La Vie en Grape Leaves

[00:00:15] Two Cat Kitchen, It's time for us to pitch in and start another two Cat Show

[00:00:22] Download the two Cat Kitchen, We're starting on a mission to put you in the culinary home

[00:00:30] Look out the finest recipes you'll ever find

[00:00:35] Yeah, I did to show you all a mighty part time here at the two Cat Kitchen

[00:00:41] Time for a new edition of the culinary two Cat Show

[00:00:47] The two culinary two Cat Show

[00:00:55] Welcome to the two Cat Kitchen, The Show that mixes musical mayhem with culinary calamity

[00:01:00] Sophia Pearson is here to help with the mix in

[00:01:03] Hey everyone! Each show features new songs, a brand new recipe and a special musical guest

[00:01:12] Who's our guest today? This week we have Suzy Chakmaki and a singer actress and librarian extraordinaire

[00:01:20] Wow, that sounds great. Each episode of the two Cat Kitchen also features an informative segment

[00:01:26] What do we have for the people today? Oh, this week we've got something pretty special

[00:01:31] It's your favorite Armenian grandma giving hospitality advice

[00:01:36] Wow, advice from your favorite Armenian grandma right here and the two Cat Kitchen

[00:01:41] What a treat! Fantastic! You know it's almost time for our first musical number

[00:01:46] Assong by the coconut

[00:01:48] Sophia, could you head over to the studio and check on the band? Absolutely

[00:02:10] Well, are they ready?

[00:02:12] Ah, they were sitting in a circle, breathing each other's hair

[00:02:17] So... Okay, yeah, we've seen that before. Might be a few minutes but we'll take a quick break and it will be right back with our first musical number

[00:02:49] Right through the darkness on a moon this night

[00:02:54] Come around the venue see your terrible sun

[00:02:59] Shadows all around me, feet begin to burn

[00:03:04] Gotta keep our wits now, don't know which way to turn

[00:03:09] Just have a look right up

[00:03:13] Right and deep into the night

[00:03:19] Gotta keep my head down baby

[00:03:23] Way down low in our side

[00:03:31] Coming over the ridge you see a ghostly glow

[00:03:35] Step out into the clear and you can't quite a show

[00:03:40] You got your motor working

[00:03:43] Ghosting droplets too

[00:03:46] Are this way that way not sure what to do

[00:03:50] Because I'm a little brighter

[00:03:54] Right and deep into the night

[00:04:01] Gotta keep my head down baby

[00:04:04] Way down low in our side

[00:04:10] That's right

[00:04:11] Cause I've been long time gone

[00:04:14] Gotta long wait and go

[00:04:17] Can't take no more

[00:04:20] I've been down down this road before

[00:05:09] I've been down this road before

[00:05:30] I've been down this road before

[00:06:04] Listen up in mama, give me some good advice.

[00:06:10] Don't you come around here no more ain't gonna tell you twans.

[00:06:14] Got that beast of burden, I'd be behind that door.

[00:06:21] Feast of pain, man ain't gonna say no more cause I'm alone right now.

[00:06:28] Right in deep into the night.

[00:06:35] Got to keep my end up made in, when I know it outside.

[00:06:43] That's right, because I've been long time gone.

[00:06:48] Got along with go and can't take no more of it down.

[00:07:23] Right in deep into the night.

[00:07:35] Welcome back to the 2K Kitchen.

[00:07:37] We're here with our special musical guest for today.

[00:07:40] It's Susie Chakmaki and Susie, thank you for joining us today and welcome to the kitchen.

[00:07:44] Thank you so much for having me excited to be here.

[00:07:46] Yeah it's great to have you on the show.

[00:07:48] So tell us what have you been up to lately for performance?

[00:07:51] So I have been rehearsing for the musical 1776 which will be opening at the contemporary theater company as of this recording in late July running through the end of August.

[00:08:04] And it's been a really exciting show to work on.

[00:08:06] It's the first musical that the theater has done since 2019, so we're all really glad to get to be doing a musical again.

[00:08:13] Wow 1776 that's great.

[00:08:16] So what is the idea behind the play? What is the story behind it?

[00:08:20] Sure. So 1776 the musical tells the story of our protagonist, John Adams, of Massachusetts who is just fighting really desperately to get the rest of the Congress on his side in terms of a resolution on independence about the colonies joining together as their own country and breaking away from Britain.

[00:08:39] So it's about him working with other people in the Congress to get more of the colonies to vote on his side, which involves things like sending someone from Virginia to get the resolution and propose it because John Adams is of noxious and disliked.

[00:08:56] So they need someone else to propose it for it to have any chance of going through.

[00:08:59] And then even things like the declaration of the independence essentially being a stalling tactic to give more time to get people on his side.

[00:09:08] And we know how it ends, but it's really fascinating to see how we get to where it ends.

[00:09:13] Wow that sounds really interesting and it's a musical which is great.

[00:09:19] And do they have, what do they have for is a live orchestra?

[00:09:23] Yes, we're going to have live musicians. We actually today had our first rehearsal with percussion and it made a huge difference. It's great.

[00:09:31] Wow that's great. That's always great when they use live music.

[00:09:35] Oh yeah, it just makes the whole room vibrate.

[00:09:39] Yes, love it.

[00:09:41] What character are you playing?

[00:09:43] I am Stephen Hopkins of Rhode Island.

[00:09:45] He is very silly and drinks a lot of room.

[00:09:48] That's kind of, that's very fun. Yes.

[00:09:51] He's a fun character to play.

[00:09:53] Yeah, good for you.

[00:09:57] And so do you work with any other theatre companies in the area?

[00:10:01] Or is just mostly with a contemporary theatre?

[00:10:03] The contemporary theatre company is my home theatre.

[00:10:06] I don't live anywhere near the theatre but it's my home theatre.

[00:10:10] Nice. Well if you, people that don't know Rhode Island, I mean if you live in Rhode Island,

[00:10:15] you're pretty much near everything in Rhode Island.

