Not My Shining Hour

Today was one of those big busy days.  It started early and ended late and had lots of parts in between. In my lunch bag I found a sandwich, (delicious) some carrots and tomatoes and a bag of pickles. *yum.*  And a diet coke.  Ahhh!   Also a container filled with Mickey Mouse shaped chicken nuggets and mozzarella cheese sticks.  And two cookies.  What the cuss?
So instead of gratitude that AJ was trying to pack food that would sustain me through my long, long day, I was peeved.  Doesn't he know that I don't eat chicken nuggets?  I mean really.  I have never, nor will I ever, eat a chicken nugget.  Just because he made too many for the grandkids last night, it doesn't mean that I have to eat them.  And doesn't he even read his own blog?  I mean, I said those cheese sticks didn't taste good and I wished I hadn't eaten them.  So what was he thinking?
Yes, I know that the obvious thing to do is to pack my own lunch if I am so picky, and if I am so ungrateful as to complain when he packs what I don't like, then that's my problem.  Get a grip, I always tell myself.  Be happy that he is kind enough to pack you a lunch every day.  Even if it's a bizarre lunch.  With cookies.  That you are trying really hard to avoid.  How dare he?  I mean really!  Doesn't he love me at all?

And there it is, the source of my occasional, irrational blame and shame spiral.  I think that food is love. I always have.  Because it is.  My mother made special food for my dad when he came home from his travels, and special food that the girls would like when he wasn't home.  I show love by making special food- all kinds of it.  AJ was trying to show love.  By giving me food I hate.  Sigh.

So in this blog, which is an exercise in honesty and openness, I'll honestly say, I can be an ungrateful bee-yotch.  For sure.  But don't send me chicken nuggets.  I mean really.

Kristin ate: (every bit, by the way, lovingly prepared by AJ)
egg on toast
2 coffees with cream
1 piece of sushi (from a student project)
some super sweet coffee (from a student project)
a really good turkey sandwich
1 more coffee (from superamerica) (yuck)
2 cranberry walnut cookies (grr)
carrots and cherry tomatoes and pickles
1//2 diet coke
1 bowl of beef stew
2 pieces of homemade bread, 1 with peanut butter
lovely green salad
healthy choice fudgesicle

Kristin spent
$0.00

AJ ate
a cookie
1 cup of coffee with cream
emergen-cee
smoothie
2 slices of baguette, toasted
a delicious brownie at Jonny's
3 chicken nuggets,
1 cheese stick
stew
salad
2 slices of bread.
coke

AJ spent
$9.43 at Hackenmueller's (stew meat and sausage for pizza night)
$7.24 at Cub for oranges, thyme, pearl onions and carrots
$1.39 for Superamerica coffee (yuck)(ungrateful again, but yuck.)

Here is a recipe for homemade chicken soup, requested by my sister Janis

An onion, a couple stalks of celery, 2 teaspoons of garlic, chopped (we keep a big jar of prechopped) a handful of carrots, in coins, and a few mushrooms, chopped fine.
In a heavy pan, like a cast-iron enamel, saute savory vegetables slowly for five minutes or so, in olive oil.  Fill the pan with frozen chicken tenderloins from costco (not breaded, just chicken.)  Add a cup of water and salt and pepper.  Cover and poach for 15-20 minutes.)  If chicken is done, hack it into bite sized hunks with a spatula.  If it's not super-easy to cut right in the pot, cook it another 10 minutes at a time until it is.
Now add about 4 cups of broth.  I used a soup stock base that you mix with water that we keep in the fridge.  You can use bullion cubes, but they tend to be saltier.  My favorite is a box of kirkland organic chicken broth from costco, but we didn't have any.
Cook awhile more, and then when it is nice and boily, add a half bag of noodles.  I put in a half bag of egg noodles and a have box of some other curly noodle.  It was delicioius with lots of noodles, but too filling and all of those noodles soaked up the broth, so we had to add more the next day.  I wish I would have stuck with half a bag, and added more during the warm-up if necessarry.
Don't forget a crusty loaf of bread from lunds or kowalski's (only 3 bucks.) Or make your own, which is much cheaper, and really rewarding.  Use the artisan breads in 5 minutes a day book.  Minneapolis author, fantastic bread.  And it really does only take 5 minutes.  seriously.  And you'll have dough ready for Friday pizza night.

Soup shortcuts-  Use a couple cans of kirkland chicken from Costco.  Some people use rotisserrie chickens, but then you might as well buy the rotisserie chicken soup from costco, which is delicious.  It costs $10.00 for a tub, and we always get the spinach salad to go with it. $10.00.    And the crusty bread at costco, absolutely the best, is 8.00 for two loaves.  Now you are at 28.00 for a dinner that will leave good leftovers for lunch.  Not bad, unless you are having a phrugal phase.  If you are, make it yourself for a phraction of the cost.  I crack myself up.