Tag Archives: cooking

Lockdown Times, Life, and Raising Kids During COVID-19

Posted on by under Misadventures in Non-Fiction

Happy…what day is it? Tuesday. Happy Tuesday! For those of you for whom it applies: happy book birthday to The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. I have my copy and I’m eager to devour it.

Tonight’s post is a study in messing around with the WordPress mobile app to post. I apologize for no formatting issues. Not sorry at all.

I’ve been dwelling on a few things that have happened during these strange Quarantimes, and so I decided to share some of them. This is a partially selfish post as it’s to quiet some of the noise in my brain, and partially to share my experiences. Partially to help commiserate, perhaps?

I’m going to focus on positive shit because I started typing about the bad moments from 2020 and it made me tired so I said the Hell with it. There’s enough negative out there.

Distance Learning, The Beginnings, were a real treat. It was a wild learning curve for Kiddo 1, and for Steff and me. Seesaw wasn’t terrifically cooperative, and there were a few nights I was up until after 11 recalling my third grade math skills. It was a bonding experience wrapped in shared frustration, but we survived it without my daughter trying to kill me while I slept. And that’s really the heart and soul of parenting. (It isn’t. I’m just very bad at parenting.)

I accidentally killed the oven. The stove top still works. The silver lining? I’ve gotten really damn good at prepping pork chops and chicken breasts in the skillet. Our go-to Tuesday dinner comfort food is my half-assed take on chicken divan. I enjoy cooking and I’ve had no complaints from my family thus far, so I’ll chalk that up as a win.

We got some projects finished around my house. I didn’t succeed at writing the next best-selling novel. I didn’t read a book a week. I still haven’t fully prepped for NaNoWriMo. There are definitely days I think about those things, but increasingly I focus on the things I have managed to accomplish. I’ve been writing four serial stories consistently. I’ve kept up, mostly, with a personal productivity tracker. I tried a weekly planner and discovered it wasn’t for me.

I’ve consumed a modest amount of whiskey, but stopped drinking soda entirely.

This year has been an adventure so far. It has been far from perfect, but I’m grateful for the good that has come of it. I hope anyone who reads this has had some good in 2020 as well.

I could write more, but my dishes still don’t wash themselves and it’s a work night. I like writing, but I like sleep a little more. Take care, folks.

A foul mood bested by good food

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging 2.0

Something about Spring cleaning combined with the last few days of vacation is a bit disgusting to me. Admittedly, this idea was one I had before I took this vacation, and so I only have myself to blame. Alternatively, I did manage to nearly Gorilla Glue two of my fingers together while trying to put a kitchen cabinet back together. I did, however, accomplish much of what I planned on achieving today, and more importantly I do now plan on doing more writing for my novel-project.

The best part of this Friday, aside from catching up on my shows, was dinner. My parents so very kindly sent me back to Altoona with a few goodies of the food variety, among which was some kielbasa. I cooked up said kielbasa, mixing it in with angel hair pasta and two varieties of alfredo sauce (four cheese and garlic). Added some additional garlic powder and a dash of cayenne to taste, and so my lousy Friday was bested by a generous helping of homemade comfort foods. Here’s the obligatory food picture so I feel less guilty about being lazy here in favor of working on the novel-project.

What I lack in plating skills I make up for with delicious food. Probably.

What I lack in plating skills I make up for with delicious food. Probably.

My pledge to no longer be bored

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging 2.0

I think it’s safe to say that one of the most commonly heard phrases, especially in people around my age group and younger folks (You dern whipper-snappers and your selfie-sticks), is “I’m bored”. Earlier today, after having completed my tasks for the day and then-some, I found myself thinking exactly that. I’m bored.

Somewhere between stopping at the liquor store to purchase the other ingredients required to make a Blood & Sand–a decision I entirely support, especially after making one and enjoying it quite thoroughly–and contemplating dinner, it occurred to me just how awful saying “I’m bored” is given just how much I could be doing with my time. I’m not talking about endless writing or spending hours promoting things on social media, interspersed with the conversations I’ve grown famous/infamous/unknown for having. Louis C.K. said it better than I ever could, in fact, and so I found a convenient image on the internet with his words placed on it to share to make my point here.

