What We’re Cooking Sundays: The (Late) Red Snapper, Lies, Lies, Lies Edition

Regrets Collect Like Old Friends…

Yep. I’m still listening to Florence the Machine. This is 10 straight days of constant play. I’m good. No, really. It’s not bothering anyone. I can quite anytime I want.

Remember way back when, about 6 days ago, when I was going to post a “What We’re Cooking Sunday” and had both red snapper AND energy?

Yeah, me neither.

The last thing I remember was sitting at the kitchen table, eating dinner with A and saying that we should watch a few episodes of ‘The Walking Dead’ – the next thing you know, it’s today and the week has bruised and battered a lot of people in ways big and small. Sometimes, that battering was, quite literal. Yes, I’m talking about myself and yes, I did draw blood again while fishing yesterday. It is not, however, my fault. No one told those rose bushes to be full of thorns, or to be the only thing I could grab onto before I took yet another fall.

I’d like to say that I’m not clumsy, but it’s possible that would be a lie and I have decided to stop lying.

And there, friends and neighbors, is the official intro to this post. What if I told you lots of people lie every day? Would you be shocked or surprised that I’m just now figuring this out? Maybe I’m not ‘just’ figuring it out. Maybe, more important than most things I’ve learned over the years, I’m actually too old to not notice. There, I put it out there: At 42, I’m too old.

I thought that forever and ever and ever, I’d have all of the patience in the world to separate out people who lie for small reasons and those who lie for big ones. Those who cheat at life and still get ahead, those who make everyone else look bad while they come out winning. Those who use their kids to present one face to the world all the while, way back in the shadows where no one is really looking, they are absolutely not cool peeps. Not cool at all.

I’m not sure what it is about lying, to be honest, that makes so many of us do it. I lie about my hair color and weight every time I take out my driver’s license. And just the other day I lied when I said I was fine being friends with someone I used to date, way back in the prehistoric era of my love life. I also lied when I said I wouldn’t actually buy anything today at Orvis. But I feel like that’s the kind of lie that is really not a lie because it’s so transparent. Of course I’m going to buy something. That’s why they made Orvis in the first place.

But lying – why in the hell do so many people do it? Why is it that on a clear (or not so clear day) I can see people lying to the people they like or love, while insisting the lies aren’t lies? What are they? Truths? What if everyone stopped lying for a day? What would happen? Would there be less regret in the world? Are most regrets built on a mixture of lying (maybe to yourself, maybe to someone else) or are regrets even bigger than lies? I just don’t know. I do know that most people who lie get so used to it that it’s not even second nature – it just is. It’s a lot like acting at life. I act (lie) therefore you think I’m pretty amazing. By ‘I’ I’m not talking about me, the writer of this blog, I’m talking about everyone.

And why, on a Saturday night, am I thinking about lying? I don’t know! I think I’m really thinking about Easter and fresh starts and renewal and spring and things like that. And I also think that I’ve been reading a lot by Gala Darling lately and contemplating a coven, or at least some radical focused writing and when you start to think about renewals and spring, you have to think about what you’re leaving behind.

And the way the universe works is that when you’re right in the middle of solving your own riddles, you see someone else is thinking the same thing. And with that, I leave you with a tweet from Marc Lamont Hill from earlier this morning. Read it, swish it around in your head and then burn that thought and get ready for some spring time renewals.

“The liar’s punishment is not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else.” – George Bernard Shaw

#Damnit.

The fish, the fish, the fish. Here’s what I can tell you: It was delicious. The recipe is ridiculously easy and works even if you don’t like to leave the head and tail on your fish (we do). Here’s what you need:

1 red snapper per person (no, we’re not greedy, they were small, I swear. This time)

1 red onion, julienne sliced

1 jalapeno pepper, chopped (leave the seeds in for more heat)

1 tomato, diced (you don’t need me to extol on heirloom vs not, so just do the right thing like Spike Lee)

2 knobs of ginger (do we even know what a knob is?)

1 whole garlic bulb. Yes, 1 whole bulb, chopped

¼ cup chopped cilantro

2 lemons, sliced

Rinse the fish and place in an oven-proof baking dish. Take just enough olive oil and sea salt to lightly bathe the fish (this is me being tender). Take the mixture of chopped and diced veggies and spices above and toss together in a bowl. Spoon the mixture into each fish, overfilling so that your fish look, well, full.

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 10 minutes (that’s it!), covered in foil.

We served our fish with wilted spinach in a garlic and fish sauce glaze and jasmine rice with Meyer lemons but don’t let us dictate what you make since we can’t keep to a schedule lately.

Next up. The happiness of ‘thank you.’

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