[00:10:18] This is true but we are also the people where it like if it takes more than half an hour to get somewhere you pack a snack.

[00:10:24] So, yeah that's true.

[00:10:25] I've got a granola bar on my purse.

[00:10:28] Exactly exactly.

[00:10:31] And you got to do for a couple of times a show that you wrote and produced at the contemporary theatre company.

[00:10:40] Yes, I did.

[00:10:41] The show is called There Was And There was Not Telling our Meanings Stories.

[00:10:46] I've performed a couple of times at the contemporary theatre company.

[00:10:49] It had its world premiere at the contemporary theatre company in May of 2022.

[00:10:56] And then I performed it in a couple of other places in late 2022 in Providence on Block Island for one whirlwind day.

[00:11:04] And then the folks at the theatre liked the show so much that they asked me to come back and do it for three full weekends in the spring of 2023.

[00:11:12] And that was just a really incredible gift of this thing to get to do.

[00:11:17] So yeah, I've done it a few times all over Rhode Island.

[00:11:21] There's a chance I'm going to get to do it somewhere out of state next year.

[00:11:26] I'm going to keep doing the show as long as people are interested and excited.

[00:11:30] So for folks who don't know what sort of like broad strokes, what's telling our median story is about sure.

[00:11:37] So it is both about what it is like to grow up Armenian-American, what the culture is like, how we treat people when they are guests in our homes,

[00:11:49] what it's like to try to leave an Armenian party.

[00:11:52] It takes a while is the footnote. It takes a while.

[00:11:54] But then also going through Armenian history and balancing the vibrancy of the living Armenian culture while also recognizing that there have been a lot of terrible things in our history.

[00:12:06] And how do you live with those two things at the same time?

[00:12:09] How do you honor that history which can be very dark?

[00:12:13] We'll also acknowledge that we are still here as a people, and we are still vibrant and exciting and silly and trying to express that both exist at the same time.

[00:12:24] And we need to embrace and understand both to understand what it is to be Armenian.

[00:12:29] What are some of the things you talk about like give us a little bit of hint about Armenian culture or something that is interesting because I,

[00:12:38] you know, it's a fascinating area I think and not many people know much about it.

[00:12:43] Yeah, yeah. The point of the show was to introduce people who aren't familiar with Armenian culture, two Armenian culture,

[00:12:50] and we will also give our means a way to see themselves on stage.

[00:12:55] So it's important to me to get to both. Some of the things I talk about are like hospitality is very important in Armenian culture.

[00:13:04] So when you're having people over your house, do you need to make sure it's super duper clean?

[00:13:08] You need to make sure that you have as much food out as possible so no one leaves your house hungry. That's sort of stuff.

[00:13:15] And like when we go out to eat at restaurants there's always a fight over who gets to pay the check.

[00:13:20] Like you'll have like my dad and my uncle will be like sniping at each other, they love each other, they love each other so much.

[00:13:26] And the way they express their love is by fighting over who gets to pay for everybody's food.

[00:13:30] So it's that kind of stuff.

[00:13:33] And then getting into the history.

[00:13:37] Like Armenia was the first Christian nation in 3.01 AD, the King of Armenia at the time, declared Armenia to be a Christian nation.

[00:13:44] So that's something that we're very proud of in Armenian history and things like about how Armenian was part of the Soviet Union in the 20th century.

[00:13:55] And how that affected where we are today.

[00:14:00] Like my parents were born in Soviet Armenia, so that means that like my experience growing up might be different from the experience of someone who has like two or three generations of people who were born in the United States.

[00:14:13] So it's just exploring all the different ways there are to be Armenian the things that we have in common and the things that are different in all of that.

[00:14:23] And you actually, you taught us a little trick to recognize if someone was Armenian or not based on the last name.

[00:14:30] I remember that from the show.

[00:14:32] Yeah, it's for the most part Armenian last names will end with Y-A-N or I-A-N.

[00:14:38] So like Armenians have this tradition when we go to movies where we have to stay and watch the entire end credits and just try to find Armenian names.

[00:14:46] And we'll literally count how many we found, like I went to see a movie last night.

[00:14:50] And I was just like, I was a doodian that's one.

[00:14:52] And I like go back in that's two, just literally counting.

[00:14:57] Just like frantically, frantically watching the names because they make them too small and they go too fast.

[00:15:01] But it's a very fun Armenian tradition. So if you're ever at a movie theater, and you see like a bunch of dark-haired people sitting in like the middle just yelling names at the screen after the movies over at that's us.

[00:15:14] That's interesting because when I go to the movies, I always watch the end credits right to the end.

[00:15:22] Because I feel that all those people that put in all that work, those movies.

[00:15:27] Yeah, they deserve a recognition.

[00:15:29] I don't know who the heck they are, but I read their name.

[00:15:34] What does the group do? I don't know, but they worked hard. I'm sure.

[00:15:37] Oh yeah. And everybody just gets up and leaves like when the credits even start.

[00:15:42] And you know, this like usually at least five minutes of credits.

[00:15:45] I'll tell you about this.

[00:15:46] And then they come by the people from the theater come by and set cleaning around you.

[00:15:51] Oh, right. Yeah.

[00:15:53] That's usually really really leave.

[00:15:54] But next time I'll know to look for some.

[00:15:57] I am names.

[00:15:58] Yeah, I can find.

[00:16:00] It's a fun party game.

[00:16:04] And do you sing in the show? You speak our medium, right?

[00:16:08] Yes. Not as well as I used to. It was actually my first language going up.

[00:16:11] But I do sing, I don't mean to in folk song in the show.

[00:16:15] And it's a very important part of the show to me.

[00:16:18] And I'm glad that I was able to include it.

[00:16:21] Oh. So yeah, you speak our Armenian.

[00:16:23] Yes. Yes. That's interesting.

[00:16:26] Yeah. Maybe we'll hear a little bit later on in the show.

[00:16:30] Yeah.

[00:16:30] That'll be fun.

[00:16:33] Okay. So that's you're doing theater stuff now.

