And she’s propped up in bed, looking at teh intarwebs, having eaten a burrito for breakfast. I can’t fathom it, but she looked happy. She’s sick as I’ve ever seen her, whooping bronchially and blowing her nose in between, so we’re going to the doctor this afternoon.
Last night I made her a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup, and we watched Finding Nemo, and she smiled for the first time in two days. Everyone has their comfort traditions, don’t they? Mine is egg salad sandwich and 7-up, while (as an adult) watching Sex and the City. Come to think of it, before the age of choice, instead of TV, I preferred reading Harlequin romances. So that’s kinda JUST like Sex and the City. What’s your comfort tradition?
orange juice and ginger ale with Chick-a-doodle soup (what I call chicken noodle).
Tea (with a big slug of Irish whiskey) and toast and really bad daytime tv (All My Children, Jerry Springer, Montel Willliams)
I’m another grilled cheese and tomato soup girl! And I like watching either the Gilmore Girls or the L word on DVD…
Mmm…cuddlying on the sofa with a fuzzy blankie, watching anything on HGTV and eating cheese and crackers. Maybe splurging with a Coke.
Yay! For being home. Yay! for being propped up in bed with your doting wife to take care of you. Yay! for burritos for breakfast.
Comfort food for me depends on my mood. Often it involves cheese and starch: grilled cheese sandwiches or mac-n-cheese (NOT Kraft, that is mac-n-cheesish substance) or bread with cheese. I also crave Vietnamese and Korean food. If I need to keep the dairy low because I’m sick, then tomato soup with frozen corn is the ticket (with goat cheese).
Comfort activity: knitting or spinning to an old B&W movie. Anything with Cary Grant, Barbara Stanwyck, Audrey Hepburn, Ester Williams, Katherine Hepburn, etc. 1955 or so is my cut off, 1930s or 40s is best. I pretty much TiVo half of TCM’s line-up.
Last night I needed some major comforting. The solution? Anne of Green Gables DVD. And knitting, of course. (And lasagna. And brownie with chocolate ice cream.)
Just about anything from the “comfort food” category – particularly things like mom’s homemade chicken noodle soup, freshly made bread & beef stew. However – I do like me a cup of tea, a big cheesey grilled samich & a bowl of the tomato too – – preferably sitting in front of a fireplace reading a book or knitting on something.
Top Ramien with cheese grated in it, diet something with tons of ice and HGTV–hours of it and…Rachel Ray all perky and happy.
Ramen soup with a big pinch of dried parsley flakes cooked in it, and a beaten egg stirred in after you’ve added the broth packet. With a drizzle of toasted sesame oil on top.
Consumed while watching multiple back-to-back episodes of The People’s Court on my Tivo. Watching Judge Marilyn Milian tell off idiots and serve up justice helps me feel like all’s right with the world.
I’m in the tomato soup + grilled cheese camp with the inclusion of popcorn, a dill pickle (spear), and ice, cold milk. But if I’m sick, it’s Vernor’s ginger ale instead. The watching choices have changed a bit over time, but one classic is The Princess Bride. Ah, good times.
Good luck with getting your girl well again.
comfort food for me … noodles with anything. butter, or cheese, or cheese and butter, or broth, or broth and butter … you get the idea.
tv…a lot of pillows … and cats.
I don’t know about a “comfort food” – maybe my grandma’s tuna sandwiches (I will NOT like them if anyone else makes them – even my mom, and she claims they’re exactly the same), but I definatly feel all cozy wrapped in a blanket either playing video games or watching cartoons. Anime is preferred, but any cartoons will suffice.
Defintely Canada Dry ginger ale, Campbell’s original chicken soup, and the Price is Right on the tube.
Coca Cola, and, I’m ashamed to say, McDonalds French Fries. Plus, a fuzzy blankie and some Anime. I think the McDonalds comes from my semester in Europe, where whenever I was homesick or really sick, it was my comfort food.
And of course, there’s always chocolate.
Soft serve ice cream, mac and cheese, and chamomile tea, not necessarily all at once, watching anne of green gables, parts one and two. Mmmm…
If I’m sick, Lipton’s Noodle Soup with Chicken (the “Chicken Noodle Soup” is OK, too — not sure of the difference? This is a good exercise in label reading — but I digress) with lots of extra noodles thrown in, plus Ritz crackers. But this invariably puts some weight on me. Or almost any kind of noodle. Leftover noodles ‘waved with cottage cheese is good — sounds gross, but it’s good.
