Julia, who?

With all the hype about Meryl Streep's new movie, Julie & Julia (about famed chef, Julia Child), and the success of shows such as Bravo's Top Chef and Food Nework's Iron Chef, it's no wonder that food is on my mind! I've recently begun typing of the recipes of Nana, my amazing and adorable grandma, who I'm fortunate enough to live with at home. After a few years of—okay, more like ever since I've been able to type—her asking me to take the time to learn her dishes and write them down, I figured if not now, then when? You see, my grandma is not just a grandma who cooks because my father cannot (because he's actually great, especially on the grill), but because she loves to cook and because she's unbelievable at it. This woman is an old-school cook, one who makes the créme de la créme of all of the homemade favorites, the italian classics, the french treats. The woman just does it all. She can whip up anything from the most simple of ingredients, without any of those bullshit garnishes and herbs, to the most decadent of dishes. Her best include an out of this world chicken cutlet, spinach, and prosciutto combo, mean braised lamb shoulder chops, the most authentic baked ziti or meatballs and sausages (with tomato sauce made from scratch) you've tasted from here to Sicily, and tomato tarts. She even slaves in the kitchen for hours every two weeks to make homemade SOUP. Chicken, beef, or vegetable soup. From scratch. I have eaten her soup almost once a day since I was old enough to eat and hands down, with all of the amazing restaurants I've been in around the world, this soup is the best damn soup I've ever had in my life. But, even so, I couldn't name you a favorite dish if I tried. The only ingredient she always uses, without fail, is…love. Seriously, she would tell me time after time as a child that her food tastes so good because she not only loves to cook for people, but she loves the people she cooks for. I was always reminded to "add a pinch of love" with every meal. And, going through her cook book to type it up so I'll always have it, I realized just how serious she was about adding love. At the end of every recipe written in her half french, half broken english, is the phrase, "Serve with love," or simply, "Enjoy!" And it's the truth. Over the past few years, I've really started to enjoy cooking and creating my own delicacies from scratch (although they are almost always out of her cook book) and I noticed that nothing makes me happier than to cook for my friends, who at school, have even dubbed me "Chef Steph." I've gotten so into her recipes that I've decided to take this project a whole step further: Instead of just copying them, I'm going to actually publish a book for her on LuLu.Com, complete with all of her best recipes, photos of her dishes, and little stories about us cooking together. I can't wait until it's complete and I can give it to her because I cannot imagine how happy it will make her, knowing that her granddaughter is finally taking an interest in one of her true loves in life.

My grandma and I last week in Corsica:

Once I put everything together and try out each dish for myself, I'm going to post some of my favorite recipes for all of you to try! I am really not biased when I say you have not eaten until you've had Nana's cooking.

xxxx and with a little love thrown in,

little monster

And if I die before I wake...

I was rummaging around on the internet today, bored while waiting for dinner, and came across this quote: "The worst mistake you can make is to think you're alive when you're really asleep in life's waiting room." - Waking Life (2001). It really stuck out to me and got me thinking about all of the things I've achieved in my short albeit crazy life and all of the things I want do in my lifetime. I have compiled a list of 25 things (in no particular order) I must do before I die:

1. Clone myself

2. Live in Europe, preferably in Paris so I can visit all of my cousins on a daily basis

3. Go cage diving in an exotic location with Great White Sharks

4. Publish a novel

5. Go to law school and get my degree in entertainment law (p.s. countdown to LSATs: 2 months!)

6. Open up a club in New York City, although my real dream would be to reopen Studio 54 or at least a club in 54's space so I can finished what my dad started

7. Launch my clothing website because the idea is really rad

8. Go to the Super Bowl when The Jets are playing (AND THEY WILL! DON'T TALK SHIT)

9. Have my lawyer write up a rock-solid prenup for whatever idiot gets conned into marrying me

10. Have Giambattista Valli create a shoe and name it after me, like he did for Victoria Beckham, lucky bitch

11. Have a guest spot on my favorite show, Weeds, preferably as the girlfriend of Silas, but I'm okay with playing a drug dealer, too

