THE SELFISH GAME
Objective
To teach a child the joy of taking responsibility, working together, and being a part of the family. It is absolutely crucial that the game is played with a fun-loving and gentle spirit. This game may only be played one time, per child, every three or four years.

Participants
*One, or more, mostly mature adults
*One child, between the ages of 8 and 12, who strongly desires to have unlimited time to do as he wishes and who believes that he does too many chores and does not get enough time to play. The child must demonstrate an inability to recognize the already-scheduled free times and holidays provided by the parents, such as birthdays, holidays, Sundays, family trips, etc. The child must have strong selfish impulses, must generally sport an I-feel-sorry-for-myself attitude, must feel mistreated and overworked, must frequently whine and fuss, must have a propensity for justice and fairness, and must have a willingness and ability to forgo the pleasures of family life.

Rules
Preparing to play the game:
*Parents and child have several different discussions in which the child gets to fully express desires and complaints while the parents make note of what the child is saying. The parents, in turn, must be very clear that the child will not get everything he desires (fun on a platter), while at the same time stressing the fun that the child will have.
*The parents set the rules for the game. The reason for each rule must be carefully explained and different scenarios ought to be conjured up and thoroughly discussed so that everyone is clear on the expectations.
*The guidelines should be written down.
*The parents should prepare the child for the feelings he or she will experience, both positive and negative.
*Prepare to start the game in the morning, immediately upon waking up.

Playing the Game:
1. The child may do nothing to help another person. This is absolutely forbidden and non-negotiable. The child may do no chores (may not feed pets, fold clothes, empty the compost).

2. Nobody may help the child:
*The child may not be chauffeured anywhere for any activity that is for the sole purpose of his pleasure (clubs, sports, games, friends’ houses), and no friends may be imported.
*The child may not eat food cooked by other family members.
*The child may only eat certain foods that are agreed upon prior (for example, eggs, toast, carrots, apples, granola, and milk), and it should be pointed out, in advance, that the food the child is eating has already been purchased and prepared by someone else.
*The child must wait to eat foods (if cooking them) till the rest of the family is done working in the kitchen.
*The child must clean up his own messes (dishes, toys, books).
*The child may not be read to, unless the parent is already reading to other children.
*The child may not play games with family members.
*The child may not be taught new skills.
*The child may go to bed and wake up whenever he wishes.

3. The child must continue to follow the rules of the house and will be disciplined in the standard ways.

4. Throughout the game, the parents should inquire how the child is feeling (lonely, excited, peaceful, frustrated, sad). Periodically the parents may offer an invitation to the child to rejoin the family, but they should in no way pester or coerce the child.

Ending the Game:
*The child may rejoin the family at any point. The decision to rejoin is final. The family welcomes the child with hugs and smiles and genuine joy. The child must do several chores that were agreed upon prior to beginning the game, such as washing the next batch of dishes, cleaning a toilet, washing some windows.
*Over the course of the next several days, the players should discuss their observations and feelings.

I didn’t come up with this game all on my own; my mother played it with me when I was a child. I have fuzzy memories of living off Special K for every meal (and loving it), staying up late, and coming down with a flu bug when the game was over. The illness was probably a coincidence, but it made a very big impression on me.

Yo-Yo Boy played this game a couple weeks ago. It took us a couple days to prepare for it, and several phone calls to my mother who spent a good deal of time discussing it with Yo-Yo. A third party was helpful for us because we were having trouble maintaining a fun-loving spirit, and besides, she was the originator of the game so she held a lot of clout. (“Can you feed Francie? Oh my no. Absolutely not. That’s directly helping someone else and that is most definitely not allowed. You can only do things for yourself, honey.” And, “You do know, don’t you, that you might feel kind of sad? Are you prepared for that?”)

Yo-Yo played the game till two o’clock in the afternoon when Mr. Handsome just happened to come home early from work. Yo-Yo wanted to go work with Mr. Handsome in the barn, so he came in to tell me he wanted to end the game.

“Are you sure?” I asked, surprised that he was done so quickly. He hadn’t even gotten around to frying himself some eggs, something he had been excited about.

“Yes, I’m sure,” he said.

I still couldn’t quite believe it. Was eight hours for the game really enough time to get the point across? “You realize that means the game is over, for good. You can’t switch back.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“And you will have dishes in a couple hours.”

“Okay.”

“And just because Papa’s home early doesn’t mean that he’ll be playing with you, or working on the clubhouse. He probably has work that he’s trying to get done.”

“Yes, Mama, I know. But I want to end the game now.”

“Well, okay then.” And I gave him a bear hug and kisses and he went running out to play. The game was over.

So you tell me, does this game have a winner?

Cookie baking is one of my favorite things about the Christmas season. It is synonymous with snow storms, candles, Handel’s Messiah, sparkly white lights, sweet smells, and happy smiles.

Never mind that I live in Virginia and we rarely have real snow storms. Or that I don’t have a radio, tape deck, or CD player in my kitchen (only the one on the computer and it’s finicky and doesn’t count). Or that I get royally pissed off at my kids when I’m up to my elbows in butter and greasy cookie sheets and they insist on pulling up stools (that would be FOUR stools, one for each kid) so they can sample the dough or grab spoons to stir while simultaneously brushing the little piles of sugar and flour that are dotting my kitchen counter to the floor via their shirt sleeves.

Nobody smiles all that much.

