I can cook. I mean, I can really COOK. I make all sorts of weird-ass obscure Indian and Mediterranean dishes from scratch. I make things up, rarely use a recipe, and you should see my spice drawer. I make what DH calls "Quick and Dirty"* meals 5 nights a week. Rachael Ray has nothing on me (after all, I can bake. And my "Quick and Dirty" meals are way cheaper).
Why is it that I can't bring myself to make spaghetti sauce (bolognese, to be technical) from scratch? Every time I just open a jar or a can of "chunky garden vegetable" and dump it into a pan of browned, drained hamburger cooked with onion and garlic. Granted, I do doctor it up a bit, add a little pinch of this or that, a little brown sugar to take the acid edge off. I watch Giada make it from scratch, and I just want to throw things at her overlarge head, with her little carrots and celery and roma tomatoes. Who in hell has time for that(Ok, who in hell that works full time, shares a car with her husband who works full time and attends college full time, and runs around after a two year old)?!
I know it's not that hard. I keep all the requisite canned tomatoes on hand for chili (which I do make from scratch). I just don't know why I should bother, other than the sodium level, to go away from jarred pasta sauce. My mother sneers at me when I tell her we had spaghetti. "From a JAR?!" she gasps. My mother makes two things from scratch - spaghetti sauce, and sloppy joes. This gives her the right, apparently, to sneer and condescend.
I still don't know why my from a jar spaghetti bothers me. It just seems that I should do better, since I know how.
*"Quick and Dirty" came to pass when it was 6pm, I sent him outside to play with the spawn, and called him back in 15 minutes later with a piping hot from scratch "gourmet" meal on the table (Spice Blackened Chicken and reduction suace over lemon-mint couscous with sauteed asparagus spears). He then started raving about me going on "I Want To Be a Food Network Star". Pft.
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3 comments:
I doctor premade sauces sometimes too, although I really prefer a very basic uncooked sauce. (just chopped tomatoes, minced garlic, some basil and evoo. Stir into hot pasta.)
Usually when I make Indian, I start with a simmer sauce and up the spices.
Occasionally I add things to cake or brownie mix too, rather than starting from scratch, even though I usually have all the basics on hand.
Yeah, the only problem with those uncooked sauces is that DH won't eat uncooked tomatoes and I CAN'T eat uncooked tomatoes for some reason since falling pregnant with Freyja. They make me violently ill, which sucks, because I used to adore tomatoes and eat tomatoes out of hand like apples.
haha least Im not the only one that thinks her head is oversized !
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