Mini-Ep 397: Make Friends, Host A Party
Doree and Elise talk weeknight dinners, hosting as a way to expand your social circle, and the Trader Joe’s staples they both recommend.
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Transcript
Doree: Hello and welcome to Forever35, a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I'm Doree Shafrir.
Elise: And I'm Elise Hu. And we are just two friends who like to talk a lot about serums.
Doree: It's true. And this is a mini episode where we hear from you, we share your comments and thoughts and questions, and we answer your questions to the best of our ability with that caveat that we are not medical or mental health professionals. And we might say, Hey, this is above our pay grade. You got to consult the professionals here. But thank you to people who have sent in questions. I realized that we are recording this before the first new mini episode actually came out. So I was kind of mining our old voicemails and emails and texts for questions. So please do send in those questions at Forever35podcast@gmail.com or call or text us at (781)591-0390eight one five nine one zero three nine zero. And just a reminder that the Forever35 Patreon is new and improved
Elise: Always. We're putting lots of stuff out on there.
Doree: We're putting a lot of stuff out on the Patreon. It's at patreon.com/forever35. We have a fun little PDF with our skincare routines that's available to everyone who is a paid subscriber. As a little thank you for being a Patreon supporter, you can also buy that if you're not a Patreon supporter, it's five bucks. If you buy it on the Patreon website, I think it's $7.50. If you buy it through the app because of Apple charges for five bucks a month, you get all of our bonus conversations, you get our casual chats, you get our fun new Forever35 questionnaire that we're doing with all of our guests. We're going to be doing monthly pop culture and book recs on the Patreon and more to come. So check that out. And then at $10 a month, you also get ad free episodes and we will give you a shout out on the podcast each and every month.
Elise: I'm psyched to do that.
Doree: Me too. I love doing that. So today, I thought before we get to our listeners, and I have to admit, this was kind of selfish of me because I always do this hoping to get ideas, but I wanted to talk about go-to easy weeknight dinners because I feel like it's a lot to dinner
Elise: To meal prep and plan. It sure is. It is.
Doree: So, yeah. And I don't eat red meat, which limits things and I feel,
Elise: but do you eat fish?
Doree: I do eat fish and I do eat chicken. So that kind of opens things up a little bit. But it's not a wide array. And the last time I took Henry to Henry saw his pediatrician a few weeks ago for his five-year checkup, and his iron was low. And I was like, oh no, it's because I'm not giving him animal protein.
Elise: But there's so many ways to get iron besides red meat
Doree: I know, I know. I know. I know. But anyway,
Elise: It's not you, Doree. You're doing great. You're doing great.
Doree: Thank you.
Elise: You got to remind yourself.
Doree: Do you have go-to weeknight dinners? What are your weeknights like?
Elise: My weeknights are crazed because my eldest daughter dances like 15 hours a week.
Doree: Oh god.
Elise: And then also plays volleyball. And so she has volleyball practice one week or twice a week. And then my middle daughter has her series of activities, her theater and her choir, and she also dances. And then my youngest daughter plays soccer, so it's crazy. It's hard to get all of us together for dinner as it is, but I try to at least reserve two nights where they don't have activities during the week nights. So Monday nights and Thursday nights, we usually have at least a quorum, if not everyone. And for those I feel like go-to the kids, all eat salmon. And so we do kind of like a pan seared salmon, just like, and then with rice and just throw rice in the rice cooker.
Doree: Have you ever made the Julia Turian salmon?
Elise: Haven't? Tell me what's special about it.
Doree: It's like a salmon salad. She calls it fancy weeknight salmon salad. You basically, they roast the salmon, bake the salmon in the oven with mushrooms, like chopped mushrooms surrounding the salmon. So they all roast together.
Elise: Yum.
Doree: And then you just like you put cooking spray and salt and pepper on everything, you roast it until the fish is opaque in the center and everything. That all takes about 25 minutes. And then the mushrooms are nice and brown and delicious. And then she has a dressing, which is shallots, sugar, red wine vinegar. And then what else?
Elise: But this is already seeming too much for me for a weeknight. Okay. As it's,
Doree: there's Okay. Olive oil, soy sauce, lemon juice, tahini in a large bowl. Okay. Then there's arugula. Then you put, okay, fine. Oh, sorry. The first is
Elise: I'm going to stop you right there.
