I know, I know.....I already posted today. What can I say? My mind is filled with irrelevant thoughts!
As I was writing earlier I was "cooking." I'm not a "bad" cook mind you. I don't experiment much. I pretty much make the same stuff over and over and over again. If you are a lover of variety, I am not your chef. Lately though I have been so distracted by the kids even my old standbys are not turning out well at all!
Thursday I made goulash. Simple recipe. 1 package of whole grain elbow macaroni noodles, cooked according to package directions. 1 lb of ground chuck, fried into miniscule pieces (Erik hates "chunky" meat--although he likes his wife chunky...ok, ok, I know, inappropriate and silly- I couldn't help myself). ANYWAY, back to the goulash. I fry the hamburger with chopped green onion and vidalia onions. Sometimes add mushrooms. Season it with salt, pepper, Italian Seasoning and sometimes garlic powder. Sometimes minced onion instead of fresh (depending on how low my checkbook is). As I am doing this step I always think of my husband saying, "Season the meat" over and over again in my head. Now keep in mind, when we first started dating he didn't own a pan, nor did he know how to fry hamburger--but now, 8,000 pizza rolls later, he's Emeril Lagassé. Then I add a can of diced tomatoes to the hamburger/onion/green pepper mixture. You can get fancy here and add the diced tomatoes with garlic. After the diced tomatoes I add 1 jar of Prego and let it all heat up. And then I just wait for the noodles to finish, drain them, and stir them into the sauce mixture. Add some whole wheat garlic bread and I am good to go. I know this goulash recipe has had you at the edge of your seat, right? "What's your point" you say? My point is...this is EASY. Cooking 101. No glazes, flambay, or thermometers needed. Just your basic open the can and heat it up. But lately I get so distracted by the kids. I can't concentrate. I can't focus. I totally screwed it up. I did the sauce. It was fine. I did the noodles, they were great. Then, at the pivital moment I missed the exit. I didn't drain the noodles before I added them to the sauce and ended up with this bland, watery, tomato soupy mixture--with REALLY mushy noodles. YUCK!
AND tonight I made Chicken and Noodles. Stay with me now....I am going through the recipe. Thaw the boneless skinless chicken breasts. Check. Heat the oven up to 375ish. Check. Put chicken in 9 x 13 casserole dish. Check. Cover with one can of cream of mushroom soup, one can of cream of chicken soup, and 1/2 can of milk. Check. Cover with tinfoil and let cook for about an hour. Check. And yet, after doing this for the 1200th time, the chicken was dry and not cooked all the way. Meanwhile, on the burner....boil water. Check. Add one package of egg noodles. Check. And that's as far as I got. The water all boiled out and the noodles burned into one rubbery pile. "So," you say, "adapt." Of course, I thought that too. I am a grown up. I'll just make some whole grain brown Minute Rice. That will work. Heck, that's kind of where I got the recipe to begin with anyway. It was one of Erik's favorites so I got it from his mother. It starts out the same....chicken breasts, cream of mushroom soup, cream of chicken, milk, tinfoil. But, 10 minutes before it's done, you take the casserole dish out, add refrigerated biscuts to the top of the soupy mixture and let it cook until they get brown. Then you spoon it onto rice and you have Chicken and Biscuts (always served with green beans for some reason).
Then I stopped. Why? It's 9:30 at night by now. Clearly the kids aren't hungry. By now the undercooked chicken I put in the oven is REALLY dry and the soup has formed a dark brown frame around the inside of the casserole dish. Nobody cares. Besides, I have Oreo cookies, a frozen pizza, and a few corndogs that can be heated up in case of an emergency. Or a peanut butter and jelly sock 'em in the belly sandwich.
Fast forward. 9:45 pm. I go into the kitchen to make the usual. Time to get everyone ready for bed. Olivia wants apple juice. Ryan and Rebekah want chocolate milk. And when I turn the corner to the foyer, there is Olivia, scraping her finger around the inside of the casserole dish and licking the cream soup mixture. Asking for a bowl! I don't know if that means A. Even when I fail horribly I am still a good cook, or B. Olivia will eat anything. BUT I am guessing B is probably the best answer. So that is what she is doing now. Sitting in front of the tv butt naked (oh, scratch that. She finally did put on a sundress and a pair of underwear with snowflakes--she calls them her Christmas underwear), watching PeeWee's Playhouse on demand.
It's been a long night. Erik works Friday nights for the local paper during the football season so it's just been me. I thought about cleaning, but why? With all 4 kids at home it's like treading water....you can work for hours and not get anywhere. I did buy some paint today though. Lots of my friends have been painting their houses, so I thought I would give it a try. It's Labor Day weekend and we have no other plans. I bought a dark rich color called, "chocolate kiss" and picked up some curtains on clearance at Walmart. They are a brick red tapestry kind of pattern. It's kind of funny. We have this hideous, albeit comfortable, bright emerald green lazyboy rocker recliner that we got from a friend of Erik's mother's. It's never matched anything. It's always just been out of place. But alas, when I put up the curtains....it finally belonged! And we also have a couch and loveseat that has been with us since Erik's bachelor days (I shudder to think of the things they've seen). They are tan, and NASTY. They have been washed a thousand times. Erik got me some denim covers for them a few years back, but they aren't in great shape anymore either.... Anyway, when I put up the curtains, the couch and loveseat didn't look quite as hideous anymore either! My plan is to paint a few accent walls the dark brown color...because all the crayon and marker really stand out on the current matte white. Then I will pick a few of my favorite pictures, print them in black and white, frame them in black frames in white mats against the brown wall....and viola. Not so crappy. Then I just need to prime and spraypaint the coffee table and the beat up tv stand enamel black....add some baskets with black and white gingham print....and what do you know? We are on the next home tour. OK, maybe not. But not so crappy would be ok.
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