Hammer Time.

I’ve been a blogging delinquent this week mostly for the fact I have been reading in the evenings or going to bed early.

First off the deity of food must have had me in their favor as on Monday I have been offered a course at “Stirr” which of course I will be writing about my time there and its utter awesomeness as well as the interesting things I learned, and probably a few things I screwed up along the way. I am beyond excited! You may have noticed I have a special knack of making at least ONE mistake in the kitchen. I call it “Fly by the seat of my pants specials”…. Well not out loud, I say that in my head pretty much all the time. It’s almost my motto and it just makes life that much more interesting. Did I mention fun?! Add that in too!  

Secondly on Tuesday I got a message I won a barbeque. I entered 3 different draws for a barbeque in April, May and July from Trail Appliances, Presidents Choice and BroadView Homes. I won the one I entered in July from Broadview Homes, we pick up our awesome barbeque on Sunday and we are sooooooo looking forward to breaking that baby in!  (Which reminds me I must tell you about the first time I grilled something, another post idea! *pats self on back*) Then on Tuesday I made this Dijon Pork Sirloin with a green bean and lemon potatoe salad which despite my few mistakes was DELICIOUS. Then on Wednesday despite the mistakes, I made a great Lemon Rosemary Roasted Chicken. So I have a few little stories to fill up some space with, the most being about the adventure making the absolutely delicious roasted lemony chicken. 

Wednesday had been a long day I dropped hubs off at home to start cutting the mini potatoes for the recipe “Skillet Rosemary Chicken” which I got out of the “Weekday Cooking” section of Food Network Magazine, May 2010 issue. (I’ll have to post the recipe later as I don’t have it with me at the moment because I am so awesomely un-prepared.)  I went to pick up sweet baby and came home to very neatly cut mini red potatoes sitting in the pot waiting to be boiled, he did a way better job than I do, and I had a small sensation of potato envy.  I got my scatterbrained self to work trying to give hubs proper direction for what the recipe called. “We need a pan, no a skillet, no not that one, nope not that one either, the heavy one at the bottom that mom gave me, YEAH THAT ONE” (side note: I love my cast iron skillet, mom gave it to me and it is made in France. I feel like a food snob when I pull it out, which so far has been twice….. side note to the side note: that last sentence is so punny) (side note number 2: because of having to 1.5X the recipe the ingredients didn’t all fit in that pan and when it came to putting it all together for oven roasting time I had to transfer it to a 9×13 oven pan which was still too small as everything was precariously piled and teetering off, I said many prayers that nothing would fall and start an oven in the fire) At this point I can imagine my mom telling me to “stop digressing and just get on with it!”  I love that woman she is so direct and always finishes everything she starts. I trait I did not inherit.  

Let’s get back to me not being able to get my head around a simple recipe from the kids point of view they could probably only pick up the “Oh Sh*ts” and “Oops” and “Oh whoops I was supposed to put that in first!” I imagine sometimes they must be just terrified at what might be waiting for them at the table.  I was supposed to chop up some garlic, get rosemary leaves off the fresh rosemary “twigs/sprigs” and add some salt then mash. Sounds fairly simple right?? Well working with fresh rosemary to me is like working with pine needles. I have no idea how to mash these things into a paste and after this whole experience I still don’t. My first thought was “Dam I don’t have a mortar and pestle thingy….hmmm…. what can I use in place.” I swear one could literally see one of those vintage Thomas Edison light bulbs go off above my head (which if that really happened it would be great because the light bulbs in the kitchen keep blowing) I remembered the tenderizer I bought a few months back for this awesome pork tenderloin bathed in buttermilk and covered in kettle cooked potato chips. For those of you who like me didn’t know what this is, it’s a hammer with pointy bits on the end used to “tenderize” meat for cooking. Quite frankly I call it the best stress relief in the world. They need to rename and remarket that as “Therapy” for 9.99 at SuperStore. (As this blog goes on I am sure you will hear my great love for SuperStore and Joe clothes, as well as how much I LOVE grocery shopping)

Anyhow I grab that lovely hammer mabober and head to the kitchen table. The spot where I cut things up on the counter is on this awesome glass thing my mom & dad bought hubs and I for Christmas that is like a cutting board and measuring thing all in one.  (Side note: our family is renowned for their practical gifts, I have a few great stories about that too)  So there I am at the kitchen table, I had put the garlic, rosemary and salt into a sandwich baggy and they were ready for a pounding.  So I started hammering & kept on hammering. The garlic was getting pulverized, the salt I couldn’t even see it anymore (I use sea salt granules) the rosemary??? Well that is a different story; they were still in their needle form. So, I beat the bag even more. I got mad. I swear I could hear the garlic begging for me to stop but I am a stubborn woman and the beats just kept on coming. Rosemary is one stubborn cow; no matter what I did it was determined to stay a needle.  I gave off a swear (or two) and threw the pulverized (and non pulverized) contents of the baggy into the bowl with the juice from 2 lemons and olive oil. I added the chicken and threw it into the skillet.

Upon returning to the kitchen table where the herb abusing took place I discovered I busted the table. I put these great divots into the table from the bobbley end of the mallet. So lesson learned, if you are going to beat the heck out of something whether it is meat or some unsuspecting herb, put a cutting board underneath and save your table! Your table will thank you! Or…. buy a concrete table. Problem solved.

You may have noticed I missed Thursday and Mondays meals, well I know you all will be jealous of what I didn’t make on those days, Wendy’s Burgers and Hot Dogs with Macaroni and Cheese respectively.  What did the kids notice about those days “Hey, I just realized we aren’t eating at 8 o’clock” When I cook anything even though the recipe’s say “20 minutes” it usually takes me about 1.5-2 hrs to get anything on the table. My mom can attest to that with my “Muffin” story which I have been badgering her to write for this blog.

I’ll post the recipes for both the pork tenderloin and the chicken up here when I have them at hand. Despite my stories they are really easy and scrumptious recipes to master and as you can see from my mistakes it is hard to mess up because everything has turned out great despite not making things into a great mushy paste to create a rub or missing an ingredient or two. The keys are to improvise and have fun and defiantly laugh about it later.

Happy Eating my dear friends!