For lack of anything better to talk about, I am going to tell you about the fabulously simple dinner we had tonight. It’s the fabulously simple dinner we’ve been having about once a week lately. Fabulous because everyone eats it happily. Faboulous because it’s guilt-free and nutritious. Fabulous because I can make it in about 20 minutes, so if naptime runs into Sesame Street/cooking time, I can pull this out of my hat instead of leftovers from the freezer.
Are you ready to hear about my fabulously simple meal?
A spinach salad with chopped red peppers, cucumbers and carrots. Topped with ranch salad dressing for me and Joe, some poppyseed stuff that I found that’s safe for Julie but *looks* remarkably similar so she doesn’t get it that we’re having something different.
Chicken breasts, pounded flat so that they cook evenly and I don’t accidentally kill one of my family members with salmonella poisoning (as Joe accused me of doing the one time I didn’t pound them out and he got a raw spot in his. ooops!), then sprinkled either with Montreal Steak seasoning or Emeril’s Southwest Essence. mmm…salty goodness. I went with Emeril tonight. Then, grilled on the indoor grill for 8 minutes on each side, or until there is no more pink. Juicy-tender! I’ve also taken to slicing or chopping these up before plating them just to double-check the doneness. I really would like to live down the salmonella-poisoning-attempt incident in this lifetime.
If I’m feeling really enthusiastic, like tonight apparently, I scrub some potatoes, poke some holes in ‘em, throw them in the microwave for 5 minutes while the oven heats up to 400 and then cook them in the oven till the meat is done. That way you get the baked-potato-not-from-the-microwave texture without the hourlong wait for baked potatoes. I even had some sour cream in the fridge for mine. Joe doesn’t like sour cream on his, and Julie can’t have it, but she’s happy eating hers plain anyway. And asked for more – get this – “tomato” several times. She doesn’t like raw tomatoes, she was asking for potato. So Cute! Kind of like the way she says “picpic” instead of “picknic”.
And that, dear readers, is my fabulously simple dinner. I think I can eat it once a week for the forseeable future. If I had readers who actually posted comments, I would ask you to post your fabulously simple dinner menu. But I’ve resigned myself to having readers who only comment casually about posts they read days/weeks/months later when they see me in person or talk to me on the phone.