Saturday, November 16, 2024

Adventures in cooking

Well… Millinocket is closer to really good college hockey, but Presque Isle is more fun to say

That’s probably not the best way to make a decision on where I’m moving to, but fuck it.

I’m watching UMaine vs Boston University right now on ESPN+. I’d rather be at Alfond Pond, seeing it in person. *sigh*

I got to see BU play Maine in Maine almost a decade ago and it was an experience. You know me… nothing says Wendell Gee like arguing with the ex about the semantics of going down (on someone) just as a bunch of college hockey players walk onto the elevator.

Yup.

Hey, they got a good chuckle out of it.

Speaking of chuckling, I’m loving listening to the announcer say “Bangor”. It’s pronounced Bang-or (more or less) but dad always pronounced it like Bang-ah and I do, too. Either that or Bang-her. (Banger? I hardly knew her!)

And… we’re finally where this entry was supposed to start: My dad.

Good old Chuck. He tried. He tried so hard - and failed consistently - to cook my entire life.

Exhibit #1: Super Duper Eggs

My success in the kitchen has mostly been limited to things I can bake. Baking is easy - you pop a bunch of flour and some shit into a hot box and let it sit until it tells you it’s done.

I grew up cooking on a gas stove. I am front row on the struggle bus when it comes to judging temp on the cooktop. For example, I watched my potato sit on a black piece of glass for 20 minutes before the water decided to start boiling. I never once saw that thing turn red. (But, surprise! A watched pot will boil. Eventually.) You throw a pot on a burner with an open flame under it and you can tell that your food is cooking. You know how you can tell?

THERE IS A FUCKING VISIBLE HEAT SOURCE.

But I digress.

I’ve been living off recipes from America’s Test Kitchen. Mostly the Cooking for One cookbook this week, but I’ve spent a lot of time with the Cooking for Two cookbook in the past. (ATK seems write the only recipes that I cannot fuck up.)

This one is the best thing I’ve made so far. BY FAR. (Chicken Lettuce Wraps with Hoisin Barbecue Sauce for One)

Because. Dude.

I made edible rice.

EDIBLE RICE.

Now, my dad had this hatred of rice. He never ate it unless it was fried with pork, and even then, he didn’t eat a lot of it. If I thought I had weird food issues, white rice triggered my father’s PTSD. (Rice paddies in VietNam, I guess. He never talked much about the war.)

I’ve heard that it’s impossible for someone like me to make rice successfully.

I didn’t even have a lid for my small saucepan, so I was positive that this was going to be an unmitigated disaster. Proof that, despite the five months of practice I’ve had, the lack of cooking skill in the Gee DNA is real.

Well.

Thursday night, I made this chicken dish but I opted to eat it in flour tortillas. I couldn’t justify a head of lettuce for this, but I had the tortillas on hand.

BECAUSE I MADE TACOS!

Wait… let’s finish the chicken story. Yes, the chicken. We must finish the chicken.

So. Tortillas. I wasn’t brave enough for the rice. Not when I had a banger (HA!) of a headache. It was good. Edible.

Decent enough so that I used the other half of the chicken to make the same exact thing last night.

But I tried to make rice for it to sit on.

No. Not tried.

SUCCEEDED.

I made that rice like I was Jamie Fucking Oliver.

No. Wait.

It was better. (Granted, it was just white rice, but… I bet Uncle Roger would have approved.)

Context:

I guess there’s hope for me after all.

I also guess I owe you the taco story.

My dad once made this Super Bowl Chili with ground beef that was a day past the sell by date.

We both got food poisoning so bad that I’m surprised we survived it. After that experience, I swore off eating ground beef unless I purchased it that day.

But, dude I have been CRAVING tacos. Mostly because I can’t have them.

I can’t buy the ground beef in the store because it’s sold in pounds and I refuse to save the leftover beef for another day. I need about a half pound, and I’ve always been afraid to ask the butcher to cut the package in half. (Not that I can even find someone working at 7AM on Sunday morning, but I digress.)

Well, there was someone working there last Sunday… and I got my meat.

Then there was the matter of finding the smallest amount of taco shells because who knows if I’ll ever be able to get ground beef again.

I ended up getting a dinner kit with six hard and six soft taco shells. I had the tortillas left over, so… chicken!

Speaking of chicken, I need to do some meal planning so…