Monday, August 20, 2007

Busy Evening

This evening I had intended to find some time to write a longer post, but here it is already 10 and I need to get some sleep. So, I'll just let you know how my strange evening went. I almost never cook anything. It's not necessarily because I don't like to cook, but I usually am busy doing other things and just eat something quick when I get hungry. Often if I go home after work, I'm starving when I get there and just want to eat something, anything. Today was no exception, but I stayed off my appetite by eating my traditional carrot on my way home and then some ritz crackers upon reaching my house while I slaved away at a nutritious home cooked meal of 33 cent boxed macaroni and cheese! Now, I don't like to waste time so while I waited for the water to boil and ate the crackers I begin to mix up some yeast dough for cinnamon rolls. That took longer than I though because I couldn't find my shortening and went next door to see my neighbors had any. She didn't have any, but I decided that the butter I had would surely work and left after a few minutes, When I got back home, my dough was already foaming (I guess the yeast was eager to grow!) so I hurriedly added the rest of the ingredients to the dough.

You know that stage when you're kneading bread dough by hand and it's still too sticky and you need just a cup more flour. Well it was at that point that I ran out of flour and realized I would have to clean off my hands and beg some from my neighbors once again. Thankfully the lady I live with saw my plight and had some in another jar. It was just enough to get the dough into the soft and perfect for rising stage.

So, by now the mac 'n cheese was ready and I took one bite and decided that I would attempt to make some fudge while I ate. I had some marshmallows left over from a Sunday School object lesson and had discovered a fudge recipe that used them and chocolate chips which I also had. It also called for evaporated milk so I scoured the cupboards, but found none. Another trip to see Pam . . . This time she had exactly what I needed! While getting the can, her little 1 year old, opened her cupboard and handed me a jar of baby food - this kid knows what he wants! So I opened it up and fed him since Pam was busy cooking dinner. By the time he finished one jar of baby food, I got called away by another neighbor to try this Internet connection since another guy from church was there to help him fix it. In my hurry, I forgot the can of evaporated milk and thus returned after a few minutes. By then, Pam had just about finished dinner and invited me to eat with them. I said, of course (her chicken fajita's look much better than my now cold macaroni)!

We had a good time talking over dinner and eventually I returned home to attempt the fudge. Well, it turned out I had everything else I needed except vanilla - who runs out of vanilla? Anyway, Pam had that and more butter which I needed to make frosting for the cinnamon rolls. Finally I begin to cook the fudge and then got to talk to Gemma (a friend of mine from college) as I continued to cook it (for 6 minutes after boiling) and then stir and stir and stir. It said to stir vigorously after the marshmallows melted for 1 minute. But the fudge never really did its thing so I finally just poured it in it's pudding-like state into the pan.

That took 20 minutes longer than I thought it would take so I was now late at getting to my other neighbors house. He needed a monkey to crawl in his attic and bring a cable from one side to his office on the other side of the house. I was perfect for the job! That was hot work, but I was glad to be able to be useful there. After that I had just enough time to mix up the frosting before sitting down here to write this.

So that's my evening! It was a good night though the cooking wasn't (in my mind) supposed to take so long. Usually a evening at home is spent in a less busy way and I'm able to read or type here. So, if you made it through this crazy post - congratulations and my apologies for wasting a chunk of your day. Tomorrow morning my siblings will come for the weekly sibling breakfast and we'll find out if the cinnamon rolls are any good. Good night!

3 comments:

Lydia said...

Hey Miriam!
The cinnamon rolls were great! Thanks again for having us over for breakfast! It's fun to be able to spend a little extra time with you during the week. It was a great treat for our last breakfast! Hope that your day goes well!
Love,
Lydia

Anna Naomi said...

Thanks for the cinnamon rolls, Miriam! They were the best!

It's neat that you get to help out so many people in your neighborhood; it's nice to live close by to friends.

Elijah said...

> So, if you made it through this crazy post - congratulations and my apologies for wasting a chunk of your day.

Thanks for posting this cool story! It wasn't a waste:
1. I learned the value of neighbors.
2. I enjoyed a funny story.
3. I learned more about my sister.

Finally catching up on blogs,

Elijah