You Say It's Your Birthday

My birthday is this week.  Growing up, we had a tradition.  The birthday girl got to choose either the dinner my mother would cook or the restaurant we would go to.  I have continued this tradition with my family.  Sarah and Matt love going out to eat, so for their birthdays we have fun dinners out.  I much prefer eating at home, but here is where this system breaks down.

I am the primary cook for the family, so I end up cooking my own birthday dinner.  I don't mind cooking dinner; I do it nearly every night.  But somehow cooking my own birthday dinner takes some of the charm out of the tradition.  Matt can cook and has cooked many a dinner, but his repertoire is all meat-based (meatballs, chili, ribs) and while all that stuff is delicious, it is not how I want to eat now.  On top of that, my birthday fell in the middle of the week.  Matt works crazy hours, so unless I wanted to eat at 10 pm, I was cooking dinner.

I made pancakes.  I decided it only made sense to continue one childhood tradition with another - breakfast for dinner!

Pancakes for Everyone!

I worried that going vegetarian would force me to change a lot of the traditions my family keeps involving food.  Today is one that does not need to change at all - National Pancake Day!  The story goes that prior to the dietary restrictions imposed during Lent, Catholics would use up the eggs, butter and milk that had on hand for pancakes on Shrove Tuesday.  I don't know if this is true, but I do know that we always have pancakes for dinner on the day before Ash Wednesday.

When I was little, I thought breakfast for dinner was such a treat.  We were breaking the rules!  We were being food rebels!  As an adult, I realize breakfast for dinner was my mother's way of getting around the problem of not getting to the store or forgetting to defrost something "better" for dinner.  For today, I am going to think about food the way I did when I was a kid.  Tonight we are having pancakes for dinner and there is no guilt or worry allowed.  Pass the syrup!