One of my goals for this month (when I've been home) is don't panic at dinnertime and buy pizza or feed the kids cereal or pancakes. Also, I had a goal to feed my family more vegetables.
(side note: I love the magazine Cooks Illustrated-- their recipes are delicious and no-fail. But time consuming. Some day I'll get back to that, but right now I'm focusing on simple meals so I have time for my little ones. Our family favorite is their grilled pizza, ha, ha-- see here)
I have a really nice garden, courtesy of my two Basque boys (explanation later)-- I'm ashamed to admit that last year a lot went to waste. But now I'm going to do better, right? I've realized that I have two big stumbling blocks in this regard: I often feel too harried to go out to the garden, pick the produce, and wash it off (so sad! I know!). And I don't trust myself to create something without a recipe.
Hence, I've been forcing myself to go out to the garden to pick or dig up what I need for dinner, and I've been trying to create things from scratch without a recipe.
I titled this post Basque Boy Eats in honor of my Basque father-in-law, who is an excellent cook. He never uses a recipe and he frequently creates succulent dishes (that the rest of us cannot ever seem to quite imitate). One day he sauteed some some fresh trout, tomatoes, and slices of lime (rind and all), then mixed it with rice and it was delicious.
I've tested my normally fearful culinary mettle several times this month, mostly with good results! I was lucky to have a friend here one day when I tried to make a vegetable soup-- she gave her input as to whether I ought to use chicken stock or water and helped snap the ends off the beans. Her encouragement helped me over that first hurdle, and the soup was really good! (it was simply chicken stock with fresh potatoes, string beans, cabbage, Swiss chard, garlic, and salt)
What is your favorite quick and healthy meal? Here is another of our favorites from long ago. :)
(FYI, more New York pics tomorrow)
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