given moment.

There are times when you just know that you’ve done the right thing. This morning, as I got my nine-year-old son up to get ready for school, we talked about how he slept, how he felt and what he wanted for breakfast (a waffle). As we were chatting, he pulled some pieces of plastic off of a tissue box and let them drift from the upper-bunk of his bed to the floor. I watched with him as they fell and then asked: "So who do you think is going to have to pick that up?" I was angry with him for making a mess and I wanted to make sure he knew it – I didn’t sign-up to be a maid and I don’t like being treated like one and since his clean-up-after-himself-gene hasn’t kicked-in yet, I am the maid most of the time.

I left his room pretty abruptly, calling over my shoulder for him to get up, get dressed, pick up the mess and come downstairs for breakfast.

While he was getting ready to come down, I plugged in the waffle iron, got out the Bisquick, an egg, the bottles of vanilla extract and peanut oil and a mixing bowl and made batter for a waffle (recipe follows).

As I write this, its spring and I’ve got some fresh strawberries and ripe bananas and I’m pushing them daily, so while the waffle was cooking, I took a half of a banana and sliced it up in strips. I arranged them at the top of the plate in a fan, put half-slices of strawberries between the tops of each "fan blade" and one at the bottom where they came together. When the waffle was ready, I put it below this little tableau, poured some heated strawberry jam (not preserves) on the waffle, squirted a little whipped cream on it, stuck a strawberry on that and sat it in front of him at the kitchen counter.

He was preoccupied with a magazine when I set his plate down and so didn’t notice it right away. I was cleaning up the cooking bowl and whisk with my back to him when he saw his breakfast.

The way he said "WOW" was enough for me.

Incidentally, he had cleaned-up the mess he’d made in his room.

Like I said, there are times when you just know that you’ve done the right thing.

I’ve discovered that, left to their own devices, the kids will often ask for the same things over and over again… often to the point of habit: where they really don’t even want to eat what they’ve asked for. To avoid that, I’ve learned to recite a list of dishes I have the ingredients and time to make rather than just asking them what they’d like. It goes like this:

"Hey sweetie? What would you like for breakfast today?"

"Pancakes."

"Are you sure? We had pancakes yesterday."

"Yeah, but your pancakes are AWEsome."

"Well, okay, but I could make a ham and cheese omelet or oatmeal with fruit and toast or a bacon and egg sandwich with cheese or a fruit plate with cereal – any of those sound better to you than pancakes?"

Sometimes you’ve just got to negotiate…

Eggs are a great source of nutrition. However, some kids like them and some kids don’t. Some like them one way and some another. Some like them all the time and others only rarely – it’s something you’ll need to get used to in cooking: even if you know how to make something really well, it doesn’t necessarily guarantee that anyone else will want to eat it. For the finicky egg eaters, sometimes omelets or breakfast sandwiches will do the trick. My youngest son doesn’t like any egg dishes unless they have something in them or they’re in a sandwich. My older sons will eat them any way I can make them. Go figure! All of the egg recipes in "Cooking for Dads – the Single Dad’s Guide to Cooking on the Fly" have pretty specific directions, but they’re really intended as guidelines to get you going. Common sense will serve you better than any specific instructions I can give in their prep but sometimes it helps to have access to the guidelines too.

The two really important things to pay attention to when cooking eggs are temperature and time – too hot or cold and/or long or short they don’t cook predictably. Generally, when frying eggs, cook them over low heat and keep an eye on them to make sure they’re not over or under cooked.

Step two:

Brunches, Lunches and Brown Paper Bags

Real-life lunch story:

It was a Saturday and my three boys were hanging out in the family room watching TV, when I asked them if they were ready for lunch. To a man, they all said no. Well, as I’ve mentioned before: I’m not a maid and I don’t want to be one – and for that matter I’m not a short-order cook and I don’t want to be one either. So, I went into the kitchen, got out the various jams and jellies I had (three flavors at the time), the peanut butter, a couple of different lunch meats and some cheese and made one sandwich of each, cut them in half, put them on a plate, grabbed a handful of paper plates, carried the whole thing into the family room, sat it down on the coffee table with a roll of paper towels and said "gentlemen, lunch is served, what would you like to drink?" When the dust settled, there wasn’t a sandwich left. So when they said "no", what they really meant was "we don’t want to stop watching TV to eat" and what I really meant was LUNCH IS SERVED.

If you’ve got your kids for the weekend, that’s brunch-time. If you’ve got them during the week, that’s lunch-time. But no matter when you’ve got them it’s a fine time to dine.

If you’ve got your kids with you on the weekend(s) brunches can be the best cooking part of the day. This mid to late morning repast can be as simple or elaborate as you like. I’ve noticed that my kids really like the more elaborate type brunch with a variety of foods that resemble the local eateries buffets. Incidentally, one of the side benefits of serving a big brunch is that it eliminates the need to prepare lunch later in the day: after eating their fill in the late morning they won’t want to eat again until the evening meal.

