Cooked dinner Thursday night.

Yesterday was my last official day of work for the fall. I'm off now from all three of the schools I teach for, lookin' at five weeks of paid vacation. That means sleepin' in while Denise works the alarm at 6:30 each day. Of course, she's NOT amused by the whole thing, but keeps reminding me that she's only got about three and a half years left till she can retire. The shoe will be on the other foot then.

So, seein' as how I was at home and the little woman is still toiling away in her office at the main campus, I decided to surprise her and cook dinner. Bein' a camera geek and blogger, I decided, of course, to immortalize the process for your slobberin' enjoyment. So here goes.



First, the easy stuff. I emptied a can of Del Monte Seasoned Green Beans into a pot and set it on high to heat up.



Then, in another pot I mixed in one and a half cups of water and half a cup of milk with Knorr's Pasta Sides, with rotini pasta and cheddar cheese. I stirred in the contents of the package and a few extra noodles (loves me some rotini), tossed a plug of butter into each pot and set them both on simmer while I moved on to the rest of the dinner.



Next I dusted my choppin' block with flour and took out three chicken breast fillets from the package I'd brought home a few days ago. I put the other two fillets from the package in a zip lock bag and set them in the cooler for another day. I've got some Gen. Tso's sauce on hold for them. Lookin' forward to that. I cracked two eggs and whipped them, tossing in some pepper and onion salt, and a few other things. Then I got into the booze.



I decided it was time for a shot. My poison of choice in that moment was a jolt of Slivovits. Good stuff. Strong, like your forefathers used to drink... back in the old country, before the pogroms. Hell, maybe during and after the pogroms.

I also used it to marinade the other chicken. We'll see how that works out. I tell ya, I think you could run your car on this stuff. Grow hair on yer chest, if you want some anyway.



The plan was to dust the chicken with flour, dip the fillets in the egg and then cover them in bread crumbs. Towards that end I mixed portions of all three of these packages in a dish and moved on to the final step.



I got the hot plate going, setting it at about 350 and melted some butter to grease it up. When it was hot enough I began to dip and cover the chicken, placing the fillets on the cook top after they'd been covered in bread crumbs.



It's all fun, like makin' mud pies when you were a kid, only MUCH better to eat. And healthy too, seein' as how I didn't fry them.



Ooops, time for another shot. I called the little woman, still hunched over her desk at work and told her dinner was on. I said somethin' like "Wowman, geet yer hiney home! Don't make me get the stick again!" or something to that effect. She told me she was heading out the door, so I made her a drink and set it aside while the chicken cooked.



That's her tall 7&7 there on the block. Now and then I'd turn the fillets over, or check the beans and noodles, making sure everything was ready. Notice I washed and dried the choppin' block while the chicken was cookin'. Kitchen bitch, par excellence!



Then I decided to switch poisons. I got out the jug and started hittin' ol' George. By the time the chicken was done the little woman was walking in and tossin' her purse in the chair. "Honey, I'm home. Where's dinner?"

"Is that all I am to you?" My tone was properly indignant "... Cook, maid and sex slave?" She got a big grin on her face as she smelled what was waitin' for her.



It turned out well, if I do say so myself... and I do! I'll have to see about what else I can think of to cook in the weeks to come. It should be fun. There's one fillet and some noodles left over, but don't even think about it. They'll be breakfast in a day or so.

So, now lets talk about the weekend. It's gonna be busy. First, Denise and I will head over to Temple tonight to take mom out to eat. We're thinkin' about goin' to BJs. Haven't been there in a while.

Then, Saturday afternoon we'll drive up to Ft. Worth. I'm gonna try to see Keith's mom. I'm a bit nervous about that, but I think it'll be OK. Then we're going to a pre-reunion dinner with some of the people I graduated from high school with thirty years ago. There should be twenty or so of us there (out of 750), meeting at Joe T Garcia's on the north side. I'm a bit nervous about that dinner too. I doubt I'll be recognized, or recognize anyone myself, but at least when the big reunion takes place in September I'll know about twenty folks.

Then we'll head over to Dallas and get into our hotel. We'll be in the Holiday Inn Express in De Soto. It's nice and comfortable, and about ten minutes from down town. Some friends of ours are driving up Sunday morning to attend the Southwest Foodservice Expo at the convention center. This is the same food show we went to two years ago, where Denise and I met up and began runnin' around together. We've been together almost every day since then, so it's an anniversary. Should be a lot of fun. I'll try to get Herschel Walker's autograph. Always liked him.

We'll join our friends when they drive up and call us and then we'll walk through the food show for a few hours, trying not to get too loaded on all the free booze and finger food. Then, foot sore and beat, we'll head back to the hotel. After resting a bit we're gonna head over to Arlington, about half way between Dallas and Ft. Worth, and attend a Ranger Game.



It should be a great time. The seats are just down from the visitors dugout, four rows up from the grass. Lets hope they win, but it'll be fun ether way. One way or the other, the experience of being there, the food, the fellowship and the fireworks at the end of the game will all be well worth the price of the seats.

Then, Monday morning we'll join our friends at a complementary breakfast being given by one of the vendors at the food show. It sounds like the kind of food you'd get at a Cracker Barrel, only it's free. After we fill up we'll head home. Denise has Monday off, and I've got... well, I've got the next five weeks off. So we won't be in a hurry.

Anyway, that's about it. You guys try to have a good time this weekend and we'll talk about how it all went down next week some time. Cheers!