Doree: The first thing is the pickled shallots. And then the second one is the dressing. It's not that I get it though. It's not super easy, but maybe this would be a more ambitious
Elise: weekend.
Doree: Weekend thing. Yes.
Elise: Because we do just a simple teriyaki glaze
Doree: yum.
Elise: It is a homemade teriyaki glaze, do soy sauce, a little fish sauce, and then sugar, and then just kind of throw that over the salmon while it's grilling in the pan. And then the rice, we just cook in a rice cooker. And so we have salmon, we have rice, and then they do kind of vegetable. So I'll just chop up some bell peppers.
Doree: Oh, nice.
Elise: Chop up baby cucumbers. Those mini Persian cucumbers and then grape tomatoes. And they just choose and they get some vegetables. They get their rice, they get their salmon, and then we're out the door.
Doree: Okay.
Elise: What about you? What are you doing for your GoTo?
Doree: So tonight we are having one of our classic dinners, which is Turkey burgers.
Elise: Oh Yeah, yeah. My partner, Rob loves that as a go-to, he's always like Turkey Burgers.
Doree: Yeah. It's just such a crowd pleaser. And they're delicious. I just make them with egg, panco, salt and pepper, and we always have cheese on them.
Elise: Are you smashing your Turkey burgers? Are you doing Turkey burger, smash burger?
Doree: They're not smashed. They're just kind of sauteed. But we also really like the brioche hamburger buns from Trader Joe's.
Elise: Trader Joe's, yes. Those are legit,
Doree: they're delicious. And then some red onion and some avocado. I don't get crazy with the toppings. And then either I will do a roasted cauliflower or roasted broccoli or salad in a bag.
Elise: If I could get my kids to eat salad in a bag, that would be my go-to. But they do love a quick roasted broccoli and cauliflower just on the pan in the oven. Totally 400 degrees.
Doree: The other thing that is a big crowd pleaser in our house is chicken parm, which I made last night and is not hard. And then I found this recipe from the kitchen, which is cheesy skillet chicken parm meatballs.
Elise: Oh, I could get down with that.
Doree: That were so good. They were really good. I was really excited about these. So it's kind of like chicken parm, but in another form. And I just love a melted cheese situation.
Elise: Costco has amazing chicken meatballs. They actually won a balloting because I have a holiday party around Christmas and Hanukkah called Deck the balls. And the theme of deck, the balls is it is a ball themed potluck. Everybody has to bring spherical foods. So there's cheese balls, there's rice balls, there's cake balls. People get really creative. Somebody made chicken pot pie balls where the outside was puff pastry. And then inside was the filling. And it's a competition. There's a balloting, there's best sweet balls, best savory balls, and then balls. I just like licking. And so that's kind of the generic category. And I didn't want to get fancy because I was hosting the party. And so for my potluck item, I just heated up chicken meatballs from Costco. I'm going to have to find the brand. But that won, it won the generic category.
Doree: Oh my.
Elise: They're on, Yeah, they have been voted on by a crowd of assembled guests.
Doree: Wow. Okay.
Elise: I'm going to have to look up what the brand was because a real crowd favorite.
Doree: Wow. Amazing. I love that. Do you have anything else that is a real weeknight go to for you
Elise: Besides just eating out? Just grabbing something that the children really enjoy is getting to kind of have choice in what they're eating. And so taco nights are good, or a noodle bar is good. So we'll do cold noodles and then sesame cold noodle, which is a very easy dish, and they can dress the noodles how they want. And so there's various toppings. We'll do egg ribbons, sliced up cucumbers, yum, and chicken. And then you can just add, just top your noodles how you want, and then you can make your sauce. So you can do soy sauce, sesame sauce, or the dressing or sesame oil, soy sauce, or the sesame dressing, and you can mix it to taste. And so they like doing things where if we do a taco night, they can make their own tacos. They can choose what they put in them, they can top it how they want. And so any stuff like that we do fairly frequently Because it's easy.
