Top 20 Things Not to Say at Christmas Dinner

Friends, your good friend Sarah has once again been thinking of you today, and I would like to share some advice about what not to say at Christmas dinner.  I made this list when I lived in Belgium and thought it was high time to bring it back for a refresher.

 

Whatever you celebrate, there are bound to be family members nearby who simply don’t understand that some things should not be said aloud at the table but rather should be whispered in the hallway or discussed in great detail in the car on the way home. 

 

I’ve gathered these over the years at dinners with families of friends and ex-boyfriends, with my own family and listening in on far too many loud cell phone conversations at airports.   May I suggest that you consider posting this on your refrigerator, near the group of Aunties cooking in the kitchen, or in the area of your home that allows smoking, as this is where the down and dirty family gossiping usually takes place.  I can’t make this stuff up.  Alright, here we go:

 

1)   Raymond, put on another shirt so that family can’t tell which of your nipples is pierced this time.

2)   Which one of you rearranged the Christmas blocks from “Joy to the World” to “Who Tooted?”

3)   Captain Crunch?  What the?!  You gave me a case of Captain Crunch for Christmas?  Worst present ever.  EVER.  I hate you.

4)   Mom told me you were an accident.

5)   I know your girlfriend is vegetarian, but chicken soup IS vegetarian.

6)   The 12 Days of Christmas forgot one thing:  what about the day my true love gave me gonorrhea after she slept with my best friend? 

7)   It’s a .357 magnum, Karen.  Do you like it?

8)   No, you certainly cannot tell people you had an immaculate conception, because everyone knows that you and that perv Ronnie do it all the time in the back of dad’s car.

9)   Before the end of the night I swear to God I’m cutting your hair.

10)               We spent all the Christmas money you and dad gave us on scratch off lottery tickets.

11)               It’s the same ring I gave Tina, but she gave it back and now I’m giving it to you.

12)               Put on a belt or pull your pants up or I’m going to start throwing quarters down there until your ass plays Jingle Bells with every step.

13)               Sharla, help me understand why I saw our family phone number and your name written next to it on the Grand Tavern bathroom wall. 

14)               What do you mean your cousin is gay?  What does being cheerful have to do with anything? 

15)               You want the gift that keeps on giving?  How about a swift kick in the pants?

16)               Gerald, you know I don’t like it when you refer to the 3 Wise Men as Jesus’ Threesome.

17)               Fran, I told you a thousand times not to bring a salad.  My list to you specifically said to bring cheese, sausage and crackers.  We always have cheese, sausage and crackers.  You’ve ruined Christmas, I hope you know that.  Thanks a lot, Fran.  Christmas.  Ruined.  Thanks a whole lot.

18)               Your cousin and his girlfriend are probably humping on the coats again in the guest bedroom.  Dad says you should go check on them.

19)               Yeah, well, the Angel of the Lord shown round about you and busted you for getting high at school again.  Merry Christmas, you idiot. You’re grounded.

20)               Jeremy, when the family sings together, don’t you dare fart in time along with “Deck The Halls.”

    And so, my Friends, as another Christmas approaches, may I once again suggest that we remember only happy Christmas stories as we welcome each other to the table with kindness.  Today is a day to be grateful for simply being together, no matter how awkward that gathering might be.  Worst case, you get to tell some awfully funny stories at work after the holiday break.  I am grateful for you and wish you a week of simple joy and wonder as we remember the true spirit of Christmas.

 

  With love from New York, soon to be Minneapolis,

  Your Good Friend Sarah

The Kitchen Vote

Friends, good morning from New York, for one more week before your good friend Sarah goes home to Minnesota to celebrate the holidays with her family.

