Hurried dinner

• semi-improvised sesame/peanut noodles with asparagus and tofu.
• gently cooked brussels sprouts, tossed with a little mustard-butter.

Kate is a total sport and remains willing to try the brussels sprouts I prepare, but even when they’ve been cooked in salted water just until bright green and toothsome and have not a trace of that sulfurous awfulness for which B.S. are renowned, she still makes that revolted “bleah” face as she chews them. The mustard butter, she says, “helps a little,” but it’s clear that she’s saying it mostly as a kindness to me, and would be just as happy eating a bowl full of erasers, or ping-pong balls.

Kate’s mom, according to Kate and Lindy and Kate’s mom herself, pretended to like peas for years in order to cajole her kids into eating them. Years into adulthood, the revelation that she had never liked peas came as something of a shock. So here let it be recorded, on the off-chance Kate and I end up having children someday and blogs still exist then: your mother, oh-currently-nonexistent-offspring, doesn’t like brussels sprouts one bit, and any that you see her enjoying are merely a sham designed to fool you.

But eat them anyway, kids. Gently cooked and treated right, they’re really tasty.