Tuesday, September 28, 2010

hear it, smell it

We had some Monday house going on here yesterday.
Nat and I went a little kitchen crazy.
First came the music. My turn, Pandora station: Joe Purdy.
Perfect for warming up. Get out the ingredients, line 'em up. And every Anthropolgie utensil in the arsenal for this meal, even the orange ceramic tablespoon with the broken handle.
Nat's turn, switch to Xavier Rudd. We are cookin' with heat now.
As I'm chopping onions, eyes stinging,
Bob comes on with a great version of "No Woman, No Cry".
If only you could hear it with the added rhythm of my big ol' knife and Natalie's mortar and pestle grind.
You can't order moments like that.

I got this set up at Anthro a long time ago. Nat needed nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves for pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. I had them all in their wholeness. Perfect! Get grinding girl. Steen showed up then and took a turn at grinding too and the smell of autumn started to fill us up. Mmmmm. . .
Beautiful. I hope you can smell what I cannot describe with words.
So beyond canned spices!
Next, the sauce. My first attempt at BBQ sauce from complete scratch (except ketchup as an ingredient) gets an A+. After a couple of simmering hours, it was time to get out the new rib painting brush. Enter the artists, Chris and Christine (again). I explained that the end result of a meal is dependent on the emotion that goes in during the cooking. A little happy, a little passion from the cooks and you get something so good. If the cook is not so happy, throws a little anger in, look out.
Stuffing the potato skins was a group effort. First Pretzel scrubbed, even grated some cheese. Steen helped me scoop, Nat helped mash, back in the oven.


Kody, Jade and Carson showed up. Yeeeaahh! Perfect attendance! Chuck got to show off his grill's new tricks. It proved itself worthy. Oh yeah, a vegetable. Nat threw some green beans, french cut even and some butter in a pan and all was well. This all just happened. One good song after another enhanced by the sound of a family. The rich smells of autumn in the kitchen gathered us all in. Hear it. Smell it.

Monday house rocked!

4 comments:

Pres8Jes said...

did you take that picture of our house in the sky???? it was a great start to the week, im glad it all tasted so good and we can be a team of cooks to feed this household!

Alisha Stamper said...

this post makes me so happy.

diane said...

That was the blog post version of Like Water for Chocolate. With less cheating and betrayals.

What a great Monday.

cathmom said...

Funny, Diane, I was thinking it was time to reread LWFC. There's a place here called Frida Bistro that causes surprising food reactions. Ask Gina. When will you be in SLC? I will make a reservation for us.