Been a long time gone

At last, I'm back! I haven't really been gone... I started the new job, and it's interesting and actually keeps me busy. So, before I head into work today, a bit of an update...

I feel bad for leaving you all hanging since August 26, wondering whether or not my dinner for the boyfriend was a success or not. I'm sure you've all been kept awake nights for the past month, wondering.

Well, it started out OK. Went and bought the groceries, remembered everything. (Even with a shopping list, I'm a notoriously bad shopper, always forgetting stuff.)

When I got back to the boyfriend's house, he asked if I wanted any help. I said, "No, you can just go relax and watch TV." (Which is Angie-speak for, "Get out of my kitchen, I don't want any witnesses to this impending catastrophe.")

Cooking in the boyfriend's kitchen is a challenge in itself. While his house may no longer be a swingin' bachelor pad, it is still a bachelor pad. Which means he had no cutting board, so I had to chop onions and red peppers on a old plastic lid I found. When I went to cook the vegetables, I had to put them in a 9"x9" baking pan, lacking other cookware. But, it worked.

The menu was pretty simple. "Italian chicken stirfry," which was pasta, red peppers, onions, garlic, chicken cooked in Italian dressing. Complicated. ;-) I used bowtie pasta, mostly for its aesthetic value. (As if the boyfriend would care!)

On the side, we had broccoli (its vegetable-ness disguised with cheese) and strawberries (their fruitiness disguised with a teensy bit of suger, which they hardly needed). I discovered during this cooking experiment that I was doing what my mom has been doing to my dad for 26 years -- sneaking healthy food into his diet! Hey, somebody's gotta do it.

We also had a nice Shiraz. The wine snobs would probably say it didn't "go" with the meal, but we'd had it before and I knew we'd like it. Tasted good to me!

The recipe for Italian Chicken Stirfry said you could make it in an hour. Unfortunately, I'm no Rachael Ray, so it took me a good hour and a half, plus the grocery trip.

Plus there was my one-track mind, getting in the way. At one point, the meal was almost ready, and I realized I still had to heat up the broccoli. (I'd put it in the microwave about 10 minutes earlier but forgotten to hit "start.") About this time, the boyfriend came upstairs from watching TV... I think he could tell I was starting to get frazzled, so I put him to work slicing strawberries.

The end result was worth it. Not fancy, but definitely good! The boyfriend had two helpings of the pasta, and he took the rest to work with him the next day for his lunch. I took a photo of the end result to send to my sister and prove that I can cook. But, it's on the boyfriend's camera... maybe I'll post it later.

In other news... I think I might have found an apartment! I'm going to look at it later this week.

That's all I've got for today, because my cat is nipping at my bare feet in my computer chair. (That means she wants her breakfast, NOW! The cat has never questioned my culinary skills, unlike some people.) Off to work... My posts will be less few and far between in the future, promise. :)

Oh, and a shout-out to my good friend Jill, off in Paraguay doing the Peace Corps thing. I have a multinational readership! :) Check out her link on the sidebar.