I Am The Messiest Cook I Know

Last night, I made spaghetti for dinner.  In selecting the vegetables that were going in the sauce, I found the sweet potato in the drawer that we didn't cook with Christmas dinner.  So, being the

Brilliant 

woman that I am.... I decided to make soup from the remaining vegetables that were hiding in the crisper, wanting desperately to be used before being thrown out....

Of course, at the same time I was browning my beef, starting the sauce for the spaghetti....

My poor husband, who doesn't often eat pasta by choice arrives home to competing 'aroma's' from the kitchen and wonders if he should have grabbed take out on his way home. 

I can see the fear in his eyes as he tries to politely ask whats for dinner... So far the only thing RIGHT in the kitchen is the beef that is browning for my meat sauce.  Now, we normally compromise when I make spaghetti, if I grate cheese for the topping, he eats the sauce without complaint as a topping for buttered bread.

OOPS, Sorry Honey!  I didn't take the bread out of the freezer.... "Do you want toast? Do you want me to run to the store quick?"

Sweet man, he says no....

I puree my veggies for the soup, have it simmering nicely and the sauce for my spaghetti is simmering also. I'm somewhat grateful that I am suffering a stuffy nose as I am sure that the competing smells were not all that pleasing.  Boiled up the pasta and we finally sat down to dinner. It seems that quick spaghetti sauce took FOREVER to cook?!?!?!?

Hubby goes to get his plate. Asks where the noodles are... I've only made enough for the kids and I, purely out of habit... In more than 15 years, I can't honestly remember ever seeing him eat spaghetti sauce WITH noodles.  So I just didn't make him any....

By the end of the evening, I had no energy left and could not force myself to do the dishes.  I finally flopped in bed and vowed to deal with them in the morning.

How in the world did my kitchen get buried?  

It was so full this morning, I could barely find the counter or stove top. 

Factor in a one pot soup adventure, one pot for the spaghetti sauce, and a frying pan for the meat.....

My poor starving man who didn't eat with us, so no dishes from him....

Where did the dishes all come from?  There were no spoons in the drawer!  Spoons?  I have roughly 35 spoons in that drawer! And we ate spaghetti....not the soup.... 

Glasses?  Coffee Mugs?  I think my dishes smelled my cooking and tried to commit suicide by jumping out of the cupboards....

A full, and I mean seriously packed, load through the dishwasher, and still about 45 minutes spent washing dishes.... and I finally had a counter.  Albeit a filthy counter.  I scrubbed the counter top while my coffee was brewing...wiped off the top of the dishwasher. 

And the front

And the sides??  Oh, man...

Stove top next. yuck.

It's a good thing I get distracted easily or I wouldn't have noticed the pretty speckled pattern on the wall from the red spaghetti sauce and the orange soup splatter on the wall beside the stove...

If I take longer cleaning up my kitchen

than I do actually cooking the food...... 

I have a problem, don't I?

Chicken Thursday? Nope, Not Here!

Every time I make tacos or anything similar, I think of that commercial. I tried to find a video of it online, but was not able to.  Otherwise I would have posted it here to get it stuck in your head too!

I am not a menu planner like that. I know a lot of people that are. I'm sure that, ages ago, Mom was like that too.  But it still doesn't get the image of a chicken in a Thursday sweater out of my head.

Last night the kiddos wanted tacos. I had no soft tortillas in the house (or at least not enough for them!!) and I really didn't feel like tacos.  The thrill of a taco is purely in the act of putting them together, and I just did not want to get it all together.  Especially since I have to cut up all the usual options to please the family even though they hardly eat all of the ingredients. I have had to make a deal with the kids that the first taco MUST HAVE MEAT.  They could care less if it was a vegetarian meal, it's really all about the salsa and cheese.

So instead of regular tacos, I made the taco beef, grated cheese and cut up a tomato.  I layered these in a pie plate and baked it a few minutes to melt the cheese.  It wasn't taco pie (the kids didn't want taco pie) so we called it taco DIP and they ate it with tortilla chips.  They ate a TON without me having to fight about it!

I also had a strange craving for refried beans.  Which is NOT a normal ingredient for anything in my house.  Usually only something found in my dinner if I order a 7 layer burrito at Taco Bell.  I don't even know if they make that one anymore.  So, I googled refried beans and found that it is often made with pinto beans but can be made with kidney beans.  I have an incredible collection of cans of kidney beans. It's a make or break ingredient for my chili.  I don't think chili is quite right with out them, but can't get the kids to eat any of it if they see the kidney bean in there.

So, I drained and mashed the kidney beans, spiced them up and fried them up.

