The Secret's in the Sauce

The smell of apples and ruminating on ethnic food reminds me of a story. Could it have been 20 years ago? Ah, indeed it was. A new Thai restaurant opened in our neighborhood. The owner was a friend of a friend and the place quickly became a favorite. One dish we particularly liked was kai yang: a chicken breast on the bone, marinated and grilled, and served with sticky rice,  slices of carrots and cucumbers, and a spicy sauce.

I asked Jimmy, my Thai friend at work, how to make it, and he gave me a recipe for the marinade, but brought a bottle of mang-da sauce the next day. "This is what you serve with it," he said. "Even in Thailand, hardly anybody makes it at home; it's like ketchup." That summer, kai yang with mang-da sauce was a staple of our dinner parties. Our guests would rave about the combination, and many evenings found us lounging at our outdoor table in the moonlight speculating about what was in the secret sauce. The label was no help; written mostly in Thai, the ingredients list in English simply read mang-da, water, hot peppers, and salt. The sauce itself was brownish-red, a puree with flecks of peppers and something else. It was spicy but complex, and here is where we all had our pet theories. What was mang-da? Animal, mineral, or vegetable?  John insisted that it tasted of apples, but I found it a little briny, like dried shrimp.

On and on we debated, until finally it occurred to me to ask Jimmy. He laughed and uncharacteristically referred the question. The ladies who worked in the pantry, doing all the cold prep, were mostly Thai and Vietnamese, and their lead was a woman named Supatra. That is who he told me to ask. Jimmy watched curiously as I approached her and asked my question. She laughed, too, but a little nervously. "This flavor is very good, but very strong," she started. "In my village we like it very much."  Her hesitation was beginning to worry me a little.

"Go on, " I urged her. Finally she came out with it-- mang da was a gigantic, 2 1/2 inch water beetle that people in northern Thailand roasted and ground as a seasoning. I realized that I had seen them in the freezer section of the Asian market, an icy block of frozen cockroaches; in fact I was quite sure that I had pulled them out of there, grimacing in disgust and wondering who would ever eat them.

Turns out, it was me. Later, when I asked the guy who owned the restaurant about it, though, he was offended that we would think that he would serve such a peasant sauce in his establishment. He was from Bangkok, he informed me, where they had much higher standards.

IMBY

We live right next door to the county mulch pile. Well, I say pile, but another noun would probably be more correct; that mound of lawn clippings, leaves, etc. over there must be over 30 feet high, 20 feet wide, and 40 feet long. When we first moved into this place 11 years ago, I wasn't even aware that it was there. A narrow swath of woods and a chain link fence beyond separates our community from the county property. I'll never forget the winter day a few months later when I stepped out on my balcony. All the leaves were gone, and I did a classic cartoon double take, and although I can't confirm it, I think my eyes popped out of their sockets with that boi-yoi-yoinggg noise, too. How in the hell had that hulking heap of humus happened?

Over the years I've made my peace with it. Such an eco-friendly enterprise has to be located somewhere, doesn't it? That it's hidden from view most months, that I'm not allergic to leaf mold, and that neither do I mind the fragrance of rotting lawn clippings on a hot summer day helps. In fact I think it kind of smells like apples. Well, apples most of the time, except now, which is why I write about the mulch pile at all. In January and early February, it's everyone's discarded Christmas trees that are making their way through the chipper, and so the scent of pine permeates the cold air on these winter days, and I like that.

Yo Quiero...

I heard today on the radio that the founder of Taco Bell died. Glen Bell (so that's where the name came from... hm, I did not know that) was heralded as making Mexican food the mainstream staple of the American diet that it is today. I can't argue, in fact I had enchilladas for dinner last night and lunch today. (And they were delicious, Leah!)

I haven't thought about it in a long time, but as great a cook as my mom was, when we were growing up in New Jersey in the 60s and 70s, we didn't eat much ethnic food beyond spaghetti and chili. (And they were delicious, Mom!) Pizza was a treat, chips and salsa were unheard of, and it was a 25 minute drive to the nearest Chinese restaurant.

We did have some friends who moved to California in 1970, and as an airline family, we had the advantage of being able to visit them in Orange County a couple times a year. It was at their house that I tasted my first "taco". Soft corn tortillas were laid flat on a baking sheet with a slice of American cheese on each. While those warmed in the oven, plain ground beef was sauteed with nothing but salt and maybe black pepper.  We folded the tortillas over the beef with some iceberg lettuce, diced tomato, and onion to complete the dish, and it was so good, that we packed tortillas in our suitcases and kept them in the freezer so that we could enjoy tacos at home.

Our friends thought we were sooo weird.

What a Relief

At my school, in an effort to raise money  for earthquake relief, we're doing Hats for Haiti, Hoops for Haiti, Hearts for Haiti, and Houses for Haiti. As I listened the other morning to the details of these activities, it somehow seemed wrong to me that we should be having so much fun when the people we were trying to assist were living in such misery.

It's hardly surprising though. So often in this country we combine fun and fundraisers. From galas and silent auctions to walks and telethons, it's what we do to raise money and awareness in support of most causes. But why? When did it become necessary and expected for us to receive some extrinsic reward for supporting a good cause?

When I asked the kids in my homeroom what they thought,  they said that they didn't believe most people would help without some incentive. They're wrong of course; millions of dollars have already been donated to aid the victims of the quake, but who can blame them for thinking as they do? It's what they know of supporting a cause.

Cutting Our Losses

It's getting to that time of year that many people think should be a big indicator of a teacher's effectiveness... testing season. Around here the curriculum specialists are gearing up for "targeted remediation." What does that mean, you wonder? Well, classroom teachers are asked to select students who we think may have trouble on the state assessments, but we are cautioned not to choose students who are too far behind to pass. Those kids would be "taking a seat" from a student who might pass with a little extra push. But what about the students we fear are most to likely fail? They are targeted all right, targeted to fail, and they are left in their regular classes, some special education, some remedial general education, others taught on grade level, regardless of the students' levels, because of a district pacing chart that must be adhered to. This is what high stakes testing looks like in an era of limited resources.

So Little Time

The teacher workday starts out full of promise and lengthy to-do lists. It seems like so much can be accomplished on a day when we do not have to rush out the door to get to school to greet our students, on a day when there aren't any students, just a quiet classroom and that long, long list.

Inevitably, we over plan, and that's what happened to me today: I made a good dent in my list (and of course I did a few things that weren't on the list, both by choice and by colleague request), but at 5 PM the checks do not outnumber what remains to do. I'm already looking at my calendar and parceling up the leftover tasks to slot into a few free minutes here and there during my planning time and after school in the coming week. I have some big deadlines looming, and those are always the most serious of motivators for me, so I'm confident all will get done (as usual), even if those pesky kids will be back tomorrow.

Blog posted. Check.

Advice from the Guru

Tomorrow is a teacher planning day, and on Wednesday the third quarter will begin. It is hard to believe that half the time we will spend with these students has passed already. Of course that means that we have half a school year to go, too, and in the spirit of that half-full perspective, I've decided that my students will write in class every day from now until June.

I got The Essential Don Murray for Christmas, and nulla dies sin linea, or never a day without a line is his number one piece of advice.