Welcome home, Lala!
Macaroni and cheese, and one of my favorite ‘coming of age’ novels from my teenage years. I have to reread it every few years – usually when I am sick and need the comfort of knowing that everything will come out okay in the end!
Chicken Noodle soup from a can (you know, the one with the red label!) and saltines that have been buttered and set in the oven to crisp up. Haven’t had this combo in 40 years I’d bet, but I remember it took care of whatever ailed me. I’m going to stock my shelves now!
So glad Lala is home and you guys are together again. Thanks for letting us travel with you.
White wine, something savory and leftover (mashed potatoes are good, homemade mac and cheese or lasagne are also good), my snuggly sweatpants topped with an ancient men’s cashmere pullover and bottomed with homemade socks, and Georgette Heyer (The Grand Sophy and The Unknown Ajax are particular favorites, but the actual book depends on my mood).
Oh, and a fire in the fireplace.
Saltines with cream cheese, and 7-Up. In fact, the kid recently said, “7-Up is kind of like soda and kind of like medicine.” Tick that off the indoctrination checklist.
Mac ‘n’ cheese (or ice cream in hot weather) and The Princess Bride.
Comfort foods- there are so many, each for different occasions- hot tea with milk and sugar, Hagen Daz cookie dough ice cream, mashed potatoes and gravy, Wendy’s chicken nuggets, my mom’s pot roast. My favorite place- watching BBC on the couch with my dog asleep beside me with a warm throw over my lap.
Kraft Easy-Mac. Which is even less macaroni and cheese than the stuff in the box, but it is so, so good. And knitting with the inevitable 8 Law & Orders in a row.
Most best-est comfort food: homemade tapioca pudding
Second best and easier comfort food: ice cream
Comfort activity: knitting in my favorite spot on the couch wearing my oldest but most comforting robe watching Law and Order reruns.
Oh! and C is on the other end of the couch with Sade snoring on top of her and Dot is sleeping next to me.
~sigh~
For me it is ginger beer, tomato soup, Sense and Sensibility.
really good ginger ale (natural brew or blenheim) with a twist of lemon, saltines, although i will never refuse any tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches.
and if my stomach isn’t feeling too crappy, i’ll treat myself to banana pudding from the local diner.
i like reading happy dog stories or harry potter (for the 200th time). if i don’t feel like reading, something from buffy or angel or firefly will suffice. 🙂
Flannel pajamas, Vogue magazine, rereading my Louisa May Alcott and L.M. Montgomery books, homemade chocolate-chip cookies, toasted PBJs.
Flannel jammies, the flannel blankie my mommy made me for, what, my 49th birthday, Sleepy Time Tea and a well-loved book! I can recommend “Sisters in the Wilderness” for a fall or winter cold and “Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant” for anything but tummy flu.
Tummy sick (not knowing whether to sit or kneel): Cold Gatorade and saltines.
Feeling like crap sick: Kraft Mac and Cheese (the bright orange kind).
Lung sick: Antibiotics, Nyquil and a straw.
Any of the above plus lots of pillows, propped up (or not) in bed mindlessly watching a DVD – whatever has shown up from the never ending queue from Netflix works nicely – on the laptop.
Get well soon Lala.
tomato soup with saltine crackers broken up in it. Or anything with noodles….
It is so much better to be sick in your own bed and home rather than on the road though….
When I’m sick, I like to crawl out and get Hot&Sour soup from the local Chinese. I like the way it clears the sinuses and overcomes that being sick bland flavor that everything takes on. Combine that with reruns of Buffy or 90210 and a blankie = goodness.
So glad that Lala is home again. I hope it isn’t anything that’ll take long to heal.
Me, I really like my carbohydrates. Good white bread toast (like, homemade bread or the better stuff, not wonderbread), buttered with fresh butter, maybe some jam, and 2 eggs sunny side up. And orange juice, again the good stuff.
Or really good cinnamon rolls, like my mother makes.
And I like to reread a favorite book that I’ve read a million times before. Or watch Muppet Show reruns, or The Blues Brothers, Animal House, or The Big Lebowski. I guess that means I like a certain amount of snark when I’m sick (but not mean snark)
Yay! She’s home!
Yep, count me in for the comforty comfort of grllled cheese.
