Introduction to Injera, or Why Soothing Boys with Food Doesn't ALWAYS work
My son had his lower-central braces put on recently and was one hurtin' cowboy. Couldn't really open his mouth, couldn't eat in his usual voracious style, couldn't this and couldn't that--he was a pathetic little thing.
We decided the best remedy would be an old-fashioned Gillen-and-Mommy excursion. Nothing was alleviating the pain, so we figured a good distraction would get his mind off of it. He has always loved the Page Museum/La Brea Tar Pits.
Sooooooooooooooooo . . . off we went. As you approach the Tar Pits/Art Museum area on Wilshire, you go through a congested strip of Fairfax known as Little Ethiopia. It's crowded and frustrating to drive, but also colorful and interesting.
As we were oooching along, one car length at a time (the traffic-light cycles up there have to be set by the criminally insane), I said "Hey, sweetie, after the Tar Pits and Museum, let's stop in one of these restaurants and order something--we'll cut it up REALLY small so you can sort of squinch it into your mouth sideways--you can angle the fork just the right way so you won't have to open your mouth too widely."
He moaned something resembling "yeaaaaahhhhh, gloouhhuood idheaalllhhh."
And we ooched forward another car length.
All of a sudden, he sat up, loudly proclaimed extreme and critical hunger, and said "Let's do the food thing NOW and the museum after we eat, okay?"
God was obviously smiling upon me, because there was a parking place RIGHT THERE. On Fairfax? On a Saturday at noonish? I shoved my way-too-big car into the spot and we chose a restaurant called Rosalind's. (Son picked it because it was RIGHT THERE; he had no interest in wandering from restaurant to restaurant reading menus and doing a comparison or downselect.)
Fine with me--it was more or less supposed to be his day anyhow, so into Rosalind's we went.
We were greeted warmly and shown to a table. The place was pretty--all decorated in black and yellow fabric, just lovely. I was trying to take in the sights and smells; Son was rabidly reading the menu--the outside cover of which was a lengthy explanation of Ethiopian dining customs, which Do.Not.Include.Utensils!!!!!
Yeah. Groovy. JUST the ticket for a boy with a sore mouth, who'd spent no little amount of effort playing with his "air fork" to determine the best geometry for delivering tons of food to the mouth without causing additional pain. The fork's narrow tines were going to enable a big ol' airlift of chow right to the gaping maw and the boy wouldn't die, he'd reasoned.
Mmmmmmmmm-hmmmm. Ethiopia had other ideas.
Ethiopian food is served sans utensils but with a spongy bread called injera. The injera is used as a "scoop" to pick up the food and deliver it to the mouth. Evidently one is an accomplished Ethiopian eater if one can get through a meal with clean fingers.
As an incidental matter, we both fell madly in love with the food. My beef dish was just fabulous, as was Son's chicken something-or-another. There was a vegetable mixture of some sort--also good--and a sweet, spicy puree served as well. All were delicious.
And he did manage to figure out the injera technique well enough to prevent death by starvation.
We decided the best remedy would be an old-fashioned Gillen-and-Mommy excursion. Nothing was alleviating the pain, so we figured a good distraction would get his mind off of it. He has always loved the Page Museum/La Brea Tar Pits.
Sooooooooooooooooo . . . off we went. As you approach the Tar Pits/Art Museum area on Wilshire, you go through a congested strip of Fairfax known as Little Ethiopia. It's crowded and frustrating to drive, but also colorful and interesting.
As we were oooching along, one car length at a time (the traffic-light cycles up there have to be set by the criminally insane), I said "Hey, sweetie, after the Tar Pits and Museum, let's stop in one of these restaurants and order something--we'll cut it up REALLY small so you can sort of squinch it into your mouth sideways--you can angle the fork just the right way so you won't have to open your mouth too widely."
He moaned something resembling "yeaaaaahhhhh, gloouhhuood idheaalllhhh."
And we ooched forward another car length.
All of a sudden, he sat up, loudly proclaimed extreme and critical hunger, and said "Let's do the food thing NOW and the museum after we eat, okay?"
God was obviously smiling upon me, because there was a parking place RIGHT THERE. On Fairfax? On a Saturday at noonish? I shoved my way-too-big car into the spot and we chose a restaurant called Rosalind's. (Son picked it because it was RIGHT THERE; he had no interest in wandering from restaurant to restaurant reading menus and doing a comparison or downselect.)
Fine with me--it was more or less supposed to be his day anyhow, so into Rosalind's we went.
We were greeted warmly and shown to a table. The place was pretty--all decorated in black and yellow fabric, just lovely. I was trying to take in the sights and smells; Son was rabidly reading the menu--the outside cover of which was a lengthy explanation of Ethiopian dining customs, which Do.Not.Include.Utensils!!!!!
Yeah. Groovy. JUST the ticket for a boy with a sore mouth, who'd spent no little amount of effort playing with his "air fork" to determine the best geometry for delivering tons of food to the mouth without causing additional pain. The fork's narrow tines were going to enable a big ol' airlift of chow right to the gaping maw and the boy wouldn't die, he'd reasoned.
Mmmmmmmmm-hmmmm. Ethiopia had other ideas.
Ethiopian food is served sans utensils but with a spongy bread called injera. The injera is used as a "scoop" to pick up the food and deliver it to the mouth. Evidently one is an accomplished Ethiopian eater if one can get through a meal with clean fingers.
As an incidental matter, we both fell madly in love with the food. My beef dish was just fabulous, as was Son's chicken something-or-another. There was a vegetable mixture of some sort--also good--and a sweet, spicy puree served as well. All were delicious.
And he did manage to figure out the injera technique well enough to prevent death by starvation.
posted by jillsifer | September 11, 2010
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