[00:16:38] You also do a little bit of music too.

[00:16:40] You're going to have some songs for us later on.

[00:16:42] Yes, I'm very excited to get to sing.

[00:16:45] So that's great.

[00:16:46] Yeah.

[00:16:47] So aren't you for so every year the contemporary theater company has a Christmas cocktail

[00:16:52] cabaret, whereas we like to call it the CTC CCC.

[00:16:57] I know well. Yes.

[00:16:59] And I believe that this year your intent is to gather a bunch of folks from the theater

[00:17:06] who have different backgrounds as well and do like holidays or holidays around the world segment for the cabaret.

[00:17:16] Yes. Yeah.

[00:17:17] It was something that I floated as an idea last year,

[00:17:19] but there just wasn't enough time to get it together then.

[00:17:24] But I'm going to try to start early and do it this year.

[00:17:26] I just think it's a really fun way to demonstrate and like share the diversity of backgrounds that we have at the theater.

[00:17:35] Like songs in different languages, telling about holiday traditions from different countries.

[00:17:40] I just think it would be a really neat, fun thing to do to get to like learn about the people who are at the theater.

[00:17:45] What did they do for their holiday traditions?

[00:17:48] And it's like we're all different, but it's all about like just coming together when things are dark and finding the light and finding what's different.

[00:17:56] But also the same and that's beautiful.

[00:17:59] Yeah.

[00:17:59] Do you have a favorite Armenian Christmas holiday tradition?

[00:18:03] Oh, favorite Armenian Christmas holiday tradition.

[00:18:05] Ooh, that's a good one. The fun one fun one is that Armenian Christmas is technically in January on a piphany.

[00:18:14] So we in my family usually don't do anything particularly special for that, but like it's Armenian Christmas and we acknowledge that it's Armenian Christmas.

[00:18:22] So that's fun. I think it might be because we're like sort of we're the Armenian Church, it's its own church, it's Orthodox,

[00:18:29] but like not Greek Orthodox or anything, it's its own entity.

[00:18:33] So that's a fun Armenian holiday tradition.

[00:18:36] I don't know if I can think of any other Armenian Christmas traditions.

[00:18:39] I do know that the one like Armenian Armenian holiday song I know is basically oh Christmas tree, but it's in a minor key.

[00:18:48] Can you do a lot of Armenian culture right there?

[00:18:51] It's been mentioned a lot of their songs or minor key.

[00:18:54] So many Armenian songs we've been through some stuff.

[00:19:00] Wow, that's great.

[00:19:01] All right, we're going to take a quick break here and the two-cat kitchen and we'll be right back.

[00:19:21] We're back at the two-cat kitchen and Susie, you're very active in the theater.

[00:19:26] We've heard which is great, but you also have a day job. What do you do during the day?

[00:19:31] So I'm actually a librarian at the Naval War College Library in Newport.

[00:19:36] Wow, librarian.

[00:19:38] And that's fascinating.

[00:19:39] Yeah, at the War College too.

[00:19:42] Yeah, I've been there since 2020.

[00:19:45] I started two weeks before we went to COVID lockdown.

[00:19:48] Oh, wow.

[00:19:50] Yeah, that was a great start of job.

[00:19:53] So what is I'm just curious, the Naval War College in Newport is really, it's actually very prestigious college from military people and everything.

[00:20:04] What is the library like?

[00:20:06] Is it like a regular library or is it like more geared to his military history or?

[00:20:10] Yes.

[00:20:11] So we've got like the kinds of things that you expect to find in a library in terms of,

[00:20:16] we have books and magazines and a microfilm which is like we took usually newspapers and

[00:20:23] pure articles and stuff and they're like shrunken down onto film so you can store a bunch of stuff in less space.

[00:20:29] And you read it on a microphone reader if we have that kind of stuff.

[00:20:31] We have a lot of online resources.

[00:20:33] I'd say actually the majority of our resources are online now, which is great because we have a lot of in-person students.

[00:20:40] So we also have a lot of students who never come to campus.

[00:20:43] They are all over the world studying with us and so they are the access to those online resources but it's, yeah,

[00:20:52] a lot of history, a lot of naval science, a lot of statistics and stuff.

[00:20:58] So it's a very focused collection in terms of what kind of information is in there but the basic services are the same.

[00:21:05] People need books, people need magazines, people need to get their research done and we help them with that.

[00:21:12] Yes so and people in the work college are actually getting college degrees, right?

[00:21:17] It's a master's degree program.

[00:21:18] It's a master's degree program.

[00:21:19] So they have to write a thesis and something along those lines so that's where the research comes in.

[00:21:24] They have to write papers and they're paper contests even and people can win prizes for writing their papers.

[00:21:31] It's the whole thing.

[00:21:32] Yeah.

[00:21:33] Oh, that's really fascinating, yeah.

[00:21:36] And so what made you go into becoming a library in library science?

[00:21:41] Why did you just curious?

[00:21:43] That's a good question.

[00:21:45] I've always been a reader.

[00:21:47] I visited my public library a lot when I was a kid.

[00:21:51] When I was in college my student job was always working in libraries and I really enjoyed it.

[00:21:58] I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do after college and I couldn't think of anything

[00:22:01] and I had a mentor at my university who asked me if I'd ever considered library school,

[00:22:07] which I did not know was a thing that existed.

[00:22:10] So as soon as she said it I was like, that makes so much sense how I not thought of that.

[00:22:16] So I went to library school at the University of Rhode Island and got my library degree there and I've been working in libraries every since.

[00:22:23] Wow, what kind of things do you learn in library school?

[00:22:26] Oh, all kinds of things.

[00:22:28] Library management, how to catalog books, how to manage your collections in terms of like what kinds of things do you need to buy?

[00:22:36] How do you know when it's time to remove something from the collection because it's older and out of date?

[00:22:41] That sort of stuff.

[00:22:44] And things like I got to do a fun class on like specifically if you're in a library where you're doing humanities work like what kinds of resources do you need for students who are studying literature?

