Monthly Review: January 2025

Does it still count as your birthday after you die? You are gone—have been for nearly four years now—yet here is your spiked handwriting and sketchy directions. You have misspelled “whisk” and you have included no measurements except for the flour (3/4 of a cup). I try to think when I must have had your pork chops last. You only made them for me a few times, but my mother sometimes cooked them when I was growing up, our stovetop crowded with our two biggest skillets and a stew pot for mashed potatoes. I don’t know that I’ve made your pork chops since I got married; I certainly haven’t since you died.

I scoop flour into a shallow bowl and sprinkle it liberally with Lawry’s and cracked pepper. I started cooking with Lawry’s again after you died. Like Irish Spring and LL Bean, it is a brand I associate entirely with you. I gently dredge each pork chop, pressing the flour into the pink slabs before laying them into my cast iron skillet. Once they brown, I pour in the water, followed by the rest of the flour mixture. Despite my ministrations of whisking and flipping, my gravy looks lumpy and one of the chops keeps sticking to the bottom. I am not losing hope, but I am losing confidence.

Nevertheless, I add more water. I keep whisking. I think about you, standing at the stove in one of your flannel shirts with a dish towel slung over your shoulder. I think about your glasses steaming when you lift the lid. I think about the trays of coffee cake and pots of potato soup and tins of caramel corn you whipped up whenever we’d visit. Once I grew up, it was my turn to cook for you, and you grinned as you told me how much you loved whatever I had made.

You would be 87 today, Grammy told me this morning. It is hard for me to imagine what you’d be like, since you never really seemed to age. You mowed the lawn in your sun hat. You drove out to see us at least once most years, from West Virginia’s winding mountain roads to the country highways of the Midwest. You remembered everything and could still do most of it, so you were never truly old. Even so, I always felt that I should hug you extra and remember you each time we said goodbye because one day you would not come back. I suppose I always knew you would be my first grandparent to go.

Now you are gone, and I am here, making your pork chops. They’ve cooked for the requisite hour, and it’s time to see whether I’ve done the thing correctly. I set my table. We sit for dinner. In Minnesota and South Carolina and Wisconsin, our family is eating potato soup and Heath Blizzards and your pork chops, a birthday feast in your honor.

The first bite is exactly as good as I remember. Like everything you made and everything you did, your pork chops are unassumingly wonderful. They taste like gravy and Lawry’s. They taste like you are still here to love me.

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Here's what I read, cooked, and created in the month of January.

What I Read

• The Covenant of Water, Abraham Verghese (★★★★★)

• The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins (★★★★)

• The Davenports, Krystal Marquis (★★)

If you want to hear the rationale behind my rating, head to my Goodreads for full reviews.

What I Cooked

• Brussels Sprout and Bacon Frittata

Difficulty: ★★

Flavor: ★★★

Keeper: Probably not

Comments: I love both frittatas and Brussels sprouts, but I'm not sure I love them together.

• Baked Cheeseburger Sliders

Difficulty: ★★

Flavor: ★★★★

Keeper: Yes

Comments: The proportion of meat to buns to pan seemed off. I ended up trying to make this in a 9 by 9, which kind of worked except for that the meat was an absolute slab. I would probably use less meat next time, but there would be a next time, so I would consider this a win on the whole.

• Best Breakfast Casserole

Difficulty: ★

Flavor: ★★★★★

Keeper: Yes

Comments: I thought there was no possible way that everything the recipe called for would fit in my humble 9 by 13, but miraculously it did, and it was delicious. It's hard to label any recipe "the best," but it's a great one.

• Sheet Pan Lemon Chicken and Potatoes

Difficulty: ★★

Flavor: ★★

Keeper: No

Comments: Aggressively lemony.

• Roasted Cauliflower, Chickpea, and Arugula Salad

Difficulty: ★★

Flavor: ★★★★★

Keeper: Yes

Comments: I made this for dinner, and it was so good the two of us ate the entire pan in one sitting. In the future, I would definitely serve this with chicken or salmon since I'm not sure it's hearty enough to stand alone as a dinner, but the flavor was outstanding.

What I Created

• Some magnet poems while I was playing with a website "for school"

May your days be filled with beauty, and may your heart be filled with the willingness to see and give thanks for it.