During the week (summer vacation or school breaks) when they’re home with me, I get them up in the morning, pretty much as though it were a normal school day, in order to keep their and my routines stable. So brunches are reserved for weekends.

At-home lunches provide a great opportunity to cook something hot and fun: grilled cheese and other grilled sandwiches, tacos, burritos, chips and salsa with cheese sauce, soups, reheated left-overs from an evening meal, home-made French fries or onion rings are all doable for lunch at home.

For quick bag lunches, if you plan your evening meals carefully, you can send them off to school or daycare with leftovers from one of the previous evening meals that taste great and cut down on the prep-time you have to invest in their lunch.

Also, I keep an eye on the school menu for the week and plan on letting them eat from it once or twice a week. That way they don’t feel like they’re "second class kids" who have to eat bagged lunches every day.

If you’ve got to make lunches during the week, it’s just something that’s got to be done.

I’ve got a bunch of semi-disposable, compartmentalized, plastic containers that are perfect for holding a sandwich, a couple of lettuce leaves and a few slices of cheese all under one cover. When the stuff comes home it goes into the dish-washer and is ready for the next day.

When I’m making any kind of sandwich, other than PB&J, I’ve found that it’s often better to put the various ingredients in one of these containers and let my kids build the sandwich as they’re about to eat. That way they get a fresh (un-soggy) lunch that contains the stuff they want.

Put some lunch meat, cheese slices, a lettuce leaf and tomato and pickle slice in a plastic container along with a couple of slices of bread in a sandwich bag and let them build their own sandwich at lunchtime. This, along with a piece of fruit, or a fruit-cup, provides them with a good lunch that’s fresh when they eat it. They can get condiments and any utensils they need from the school cafeteria.

Some schools have microwave ovens they’ll let the kids use to heat stuff up. If that’s the case in your kid’s school, you can put together lunches, like cheeseburgers or hotdogs that they can eat hot. If not, you’ll have to stick with stuff that tastes good cold, like cold-cuts, salads, fruit and PB&J.

Some kids like salads enough that you can pack a chef’s salad with strips of cold cuts and cheese along with the greens your child likes. It’s fun to put a couple of kinds of salad dressing in small containers that they can choose from and it gives them some lunch-time input into what they eat.

I used to buy the individual serving size bags of chips to toss in with their lunches but I don’t any more. I noticed that when I did that, most of the other stuff I packed would come home uneaten or just nibbled on. But, even so, I’ve come to think of these partially eaten lunches as a bridge from home to school. I think of them while they nosh on what I’ve prepared and hope that they think of me and the fact that I love them and care for them enough to spend the time to make something especially for them. Now, in order to get them to eat more of the stuff I’ve made for them, I’ve eliminated the chips. I send them off to school with a sandwich and fruit cup and/or celery and carrot sticks and some ranch dressing and all of the food gets eaten. I also don’t send the little one to school with fruit punch or any other sweet drink – he buys milk at the school cafeteria – because the sugar would get him wired-up enough that he’d invariably get into some kind of mischief at school.

Next: Suppers That You Will Like As Much As They Do

Supper Stories (I tell stuff like this to the kids all of the time, it keeps them on their toes; this was a prelude to serving beef brisket):

"The weirdest thing happened on my way home from dropping Alec (my youngest son) off at school this morning. There was a deer lying by the side of the road with its front legs broken: apparently, it had been whacked by a car… It was unconscious but still breathing - I knew right away what to do: I tied it to the back bumper of the car and drug it home! Now, I’m not much of a butcher, but I’ve got to tell you: I got out the electric hedge trimmers and the electric carving knife and went to it! Man! What a mess!

Anyway, remember how I asked everybody what they wanted for supper tonight before you went to school? Well, I don’t want you to think I didn’t listen, but we’re having Bambi’s mom!

Oh! By the way, could somebody go out and hose down the driveway?

Thanks!"

Suppertime is another great opportunity to be involved with your kids: to find out how things are going for them and how they feel about themselves, as well as letting them know how, and what, you’re doing. This is the perfect meal for you to enlist their aid and input. They can help set the table, prep the food, and even cook if they’re big enough to do so safely.

The best part about this time of day is the fact that it’s over. Everybody’s been through whatever was going to happen to them and now they’re safely back home. I’ve noticed that if I just sit down with the kids and ask them about their day, they go stone cold dead on me… It’s like the inquisition. But, if I have them help out and hang out in the kitchen while supper is being put together and listen, they open up about all kinds of stuff: things that go on at school; things they think are cool; things they wish would happen or maybe things that they wish wouldn’t.

A word of advice here: if they bring up mom, listen – don’t judge – remember, you were together for a (perhaps) long time and they’re going to want and need that sense of continuity that talking about her creates. Be supportive – don’t bad-rap and don’t be judgmental: when in doubt, take the high ground.