What's For Supper?

Baked chicken breast with Tarragon gravy, green beans & new potatoes, sliced cucumbers and onions. Everything but the chicken came from our garden.

 

Chicken and gravy, yellow rice, combo of navy and pinto beans with jalapeno and bacon bits, and fresh broccoli spears.

 

I started an old fashion red spaghetti sauce in the deep well of my 1940's Chambers stove last night. When I checked it this morning, it was perfectly done. We'll have it over a nice dish of wild rice. Paste has become a no no foe both of us.

I can't wait for my grandson to taste the difference between what he fixed about a month ago, plain Ragu over white rice. No onions, bell peppers, not even garlic powder. Not so good, but he was trying, and he does make a good bacon and egg sandwich.

 

@Ina I. Wonder I used to always make my spaghetti sauce from scratch. It took most of the day to cook but my kids loved it and most of their friends always wanted to come eat at our house when I made spaghetti.

Now that there is just my Honey who can eat spaghetti, as my digestive system no longer does well with tomato sauce or paste....spaghetti is not something I cook very often. Even when I do, it is no longer from scratch but from a can of Hunt's sauce with garlic and herbs. I add smoked sausage to the ground beef, and fresh bell peppers and onions (if I have one)or onion powder and Italian herbs. My Honey loves this sauce and it takes little time to put this together. He gets his spaghetti when he wants some, and I don't have to spend all day in the kitchen. It's a winner for both of us.

 

Nothing! On a strict diet now.

Look out forum members, it's one of those days I'm on a roll with humor.

 

If you're on a diet ya better ditch the roll!

 

@Babs Hunt , that why I like my deep well in my old stove. I just cut everything up, throw it in the pot, cover it with the deep well's lid, and it cooks all by itself on just the pilot light over night. I use to keep a pot of soup going 24 hours a day. It sure helped feed everyone, no matter what their schedules were.

 

I'm pretty sure we could probably do that with our crock pots to on the low cycle Ina but since my Honey loves the "fast" spaghetti sauce I now make this way works for both of us at this season of our lives.

 

I guess I just miss cooking. Until 2015, I was use to cooking three meals a day. My Michael and I never spent money on ourselves. We didn't go to movies, sporting events, and we never went more than 75 to 100 miles from home. If it cost money, it wasn't somethings we wanted to do. We were always trying to get ahead, so my cooking good wholesome meals was about the only way I had of letting him know just how much I loved and appreciated all he went without for our family. By the time our business was doing well, neither of us really wanted stuff anymore.

I'm trying to teach Bobert that food wasn't always cooked in a microwave. To Bobert vegetables are potatoes, rice, and pasta. So about the only way I can get him to eat veggies is if I can hide them in a sauce. He actually let me put onions, bell peppers, and a couple large fresh mushrooms in potatoe soup a couple of weeks ago. I'm even trying the old trick of putting a cheese sauce over veggies, but he'll actually scrape the cheese off and leave the veggies.

 

What's nice @Ina I. Wonder is that at our age and season of life we actually get to choose whether we want to cook or not. When I were raising a family, I had to cook pretty much on a daily basis for all of us...and most of the time I really enjoyed cooking.

When my ex worked at Piccadilly Cafeteria in management I would take the girls after Church and we would have an early supper at Piccadilly with their dad. The meal was always free, my girls and I got to choose anything we wanted and I had a break from cooking, plus we got to spend a little time together sharing a meal as a family.

Now I don't want to cook all the time, and my Honey and I can't even make up our minds what we want to eat often for a lot of meals. So I try to cook for more than one day when I do cook now. And I also will buy cooked rotesserie chickens at the Market, and just make sides to go with it. Then use the leftover chicken to make my Honey his favorite chicken pot pie.

I think when my youngest gets moved back here and all settled in I will see if she wants to share some meal days. Like one day I cook a meal to share with them that she can pick up...and then she returns the favor to us. My middle daughter will probably want to get in on this too.

 

I also enjoyed cooking when I had a family and I was good at it too but I have to admit towards the end with my husband being so sick yet wanting all his favorites and usually from scratch, I got tired of it. Most of the time he couldnt eat much or anything at all even with anti nausea pills.

So after he died I was very happy not cooking and now usually only do special requests when I visit my son or daughter and even that's not so often now.

I do like having the freedom to eat when and what I want now and don't miss my cooking days...I do miss those days but not for the cooking.

 

@Babs Hunt , you are so blessed to have daughters. And now, as you pointed out, you are at a great age to still enjoy being a mother and grandmother. That time for me was more than 20 years ago. (I became a grams at 32.) Everyone thought I was nuts to work 60 hour weeks, and then I would have our kids bring their children over for the weekend. At one time I had 6 grandchildren under the age of five. But, I knew it was a time that could not be put off. It was then or never, and it was also great fun. The oldest is now 33, and the youngest just turned 18. They grow up so fast.

 

I bought a nice big pork lion, and I cut into 1" thick boneless chops. So tonight, I'm going to broiler 2 of the chops, and I'll parboil a couple heads of corn, and then broil them with the chops. I'll try to tempt Bobert with some steamed broccoli, and cauliflower.

Maybe if I put ranch dressing on some of the veggies for him he'll try it.

 

Will he eat them raw with the Ranch dressing...that is how I learned to eat veggies.