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There’s a lot of fantastic truth in this quote, and it got me thinking even further. There is, at no point, really a good reason to be bored. I’m not going to preach about the miracle of consciousness. I think it’s more about finding the things that matter most in this sea of constant information and distractions.  Continue reading →

Lazy comfort food post…go!

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging

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Today kicked my ass so savagely that all I can think about is sleep and the weekend ahead of me. Instead of my planned post, gaze upon the spiced, cheddar-stuffed baked chicken I made and know it was worth setting off the smoke alarm twice while making it.

I cut the chicken breasts just enough to stuff cheddar cheese, both cubed and shredded, into the chicken. Closed it up, then added sea salt, pepper, a dash of lemon juice, a little garlic powder, and some cayenne powder to mine. I drizzled just a little olive oil over top of the chicken before putting it in the oven at 450 degrees for twenty-five minutes. Turned out pretty well.

A little comfort food

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging

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Today had a fair few trials and tribulations I could have done without, and so I’m happy to instead post about the dinner experimenting I just finished working on. It’s just as unhealthy as it looks.

I took boneless, skinless chicken breasts and cut them down the middle (I’d say I butterflied them, but I can’t take myself that seriously as a cook). I stuffed the chicken with mozzarella cheese, closing it again and wrapping it with bacon. Some pepper and olive oil were added, and to try something different I topped it with a dash of real maple syrup to offset the saltiness of everything else. Fingers crossed it turned out well.

A breakfast of champions

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging

Not to be mistaken for Breakfast of Champions, which I haven’t read in years and now suddenly find myself wanting to find and reread. Not even sort of the point of this post. And now a pause for the appropriate number of gasps incited by today’s post happening before 10pm or later. Only the appropriate number, however; I’ll have no excessive or exaggerated signs of shock on my posts, thank you very much.

This is a food post, entirely and apologetically. I’ve been trying to cook more lately instead of opting to go out for dinner, which is just as well since it’s less expensive to throw together ingredients in the hopes it will transform into something mostly edible (I’m working at about a 75% success rate here, so I’m going to say I’ve been doing something right). I really enjoy cooking, if only because it gives me a chance to revert to the days I spent dreaming of being a mad scientist. There are, quite sadly, far fewer robots involved in cooking meals, but I’ll think of a way to change that up sooner or later. Continue reading →

An oddly responsible day off

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging

My days off of work are pretty sacred to me, in that I generally try to relax at least a little bit. Today wasn’t an exception to that rule of sorts.

Marceline the Adventure Bean, our third cat, had a vet appointment for her final vaccinations, and I had a very pressing need to find out why the Hell the Maintenance Required light was on in my car (spoilers: it wasn’t because it missed my bright, beautiful smile). I also had come to the realization that there’s not a whole lot by way of food in the new place, which was something I decided needed correcting. I wanted to get a haircut, but that didn’t quite manage to happen. We’ll get back to that.

My errands followed one another quite neatly, with the vet appointment going smoothly, the cleaning out of my car going well, and then the oil change & battery check-up for my car going poorly. Womp womp. Turns out the issues I’d noticed lately were because my poor ol’ Toyota’s battery needed replacing, but the folks at the Plank Road Jiffy Lube are the absolute best. Problem solved nice and quickly. Thanks to stopping there, I saw a recipe on TV for two ingredient chicken (skin-on chicken breasts; add garlic and herb brie or Borsin, then bake…For those interested, Google two ingredient chicken), and so dinner plans were set.

If this post sounds oddly responsible, that’s because it is. I wanted to get some writing done today, but that didn’t quite happen (it will be happening tomorrow instead, as I have self-imposed deadlines to meet). There’s a problem there, however, because I had plenty of creative thoughts rattling around that were left to wait. They seem to have conspired with my love of cooking. Something made me think of scotch bonnets, which are a type of very hot pepper similar to habaneros. They’re commonly, or so Google says, used for Caribbean jerk recipes and have a sweeter taste than their similarly-spicy pepper cousins. I suddenly found myself, a couple hours ago, wanting to use them to make something. I couldn’t figure out what.

My current idea? I happened upon a recipe for caramel sauce with cayenne pepper in it, and decided trying it with scotch bonnets could be plausible. I’ll have to post the results once this food experimentation invariably happens.