 

You need to understand something.  Working in this uber-intense NYC Kitchen of mine only prepares me for going home to my family.  We are a crazy family.  No, I mean it, there is crazy, and then there is Moxie crazy, and we, are, I swear, the worst.  We are the best, do not get me wrong---I love my family, and I am part of them and come from them, but we are, collectively, I swear, the very worst family you would ever want to cook with, if you have no experience with chaos in a Kitchen. It can be overwhelming to newcomers, which is why I do not introduce my latest man of the year to the family or to many of you, ever.  There is not enough bourbon in the world to repair a relationship after that.  I swear it is one of the reasons my short-term marriage ended, because my ex-husband honest to God brought up our family Christmas cooking traditions in marriage counselling, which made me burst out laughing so hard, so long, the tears just kept coming down my face as I actually snorted at him and fell onto the floor off the therapist’s couch, which does not contribute to successful repair of a relationship that never should have been one in the first place.  His pain at just WATCHING our family cook together was just too much for him.  That is when I knew the relationship was doomed, doomed I tell you, and that is when I knew, KNEW that I belonged in a Kitchen.

 

Let me set the scene, shall we? Imagine me at my feistiest, then multiply that times 14-25 people, all in one house, all shouting and cooking and mocking each other simultaneously.  THAT is how it is when we cook at Christmas at my mom’s and stepdad’s house.  Do you now see why I love my NYC Kitchen so much?

 

At our house, there is no serene, Currier & Ives Christmas of quiet cocktails by the fire.  There is no civilized exchange of hearing about each other’s accomplishments at work or how the kids are doing in school.  No.  There is shouting and mocking and making rough fun of each other all day long. You will hear, “Sarah, did you want to put on a red leather bra for Christmas this year?” followed by, “You kiss your wife with that mouth?” and, “Let me get you another shot of insulin to go with that shot of brandy,” until Mom starts loudly singing songs about how Jesus Loves You to drown out our sassing so that my nieces and nephews do not start asking questions about what an alcoholic is. And for the record, I still have that red leather bra, and it is hot as hell.  But that bra is for Hanukkah, not Christmas.  Everybody knows that.

 

With this kind of chaos in a Kitchen, the other nerds in my family decided that we must have some sort of civility established, at least some MINIMAL framework of decisionmaking that was, of course, fair.  Friends, I give you the Moxie Family Annual Christmas Menu Vote.

 

 

 

Don’t think I’m kidding. 

 

Each year, Mom distributes a list of at least 40 items which each member of the family must vote on, in order to come to agreement on which 15-18 things we will be making as a family.  Each year, the columns have had different answer options available.  When we all lived in different parts of the worlds, options for voting “yes” included “oui, si, ja, and yes.”  Answers for “no” included “no, ne, nyet, and WTF.”   That last answer got used quite a bit when she tried too hard to incorporate quinoa into our menu options.  Mom has had it with the shenanigans of my siblings and me and has streamlined the process now.  WTF is no longer an option, unless it is written into the Comments line.  Mom also overrules anything she wants to, which, of course, she should be able to do, because she is mom after all. Note the second tab of the spreadsheet, where all of the voting results get auto-ranked so that we can have assignments given.  No, I am not kidding, and you should know that by now.

 

Mom assigns items and grocery lists, she assigns teams of who is making what, and she tells each of us from our various locations in the country or world what we will be bringing from our new home cities.  My brother Pete brings avocados, citrus and wine from California.  I used to bring chocolates from Belgium.  We all do our part.

 

We are nerds, NERDS I tell you, and this is why we are ferociously successful in business while also able to navigate extremely different personalities in the Kitchen.  Some years it is all too much for me, and I end up down in the basement bar with my stepdad, just staring at each other, drinking Jack Daniels, because I cannot take the noise any more, and neither can he.  Some years I am in the throes of it, in charge of the Kitchen, testing, tasting, stirring, chopping.  This year I have stepped back, because I am far away again, and because this is the first year our family has sorted out some really difficult background issues related to big changes, and we will be coming together again for the first time in a couple of years.  It will not always be easy to do that, because, as in any family, there are sensitive places and topics that must be carefully navigated, and we will do those things, as we chop and cut and plate our dinners, together.  I love the Kitchen because, for me, for us, for my family and for my Friends, the Kitchen is the place where we always come back together, no matter what happened, no matter what went wrong in the past.