Doree: Yes. I love a sort of choose your own adventure kind of situation. I would love to hear from our listeners if whether or not they have children, what their go-to weeknight dinner situation is. Are you cooking? What are you cooking? I mean, I made a real resolution this year to cut down on my takeout just because it was just getting very expensive and we're not driving around with activities every, you know what I mean? We were at home, so it was like there's no reason why we should be,
Elise: why we, yeah.
Doree: So I'm really trying to always expand my repertoire because otherwise I just want my son to eat. So I will make stuff that he likes, but if I only made stuff that he likes, it would be like ravioli, mac and cheese. He doesn't even really pizza anymore. Burgers, breakfast for dinner, which means pancakes or waffles. It's not like any of these are bad. It's just like I get very bored of them.
Elise: You don't want to eat breakfast for dinner all the time.
Doree: I don't want to eat breakfast for dinner all the time. Maybe once a month, but he wants it once a week. So anyway. Alright, let us know. Yeah, let us know. Forever35podcast@gmail.com or (781) 591-0390. All right, we will be right back. Okay, we are back and we have a voicemail.
Voicemail: Hi Doree and Elise, this is Lila from Kansas City, Missouri. Welcome, Elise. I'm really excited. I'm excited to have your point view on here, especially being somebody who has been on the dating app in the last few years, especially has somebody who is 40 and has been on the app. I did meet a long-term partner on Tinder. We are no longer together, but it was in a weird time. And yeah, it's nice to hear that somebody else is actually has that point of view also about social meeting people socially at work. I was predominantly freelance for half my career. I'm currently freelance now, and I was freelance in my twenties and it was isolating. But one of the things that kind of got me through was doing a lot of after work activities, like going to lectures or going to things that caught my interest and taking classes was the number one thing that really got me to expand my social circle. But another thing that really helped at the time was Twitter and that so many friends on Twitter, many I still keep in touch with and been in touch with for 15 years. And recently around the pandemic time, I joined a paid slack group for a club online. And the online club ran a business where the company shuttered down. So the people in the group made a new group and we've all kept in touch. And it's like I check their daily and we have virtual meetups and groups and stuff, and I'm hoping to meet some of those girls in real life. But I feel like my social relationship, and I know I'm unusual because I'm in my forties, it's a mix of using online, meeting people online and also meeting people in real life. So it is possible. And there have been people like myself who are in their forties that have been doing it. So I just was so long. Love the show. Welcome Elise
Elise: Thank you so much, Lila. And some of what she was talking about followed on our really fun conversation with Sequoia Holmes, who is a Gen Z. And was talking about how now that we don't all go to offices anymore, where do we meet people and where do we find our crew, our squads? It raised some interesting questions and also brought us some nostalgia about how we came to know so many of our close friends was often through work. And so I'm glad to hear Lila, that you are finding so many different ways both online and offline in order to make a social circle and build your friend circles. So that's exciting.
Doree: Yeah, I mean, I do think that people always talk about joining a kickball team in your twenties, and that does feel, that feels kind of young to me, but I feel like there are other activities if you have the time that this color, Lila is 40 that are kind of more age appropriate. I mean age appropriate is a weird term, but if you want to find people more around your age, I think there are other things. And I love that she brought that up, that that's such a good way to meet people. I mean, I will say starting to play tennis in a league, I've met so many people now. I haven't hung out with any of them, but I think that's also because I'm in a different phase of my life at this point where I'm not seeking out new friendships. But I think if I was, I would totally hang out with these people. And in the meantime, I feel like I've made tennis friends.
Elise: Something I'm doing is so often I'll get invited to a birthday party or a drinks hang or something of a friend of mine and then meet their friends. And we have such a good time. I often so many of my friends' friends, but then we don't follow up because it's like, well, we're sort of just friends by association.
Doree: Yeah, Totally.
Elise: And something I want to be more deliberate about is if I do meet friends of friends at parties, at happy hours, at birthdays, I should actually try and exchange information and make friends with the friend's friend.
Doree: That's such a good point. And I think it also raises this bigger picture question of what do adult friendships look like because they don't all look the same. We don't necessarily need to have the same sorts of intense friendships that we had in our twenties or in college. You can have friends that you consider good friends who you see maybe once every couple of months or even less frequently. And I think for some people that can be a difficult transition, especially if they move to a new city and they feel like, oh, I don't have any friends. Well, you might not ever have the same types of friendships that you had in your twenties or in college, but it's a different phase of life now. And I think there's ways to cultivate those other types of friendships in the way that you were just talking about.
