Wednesday, September 04, 2002

"Mommy's home!" When its been a long week on the old hamster wheel, and the cats greet me at the door, husband in tow, when Lucinda's playing on the stereo and there's a frosty bottle of Ketel One waiting in the fridge, they can be the most beautiful two words in the English language. However. When I've spent the past three hours in an unsuccessful search for beef marrow bones, and the door opens to the jabbering of talking heads (politico-geeks, not the band,) on the TV, and it's four days until the Big Move but the words are followed by a cheerfully sheepish, "I've been too busy waiting for you to pack!," well, then Eric's traditional evening greeting can grate a mite. However. It's time to cook. Since I didn't find the beef marrow -- Dean & DeLuca, aka Grocery of the Antichrist, didn't have any, surprise surprise, and I couldn't get over to Ottomanelli's before it closed -- my plan was to make Poulet Roti a la Normand, Roast Chicken Basted in Cream, Herb and Giblet Stuffing. Stuffing a chicken on a weeknight seems a lunatic's errand, but this is the Julie/Julia Project, and I'm Julie, I can handle it! Only, upon opening up the chicken, lo and behold, no giblets! Things have some to a sorry pass when the packing plant can't even be bothered to stuff a baggie of guts up a chicken's bum for the sake of the American consumer. Anyway, no giblets meant no chicken with giblet stuffing. Basted with cream. Thank you, Lord. Sometimes, with the Julie/ Julia Project, you have to know when to just lay low. So, for dinner, plain old roast chicken, plain old rice. I could do the Harticot Verts, Sauce Crème, which would bring down two recipes with one blow: the Sauce Crème, which was just last week's bechamel boiled down with some more cream and lemon juice; and the green beans -- boiled, then tossed with butter and shallots, then simmered in the sauce crème. I stuffed the chicken in the oven, got the rice ready to go, started the beans. JC, bless her, is a goddess, but she likes her vegetables rather mushy. It was tricky avoiding overcooking, what with the boiling, sauteing and simmering, but somehow I managed it perfectly, if I do say so myself. Perhaps it was the lack of distraction, seeing as how I didn't baste the chicken once. The beans came out still slightly firm. The chicken, forgive my blasphemous soul, was better than Julia's. Crispy, moist. The rice we had with unadorned drippings on top -- no butter enrichments, no boiling down. The beans were lush, of course, as pretty much everything simmered in cream is. Though in retrospect, they might have been better a bit mushier. Tomorrow, the beef marrow, but for tonight, a simple meal. We watched a Sopranos episode (being too poor for either cable or the 3rd season on DVD, weve been mining seasons one and two for our entertainment. In two weeks time, as you all wallow in the splendour of Season Four, there we'll sit in Long Island City, pinching our pennies and dreaming.) My Eric washed the dishes, as he always does, which never fails to make me feel cared for. The house smelled of roast chicken, and we didn't pack. Now this is what I call the art of French cooking. 8:21:04 PM    comment []

I wrote a very long blog here, and this FUCKING Userland software ate it. I hope some self-satisfied computer geek gets some very bad karma off of this. I'll be back this evening.  No thanks to you people. 7:49:33 AM    comment []