I actually learned yesterday that refried beans does not mean beans that have been refried, but actually that the 're' prefix is often used in Mexico in place of 'well'.  So refried beans are actually 'well fried'.

I was incredibly impressed!  That was super easy to make and absolutely delicious.  Only one of the three kids would eat it, but it was all used.  Of course when you mash them up and fry them until almost all of the moisture is gone, there really isn't a lot of bean left....

Some days I wonder where these ideas come from.  I don't know what drives me to figure out how to make things that no one but me even likes.

After all of that, I found that giving things the right name will make kids eat anything. 

How To Make Your Kids Eat Dinner

Tonight, I had this massive craving for pasta.  The trucker was working later, still home in the evening but not home for dinner, so this worked perfectly.  He's not a noodle guy.
I decided on Chicken and Mushrooms with Penne and Pesto sauce, which I loved and the little princess inhaled!
My boys don't like mushrooms (when they can see them) and they are not big fans of 'fake chicken' (the kind with skin and bones removed).  They believe that all pasta should be like KD.  Super cheesy and only in that shape!

I had store bought pesto that had just a hint of lemon in it.  My boys LOVE lemons, they often ask for them and will almost always eat them like oranges.  So for tonight's dinner, I sliced up a fresh lemon and lined the pieces up on the edge of the plates. The meal looked gourmet!!

A little sprinkle of lemon over the pasta, then they ate what was left of the fresh lemon... and then cleaned their plates!  They ate a meal full of things they don't like, simply because of a few slices of lemon.

Don't I wish I had thought of this earlier!

Oh, and before I forget... for those who are curious... 
Yes, the potato salad was great as was the pork, the company and the entire evening with friends and family!!

When Life Gives You Lemons

Most people will say "make lemonade"  though I have heard a thousand variations of this saying.

If you are more like me, you will probably find that when life gives you lemons, you forget about them down in the bottom drawer of the fridge for a few weeks.


If you make lemonade when life gives you lemons, what do you make when life gives you rotten moldy lemons in the bottom of your fridge?

Potato Salad - Part Deux

Brave Enough To Try Again?
Same Guests as last time I screwed up the potato salad... Think I can get it right this time?

Honestly, I was a bit surprised when the trucker asked if I was making my salad.  He doesn't even eat it!  I guess they really missed it when I messed it up last time.
I will try again today, even though I don't have as wide a variety of veggies to throw in.  Really, it only 'needs' eggs and potatoes, right?


I'm making a bbq pulled pork for dinner. Last night I said "remind me to take the roast out of the freezer when we get downstairs"  about a million times.  After a brief argument this morning, I think the trucker and I agree that I should know better than to ask him to remember something for ME, and he will work on NOT answering me if he didn't hear what I asked!

Remember my meal planning story?  Yeah, I've known for a week that I was making this today.  I completely forgot to take it out of the freezer last night so it was frozen solid this morning.
First Mistake.
Not having it out of the freezer means I definitely need to get it in the slow cooker early in the morning in order to be cooked well enough to pull apart easily.
Second Mistake.
Darling Trucker calls me at 10:30 and says "Have you got the roast cooking?"
"What?  Oh, Yes, Of COURSE I do!"
CRAP....
Haul out the slow cooker, get the roast from the stinkin freezer... it DOESN'T FIT in my crockpot!!  It's frozen solid so I can't manipulate it, I know it will shrink as it cooks and fit fine!  Can I put, like, tin foil over the top of the crockpot since I can't use the lid?  No, really, I don't know!  I decided today was probably not the day to test it out, since I've ripped off these friends before with dinner.... I think they actually want to eat what I said I was making!!
Grabbed the roaster and turned on the oven, deciding that I would just get it started in there (or maybe finish it that way too). After it thaws out a bit and starts to cook, it will be easier and I can fit it in the slow cooker.
I had lunch with my son, dropped him off at school and started to think about where I'd like to go for the afternoon.... "NO!!!"  I did realize before I got too far that I had a freakin' roast in the oven at home... close call, could have been yet another mistake!

Now the toddler is napping, I've got things in order again (finally) and the roast is in the crock as it should have been a while ago...
OH.... no, I am NOT in order... I was heading out to pick up the buns, wasn't I?  I was going to get buns after I dropped off the boy. But thinking I'd forget the meat, I turned around and came home...oh, man!

Now, having such a bad experience with my potato salad before, and such a rough morning with the roast.... I'm afraid to even start it!!  Hahaaaaa......ugh...

I'm sure it will be fine....right?  I'll send out an update once it's eaten (providing it all turns out edible!).