Elise: The Other, one thing that this brings to mind is that something that brings me a lot of joy. I'm somebody who wants all my friends to be friends. And so in order to get there, I try and be the organizer or be the host a lot. I don't have a fancy home or anything, but I try to host a lot. I like to have a lot of parties because I want to have an opportunity to invite people who might not be in my inner circle who might be more friends of friends and just say, Hey, everybody come over. It brings people out. They end up making friends with other people, but also they're just happy to be invited. They're happy to be included. And I like giving people that sense of inclusion and that opportunity to maybe get out if they're not getting out too much. So you can host too, Lila. So if you're thinking about, Hey, I've gotten to know all these different people from various activities and various points, you could bring them all together maybe and have a cocktail hour or organize a happy hour outside somewhere, whatever you think or whatever you want. But don't discount the value of just inviting everybody, inviting everybody to things.
Doree: That's such a good point. And I used to love hosting and I just don't host anymore for various reasons. But when I recently had a birthday party that was not at my house, but I guess we technically hosted it, I remember we were, I was going through who should we invite? And I brought up, you know how sometimes there's a group of people and if you invite one of them, you have to invite all of them.
Elise: Yes. This happens with mom groups and dad groups.
Doree: Yes. So this was a group of moms, and I said to Matt, I was like, oh, well, if I invite one of them, I'll often invite all of them. And he was like, just invite them.
Elise: Yeah, invite everybody.
Doree: Just invite them.
Elise: That's my thing.
Doree: And I was like, oh yeah, totally. Why? Who cares? You know what I mean? But I felt like I was kind of almost out of practice and I blame the pandemic and having a child and having a crazy dog and various other things that are surmountable, but also good excuses if I want to just sort of not deal. So I think I need to deal a little bit more. And Matt, it's funny, Matt is definitely more of an introvert than I am, but he knows that, and I don't think I'm a full extrovert. You're much more extroverted than I am. I feel like I lean extrovert, but I'm not a full extrovert.
Elise: Also, different phases of our lives can bring out different parts of our personality, and then different people in our lives can bring out different parts of our personality.
Doree: Yes. But I have expressed to Matt that I would am like, oh, I'm sad that I can't really host people here. And he has been like, why not? To your point of like, well, I don't have a fancy house, and it's not, I feel like I need my house to be fancy, but I'm like, oh, it's not really conducive to hosting. But he's just been like, who cares? Just have people over. And I'm like over, I dunno,
Elise: Nobody is in your guest bath judging your lighting fixtures. You know what I mean? But we are so hard on ourselves. I wanted to get those doorknobs replaced and really updated. Nobody cares.
Doree: Yes.
Elise: People are just so happy to be invited out. So just invite them
Doree: a thousand percent. No, I know. It's funny to me that he's been the one to be like, just do it when he doesn't want to have people over, but he sort of sees that I crave that. You know what I mean? It's Interesting. Anyway,
Elise: Well then he sees you and he's very supportive. I like that.
Doree: He does. He does see me. Lila, thank you for inspiring this conversation.
Elise: Yes, Thanks, Lila.
Doree: All right. We're going to take another quick break and we'll be right back. All right. We are back and we have another voicemail kind of related to something that we talked about at the top of the show. And Elise, this voicemail was left before you started, so it is addressed to Kate and me just FYI.
Elise: Okay.
Doree: Alright, here we go.
Elise: No sweat.
Voicemail: Hey Kat and Dor. You know how at the end of Forever, or sorry, excellent adventure podcast, you often have a Disney segment. Well, I am proposing to you my sweet Doree Shafrir that you have, trader Joe recommendations.
Doree: Hey,
Voicemail: At the end of the Forever35 podcasts, because what is more self-care than a delicious or fantastic trader, Joe Trader Joe, find, I don't know what just the tip, I mean just the tip right now. And it's so good. And then you had your other recommendation, the BOGO thingies, and it's just really life changing and I think it can be short and sweet, but it would really be amazing. You guys are awesome. Thanks for continuing the Pod. Bye-Bye.
