Trying to focus. Having a hard go of it. Still.

Yesterday I tested Covid-free for the second day in a row so that is behind me, behind all of this household. But when I went out yesterday I had to deal first thing with the perennially incompetent CVS and it just ruined my morning. I HATE dealing with that store so much that I must stop writing about it right now.

The good thing about yesterday is that Dale and I launched our food-planning system. This is our first effort and I swear. How awesome. I followed a recipe! I really followed it and instead of spending hours in the kitchen fretting and worrying over how things turned out when I just make stuff up, I only fretted a little when it didn’t taste good at first. But then I knew that it would be the recipe to blame, not me, if it didn’t turn out.

Dale’s first comment was “this is fantastic.” I’ll take it. And it was fantastic. Pasta e Fagioli. An incredibly simple recipe for TWO. Just us two. And there were no leftovers to fool with.

I will be following pretty closely, to get rolling, the recipes in America’s Test Kitchen’s COOKING for TWO. I had studied this book in the past, but Roslin was still living with us off and on. Now that there’s only James left and he will eat NOTHING like real meals, we are planning meals for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday suppers and every day for breakfast. We are SITTING at TABLE. Last night we even opened a bottle of wine to go with our pasta though I swear it made us both too sleepy.

Things turned out so well and everything was so EASY that I am not dreading cooking again. I mean, for this recipe the only thing I had to cut was 1 rib of celery and as I use nothing but frozen onions and precooked bacon now it only took about 20 mins to throw together in the slow cooker. (The slow cooker wasn’t part of the recipe but it made everything easier.)

And one thing to consider when I choose recipes is their ease. Pasta e Fagioli (pasta with white beans), allows you to cook the pasta in the sauce and as I despise cooking pasta (except in the microwave Fasta Pasta), this was ideal.

Another thing I’m excited about is making dessert. I have a tremendous (bingy) sweet tooth. Sugar is one of my main food groups—I eat tons of fruit and lots of sugar like straight-up icing when I can get it. But the issue is that sugar/sweet has always felt like a “Forbidden” food. When there is a cake in the house I eat the whole thing as quickly as possible so I don’t have to obsess about it. The sooner it’s gone the better. This is the house I grew up in. But with this cookbook I can literally cook dessert for TWO people. Which will mean buying some small cake, pie, and tart pans, and lots of ramekins, but this should be fantastic for me because while I ALWAYS want dessert I do not like the horrible aftermath of LEFTOVER CAKE.

Boom! There it is. If I go back to see Food Coach I can tell her this—That I do not like the horrible aftermath of leftover cake. I should have tee-shirts made. I do not like the horrible aftermath of leftover cake.

And what a trap cake has always been—they are meant to serve 8. Or 12. Not 4. Certainly not 2. Cookies? Seriously. I’ve often thought this about cigarettes—who decided to sell them 20 to a pack? Please, don’t answer that one cause I already know. But doesn’t this scream the question—Just who decided that cakes should be 8 inches round? Or 9? Or ¼ standard sheet? When does one ever need to bake 24 cookies if one is not planning on eating ALL of THEM?

I think that just the act of having dessert every single day with NO leftovers may just be the thing I’ve needed all along—a built in kill switch.

This morning I did up a frittata and yellow grits. Tonight Dale is cooking Thai, which will be difficult for me to eat, because of the meat—porkchops. But I am going to try and he is not going to make it hot so that I will be able to eat it.

I may try to find a dessert recipe for 2 online. To do the ones in the book I will need ingredients. It’s not that these recipes use lots of exotic ingredients, but I will have to make some additions to my pantry.

~r.