What's For Dinner?

The same  question haunts me daily.

No matter how many loads of laundry I've washed,

how many weeds I've pulled,

how many errands I've done,

it's never enough.

There's always demand for one more task in my day.

I could swim the seven seas,
scale Mountwashmore,
and cross off 29 things on my To-Do List.

Still the question buzzes in my ear
like a Kamikaze mosquito who comes out of hiding
after the bedroom light is extinguished.

Sometimes,the demands of life are so great,
I actually get annoyed when this
survival-of-the-fittest question is asked.


Remember, I'm the one who wishes the Wonka pill was real?

You can read about it here.

As if breakfast and lunch weren't enough,
even though the kids often make their own,
they always gotta' ask
"What's for dinner?"


It's not that I don't wanna' feed my kids,
it's not that we are poverty-stricken and
need to beg for food from the starving kids in Africa.

Most of the time I just can't come up with any idears.

Nothing sounds good,
nothing sounds easy.

Then one day I heard giggling in the kitchen.

Like handwriting on the wall,
I received my answer.

She looks so delicious,
 we might have to make this again.

***********

(Please don't panic.
No children were hurt or abused
in the writing of this blog.
A mommy trying to carry an adorably chubby baby
and a large gleaming kettle upstairs at the same time,
merely simplified her life.)

(Blue words are links to past blogs,
just in case you were too busy trying to figger'
out what to make for dinner to notice.

May I Take Your Order Please?

The words were music to my ears.

"Mom, can I make lunch?"

Like I'm gunna' say NO?!?!?!?!?

My youngest daughter loves to serve

and loves to be in the kitchen,

so I love to let her serve me by

being in the kitchen.

I like to avoid the kitchen.

We're not always on speaking terms.

So, I continued to work on an article I was writing,

corrected Geometry and tried not to let Facebook

interrupt my day any further.

When she called me into the kitchen later,

I knew I was in for a fancy restaurant kinda' experience.

A tablesetting with cloth napkin awaited.

After she seated me, I was given a menu,

just like in a real restaurant.

(We'll talk about the spelling tomorrow, k?)

She wore an apron and talked about the menu items,

just like in a real restaurant.

My order was written down and the food quickly prepared.

I should have taken a picture of the food,

but I devoured it too quickly.

She fanned the whole grain crackers around the mound of chicken salad.

The egg salad was served with potato chips

because we like to use it as a dip, not a sandwich spread.

It was delicious!

Just like in a real restaurant.

The bill was just like in a real restaurant, too.

"And, Mom, you have to pay me in real money,"

she said graciously, but firmly.

This is as opposed to the fake money we use

with our fake cash register

when we're studying money in school.

Real money?

Who's she kidding?

I have two teenagers in the house,

I'm not allowed to carry money.

They can sniff out dollar bills faster than

pigs can sniff out truffles.

(I've been waiting for years to use that useful

tidbit of information I gleaned from my fourth grade reader.)

My wallet was emptied.

It wasn't enough.

The piggy bank was shooken/shooked/shaken

until I felt like I was getting carpal tunnel.

The restaurant owner conceded to accept

the amount that slid out of Mr.  Piggy Bank,

who's not the truffle sniffing kinda' pig.

The change was tossed into the tip jar,

and I finished up the dishes.

Just like in a real restaurant.

fUmBliNg iN ThE kItChEn WiTh mOmMa MiNdY

I kinda' don't like to cook. I've been cooking as long as I can remember and I am a little battle weary. I used to do the homemade meals, homemade breads, quick breads, cookies, candies, jams, jellies, pickles, salsa, on and on and on. I had the huge garden. I cooked and canned with all the best of them in them in the Midwest.

Then, we moved to the West coast. Out here, we grow moss in our yards, have huge slugs and we have more critters in town to eat gardens than I had living in the farm country of North Dakota. We rented our first year so gardening was out.


Then, I got cancer. The recovery was very slow, over a year, as I learned to live with artificial hormones and finished treatment. We bought a house. I continued to recover. Dinner became a family workshop with everyone pitching in to try to keep our meals timely and healthy. I remember the kids victoriously celebrating when I made dinner for the first time all by myself. The younger kids NEVER remember that I USED to made things like lasagna, pizza, brownies and breakfast.


Then, I got lazy. Hey, once you've bought Stouffers, who wants to go to all the work to make lasagna? Once you know the number to three different pizza delivery places, who wants to make their own pizza?


Now, I am sick of my cooking. I've been reading cooking blogs long enough to inspire myself to get back into the Mommy mode of preparing new and interesting meals.


I had a nap today, so I was ready to tackle something simple. With a leftover cooked roast to warm up, all I needed to make was a new side dish.


A recipe from Ellie from Homecooking In Montana had been taunting my tasetbuds all weekend. Plus, it looked easy. I printed out the pages from her blog with her amazing photography and step by step directions.


I had to boil new potatoes until fork tender.

Sounded easy. I just wasn't sure how tender fork tender was. I overcooked them. Notice how close I left the plastic spoon to the burner. I'm amazed I didn't start it on fire. That happens a little too often around here.

I was supposed to line my cookie sheet with parchment paper. I've never owned that in my life. I hoped aluminum foil would work.
I was supposed to crush the potatoes carefully. I couldn't find my potato masher. I couldn't even remember how many years it has been since I used it. Did I get rid of it when I started buying Potato Buds? Did the kids take it? If they did, do I want to know what they did with it?
I tried this other utinsel thing, I don't know what it is called, but I have had it for years and never use it. It just looks cool and old.

It didn't work. I had to mash the pieces back with my wrinkled fingers.

I tried again with not so much brute force. It still didn't work. I used Ellie's recommendation to use a napkin and press it down with your hand.

Notice the one in the front middle? I guess most people wouldn't have used a pink napkin, I did. I won't next time. I also smashed some of them harder than I should have. At this point, I had tears in my eyes. I felt like such a failure because I couldn't even boil potatoes correctly for this first step of the recipe. But, I rallied and pushed on.

.

I needed to mix olive oil and garlic clove for the next step. I had to sniff all the olive oils to find the one that was the freshest. I couldn't find garlic, so used some crushed garlic from a jar that I think is about a year old. While I was debating on how old garlic can be and still be edible, Beth came in and showed me where she hid the garlic she just bought. I threw out the first batch and made the oil and garlic again, fresh.

.

I topped the potoes with oil and garlic, parmeson cheese and broiled them for a few minutes. I added grated colby-jack and chives from my OWN garden to the top, returned them to the oven.

At this point I was a little amazed, but wondering if I could get the rest of the dinner on the table before the potatoes got cold. I have lost that art of multi-tasking in the kitchen.

.

Despite all my fumblings, Ellie's potatoes were a hit with my family. I didn't show them the picture of her potatoes, so they didn't know how inferior mine were.

.

Jon, the one who doesn't remember the Days When Mom Used to Cook, totally appreciated the dinner. With lip-smacking approval he gushed, "Mom, the potatoes are amazing! You should cook every night!"

.

Oh. If I had know that would be the expectation, I would have opened the Potato Buds.

.

Now that you seen my fumblings, drop by Ellie's site and see some real cooking. She was inspiration enough to get me back in the kitchen.