Doree: Yay. Okay.
Elise: I love this idea so much.
Doree: I dunno that we're going to have enough content for every week to do a Trader Joe's segment, but I was like, you know what? We can at least start with some Trader Joes recs.
Elise: Sure.
Doree: Now I know it's no Costco, but I feel like you and I both appreciate TJ's
Elise: Confession. I go to Trader Joe's to buy groceries more often than I go to Costco to buy groceries because when I go to Costco, it's an event and I really have to plan for it. And I go to Costco at least once a week, but that's often to get lunch.
Doree: What?
Elise: Because I enjoy my hot dog. Yes. I enjoy my hot dog and 20 ounce meal, 20 ounce drink meal so much for a dollar 50 that after a workout, sometimes I'll just go to Costco and eat outside.
Doree: Wow.
Elise: This is mind boggling. This is blowing. This is mind boggling. To Doree.
Doree: My mind, this is amazing. I love this,
Elise: But for grocery runs, I will often go to Trader Joe's more than Costco. And in fact, because Trader Joe's, and this is kind of the storied and delightful part of Trader Joe's, its products go on and off the shelves. You don't know. And so much stuff is seasonal and you end up loving something and then it disappears and it might be discontinued forever. There's some slot machine aspect to it that makes it really fun and enjoyable. So my first Trader Joe's recommendation is actually an Instagram account called Trader Joe's list, and it's a woman who's here in Marina del Ray. So my neighbor,
Doree: my gosh,
Elise: Who goes to my trader, and she updates you on what's back on the shelves, which seasonal items are there. And then you get to kind of vote and compare the new oils or the new sauces or the new frozen items. And it's my way of learning what's hip and happening at Trader Joe's.
Doree: Wow.
Elise: So that's my first Trader Joe's item, which technically isn't a Trader Joe's. Joe's item. So Doree, I'd love for you to go first and talk about your staples from TJ's.
Doree: Okay. So I still love the Kimbap. Still eat that all the time. There's also the, and I'm sure I'm pronouncing this incorrectly, but they have a new item called the Ju Oak bop.
Elise: Let Me, I haven't seen this yet.
Doree: They're basically like rice.
Elise: What is it?
Doree: They're like rice balls and they have fake meat bulgogi in them.
Elise: Oh, whoa. Okay. Well, we know B means rice, so it has to be rice related.
Doree: Yes, they are rice balls. I do find 'em to be a tad sweet, but they're pretty yummy. Another staple in our house are the soup dumplings. Henry eats the chicken, the chicken soup, dumplings.
Elise: Those are solid.
Doree: I think they also make pork ones. I also really like the chicken cilantro mini wontons. Have you had those?
Elise: I haven't tried those yet. I haven't tried those yet.
Doree: Those are, I will eat half a bag as lunch. They're delicious.
Elise: They're not big bags.
Doree: No, they're not big bags. The che is also really good. The glass noodles with vegetables.
Elise: Yeah. You like the Korean food?
Doree: I like all their Korean stuff.
Elise: You like the Korean food at TJ's?
Doree: Yeah, I know real authentic of me. They also have these scallion pancakes that they call Taiwanese green onion pancakes that I think are very good. Now You are Taiwanese?
Elise: Yes. So does my Taiwanese mom. Yeah. She's like, we got to go to Trader Joe's and see if they have the green onion pancakes. I don't want to make them. She will make them. She will make them from scratch by hand and they're delicious. But then she's sort of like, I don't have to make 'em. If we can just go pick them up at Trader Joe's.
Doree: Okay. I love that. I feel a little better.
Elise: They are Elises Mom approved
Doree: Elise's mom approved. Okay. Now in the non Asian frozen food section, I mentioned the bagged salads, but I think their broccoli and kale salad bag is really good, and something, it has dried cranberries in it. It has pumpkin seeds. Something that I also like to do, if I'm not having it as a side, I will just saute up a chicken breast and have it with the broccoli kale salad. You can also buy their precooked chicken breast strips. My only problem with
Elise: Yes, I've seen that.