[00:22:55] What kinds of resources do you need for people who are studying theater? Those kinds of things.

[00:23:00] Yeah, just basically what do you need to know to help people get the information that they need?

[00:23:08] Both like how do you decide what resources to add?

[00:23:11] How do you help people who have research questions?

[00:23:13] What resources do you point them to?

[00:23:15] All that kind of stuff.

[00:23:16] We're all about making sure that people can find the information that they need.

[00:23:21] Do you have to learn memorise any dewy decimal system?

[00:23:25] I wish that would be so fun to know.

[00:23:28] I know there are some folks who have like some librarians are very dedicated and we'll get like call numbers tattooed and stuff on them.

[00:23:36] Yeah, no, I didn't have to memorize call numbers.

[00:23:38] I did have to learn how to create them when I was cataloging books more often at my first job.

[00:23:44] But yeah, it's formulas and just looking at a book and trying to figure out what is the most important thing that people need to know that this book is about and that time you make a call number for it.

[00:23:55] Yeah, I'm interesting.

[00:23:57] So I've been around a while.

[00:23:59] I did a minute, but I think it was probably back in the 1990s or 1990s.

[00:24:05] When people were getting worried about and debating the idea of putting books online like digitizing books and what that was going to mean for culture in general.

[00:24:20] And I don't know if that's still something that people are talking about or thinking about because it seems to have, I don't know.

[00:24:27] I mean in terms of it, it's interesting that now someone has an ebook and there's an up there is a publishing error in the ebook.

[00:24:35] They can automatically update it and you won't even realize because if you even if you've purchased it on your Nukary or Kindle, the book will just update.

[00:24:46] So that it does raise a lot of interesting questions of like what do you need, what do you how do you people need to know that that change was made or I don't know.

[00:24:57] It is kind of interesting.

[00:24:59] Well, I do remember doing research back in the day when there wasn't digital anything.

[00:25:05] And it was a pain in the next time, if you needed a book that wasn't available at the local, at the university library or whatever it had to be library into library alone.

[00:25:16] And it was a little bit, I don't know how we did anything back then.

[00:25:22] Yeah, you waited.

[00:25:23] But now it's, it's so much easier.

[00:25:27] It seems because things are digitized.

[00:25:29] So that's maybe an upside and what you mentioned too about being able to correct things.

[00:25:34] But does it down? How do you feel about this, Suzy? You're the librarian.

[00:25:38] Oh, ebooks are, I think, very, very important, especially for universities.

[00:25:46] Like one way that ebooks can be great is if you're able to get an ebook that is accessible to an unlimited number of users, then if you have a book that like the entire school needs to read, then you can buy that one book and anyone can access it whereas

[00:26:02] If you can't do that, you might have to mail and copy of that book to every single person who needs that book.

[00:26:09] So their upsides and downsides, some of the tricky things are like there's a lot of debate over how libraries are often charged more for the same ebook than the regular consumer will be.

[00:26:25] Yeah.

[00:26:25] And then there's the question of like who owns this if we're using it for a course and then the publisher decides that they don't want you to have it anymore.

[00:26:32] It can just go away because if it's not a physical thing that you have in your library, if it's if they own the rights to it and they decide they don't want to provide access anymore, it just goes away.

[00:26:45] So there's been a lot of talk in the library world about how, how you balance the rights of the publishers and and the authors and stuff, the people who are making money on the books because they need to be able to make money to produce the book.

[00:26:58] Right, but then also how do we as librarians make those things accessible to people in a way that we can maintain doing when library budgets are either like stagnating or going down and just trying to balance those two sides of it.

[00:27:13] Wow, yeah, there's a lot to it.

[00:27:16] But you don't see books going away.

[00:27:17] I don't think kind of.

[00:27:18] No, I think I think we're gonna, I mean, in terms of the format, yeah, books are going to be around forever.

[00:27:24] You can quote me on that.

[00:27:26] You heard it here first.

[00:27:28] Let's do a catch in the books we'll be in.

[00:27:31] Okay, that's great.

[00:28:20] I'm sorry that you have to see the strength inside me burning.

[00:28:31] Where are you my angel now?

[00:28:34] Don't you see me crying?

[00:28:39] And I know that you can do it all, but you can say I'm not trying.

[00:28:47] I'm on my knees and in front of him, but he doesn't seem to see me.

[00:28:57] With all his troubles and his mind, he's looking right through me.

[00:29:06] And I'm letting myself down by satisfying you.

[00:29:14] And I wish that you could see I have my troubles too.

[00:29:38] Looking at you sleeping, I'm with the man I know.

[00:29:47] I'm sitting here we've been while the hours pass so slow.

[00:29:56] And I know that in the morning, I'll have to let you go.

[00:30:06] That you'll be just a man once I used to know.

[00:30:14] Before these past few days, someone I don't recognize.

[00:30:21] This isn't all my fault when you realize.

[00:30:45] Looking at you, leaving and looking for a sign.

[00:30:57] Susie Chakmaki in with her version of The Hill by Marquette Erblova.

[00:31:01] Right here on the two cat kitchen. Thank you Susie, that was beautiful.

[00:31:07] One of the things we ask all the guests here on the kitchen is what was your earliest musical memory?

[00:31:14] That's a good one. I have to say that probably my earliest musical memory is learning the Lord's prayer in Armenian at my Armenian church.

[00:31:25] It's very, the song that goes with it is just so lovely. It's the rare Armenian song that is not an a minor key.

[00:31:33] And I love that you can go anywhere in the world where there are Armenians and they just all know the Lord's prayer in Armenian.

[00:31:41] It's just a lovely song and it makes me feel connected to my community and it's just very nice.

[00:31:46] And how did you learn Armenian just from like speaking with your parents or was it kind of like Hebrew or you go to Hebrew school?

[00:31:54] So Armenian was actually my first language growing up. So I spoke it with my parents and my grandparents and my aunts and uncles.

[00:32:03] And then from kindergarten through, I want to say 10th grade. I went to Saturday Armenian school in Providence.

