If the Pot Fits...

So many lessons learned today, mes amies, it's hard to know where to start.

Tonight's menu consisted of two food items from the ECD Family and Kids. Smashed Sweet Potatoes with Crispy Chicken Bites. I added a side of broccoli melted with low-fat mozza, hoping that the cheese would be the winning factor, and the whole thing would be devoured (how wrong I was).

The recipe for the sweet potats (ahh, that word..."po-tats", one of the many Nana-isms conjured up by my Scottish Grandmother) said to cook the potats until soft. But it didn't say how to cook them. I assumed boiled, but what if I was wrong and they needed to be baked? A quick look on the interweb told me that boiling before smashing was a regular occurrence. Good to know. I stuffed almost all of the SP cubes into the boiling water, and some didn't fit. Another lesson learned.....measure the pot vs. item being cooked. I refused to get a new pot, and boil new water, so the SP stayed jammed together looking like a steaming orange mosh pit.

I know I said it before, but reading the recipe BEFORE starting to create it is essential. The chicken dish had me putting all sorts of things together, like oat bran, flax, egg whites, water. I mixed them all together, and then realized that the egg whites and water were not invited into the mix, and are the glue that sticks the "dry ingredients" to the chicken. After cursing, and kicking the oven, I went about making a new batch, keeping the dry ingredients far away from the wet ones.

The meal looked somewhat like the pictures in the book, so I was pleased with that. I didn't find it that flavourful. Nicholas ate a tiny bit, and Craig said that he thought it was great (although secretly, I think he would say that even if I fed him cow poop because he just wants to make me happy). But Miss Hannah.....ohhh Miss Hannah. The girl did not want anything to do with the meal. Yes, it was upsetting because I could hear my own mother's voice in my head, "I cooked this wonderful meal for you, and you will eat it without any complaint." But, even with telling her that she could have a treat afterwards (yes, bad I know, but she needed to eat something healthy) she held vigil and did not eat anything tonight. Good for her. Standing up for her rights....except she's six, and this isn't a restaurant, there was nothing else offered for her.

But, with tomorrow night being baseball night, the kids will be dining on leftover Baked Ziti (which pleased Hannah when she heard this news), and I will be making Jerk-Spiced Tilapia with Asparagus and Rice Pilaf. Fish is a new protein in my life. I spent many years thinking that fish only came in the form of Fish and Chips. Eating unbattered fish seemed wrong, and I never attempted it. Since starting on the ECD journey, i've had tilapia a few times. It's not bad at all.

That's it for now!

Cheers!

OH!! - here's a ps. Does anyone else find it revolting to handle raw chicken? I had to de-bone the chicken breasts, and hearing the bones snap nearly did me in.