Doree: My only problem with those is that it's a pretty large container and if you're just eating for one, I find that I can't eat enough. I can't eat enough of them before they go bad. Their brio hamburger buns are really good. Henry loves their fruit bars, which are just like the apple and mango. Apple and strawberry. Apple and banana. They have a regular mango one. They have a coconut one. They're like 99 cents.
Elise: Yes.
Doree: I think they're fine. He really loves them. I like their maple pecan cereal.
Elise: Haven't tried that.
Doree: It's good.
Elise: Thank you for the wreck.
Doree: I like their pita crackers. We also really like their dark chocolate peanut butter cups in this house.
Elise: Yes, Yes.
Doree: So those are my Trader Joe's staples. And I do find that they tend to have them most of the time. What about you though?
Elise: It's been hard lately for me to find those Taiwanese green onion pancakes.
Doree: Yes, You're right. You're right. They have not been, I think I got them a week ago, but then they weren't there the other day, so maybe. And the Kimbap was really hard to find in the beginning.
Elise: Yes, it was so popular.
Doree: But now I think it's gotten a little easier.
Elise: I like the bagged orange chicken. And then on TikTok there's a ton of recipes to dress up the orange chicken and make it better.
Doree: That's fun.
Elise: And so I'll just get the orange chicken, but then follow the various recipes on TikTok to learn what to do with my Trader Joe's frozen orange chicken. And then just along the lines of some of the things you brought up, they make the brioche hamburger buns, but also in a hot dog bun size. So the summer, if you're doing you're grilling, you can also get the brioche hotdog buns.
Doree: I dunno if they're actually called hotdog buns. Speed of hotdog buns. They also now carry a split top hotdog bun, which is a very New England thing to have the split top. So my husband likes those
Elise: For snacks. They make the Israeli bomba puffs, those peanut bomba puffs.
Doree: Yes.
Elise: And I just have an entire bag as a snack.
Doree: Yeah, those are so good.
Elise: They're awesome. And then my kids, instead of the fruit bars, they like the fruit buttons.
Doree: Oh yeah. Henry likes the Fruit buttons too.
Elise: End caps. I get my cookie butter there, but lately it's been out. I also like just their straight coffee bean blast ice cream. I think it's the Creamiest coffee ice cream for those of you who enjoy coffee ice cream.
Doree: Okay.
Elise: What else? They make a pretty good
Doree: No, I was just going to say, you reminded me of something else that we always get that I forgot to put on, which is the mini cones.
Elise: Yes. Those are in my fridge right now.
Doree: No, they're so good.
Elise: Yes. And they're mini.
Doree: They are mini. They're delicious.
Elise: Yeah. It's a nice little treat to enjoy in the middle of the afternoon for me. My daughters really like the, I think they're called bambino. They're the mini frozen pizzas, and they like those as a snack after school. They come in packs Of two and I think it's called the Bambino Pizza. And it's a little personal pizza for them.
Doree: Yum.
Elise: And if they're really hungry, they can eat both. But those are great for an afterschool snack. I like their hash browns. They have different hash browns. They have the shredded kind, and they have the ones that look like the McDonald's kind where you hold it in your hand. And so I'll make those in the morning sometimes. Oh. And then when I am in need of a quick lunch, I like their Indian food. Frozen foods, like their chicken tica masala or their Saag paneer, frozen Indian lunches. Those are solid also.
Doree: Yum.
Elise: And did I mention their baguettes? I think the Trader Joe's baguettes and the various selections of cheeses are also good.
Doree: Okay. Hot tip.
Elise: Yeah. Yeah.
Doree: Wow. Okay. I feel like
Elise: maybe we do have a segment in this.
Doree: Maybe we do. I'd love to hear what listeners are buying at Trader Joe's and what we have overlooked. Right.
Elise: People are going to say the oils and the spices. I bet I get a lot of folks talking about the everything.
Doree: Oh, the everything but the bagel. Yeah.
Elise: Seasoning. And then there's a lot of great seasonings that are available at Trader Joe's.
Doree: Alright
Elise: But I was thinking stuff I eat, not stuff that I put on.
Doree: Totally. Yes. Yes. So Forever35podcast@gmail.com. (781) 591-0390. Let us know. Thanks for listening and we'll talk to you soon.
Elise: Bye.
Doree: Bye.