[00:32:11] So we learned to speak in Armenian reading, writing history, music, dance from I like 9 o'clock in the morning until 1 pm every Saturday.

[00:32:21] So I got both like the learned at home experience and school experience for Armenian.

[00:32:28] Yeah.

[00:32:30] So the Lord's Prayer in Armenian, I think you'd mention that when you, in an Armenian church service, this is one of the songs that gets,

[00:32:40] yeah, it happens every, I'm fairly certain that it's sung at every Armenian church service every week. It's certainly in mind in Armenian for the most part.

[00:32:52] Well that's fascinating and you are pretty young when you landed on a guess.

[00:32:55] Oh, tiny tiny, even tiny, you're the one I am now, which is so pretty small.

[00:33:00] Can you give us an example? Sure.

[00:33:04] Yeah. So we can hear it.

[00:33:05] It's not long. I'll just do the whole thing.

[00:33:07] Okay.

[00:33:51] So, I'll just do the whole thing.

[00:34:09] It's a anymore.

[00:34:30] That's beautiful.

[00:34:31] Thank you for that.

[00:34:33] Yeah.

[00:34:34] Yeah, so and actually we'll gonna come back in just a minute on the 2K kitchen.

[00:34:39] You're gonna have another song for us. So stay tuned for that next up.

[00:35:00] Suzy is joined by members of the coconut to perform La Vía on the rose.

[00:35:58] La Cosa, say to me, for what I'm gonna put it on a beat.

[00:36:11] In the morning, La Jure, for La Vía, it's because I love you.

[00:36:24] La La Jure, for what I'm gonna put it on a beat.

[00:36:36] that are the darkness.

[00:36:45] And when you speak,

[00:36:48] you can just sing from above.

[00:36:54] And with it what's him

[00:36:56] to turn into love,

[00:37:01] and the sound,

[00:37:04] give your ten soul to me.

[00:37:09] And life will always be

[00:37:13] love,

[00:37:15] all.

[00:37:29] It's time for the recipe portion of our program

[00:37:32] here on the 2K Kitchen.

[00:37:34] And Susie, what do you have for a recipe for us today?

[00:37:38] I'm going to share my mom's version of the recipe

[00:37:40] for stuffed grape leaves with olive oil.

[00:37:44] The Armenian name of it is Yolk-Anshi.

[00:37:47] And her recipe is adapted from the version of the recipe

[00:37:51] that's found in this Armenian cookbook.

[00:37:54] It's called the Complete Armenian Cookbook.

[00:37:56] It's from like the 80s.

[00:37:57] The author is named Alice Bez-John.

[00:37:59] And I feel like every Armenian has this cookbook in their house.

[00:38:02] It's a great cookbook.

[00:38:04] Yeah, I mean, every Armenian everywhere,

[00:38:06] or just in the US cookbook or...

[00:38:08] It's in English.

[00:38:09] And it actually has our meaning recipes,

[00:38:11] but also some non- Armenian European recipes.

[00:38:16] But like, a lot of her traditional Armenian foods that my mom makes

[00:38:19] are based on the recipes in that book with her adjustments

[00:38:22] because she's been perfecting them over the years.

[00:38:24] Okay, that's fantastic.

[00:38:26] So grape leaves, well...

[00:38:28] Yes.

[00:38:28] It seems like an Armenian dish to me.

[00:38:32] It's very Armenian.

[00:38:34] Mediteranian.

[00:38:35] Exactly.

[00:38:37] Okay, so what are...

[00:38:39] What do you get your grape release?

[00:38:42] So we're very lucky.

[00:38:43] We actually have a grapevine in our backyard.

[00:38:48] In the house that I grew up in when I was younger,

[00:38:49] we had an absolutely massive grapevine.

[00:38:51] It was like half of our yard was a grapevine.

[00:38:54] We have a smaller one now.

[00:38:55] But my mom will go out there and pick the leaves

[00:39:00] when they're big enough to use for stuffed grape leaves.

[00:39:05] And she'll wash them,

[00:39:06] and stack them, roll them, tie them with twine,

[00:39:10] boil them, strain the water out,

[00:39:12] and then bag them and freeze them.

[00:39:15] So we have them saved even like in the winter.

[00:39:19] So she can take them out and boil them so that they are ready

[00:39:23] to cook and then or rinse them rather.

[00:39:28] So we have grape leaves all year round.

[00:39:30] Is a particular type of grape that gives you good grape leaves?

[00:39:34] Or is it just any grape leaves?

[00:39:35] That I don't know.

[00:39:36] I'm not sure what variety of grape leaves it is,

[00:39:39] but I can tell you it's delicious.

[00:39:41] Okay, delicious grape leaves.

[00:39:43] Excellent.

[00:39:44] Well why don't you go through that...

[00:39:46] Some of the ingredients, what people need to make this fantastic

[00:39:49] recipe, it sounds great.

[00:39:51] So you need your grape leaves.

[00:39:53] If you have a grapevine, that's ideal,

[00:39:56] but you can also buy packaged preserved grape leaves from the store.

[00:40:01] You need some thinly sliced onions.

[00:40:03] The recipe calls for four cups.

[00:40:05] You want one cup of olive oil.

[00:40:08] You want one and a half cups of short grain rice.

[00:40:11] My mom up to that from the original recipe,

[00:40:13] which is one cup.

[00:40:15] You also want some pine nuts in there.

[00:40:17] Less than three quarters of a cup.

[00:40:20] Okay.

[00:40:20] What do you mean less than three quarters like this?

[00:40:23] So the recipe calls for three quarters of a cup.

[00:40:26] But when you put them in, you mix them in with the rice and the onions

[00:40:30] and stuff and they go inside the grape leaves.

[00:40:32] And you usually want your mixture in there to be about 90% rice

[00:40:38] and maybe 10% onion and grape leaves.

[00:40:41] So that's where your cup is too much, too much pine nuts.

[00:40:44] Yeah, my mom's a little less than that.