Which means that for the 7 years I was vegan, I was inconsolable.
ahhh… grilled cheese. waffles with maple syrup, ice cream in a wide variety of flavors (though chocolate brownie is a favorite), kimchee rice, lamb biriyani, my dad’s chicken curry. southern-style mac ‘n’ cheese casserole. chicken shawerma with good garlicky hummus. can you tell i’m writing this right before dinner and i’m starving? 🙂
if i’m sick, though, just toast ‘n’ chai and a little reed’s ginger beer.
A big cup of tea, comfy blanket on the couch with a cat snuggling with me and Perry Mason on the television. Raymond Burr and the gang can send me to sleep in like 10 minutes when I don’t feel well. As an added bonus in Portland they now show two episodes back to back so I can watch one and fall asleep when the next one comes on, so sweet.
I’m in with the grilled cheese and tomato crowd (but tomato soup made with milk, not water). Yum. And it cracks me up that so many of us love Anne. I love Anne. But I like to watch Pride & Prejudice when I’m feeling crummy. The BBC six hour one. Yum.
I have a couple of them…the “normal” one is spaghetti with a basic meat sauce after a long, tiring day. The “weird family tradition” one: tomato soup with peanut butter crackers crumbled up in it. It’s bizarrely delicious!!
Those viruses you catch in foreing countries are HORRIBLE!!!! Hope she feels better soon!
Way to snag the comments. It makes me smile just to think of my comforts.
A big bowl of oatmeal, with lots of brown sugar and a cuppa tea to wash it down.
Depends on the situation – if I’m sick, generally all I want is a couch, a warm blanket, a big thick (yet not demanding – Harry Potter, Stephen King, etc) book, and kitties.
If all I need is some time to be nice to myself, then I buy one of those little round boxes of camembert, a really good box of crackers, and a new DVD box set. If I only have time/money for a quick lift, then it’s grilled cheese all the way.
Come to think of it, damn, I’ve been working really hard lately, haven’t I? I deserve fancy cheese and crackers, and a new DVD box set, don’t I?
Hot and sour soup and white rolls, just like mom used to bring me from the Chinese place on the corner. And Vernors- a really strong ginger ale local to Michigan. And an empty house. I like being alone and not answering questions when I’m sick. People should just pop by, bring me things, and let me watch the light come through the window and work its way across the floor.
Grilled cheese is definitely good comfort food (it’s best when cut into four little triangles – don’t ask me why). And, if I have a cold, I inevitably crave homemade chicken soup (which I’ll be making this evening). Tomato soup is high up there, too, though.
If you really want to make her happy, you could make her a fresh tomato soup. Very easy.
Chop up an onion and sautée. Add a bunch of fresh tomatoes or a large can (you can purée this in advance, if you want). Add dried basil (or fresh, if you’ve got it), salt, pepper, and a bit of sugar to cut the acidity of the tomatoes. Cook on med-low heat till the tomatoes are that nice orangey-red color of cooked tomatoes. Purée for a nice consistency. Add cream and milk (or cream or milk, depending on the fat content you want).
If she likes cilantro, you could replace the basil with cilantro. Very tasty.
Mmm, comfort food. Mine is a cup of tea (good tea, with milk and sugar in it, as tea is meant to be drunk) and toast with jam. And to read? Jurassic Park or Congo. For TV, I’ll always go for an X-Files rerun, if I can find one, otherwise it’s Harry Potter all the way.
Well, now I wanna go curl up on the couch and not be productive.
White toast with butter, chicken broth, ginger-ale (which tastes awful to me UNLESS I’m sick) and the biggest, fatest, trashiest romance novel I can find.
There should be improbable abductions that exist in the plot only as a device to give the characters an outlandish place to have sex and desperate problems caused by a misunderstanding that two seconds of logical thought and smidgen of honesty could have avoided completely and if at all possible, a heaving bosom rising out of a gown that foams.
Feel better Lala!
A piece of buttered toast with a fried egg on top, made by TMK. Not made by TMK, not comfort food.
For comfort food…toast with butter and sunny-side up egg. But then I can always just go the starch and salt route. It must be creamy and and pasta/potatoy with butter and salt…that should do it. Beverages are purely governed by the time of day – tea in the morning and licker in the evening…
So glad she’s home and in your capable hands.
As a kid, being sick always meant orange juice and gingerale — quite exciting, since we weren’t allowed to drink pop. As a grown-up, I don’t get sick often (knock wood), but there are definitely lots of daytime talk shows involved in any recovery.
