For the first time in more years than I can remember, I'm an
empty nester. My kids tracked out from
school on Friday, so that night, my wife took them to New England to stay with
her parents for the week. Tomorrow night,
she'll return by herself so that we can enjoy some peace and quiet (and some
good food) by ourselves to celebrate out tenth anniversary. But in the meantime, I've got no
responsibilities! So, I ask "What's
a Guy to Do?" Should I drink myself into oblivion? Should I eat McDonald's and Dunkin Donuts for
every meal? Can I sleeping until 11am
and go to sleep at three in the morning?
No to all of the above!
It's 7:42am on Sunday and I've already been up for an hour, let the dog
out, cleaned up a bit, and now I'm writing a blog post. After almost eight years of steady wake up
calls from screaming babies, then crawling toddlers, and now demanding
children, it's pretty much a certainty that this body isn't ever going to sleep
late again.
So I'm up, but I should be vegging on the couch, right? Well, yet again, after all this time paying
bills, mowing lawns, grocery shopping, and simply cleaning up behind everyone
else in this house, I'm prepared to face the facts that I'm a doer. If I'm not getting stuff done, I'm thinking
about getting stuff done. So, as they
say in these parts, let's just get 'er done.
The good news is that while much of what I've been doing is
chores, I'm also focusing this weekend on two of my three passions, while my
other passion (my kids) goes lobster fishing.
I was supposed to play golf last night at an outdoor par three course
under the lights, but the summer of rain was prevalent once again, so that
didn't happen. But it did give me time
to watch Argo, which I had been dying to see.
Good choice by the way. And it gave
me more time to cook up creamed corn for the first time, alongside a stuffed
burger I picked up at Whole Foods.
Here's the recipe for the corn (single serving), which was rich and
delicious:
Cut off the kernels from two raw ears of corn. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter on medium-high
heat, then add kernels and 1/2 tablespoon of flour. Cook for five minutes, stirring frequently. Whisk in 1 cup of milk and a few
tablespoons of cream cheese. Simmer on a
low boil for 10 minutes, stirring often until it's thickened. Add salt and pepper to taste. I also added a few dashes of Habanero hot
sauce.
I'm going to pause here for about 12 hours and finish
writing the rest of this post tonight, after I've cooked up a few more
delicious meals. See you soon...
And I'm back. Did you
miss me? Ok, so today was a cooking and
dish washing fest. I started off by
making hash browns using red potatoes and a chili pepper from our garden topped
with two sunny-side up eggs and bacon, all cooked, of course, in the bacon fat.
While I had that cooking, I made a batch of tomato sauce with balsamic vinegar using several pints of freshly picked cherry
tomatoes, also from our garden.
Then,
once I had chowed down on my breakfast, I baked up two Amish cinnamon breads
from a starter my wife had gotten from one of her co-workers a few weeks
back. This is actually the second round
of breads we've made, so we'll see if mine comes out as good as my wife's did. After all that, I took a break to let my pruney hands recover
from all the dishes I had to wash. Thank
goodness we have a super wide, deep sink!
I had a small lunch so I'd be plenty hungry for the dinner I
planned. Since my wife is not a fan of
mushrooms and I love them, I decided I needed to honor the Great Fungus. As a treat, I picked up some Chanterelles
from Whole Foods. At $30 a pound, a few
would do, about $3 worth. I also picked
up some Crimini mushrooms. I also planned
on fully testing my abilities by making fresh pasta rags, but after mowing and
all those dang dishes in the morning, I decided on packaged pasta. The pasta making will just have to wait for
another day. To go with the pasta, a
wild mushroom cream sauce and pan- seared chicken. Here's how I made it:
I started by pan-searing some chicken breasts in a cast-iron
skillet and then finished them in the oven.
When they were done, I sliced them into bite-sized pieces. In the same pan, back on the stove top, I sautéed
some prosciutto to render some of the fat out, and after a few minutes, add
some butter, garlic and red pepper flakes.
When the butter melted, I added the sliced mushrooms and some fresh thyme
from the garden and cooked for about three minutes. Then I added about a cup of heavy cream and
simmered it down for about five minutes.
Lastly, I added in the cooked pasta and chicken and tossed it through to
soak up the sauce. I plated it up and
topped it with some freshly grated Parmesan cheese.
Beautiful wild mushrooms |
Prosciutto rendering down |
Mushroom and prosciutto simmering in the cream |
The final glorious product! |
Now I find my belly full and my mind satisfied after a
wonderful and relaxing day in the kitchen.
So where did the sports come in to my weekend? I've got a 7:56am tee time tomorrow with a
good buddy. A great way to top off my
home alone weekend!
Looks like you enjoyed the short lived empty nest.
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