[00:40:45] A little less.

[00:40:46] Yeah, I got it now.

[00:40:48] It's a little sense.

[00:40:49] And then there's a tablespoon of tomato paste for the whole recipe.

[00:40:54] Some people put currents in their stuffed grape leaves, but my mom doesn't do that.

[00:40:58] Currents.

[00:41:00] There's also some minced parsley in there about two cups.

[00:41:05] Some people put dried mint leaves in there, but my mom doesn't.

[00:41:08] But she does put a teaspoon of sugar.

[00:41:10] Mint.

[00:41:11] Your mom doesn't put mint.

[00:41:12] She doesn't put mint.

[00:41:13] But she does put dill.

[00:41:15] Fresh dill is best.

[00:41:18] That's optional in some recipes, but in our version dill is not optional.

[00:41:22] It's included.

[00:41:22] Okay.

[00:41:23] So dill leaf.

[00:41:25] Yes.

[00:41:26] Fresh ideally.

[00:41:28] And then a whole bunch of lemon juice.

[00:41:31] The recipe calls for six tablespoons, but my mom will put 10 or more

[00:41:34] or more tablespoons of lemon juice because we want it tangy.

[00:41:38] And then salt and black pepper to taste, hot red pepper.

[00:41:44] And two cups of water for mixing the stuff in.

[00:41:50] But the recipe calls for three actually though the water is for cooking the grape leaves

[00:41:55] once they're all assembled.

[00:41:56] I think my mom finds that three cups of water makes them too mushy.

[00:42:00] They fall apart too easily.

[00:42:01] If you do two cups of water, then it's just the right amount.

[00:42:04] Wow, this recipe is full of pro tips.

[00:42:07] Yes.

[00:42:07] This is some of the little.

[00:42:09] Yeah.

[00:42:09] This is great.

[00:42:10] Yeah.

[00:42:11] But no mint.

[00:42:12] No mint.

[00:42:14] Lots of dill but no mint.

[00:42:17] That's okay.

[00:42:18] We can do it out of mint.

[00:42:21] All right.

[00:42:21] So that's your list of ingredients.

[00:42:24] So you know, I always wondered how you make stuff to grape leaves because you know,

[00:42:28] I've had them.

[00:42:29] I love them and what were other people have made them.

[00:42:32] But I've never made them.

[00:42:34] So where are you going about doing it?

[00:42:36] So you want to start by preparing your grape leaves.

[00:42:40] So you want to make sure that they're washed because you've either frozen them or they're preserved.

[00:42:47] So you rinse them and running hot water and then you take the stems off and you set those aside because now you're going to make the filling.

[00:42:54] And most of the recipe is making the filling and then putting the filling in the grape leaves.

[00:42:58] So to prepare the filling,

[00:43:00] you're going to saute the onions in the olive oil for about 15 minutes and a heavy skillet.

[00:43:06] And then you stir and remove the meat or low heat.

[00:43:10] It does not say just as saute.

[00:43:13] So however, whatever temperature you think is right because the temperature that you used to saute the onions.

[00:43:20] All right.

[00:43:20] So once the onions are sauteed, then you stir and remove the meat.

[00:43:24] I'm sure mom has it in opinion on me.

[00:43:26] She doesn't put it here though because she has it in some of her soup.

[00:43:29] She's well, and she just knows. Oh, she just got it. She's listening to it. She's by saying why these people even asking.

[00:43:36] Yeah, no, you just let heat.

[00:43:38] You're on me, and you know it in your soul.

[00:43:41] So you cook your onions and then you stir in the rice and you cook for another 10 minutes or so.

[00:43:46] Then you add everything else with the exception of those two cups of water at the end.

[00:43:53] So when you've cooked all the inside, so that's the rice, the pine nuts, the tomato paste, the parsley, the sugar, the dill, the lemon juice and all the spices.

[00:44:05] The salt, the black pepper, the hot bread pepper. You cook all of that together.

[00:44:09] And you want the rice to be a risotto-y kind of temperature, consistency, not like too hard.

[00:44:19] But like sort of as like a sticky rice is what you want it to be.

[00:44:22] I know what you mean, yeah.

[00:44:24] So when the filling is cooked, what about the stems?

[00:44:28] So you take the stems off because you don't want to eat those, those are too chewy.

[00:44:31] Oh, okay. I thought you were going to say that you put them in the, no, no, you get rid of the stems.

[00:44:36] You get rid of them. You don't want them. No stems.

[00:44:38] No stems. So when your filling's good to go, then you actually put the filling in the great leaf.

[00:44:43] So it says to put about a tablespoon of the filling along the stem end of each leaf.

[00:44:51] Ah. And then you fold over the sides and roll from the stem up, so it's almost like a sausage.

[00:44:58] So when you're done rolling all of your great leaves and that can take a while, then you have a pan and you put some leaves in the bottom of the pan to keep the rolled leaves from burning the leaves.

[00:45:14] Oh, that's a good idea. So you yes. This is very type to.

[00:45:18] Is that your mom's idea? That's in the written.

[00:45:22] Resin the original. Okay.

[00:45:25] So when you've put your leaves in the bottom to prevent the burning, you take the stuff great leaves and you put them in the pan side by side,

[00:45:32] you put them on the stem side down in layers, then you put some leaves on top as well.

[00:45:38] And when you've done that, you put a heavy plate on top to keep them from moving around too much and then you pour those two cups of water in and you boil it over high heat.

[00:45:50] High heat.

[00:45:50] High heat.

[00:45:51] So when it comes to a boil, then you reduce to low and taste the cooking liquid to make sure that it's salty enough and you can add more if you need to.

[00:46:01] And then you cook it for about 30 minutes or until you think it's done.

[00:46:07] And once that's done, you drain any remaining liquid but you keep the plate in place until the rolls are cool to prevent discoloration and hardening of the leaves.

[00:46:18] And so then you need to let them cool because they, you can eat them warm right out of the pan, but they taste best cold.

[00:46:26] Honestly.