Sick clothes – oversized long-sleeved t-shirt and sweat pants with socks
Favorite quilt, on the sofa, with movies that don’t require too much thought, so if a nap happens, nothing is really missed.
To eat: Macaroni and cheese. My tummy wants comfort foods when I’m sick.
W.:)
I need fleece pants, an old comfy oversized t-shirt, a sweatshirt with a hoodie, fuzzy socks (note to self: knit a pair of official sickday socks out of some outrageously inappropriate-for-socks yarn).
From there, homemade tapioca pudding and a movie. Preferably sappy. Love Actually comes to mind, as does the BBC production of Pride and Prejudice. Hmm. Maybe it’s really about Colin Firth…
My comfort food: Swanson turkey TV dinner, warm and mushy white rolls with lots of butter, potato chips dipped into softened chocolate ice cream.
Comfort food: A big giant bowl of mashed potatoes with butter
Other comforts: pillows, a warm blanket, a cat or two and old movies (love me some Doris Day or Cary Grant)!
Such a great question! Food would have to be mom’s poached eggs w/ the yolks kinda runny on wheat toast cut up into little squares. I miss Vernor’s with a passion–but I like it microwaved or else it makes me sneeze even more, On TV I like Little House reruns, or CNN on a slow newsday that I can sleep through. But it makes for strange dreams sometimes.
Sadly, ramen noodles. Greatest stuff on earth. I am sure that all the salt and MSG does wonders for me when I am sick, but sometimes you just have to ignore the ingredient list.
That and my polyester quilt my grandma made me out of moo-moos from the 70’s. Hmmm, sort of have to ignore the ingredient list on that one too….
Oh yeah, no burritos in Belgium (and probably no watery Mexican beer), so I’m sure it was good to be home. Hope Lala’s on the mend now.
Grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup out of a can. Mac and cheese out of a box, with Picante sauce mixed in. Lord of the Rings books, or Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly movies.
I could go for this right now.
Pj’s, especially silly pink flannel girl power pants, koigu sweater, hand knit socks.
Food: grilled cheese and over done frozen fries, dill pickle. Coke. Or if I’m feeling flush pad thai and red curry chicken with pineapple.
And a bunch of dvds–Jane Austen stories, La Femme Nikita or other good action flicks (yes they exist), and historical romances (A Room with A View in particular)(I am a woman of many facets!)
depending on the season cotton pajama bottoms, flannel lined sweatpants, handknit socks (even before I learned to knit them, I had a pair on permanent loan from my dad’s collection – I think my mom knit them for him in their courtin’ years), a bright red batik scarf to hold my hair out of my face – I really can’t stand my hair touching me when I’m sick (odd?) one of my fav sweatshirts and my softest t-shirt.
sick food: from childhood soft boiled egg (can’t do that part any longer) and strips of buttered ww bread to dip in cream of wheat; or chicken noodle soup, crackers and 7up with a paper straw (I must find me a box of those, I miss ’em)
Feel better Lala.
Cinnamon Toast and tea is the ultimate comfort snack, anyway. I don’t know about a meal. Anything I don’t have to cook myself. My mil’s chicken soup is divine. Her secret is star anise.
Comfort viewing would be something British, like As Time Goes By or the Hetty Wainthropp mysteries. Comfort reading would be any Madeleine Brent gothic romances, or Dick Francis mysteries. Books I’ve read before and feel like old friends.
Sending healing vibes!
Oh, comfort food!
First of all, thank HEAVENS she’s home and safe and you’re home and safe and you’re together and what is better comfort than being home with the ones you love? 🙂
Secondly, on the comfort stuff.
for HorrificHeadaches(TM): Hot toddy — I’m with LaLa on that one. Theoretically anything down a sinus-cold throat is a waste of really excellent whisky, but for a headache, there’s nothing better. My Mama gave me a hot toddy for the first time when I had my first migraine at 16; knocked me on my ARSE, but oh, it was just what I needed!
For general sickies: Ginger Ale — we have Dominion brewery here and they’re so marvelous, and Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. Down comforter, ThePillow, laptop, and everything I can think of that I may need for the day within arm’s reach. (I will spend 20 minutes while feeling of ass just to get everything nearby so I don’t have to get up again ALL DAY if I don’t want to)
General comfort — laying my head on my husband’s chest and listening to his heart beat and breathing. Warm purring kitty in the lap. Holding Miss Plum (my almost-3-year-old daughter) in my lap when she’s having a quiet moment and just being with her.
Remembering the sound of my mother’s laugh.