Too Many Dishes

I just unloaded the dishwasher again! It seems the two of us use way too many dishes, but some people say to be thankful for a lot of dishes because it means you’re well fed. Oh, we’re well fed alright, but not thanks to my cooking.  If it weren’t for the scores of restaurants in our town, we might go hungry. Also, a whole roasted chicken from the store can provide three meals if you divide it up right; sliced the first night,  tacos the second, and chicken noodle soup the third.

            Actually, my husband tells me he likes what I cook, and we don’t really eat out THAT much. My repertoire of dishes prepared without a recipe consists of hamburgers, tacos, spaghetti, hamburgers, ta… Oh darn. Well, things will be looking up because my son-in-law brought me some delicious samples, one of which is a plastic squeeze bottle of garlic! I coated a roast with it today before I baked it, and except for needing to keep the stove fan running for the rest of the day, it worked out well.

            I feel compelled to confess a few cooking disasters, one just yesterday. I decided to cook my oatmeal in my little frying pan because it has a non-stick surface. It cooked much more quickly than usual (timer malfunction?) and boiled over. Not a first, the boiling over part, but when the sticky stuff poured into the bowl, a definite layer was left in the non-stick pan. I’ve eaten fruit leather, but never oatmeal leather!  Then there was the exploding Pyrex dish when I tried to brown a roast in it on the burner, the stroganoff with only sour cream which went into the sink and was replaced by straight tomato sauce, and the incredible stuck-in-the-dish 4 C Pie from a Sunset magazine. Too long to tell here.

            Perhaps all the dishes to wash mean something else. I know the community college here offers cooking classes. Maybe I’ll sign up.