[00:46:27] I've never eaten them warm to be honest with you.

[00:46:29] Yeah, no they're okay warm will usually eat one or two warm when they're done just to make sure that like the flavors are right.

[00:46:36] Also because we love them and we're anxious and we just need them to use possible.

[00:46:39] But ideally you should cool them and you can serve them garnish with a lemon leaf, don't a lemon leaf sorry, a lemon slice if you want to be fancy.

[00:46:50] And when they're ready we'll put them, we'll put them in like an absolutely massive Tupperware packed in good and tight so that the oils don't get lost.

[00:47:01] And if we're careful they last for a week and if we're not it will all be gone in like three days.

[00:47:08] Excellent.

[00:47:10] That's great. It sounds like a really excellent recipe.

[00:47:13] Oh it's so good.

[00:47:15] And you know I was thinking because you have to cook the leaves in the boiling water but the filling is already cooked theoretically.

[00:47:25] So so you've cooked it when you mix it, but I think I think cooking it once it's in the leaves is about and this is purely speculation.

[00:47:37] My thinking is that that's about making sure that the flavors that are in the filling go into the leaves.

[00:47:46] And also to make sure that the leaves are nice and soft because when you're so you're rinsing them to add the filling to them but to cook them through that's that happens after you put the filling into them.

[00:47:58] Oh okay yeah so in other words the leaves haven't been cooked yet even though the filling is cooked.

[00:48:04] So you got to get the leaves with and I like leafy.

[00:48:07] Yeah, I honestly took two I waited too long in my life to start eating stuffed grape leaves because I was I thought that the texture of the leaf would be unpleasant.

[00:48:16] And I finally like when I was in my 20s had by for a stuffed grape leaf and I was like what have I been doing with my life if I've made I've made so many mistakes.

[00:48:23] I could have been eating these for years because they're delicious.

[00:48:25] Yeah well now you can make up for the last time.

[00:48:28] Absolutely and I do.

[00:48:30] I do.

[00:48:32] Alright well that's fantastic what a great recipe I can't wait to go try it.

[00:48:36] You should it's wonderful.

[00:48:37] Thanks so much for sharing it with us here on the two cat kitchen.

[00:48:40] Alright we'll be back in just a minute.

[00:49:09] Alright everybody we're back the two cat kitchen and this week we have a special guest here with us.

[00:49:15] It's everybody's favorite or medium grandma welcome.

[00:49:19] I don't think you so much for having me it's nice to be here.

[00:49:23] We're really lucky to have you.

[00:49:26] So I'm actually hosting a party this weekend and so I just I thought maybe you would have some good advice for me for hosting my party.

[00:49:36] I am happy to have hospitality is very important not me in culture I will share my wisdom with you.

[00:49:42] Okay so I'm inviting about like between six and ten people how much food do you think?

[00:49:49] I should prepare.

[00:49:51] You should have food to feed at least twenty people.

[00:49:55] Oh you want to have so much food when the night is over there will be some food that no one touched and you just have to put it away again.

[00:50:02] This is how much food you should have.

[00:50:04] Okay alright I'll get working on that and I'm in my house when I'm having people over I will regularly take out a tray and fill it with different kinds of nuts and dried fruits.

[00:50:15] So like six different sections in the tray a different kind of nut or dried fruit in each section of the tray.

[00:50:21] I will put it out on the table no one will eat it but they will know it is there in case they wanted and then at the end of the night it all goes back in the same container as it came out of.

[00:50:29] Oh right well good thing I live near South Coast organic bulk foods because I'll probably get my fruits and that's there.

[00:50:37] It's a very good idea.

[00:50:40] Alright so alright great so lots at least food for twenty people great.

[00:50:45] Any any advice on like I know obviously I'll clean my living room and the dining room and the bathroom because people will see those but like what about the bedroom upstairs?

[00:50:59] Like you know if no one is going in there do I need to clean in there?

[00:51:02] Yes.

[00:51:03] You need to clean it anyway.

[00:51:06] I don't care if no one is going to see your bed you're going to make your bed.

[00:51:09] I don't care if no one is going to go into the room you're going to vacuum the floor.

[00:51:13] If you have to clean like the Pope is coming over it should look like no one lives there.

[00:51:19] Okay alright I'll get my husband to help me with that part.

[00:51:26] And so how long should the party go?

[00:51:30] Oh this is a very good question.

[00:51:31] So if your guests are our minions they will not be arriving on time.

[00:51:36] Oh this is important to know.

[00:51:38] They will also not leave on time.

[00:51:40] What you have to understand is that there is a tradition called the Armenian goodbyes, which is when you are saying goodbye at the party.

[00:51:48] You have to say goodbye individually to every single person at this party which will often mean that you will start saying goodbye to someone and then you will have a conversation with that person for twenty minutes.

[00:51:58] And then you will go to the next person and say goodbye to them and you have a conversation with that person for twenty minutes.

[00:52:04] And so on and so forth until you have spoken to everyone at the party.

[00:52:07] And then eventually when you cannot talk anymore you will leave unless someone else starts to leave after you are starting to leave.

[00:52:14] And that will start the whole chain over again and then you will never get out of the house.

[00:52:18] Oh okay, so I should expect people to stay for a while.

[00:52:23] You might want to plan about a week for your party I guess.

[00:52:25] I think so. Yeah.

[00:52:29] You know, I wonder Sophia you should I haven't seen your furniture but I don't

[00:52:33] Should you consider like renting new furniture for your party or is that I mean I don't know if you need to go to the trouble of renting furniture.

[00:52:42] But if you are going to have a lot of people you might want to take multiple tables and put them together and put one big table cloth over it.

[00:52:50] So you can fit everybody at your table.

[00:52:53] That's you need to make sure everyone has some more to sit where they eat because everyone is going to eat.

[00:52:58] But nobody will anybody actually sit at the table.

[00:53:01] Oh yes people will sit at the table we will insist we will insist they eat before they leave.

[00:53:06] Do you have a favorite dish that you look forward to?

