Covid Journal, Day 14: Recipes

56 this morning, and again looking like rain. We had some showers yesterday and a short but satisfying thunderstorm, but could still work outside the better part of the day. My tomato, pepper and cabbage seeds arrived so I got them planted in peat pots. I've never raised these plants in the house--we always had some homemade or inexpensive greenhouse-- but I am going to give it a try this year.

People have dived back into cooking at home during these shut-down days, and many of them are really enjoying it. I can imagine the pleasure at discovering how simple it is to cook from scratch, make bread, and explore new recipes. I remember the first time I made bread. That feeling of satisfaction is like no other.

Which made me think I should share a few recipes I've been cooking up lately. I'm not an adventurous cook and don't have any exotic ingredients on hand ever, or even semi-exotic for
that matter. I'm a country cook, and tend toward the simple and hearty foods.

Yesterday I had blueberries and and a banana that really needed to be used before they spoiled. So I made blueberry muffins and banana-blueberry bread.

The bread was experimental, simply adding a cup of berries with the one banana I had on hand to the usual banana quick bread recipe. I left out the nuts, and it came out beautifully. I really like this better than banana bread--the berries give it a piquancy not found in the regular recipe.

For dinner the other night I thawed out a couple of boneless, skinless chicken breasts. I wanted a simple recipe that I could make in the crockpot because I wanted to be outside, not in the kitchen. I found this recipe for Chicken Parmesan, and gave it a try. I didn't have quite enough cheese and no seasoned bread crumbs. I solved the bread crumbs problem but making crumbs from some whole wheat rolls that were getting stale and adding seasoned salt to them. As for the cheese, well, we just had to make do with what we had. I served it with vegetable spaghetti and it was really tasty. More cheese would have made it even better, but I consoled myself by thinking of the calories saved.

Another meal this week: ham, broccoli and cheese bake. I used fresh broccoli instead of frozen, but surprise! Had all the other ingredients on hand. It was delicious, and made enough for three meals.

Both of these recipes are real comfort food but a little heavy on the calories, so tonight we'll be having vegetable soup and a salad. Fortunately we've both been pretty active this week with both outside and inside work, so I hope we've burned off most of those calories!

I've heard that eggs seem to be in short supply in the stores this week, and I am grateful for our hens who give us a steady 8 eggs a day. But if you are short of eggs and milk and crave something chocolate-y, this recipe for Wacky Cake might be just the thing. I used to make it often when my sons were young. It's more of a snack cake than a regular cake.

What's been cooking at your house? Are you trying new recipes, or being creative with what you have in the house?

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