 

And so, as I look forward to being, once again, back in my NYC Kitchen with my favorite Chefs, I also look very forward to being back home in Minnesota, surrounded by familiar chaos, in a Kitchen, with the people I love best.  I feel blessed, Friends, to be welcome in so many Kitchens, to be able to hug so many people with so many stories and jokes and so much love.  Cross your fingers, though, that mom’s quinoa salad did not make the cut.  And pass the bourbon.

 

 

With lots of love from our Kitchen to yours,

Your Good Friend Sarah

 

 

 

 

A Little Christmas Song for Our Sous Chefs

Friends, good, early, early morning from New York City, from your good Friend Sarah, who cannot help but be caught up in the holiday spirit, even while working in the kitchen.  This morning I am up early for a conference call with one of my European medical research teams, but I am, as usual, as always, thinking about my team in the kitchen. 

 

Sure, sure, I write about the intense moments of being called borderline retarded by my Sous Chef now and then, and I write about my love/hate relationship with the 60+ heads of cauliflower I prep each day and how much my feet hurt, but I love it.  I love it every day, and I cannot wait to get back there on Sunday. 

 

I love these Chefs, I love this energy, I love how, in the down time, they stop and take time to help with tasks for two reasons:  the first being that they care and also want to get to know me, to make sure I am doing ok, and the second, hey, let’s not kid ourselves, after working 6-8 hours in my “real job” on the days I also put in 12 hours at my restaurant gig, I am pretty tired, and I am still too slow in the kitchen and must get faster, so they help me out to teach me, always, how to be better.  And I will, thanks to their constant coaching, which I respect and appreciate, even if it comes with 86% curse words. 

 

There is a caring and a sweetness in that kitchen, even with the toughest of the tough Chefs, that is unlike anything I see anywhere except in the most intense situations.  My reference is a surgical team, as that is where I have spent my most intense time, where a lead surgeon and the team of circulating and scrub nurses and doctors assisting, including the student doctors, can result in some pretty rough days when things go wrong.  The flip side is that you work side by side with some of the most interesting and big-hearted people you could ever hope to meet---and that goes for both surgery AND the kitchen, because when it comes down to it, they have a lot of similarities.

 

So as I go about my day keeping a watching eye on my budgets and spreadsheets, my data analysis and safety reviews, my FDA inspection preparations and slidesets for teaching class, I am thinking of my Chefs, always.  Here is a little something I wrote in my head while prepping 60 heads of cauliflower for about 3 hours the other day at the French restaurant where I work in New York.  To all my Sous Chefs, thank you for being patient with me, you know I love you even as I make your life hell some days.

 

Sing it with me now….you all know the tune….

 

 

On the 12th Day of Christmas, my Sous Chef gave to me:

 

12 pounds of butter(Sarah, cut this into perfect 1cm cubes for the hot line!)

 

11 dozen oysters (don’t f’ing cut yourself!  I don’t want to do paperwork!)

 

10 minutes for dinner (is your prep done yet? No?  Then why the F*CK do you think you get dinner?!)

 

9 heads of cabbage, (shave it!  I didn’t say chiffonade, I said shave it!)

 

8 quarts balsamic (make lemon oil, too, and make it 10!)

 

7 tons of Brussels, (where’s your mandoline? We need 950 NOW!)

 

6-tee heads of cauli, (what’s this bullshit?! F that guy, do it this way!)

 

5…… quarts of viiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin! (double it, we’re out again!)

4 pounds of foie (did we forget the cognac? Dammit!)

 

3 (thousand) French beans,

 

2 boxes of salt

 

And a loooooooooooong day of meeeeeeeeeeee repeeeeeeeating OUI!

 

Lots of love from our kitchen to yours,

Your Good Friend Sarah