12. Compile a book of my Nana's recipes, because trust me, you haven't eaten until you've devoured her sauce and meatballs

13. Open up another club in Paris or St. Tropez because my club in New York is doing just oh so well!

14. Make someone's day, like for real though

15. Create a beer aimed at the ladies because there is nothing more annoying in life than a girl who proclaims that she "just doesn't drink beer, it's gross"

16. Learn to let go and be more personal and open with people I can trust

17. Trek across Japan and see how it's done over there

18. Marry Hugh Laurie but make him ditch his real self in favor of his American accent and pill popping persona of Dr. House

19. Find a way to go back in time so I can film what going to a private school in New York City's really like in order to tell Bravo and NYC Prep to shove it up their asses

20. Learn to DJ and spin with the best of the best

21. Get another tattoo, maybe of a favorite quote, or the music bar & notes of my favorite song

22. Find the balls to tell people how I really feel about them. I'm emotionally retarded only when it comes to good feelings

23. Own a Porsche Cayman in pearl white

24. Find a way to block off all bridges and tunnels from Westchester, Long Island, Staten Island, and New Jersey, into the city every Thursday night-Sunday morning so all guidos and wannabe guidos and trash can STOP invading my luxurious nightlife! Stay in Perth Amboy or party at Hofstra, for Christsake!

25. Adopt a baby pitbull and name her Smurf

Brief list and maybe I'll add it to at some point. Btw, I'm really serious about #1, #24 and #18!

Bisous, bisous,

little monster

There is no "I" in team.

At our daily 3 hour dinner last night whilst in Corsica, I was told that my two present cousins, Bernard et Marie-Christine, just celebrated their forty-sixth anniversary! 46th! Shocked, I then asked my Great-Aunt, Ta Ta Mauricette, how long she had been with her husband before he passed a few years back. "A month shy of fifty years," she told me. My Grandma then said that had my Poppy Jack not passed the year I was born, they would have been together for—wait for it...sixty-six years! I almost chocked on my vin rouge. YES, my grandma was just seventeen when she married and they had made it all the way through. Unfathomable! My sister remarked that she wants to marry someone for the rest of her life, too (I mean, it's not like anyone goes into a marriage saying "Okay, for the next 4.5 years, you're mine, then adios!" but I digress). Me? Not so much. I mean, sure, maybe a "life partner," whatever that truly means. But I never saw myself walking down the aisle. I want a kid, maaaaybe two, but not really a husband. Men are just too much trouble, if you ask me. I really cannot envision myself in forty years with the same dude. I can't even stay with someone more than a few months if it's really committed, without going crazy. I always seem to lose myself when I've been in serious relationships for some reason. Maybe it's the men that I've chosen to date, maybe not, but I want to be me with a man, not who he thinks I am. So, in light of this, I have decided to create a list of things I love about being single versus being attached.

Wild & Free:

the ability to go from guy to guy to guy to...hah!, going out with the girls whenever I want, getting to hang out with the guys all of the time without having someone complain that I have "too many men in my life," dressing up to get the attention of the entire club, being myself and not having to change for somebody, not having to deal with his family and inevitably, his sure to be crazy mother!, acting like a total girl while waiting for his call and then having too much fun picking out the perfect outfit for date night...

Significant Other:

having somebody to curl up with on a rainy sunday, having a constant dinner companion, not having to shave my legs everyday, knowing he will be there no matter what the situation is, taking a quick romantic getaway or vacation in a luxurious suite...

There are obviously pros and cons of the single life and being in a relationship, but for now I'm really so happy to not have anybody to answer to. I've had to do that two too many times in my young life and I'm so over it! In 65 years, I'd rather be toasting to me and all of the lucky bastards I've met along the way :)

bisous, bisous!

little monster