And never mind that I do too much cookie-tasting myself and end up feeling sick and not wanting to cook supper, but my kids are starving hungry (because I only let them have one cookie sample) so they are grumpy and mad at me and I’m mad at them and then Mr. Handsome walks in the door and I’m mad at him, too, just because he’s in my house and his presence hasn’t miraculously vanished all my problems since there is still sugar and flour on the floor, mounds of dirty cookie sheets, measuring cups, and stainless steel bowls cluttering up the sink, and piles of cookies on the cooling rack and I haven’t even gotten around to icing them yet, and, oh crap!—there is a still a tray of cookies in the oven and they are way past the golden-brown stage. It’s usually right about then that an enormous wave of cabin fever washes over me and I bellow at everyone that I am leaving and I throw on my jacket, stomp out of the house, and take off down the road for a breath of fresh air, the children’s wails fading into the distance.

Baking cookies was a lot easier back when I was in highschool. My mom let me make as many cookies as I wanted as long as I cleaned up my mess. One year I made a list of all the cookies I baked. I kept this little scrap of paper—hold on a second, will you? It should be in the back of my recipe file…

Okay, here it is: sugar cookies, gingerbread boys, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, Russian tea cakes, peppernuts, peanut butter cookies with Hershey Kisses, lemon cookies, molasses cookies, coconut macaroons, hard tack, and mint-chocolate chip cookies. There are some other cookies on the list that do not have a check by them, so I assume I did not get around to making them: lemon squares, butterscotch cookies, stained glass windows, fruit cookies, and chocolate covered pretzels.

I would make oodles of cookies all December long and then come the last day of school before Christmas vacation I would fix little plates of cookies, bundling them up in plastic wrap, pulling all the corners up to a festive peak above the plate and tying them together with some Christmas ribbon, the ends zipped curly with a pair of scissors. I delivered the cookie plates to all my teachers, and the bus driver.

I still make cookies, but not as many as I did when in highschool. On Saturday I made a list of different ideas, being sure to include all of the Cookie Food Groups—lemon, chocolate, nuts, iced, plain sugar, fruit filled, ginger, and coconut. I think I have all my bases covered. One of our most anticipated and talked about (among the children) Christmas traditions is our Cookie Breakfast: on Christmas morning we have a huge plate of cookies for breakfast (after the requisite scrambled eggs—I’m not a complete glutton for punishment), and the children are allowed to eat however much they want. It’s a pretty important tradition.

So, all this to say that this cookie-baking season I will do my best to type up all of my Christmas cookie recipes, so brace yourself for some sweet writings, okay?

I made some Truffle Brownies the other day, just as an experiment.

Now, after eating them for a couple days, I have decided that this recipe is not really a brownie recipe after all. See, brownies are a dessert for any day, for anybody—kids, grown-ups, your great aunt Eunice, the dog. You can eat a couple pieces in one sitting and not feel too gross.

By that definition, these so-called truffle brownies are most definitely not brownies (thus the name change to “Chocolate Truffle Cake”). For one thing, they call for dark chocolate which tends to be too strong for children (and Mr. Handsome, who, believe it or not, does not really care for chocolate, poor guy). For another thing, there is coffee liqueur in both the batter and the ganache, and while I can not taste any alcohol in the batter, the ganache has a pleasant, very adult-ish, zing to it.

The bottom line: When I want to have a brownie, I will still turn to my basic brownie recipe, but this is a darn good decadent chocolate dessert (that was redundant, I do believe) of the snobby sort. However, it prefers to stand alone, so don’t go stuffing it on any plastic-wrapped Christmas platters.

Chocolate Truffle Cake
Adapted from The All-American Cookie Book, by Nancy Baggett

Remember, your truffle cake will only be as good as your chocolate, so it doesn’t pay to scrimp.

You may want to serve the cake with some whipped cream which will help to cut the dense richness. (Whipped cream is somehow able to cozy up to the snobbiest among us, desserts included.)

6 ½ ounces bittersweet chocolate, broken into bits
1 ½ ounces unsweetened chocolate, broken into bits
1 stick butter
3/4 cup, plus 2 tablespoons, sugar
1 ½ tablespoons coffee liqueur (I used Caffe Lolita)
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 eggs
½ cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda

In a heavy bottomed saucepan, melt the butter and chocolate on low heat. Remove from the heat and add the sugar, liqueur, and vanilla, and eggs. Stir in the flour, salt, and baking soda. Pour the batter into a greased 9-inch square pan and bake at 350 degrees for about twenty minutes (the toothpick will still be wet, but not gloppy-gooey). Cool completely.

For the ganache:
1/3 cup cream (the heavier the better)
1 ½ tablespoons coffee liqueur
6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, broken into bits

Simmer the cream and the liqueur in a saucepan on the stove. Melt the chocolate in the microwave (or in a double boiler on the stove top). Add the chocolate to the cream. The chocolate will seize up, but do not panic, just continue to stir it steadily and it will smooth out. Pour the ganache through a sieve to eliminate the remaining few lumps, cool it slightly (by the time you get it through the sieve, it will probably have cooled enough), and pour it over the cake. Using a rubber spatula or knife, smooth the ganache out all the way to the cake’s edges. Cover the cake with plastic and refrigerate.

Note: You can substitute strong dark coffee for the coffee liqueur.

Ps. I just read this out loud to Yo-Yo and Miss Becca Boo, and Miss Becca Boo informed me that she, too, likes the truffle cake. So I guess it’s not totally an adult thing after all.

Note: This cake freezes well. Just cut it into pieces, package in a box (or plastic wrap), and stash it away. When the chocolate cravings hit, you will be so glad you saved some.