[00:53:10] That's a very good question.

[00:53:12] And our minions we do very good appetizers so if you want to do like a homos,

[00:53:18] who most with Peter crackers, home made Peter crackers you put them you bake them in the oven and then you take a bag and you fill it with spices.

[00:53:27] Your garlic powder your paprika and you put the chips in there and you shake it.

[00:53:31] It's delicious.

[00:53:32] So that's a good appetizer.

[00:53:34] The fruits and nuts as I have mentioned, good appetizer, olives very nice appetizer.

[00:53:40] Also some pickles pickled vegetables not necessarily does not have to be cucumbers.

[00:53:45] Our minions will pick all cauliflower, mushroom, carrot, it's delicious.

[00:53:51] Nice and crunchy.

[00:53:53] Pickled vegetables are good.

[00:53:55] My favorite thing is lebney which is very thick condensed yogurt.

[00:54:00] It's so good definitely lebney.

[00:54:03] And then for dinner dinner you might want to do things like a traditional onion dinner to celebrate an event.

[00:54:10] It's chicken and rice peel off.

[00:54:12] So that's a nice standard dish. A lot of people can eat.

[00:54:16] We have some vegetarian foods like stuffed grape leaves with rice, those are very good.

[00:54:20] I don't know I can have a whole meal just that.

[00:54:23] Other people will have it as an appetizer but I will eat that as a meal.

[00:54:27] But there are so many options.

[00:54:31] And this is food like the main event or do I need to do like any party games or I don't know if you need to do party games.

[00:54:41] It's necessarily but you definitely want to have music.

[00:54:45] Oh, okay.

[00:54:45] Music is very important in the background of any army and party.

[00:54:48] It's usually going to be very loud so you're going to have to shout over the music.

[00:54:54] It has very lots of drums and very like high pitched wind instruments.

[00:55:00] Okay.

[00:55:01] It's going to be piercing.

[00:55:02] You're going to have to project over it.

[00:55:05] All right. I'll drink a lot of water.

[00:55:07] I guess to lubricate my vocal cords.

[00:55:10] Yes.

[00:55:12] Oh, speaking of drinking anything besides water that I should make sure I have vodka.

[00:55:18] Just straight?

[00:55:20] Yes. So for our immune branch for example, when we have people over for our immune branch, usually the way it works is you have a big long table and all of the men will sit at one end of the table and they will have their tiny little glasses and they will do vodka shots throughout the whole brunch.

[00:55:36] This is at 10 o'clock in the morning important to know.

[00:55:38] So you'll do their vodka shots and then the other end of the table will be the women who have prepared all of the food and no one thanks them.

[00:55:45] Great. So I know where I'm sitting, I guess.

[00:55:49] Oh, there's some times people thinking.

[00:55:51] Yeah. This has been pretty helpful.

[00:55:53] I think I'm going to have a great party.

[00:55:56] Any last piece of advice?

[00:55:59] You just want to make sure that everybody is happy and fed and has a good time and eventually they will leave.

[00:56:07] All right. Sounds good.

[00:56:09] How about clean up after the party?

[00:56:11] Clean up after they party takes such a long time.

[00:56:14] Sometimes if it's a family party, people will stay and help you clean up which is very nice, which is very nice of them.

[00:56:20] They will come before and help you set up and also stay after two clean.

[00:56:24] But other times that does not happen and then you have to run the dishwasher like four times.

[00:56:29] So many times. I'll be ready.

[00:56:33] I have a question. So I've been kind of lonely in my old age and I was wondering,

[00:56:38] What type of cat should I get for a pet?

[00:56:42] I'm trying to think when I was in my younger days there was a cat who lived in my neighborhood.

[00:56:50] We called her Tommy.

[00:56:52] I think her actual name, no, we called her Tommy.

[00:56:56] Her actual name was Tommy like how Americans would say it but we are our minions so we pronounced it to Tommy.

[00:57:01] Because that is how the letter all works in Armenian.

[00:57:06] And she was a very sweet girl. She was very kind to when we were children and we did not know how to be around cats.

[00:57:13] She was still very kind and gentle with us and she was just coming to house and we would give her some chicken and a little bowl.

[00:57:19] And she would just sit on the couch and watch TV and she would come sit on your lap and she was very sweet.

[00:57:25] So you can find yourself at Tommy.

[00:57:27] I don't know what kind of cat she was but whatever kind of cat she was is the cat you want to get.

[00:57:33] Excellent, I told me.

[00:57:35] Yeah exactly.

[00:57:37] What do you do for fun in your free time?

[00:57:40] That's a very good question.

[00:57:42] And Armenians are very artsy crafty people.

[00:57:46] So I do a lot of sewing Armenians have a very important tradition of making handmade lace.

[00:57:53] There is an Armenian historical association of Rhode Island in the province and they collect handmade Armenian lace.

[00:58:02] So that's very important.

[00:58:04] There's this special kind of knot in Armenian sewing called the Janjak.

[00:58:09] I believe it shaped like a strawberry.

[00:58:11] So there will be Armenian embroidery with a little strawberry on it and that's a very important tradition.

[00:58:17] So so yes, it's a very important Armenian craft that I like to do.

[00:58:21] Besides from you know the cooking and the cleaning which are not as the cleaning is less fun.

[00:58:26] The cooking is more fun but the sewing is very nice.

[00:58:32] Well we know you're busy Armenian grandma so we'll let you go.

[00:58:36] Thank you, it will still take me 20 minutes to leave.

[00:58:39] So we should start saying bye now exactly yes.

[00:58:42] Great, well thank you so much for joining us.

[00:58:45] Of course have a very nice bucket.

[00:58:51] That's all we have time for for this episode of the two cat kitchen.

[00:58:55] We'd like to thank our musical guest Susi Chakmaki and thank you to the house band Sarah Grady and the coconut.

[00:59:04] I'm Rick McKinney and I'm Sophia Pearson.

[00:59:06] We'll see you again next time right here on the two cat kitchen.