It is so hugely satisfying when something goes completely right. Whether it's hitting all the green lights on your way home after a long day or adding the perfect finishing touch to a hand-crafted gift, nothing beats the feeling of 'heck yes, this is awesome'.
In recent times, I've found myself in the role of housekeeper (and, naturally, daytime tv show watcher) and while I thought I'd get super bored playing house, I'm finding I'm really enjoying it. It makes me happy when the bathroom is sparkling clean and the laundry is folded and put away. It's made me more adventurous in the kitchen, too; not that I had a tiny repertoire of recipes but after three months, you find yourself on a weird kind of repeat. I thought I'd outdo myself in my newfound role and prepare something brand new and delicious for S and I. Cue experiments.
Dinner was a variation on a chicken pasta bake. After sautéing onions with garlic, mushrooms, carrots and celery, I added the strips of chicken and gazed into the pan. Usually I'd put tomato sauce on it, plate it with spaghetti and be done. Then I remembered I had a tin of creamy chicken soup in the cupboard. Throwing caution to the wind, I poured it in, adding about half a tin again of water to turn the soup into a sauce.
It smelled glorious. The mix of veggies and chicken cushioned by the comforting scent of 'feeling better' (do you eat chicken soup when you're sick?) was a delight as it filled my kitchen. I added a couple of handfuls of pasta, sprinkled on some cheese and put it in the oven to bake for half an hour. As you can see, we were both very happy with how it turned out.
And what dinner would be complete without dessert? It made me laugh when I asked S if he was ready for pudding (the English standard for anything that comes after your main course) and he replied 'pudding? I thought you made cheesecake?'. After my explanation, we tucked into a slice of creamy, coconutty goodness (the store bought box kind with some flaked coconut added and some chocolate drops to complete the experience. Yes, pudding is an experience.) and we were two stuffed, content people.
It's not often that I go the extra mile when I cook but this meal felt really special and 'grown up' to me. It's inspired me to do the same in the future, to try new things and prepare a couple of courses to chow down on. And I do have to cross off a few more new recipes to complete one of my goals for this year. I hope I can fit another six in before 2014! Have you cooked anything new recently or prepared something a little different to your usual? Did it fall perfectly into place? I hope so.
Love, K.
That looks delish!!! My mom always used the same trick with canned mushroom soup and it was always good.
ReplyDeleteThank you ^_^ I'd heard about using soup as sauce but never tried it before. Glad I did, it was super nice!
DeleteI'm recently unemployed and have fell into the "house wife" role. It does feel great to have a clean home, and that's basically my full time job. That meal looks yummy! I always like to try new recipes. Google and pinterest are my assistants :)
ReplyDeleteI do rather like it that while I can't work yet, I have a little job to do in keeping my home nice ^_^ I'm all for Googling recipes, sometimes you can find the most delicious and simple dishes that you'd never have thought of!
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