I like the idea of nationalized standards for a variety of reasons, but I find the Common Core extremely overwhelming. For our Chancellor’s Day Professional Development, I’ve been asked to lead the afternoon humanities workshop. We’re meant to analyze a Common Core-aligned task and ask ourselves about how it aligns to the standards and this new Cognitive Rigor Matrix, a re-imagining of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning, which should look almost annoyingly familiar to any current-or-aspiring teachers who read this. The amount of preparation I’ve had to do for this PD is staggering; the sheer amount of reading material required just to understand these standards is overwhelming in itself. When I begin to think about teaching with these standards in mind, I almost fall into a fit. My students can barely write a complete paragraph, let alone smoothly incorporate and clearly explain text evidence (a huge part of the new ELA standards) to support their ideas.

I’m not quite sure what I hope to accomplish in posting about this.

Fellow teachers, what do you think of the Common Core? How do you think it will change your teaching? Do you think it’s an improvement on older standards?

Anyone else, please also feel free to weigh in or ask questions! I need to keep the Common Core on my mind, as I plan this PD (and work toward helping revise my district’s English curriculum).

I was doing this Bon Appetit detox.  For four days, I lived on vegetables, whole grains, yogurt, and beans. I really wanted to see if maybe I was lactose intolerant or gluten intolerant, since I so often suffer from stomach problems.  Then, on Friday,   I ate Cheese Doodles and Fritos and drank a lot of beer.  Eating those chips is especially ridiculous, since I almost never eat chips in my regular life anyway.

Yesterday, I resolved to do it my own way. I’m going to just make sure I avoid processed food and seriously cut back on dairy. As Chris pointed out, I don’t really want to learn that I’m intolerant to gluten or lactose. Let’s be real. I’d never totally cut them out of my diet anyway.

I did, however,  add some delicious recipes to my repertoire; I’ll post a list to follow.

Tonight’s dinner came from a blogger I like. She didn’t list the amount of stock required; I used equal parts stock and wine. It was delicious, and I’m definitely going to use Keller’s technique with chicken in the future (sear until brown, bake, broil). The skin was crisp and the whole thing was super moist and flavorful. A success!

Back to work tomorrow, so don’t judge me if I take a Tylenol PM at like 9:30…

Chris also attempted Mark Bittman’s homemade crackers today. They were good, but we still need to tinker with the recipe. So stay tuned!

• 2 regular-sized cans chickpeas/garbanzos, drained
• 1-2 tbsp. lemon juice
• 2-3 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 tbsp. paprika or cumin
• 2-3 garlic cloves, smashed
• Salt and pepper to taste

(1) Bring a small pot of water to a boil (enough to cover both cans of beans)

(2) Boil beans for 10-15 minutes, until you see a lot of bean skins floating atop the water

(3) Drain beans, reserving a few ladle-fulls of cooking water, and rinse with cold water. Peel skins off the beans. If you miss a few skins, this is no big deal, but this tedious step is what makes the hummus creamy enough without the use of much olive oil.

(4) Pulse beans and garlic in the food processor with a splash of the water. Pulse. Add water until you reach something just a touch grainier than your desired texture, and then add olive oil to make your hummus the perfect smooth consistency.

(5) Add lemon juice and spices/herbs, pulse, and taste, adding more spices as needed. Remember: you can add more salt/pepper/herbs! You can’t remove any.

Serve with carrots, celery, and/or pita.

We bought some frozen ahi (or yellowfin) tuna steaks at Trader Joe’s for $4.50, whole wheat couscous, basil, and feta.

I figured I’d flavor the couscous with some leftover canned diced tomato, heated quickly over a lot of sauteed garlic, crumble in some feta, and top the whole thing with basil. This side dish worked reasonably well, and was very quick. I don’t think the feta flavor really seeped into the whole dish. A meltier mozzarella or even goat’s cheese might have been a smarter choice.

I looked up strategies for cooking the tuna steaks, and decided to sear them on my non-stick griddle pan, sprayed lightly with olive oil,  for about 2-3 minutes a side. I brushed a little olive oil on the steaks (hastily defrosted, in their wrapper, under cold running water in the sink… Chris forgot to refrigerate them to thaw!) and salted and peppered them liberally.  Chris’s larger steak was fairly tasty, though the texture was  bit tough.  Mine, though, was nearly inedibly fishy and tough. I’m not sure whether this is a result of the thawing method, overcooking, or what? Thoughts?

Tonight, I’m back in the game, and I’m creating a quick recipe for some (alas, frozen) yellowfin tuna steaks Chris and I bought, feta, tomato, and couscous. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Today, I’m making this vegetable stock. I think I’ll make a lentil soup one day, maybe with some chicken sausage. I’m also going to use the stock to make a meatless chili this week, which we can reuse for a taco night, too. I almost bought El Paso refried beans, but have you ever looked at the ingredients?! It has a ton of chemicals, and lard, which probably is why it’s so delicious. And gross. We’re going to Jeffrey’s Meats tomorrow to pick up something for Sunday dinner.

We still have some tofu to use up. Any suggestions? We’re having trouble finding appealing tofu recipes.