What’s Going on Today: Preschool orientation. Pay attention!
Naptime Goals: Prepare Eggplant Parmigiana, put significant school dates in my calendar.
Tonight’s Menu: Eggplant Parm, Green salad, dessert from cookbook recipe testing (!)
Parenting Lesson of the Day: Even if you don’t think they’ll ever learn their manners, trust me, they will.

Today I attended parent’s preschool orientation. Two hours of my morning was dedicated to listening to field trip policies, noting significant holidays and understanding snow day procedures. This was a meeting for parents only so my daughter stayed home with a sitter. We both agreed that was a good arrangement, it would have taken a hundred lollipops to get her to sit still for just one hour, let alone two! Tomorrow we go to her school for an hour to meet her classmates. Then, next week, I drop her off on her own. For Three. Whole. Hours. (Sniff!)

While she’s at school I’ll be in the kitchen. Like naptime, her school time is my downtime. I’ll have plenty of time to cook, photograph and write about tons of interesting recipes and food. I’ll treat myself to our old favorites, and I also look forward to experimenting with new, interesting methods and ingredients. This way, after she takes her post-school nap (more downtime for me!), dinner will be all ready in the fridge and we can be together for the rest of the day.

Since there is enough change taking place this week, today I am returning to an old favorite. My very first post was about Eggplant Parmigiana (check out the awful photograph!) It is one of my most favorite warm fall casseroles and this week is the perfect occasion for bubbly, cheesy comfort food. Here you’ll see that I prepare it while she’s napping (and in the future could do it while she’s at school), and then leave it in the fridge until it’s ready to bake. I’ve updated my old recipe, using new techniques for preparing the eggplant, eliminating the use of breadcrumbs, and using only fresh mozzarella for the best possible taste and texture. As you’ll see, the casserole comes together beautifully during the day and is perfect to have at the ready for dinner. As we get into the school rhythm I’m sure this is something we’ll be having again and again this fall. I am looking forward to it.

What’s Going on Today: Scheduled teacher visit from school. Library to return books, playtime with friends.
Naptime Goals: Prepare ingredients for Apple Snack Muffins, clean house to prepare for visit.
Tonight’s Menu: Meatballs for Choir Boys, Green Salad, Garlic Bread, Apple Muffins.
Parenting Lesson of the Day: You can’t wait for them to start school, and then they do.

When her teacher called the other day to schedule a home visit it really hit home. I have a preschooler. I know I have many years to look forward to with her living at home, but I can’t quite believe our time together with zero obligations has drawn to a close. For almost three years we have been together from sun up to sun down, no nanny, no cleaning lady, and only a few babysitters here and there. It’s been the just two of us and we’ve become quite a team.

With the book underway and other projects up my sleeve it is probably a good time for school to start. She needs more stimulation then just off-key singing with Mom and time at the playground with the neighborhood kids. I’m sure she’ll excel at all of the singing, jumping and arts & crafts activities they throw at her. But I’m still going to miss her. After three years of non-stop time together nobody knows all of her as well as I do. And, I venture to say, she’s gotten to know me pretty well, too.

Sometimes, I think, the best way to cope with change in the air is to bake. In this case, with the teacher due to arrive the following the day, my daughter and I decided to make some snack muffins to give to her. I mixed up most of the batter during naptime then let my daughter add the shredded apple and put them in the muffin tins when she woke up. We popped them in the oven to bake, then let them cool all afternoon. The following day the teacher came and the kiddo served them to her on a paper napkin with the letter “B” printed on it. The teacher’s last name and our last name have the same initial, a coincidence we loved. The rest of our visit was easy and fun. Together we remarked on the delicious chewy texture, intense apple flavor and slight punch of cinnamon in each bite. They set the tone for what I hope will be a wonderful year.

What’s Going on Today: Taking advantage of last week without preschool obligations (!)
Naptime Goals: Prepare dough for Cherry & Cream Cookies, test two recipes for the book.
Tonight’s Menu: Two book recipes (I can’t tell you which ones!), Caesar Salad, Cherry & Cream Cookies for dessert.
Parenting Lesson of the Day: I don’t think she understands what I mean when I say “you are starting school next week,” but she seems excited about it.

There is nothing I love more then stumbling across a recipe that grips me with such excitement I shift around my schedule to make it straight away. I am doing a lot of cooking during naptime these days, since I am hard at work on the book, but I still need to make room for spontaneity.

Last week I was studiously reading my new issue of Bon Appetit and came across an article about Christina Tosi, the pastry chef at Momofuku Milk Bar, and her indulgent recipes. With words like Crack Pie, Chocolate-Malt Cake and Blueberry & Cream Cookies springing off the pages it was all I could do not to drop everything and make all three right then and there. I love desserts like these, ones that are unfussy and indulgent with a child-like quality, and I was thrilled to see that someone at such a high-end restaurant shared this sentiment.

Here you’ll see that I decided to do a riff on Tosi’s cookie recipe, using dried cherries instead of blueberries. I also opted to make it more Naptime Chef-friendly, cutting the chilling time by two-thirds. Of course, if you want to chill the dough for 24 hours or more, feel free to do so. I decided to work with my usual time table, mixing dough during naptime and baking it after my daughter went to sleep. I could have, however, waited to bake them the following day at naptime if I’d preferred. Tosi’s recipe calls for a few large cookies, but I like small drop cookies for home eating. I played with the baking time to compensate for the smaller cookie size and it worked like a charm.

The speed at which these disappeared from the OXO Good Grips container on my kitchen counter has to be a record-breaker for my household. The chewy texture and smooth milky taste was so unique all three of us went nuts. Each cookie perfectly encapsulates the flavors of cherries, cream and butter. My daughter is a berry nut and kept asking begging and pleading for more, often negotiating them as a reward for my requests that she pick her her toys and use her “indoor voice.” I couldn’t blame here for trying, we all were looking for excuses to have just one more.