"dad" news and stories

I'm back in my hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota, staying with my parents for Thanksgiving. I decided to have a little rummage through their cupboards to see what kind of weird stuff might be in there, and I was not disappointed! If you're home for the holidays, I suggest you do the same.

Click through the gallery to see the individual items. We have everything from vintage baking cups (right) to inedible cookie decorations. Next time my mother wants to know what's wrong with me, I'm going to say "Silver dragees, Mom. They messed me up for good."

Enjoy, and Happy Thanksgiving!

• 
• Maintain your veggie garden, and more from the Neighborhood Garden Project
• Zhi tea? Yes, please
• Applebee's: Eatin' green in the neighborhood
• Show dad you love him with liquor that leaves no eco-footprint
• The end of an abundant era?
  
• Freaky but factual: Chinese animal parks selling tiger bone wine as tonic

When kids are very young, they often want to emulate what their parents are doing. For example, if Mom and Dad are preparing dinner, Junior will want to be involved. Unfortunately, while cultivating an interest in food - especially homemade food, as opposed to fast food - is a wonderful thing for a child, they can occasionally get in the way of the chef.

An easy solution is to assign your child age-appropriate tasks that they can do with little to no supervision once they have been shown how to do it in the first place. Real Simple offers a helpful list of such tasks, sorted by age, so your kids can join in the cooking process. Here are a few of their suggestions:

5 and over

• Retrieve ingredients from the pantry or refrigerator.
• Wash vegetables and fruits.
• Stir together dry ingredients.
• Smash crackers into crumbs.
• Set the table.

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It's hard to say precisely why grilling and golf seem to be the two most popular themes for Father's Day, but we're not complaining because this BBQ set is fantastic. The 5-piece set was designed with golf in mind, for someone who loves the sport but also likes to cook. All the handles are soft and insulated, modeled after the handles on real clubs, and top cylindrical, stainless steel shafts that end in the grilling tools. There is a spatula shaped like a club, grilling fork and tongs that have a remarkably golf ball-like look to them. In addition, the set includes two plastic golf ball salt and pepper shakers.

 

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With Father's Day only one week away, I'm going to aim to pick out cookbooks that would make good gifts for Dads - by which I mean that they will often have words such as "manly", "man" or "dad" in them. Case in point, today's cookbook is Patio Daddy-O: '50's recipes with a Modern Twist. "Daddy-o," if you're not familiar with the term, was a word that originated in about 1950 that hip guys (i.e. not "squares") used to refer to each other. The recipes in the book have adorable names that evoke truly retro cookbooks, but are updated in their ingredient lists and methodology to make dishes much more appealing than Perfection Salad. For example, how do "Slab o' Fun Barbecued Meat Loaf", "Uncle Bob's Peanut Butter Sandwiches with Texas Sweets" and "Rock 'n' Rollin BBQ Baby Back Ribs" sound? Nostalgic? Fun? Delicious? They are all the recipes that you wish your family made but never actually did. Pour a martini or an "Atomic Cocktail," fire up the Weber grill and enjoy.

I also want to point out that Amazon has a used price listed for the book of 1¢. It's hard to go wrong at that price, even if you still have to pay for shipping.

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