Kids, cooking and crustaceans

KAREN WIGHT

The Wight house is back on its summer cooking routine: Every person

in the house is in charge of one dinner per week. This includes

shopping, cooking and cleaning for a meal that must be somewhat

nutritionally balanced, be within a set budget, be prepared in time

to eat before the evening’s activities begin and appeal to the

majority of the victims, I mean family members.

This summer is particularly fun -- we have a house guest whom we

have thrown into the schedule. Elsie is a teammate of Annie’s at UC

Berkeley, is also a sorority sister (KKG), and since she is working

out in Southern California this summer, we’ve gained another

daughter.

We warned her before she moved in about the dinner rule, and being

the good sport she is, she joined the mayhem with a smile on her

face.

Why do we do this? This is a question my kids ask all the time,

hoping I will change my mind. The most obvious reason is that it

lightens my load. I often feel that between buying food, cooking food

and cleaning up afterward, my day mainly consists of KP duty. The

more important reason is that they learn to appreciate my and others’

culinary efforts, that they learn how to become confident in the

kitchen because every human being on Earth needs to know how to fix a

meal.

One more rule: The dinner can’t be takeout. They’re not allowed to

do E-Z Takeout Burger every Wednesday, although six burgers for six

bucks is a great deal.

So far, the gang has done an outstanding job in the kitchen.

Annie’s latest creations have been sauteed chicken breasts, turkey

burgers and, yes, one round of EZ. Breck has pulled off tacos and

breakfast for dinner (which included waffles, eggs and fruit salad).

Elsie barbecued tri-tip and made a delicious ravioli dish ... and

then there’s Mary Rose, my chef-in-training.

Mary Rose started the summer with chicken breasts stuffed with

Parmesan cheese, spinach and prosciutto. The next week, she moved on

to fettuccini Alfredo. Then she came up with a plan. A big plan.

She had seen a cooking show that featured live crabs. I think the

thing that appealed to her most was the table covered with newspaper

and the little wooden mallets that you pound the cooked crabs with.

Since I created this cooking monster, I was obliged to facilitate. I

gave her a pass on the budget portion of the meal, but the search for

live crabs was more of an effort than I expected. Live crabs were not

within my five-mile geographic limit. The last stop was Santa Monica

Seafood Company. No live crabs, but there were plenty of live

lobsters.

We had the helpful guy at the counter weigh a lobster and do the

math -- it was approximately $25 per lobster. Mary Rose found a new

appreciation for seafood -- those lobsters were gold-covered with a

dark blue shell. We decided that two people could share, so three

live lobsters came home with us.

I’ve never cooked a “live” anything before, and the minute we got

the lobsters home, I knew Mary Rose was having trouble with the idea

that she would be putting them in a pot of boiling water. Somehow

seeing things neatly wrapped in cellophane in the store and having

them wiggle in your sink changes the meat-eating perspective.

After she decided she would consider vegetarianism, it was time to

fix dinner. The most time-consuming part of the preparation was

waiting for the enormous pot of water to boil. I stepped in for the

actual plunge, and we boiled our scavengers for 12 minutes, then dinner was done: melted butter, lemon wedges, sourdough bread, a

green salad and voila.

We considered halving them out of the pot, cleaning them out, and

then popping them on the grill for a grand finale, but by the time

the lobsters were boiled, I felt like we had done enough. Maybe next

time we’ll fire up the grill.

A few observations through the eyes of an 11-year-old:

* Lobsters are bluish-brown before you cook them. The cooking

process turns them bright red.

* Even if you let them go in the ocean, their home (at least the

lobster we bought) is in Maine, so the likelihood that they will

return to their families is zero.

* Eating lobster for dinner is the equivalent of buying two

PlayStation games.

* If your sharing partner doesn’t know any better, go for the

claws.

* Eating lobster at a restaurant is a lot easier -- if your

parents will let you order it instead of chicken fingers.

And finally, if you do decide to have a lobster adventure of your

own this summer, here are the guidelines: Use one gallon of water for

the first lobster and then one additional quart for every lobster

added to pot after that. Place the live lobsters head first into the

boiling pot. Each 1- to 1 1/2-pound lobster should be cooked for

eight minutes. For every extra lobster, add two minutes of cooking

time.

* KAREN WIGHT is a Newport Beach resident. Her column runs

Thursdays.