Four Courses

I thought I’d ease my way into June’s “In The Kitchen” theme with something not too far-fetched: a four-course meal made with my 9-year-old assistant, Zoe.

I’ve never gotten fully immersed in the whole “meal planning” thing. As a Type-A personality, I love the idea, but I’m much too lazy to follow through with it. I also hate unnecessary trips to the grocery store, so my cooking can get a bit…creative. It’s worth noting that the kitchen is not where I shine. Thankfully, I had remembered to thaw some chicken breasts in the refrigerator the day before, so I didn’t have to scramble for a main course when I decided on this impromptu blog post. We decided on a menu of breaded chicken, roasted carrots, ciabatta toast, a green salad, and dessert.

Zoe had her eye on a box of German chocolate cake mix we had in the pantry, so I let her run point on course #4. The only thing I would have to do was transfer the cake tins in and out of the oven (she wanted a two-layered cake). She did everything else from pre-heating the oven to adding sprinkles on the frosting. My epiphany for the day? The secret of success is delegation.

While my minion dove into her task, I preheated our second oven to 425 and got a brand new green scrubby to clean the carrots. They then got sliced and mixed with olive oil and — to be fancy — a few sprinkles of parsley before getting spread on a tinfoil-lined tray and popped into the oven.

Next came the chicken. Thanks to a trial run of one of those meal delivery services, I recently added a new recipe to my repertoire which entails spreading cream cheese on top of raw chicken breasts and topping them with a bread crumb mixture before roasting. Thanks to Zoe’s new fondness for bagels with cream cheese for breakfast, cream cheese is a staple in my house. I belatedly realized I was out of breadcrumbs. I did, however, have a couple of bread heels to sacrifice to the cause. When in doubt, improvise! The heels got crumbled up, mixed with a handful of flour, some Italian seasoning, and a dash of paprika. Did I mention I don’t measure? I blame my mother. The breadcrumb “recipe” also calls for parmesan cheese, but I was fresh out.

Once I had my “breadcrumbs,” I pulled my chicken out of its freezer bag and was pleasantly surprised to find that I had previously halved them so they were half as thick, which meant less cooking time. Small favors. The petit carcasses a la chicken got plopped in a baking pan (I was out of cookie sheets), topped with globs of cream cheese, and smushed with my custom bread crumb mixture before joining the carrots in the oven for about fifteen minutes.

The “hardest” work done, I pulled out the bag of leftover ciabatta rolls I had gotten from the grocery store deli. They got sliced and buttered. I would have taken the extra step and topped them with mozzarella, but, alas, I was out of that, too. Instead, they got a sprinkle of garlic salt and spent five minutes in the sauna with the fowl and carrots.

The lettuce came from a bag of romaine blend mix but I did go through the trouble to peel and slice a cucumber. I also added a sprinkle of cranberry-and-almond salad toppings and croutons before drizzling a curtain of Olive Garden Italian dressing.

Voila! Who says you can’t make an impromptu four-course meal? Of course, what should have taken a half hour took twice as long (or more) when you only have half of your intended ingredients. Nevertheless, the food got cooked and no one was poisoned. Zoe and I agreed that the chicken and carrots turned out delicious. Honestly, the bread was a little dry and Zoe was too full to finish her salad, which she ate last.

Once our stomachs settled, we served up her German chocolate cake topped with Death-By-Chocolate ice cream, which was all we had on hand. A little rich, but you’ll get no complaints out of me.

We had enough of everything for leftovers, which meant my husband got to eat his dinner (and cake) at work the following day. I had no room in the refrigerator for the two-tiered cake, so I put it in the oven for safekeeping overnight, which is a necessary evil as our two Rottweilers like to counter-surf.

Two days later, I went to cook dinner again (I was so proud!) and became slightly dismayed when I smelled something burning. Sure enough, I had preheated my oven without checking that it was empty and burnt the remaining half of my daughter’s German Chocolate cake. I can only say it is a blessing in disguise because if I hadn’t burned it, I would have eaten it and I just don’t want to have to burn off that many calories all at once. You may be surprised to hear this, but that is not the first time I have preheated the oven without verifying it was empty…my daughter’s Christmas sugar cookies also got cremated. I’m seriously thinking about taping a sign to my oven that says “check for food inside” but that seems overly paranoid…maybe I only burn desserts, in which case, I should come up with something healthy for next time…nah!