How do you other creative types seem to handle the untapped creative ideas in situations like this?

I’d say more, but I work very early tomorrow. Pretty sure this hundred days is almost up, but I need to verify that to be sure.

Creative cooking

Posted on by under One Hundred Days of Blogging

Or “I owe a fair bit of editing and really want to start on my unnamed novel project, so here’s a cool thing I made on a whim”.

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This may have been one of the tastiest crazy ideas I’ve ever had.

I love to cook, which goes hand-in-hand with loving food for me. Coming up with new, potentially delicious dishes is exciting in similar ways to binge-writing tends to be.

My annual health screening at work revealed something I had figured out on my own: I need to shed some weight. Not one to just say meh and give up (yes, I do that sometimes; shut up), I decided I needed to make a healthy dinner tonight. Above is only part of the dinner; a mango-pineapple-pomegranate salsa-thing of my own design. I applied a bit of Pyrat XO Reserve to the sauce pan before adding the diced fruit bits.

The orange aromas from the Pyrat were especially noticeable as this mix heated up, and the kitchen still smells like some new, secret scent from Bath & Body Works. The pineapple broke down somewhat, mixing in with the mango and pomegranate quite nicely. Overall, it went very nicely with chicken and mixed veggies. Definitely something I’d make again.

A day of recovery

Posted on by under Misadventures in Non-Fiction, One Hundred Days of Blogging

I’m going to focus largely on the good here, as today was actually an excrement sandwich sprinkled with shards of broken glass and used hypodermic needles of questionable origin. There may be a touch of hyperbole there, but to be fair I also just realized my next post-vacation day off is fourteen days away from when my vacation occurred (with some of those days involving multiple shifts). It makes me tired to even think about it, so I’m going to shift my focus elsewhere.

The stuff – After work, I headed over to Walmart to pick up some ingredients for dinner. I had no actual game-plan in mind, but I figured I could probably mange to make something relatively edible without too much effort. Keeping in mind I didn’t want to do more of the usual, I picked up some chicken (off to a poor start on avoiding the usual) and I wandered around a bit. The end result was I bought some yellow and orange bell peppers, some sugar snap peas, and some baby carrots (which didn’t end up in the dish anyway). I wasn’t quite sure how I’d prepare the chicken until I walked by a display of dressings and spotted a bottle of raspberry balsamic vinaigrette. The dressing, which I’m not ashamed to say I’m actually too lazy to type out repeatedly, ended up being a marinade for the chicken. Tossed it in a bag and let it hang out in the fridge for a bit while I took a nap. Brianne had a very busy day with a doctor’s appointment followed by work followed by one of her grad courses, so I had some time between thinking up dinner and making the actual meal.

Bragging that isn’t really bragging – I managed to get into a Looking For Raid iteration of The Dread Approach after minimal waiting. I was probably one of the lowest DPS players in there, but I also managed to not die. Something about half of the people in our raid couldn’t say about themselves, unfortunately, as people seemed pretty intent on standing in the fire whenever possible. This was my first time really doing any raiding in Mists of Pandaria (ignoring that I did get into an LFR group right at Sha of Fear last week; that was fun). I nabbed a good few pieces of gear and generally enjoyed myself. The best part, however, was that my queue for Terrace of Endless Spring popped right after I completed The Dread Approach. As I’ve not gotten anywhere in my Legendary cloak questing, I was pretty happy to get to 4 of each…er, Mark I guess. Marks of Wisdom and Power? I’m not looking it up. The point is I got to kill things I’ve never killed before, and if that’s not what raiding is all about then I must be doing it wrong. Note to self: I still need to try my hand at getting the other Thunderfury binding before next Tuesday (damn it).

Dinner turned out really well. It’s Brianne-approved, so that’s a plus. It was absolutely awful to look at, but it was a nice and healthy sweet meal I’ll have to try my hand at making again soon.

The best part of tonight is that I feel pretty rejuvenated. It’s a bit surprising, actually, as I ended work and shopping feeling very stressed out. A lot of it is a matter of accepting things that aren’t presently within my control and moving along with the things I can handle in the present (shocking, I know). The nap certainly didn’t hurt.

In closing – Here’s wishing everyone a relatively insanity-free next fourteen days, and in doing so sending the same wishes to myself. Victory is just ahead, right?