5.18.2007

WITFP





Ok, now that I’ve got this food blog thing up and running, I feel pressure to chronicle every morsel that passes between my perfectly glossed lips. Hopefully, I’ll get over that soon enough. Until that happens, though, here’s a post on last night’s dinner, which was Whatever’s in the Fridge Pasta.

There’s an art to Whatever’s In The Fridge Pasta, because you can’t really throw in whatever’s in the fridge. You’ll wind up with Orecchiete with Non-Fat Strawberry Yogurt and Leftover Pork Fried Rice in a Diet Coke reduction. Whatever’s In The Fridge Pasta (henceforth WITFP) really only works if you have some decent things in your fridge. Fortunately, I had a pound of gorgeous sugar snap peas, which have been patiently sitting in the crisper for about a week, waiting to be noticed. I sautéed a shallot and half a red bell pepper, made a sauce from some leftover white wine, a touch of cream, ½ a lemon, and threw in some cannelini beans. Sounds a little fancy pants, but these are not terribly expensive or difficult ingredients, and they’re the kinds of things that have a relatively long shelf life (not to mention a zillion uses) so I like to keep them around. This is the kind of food most restaurants would like you to believe requires years of advanced culinary training in order to attempt, so they can give it a fancy name and charge you $19.

I grated some parmeggiano reggiano on top and dinner was ready to go. It was, like, a 19-minute meal, which was good, because I was so famished that I was about to start gnawing on my own arm. That’s one of the problems of working the hours I do. I often don’t get home until 8 or 8:30 and that’s when I start cooking. And I prefer to cook than to order in, since it’s usually a tad healthier and it takes the same amount of time. But by the time the food is ready, I’m about two exits past ravenous.

But last night, I couldn’t just dive into my big, steaming bowl of WITFP, because I was all concerned about taking a picture for the blog, so everyone could be hugely impressed by my restaurant quality 19-minute meal. I grabbed my cute, li’l digital camera, but it refused to turn on. The batteries had died (probably just to spite my growling stomach). Hhmph. Fine, I thought, I’ll just use Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera. But Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera was nowhere to be found. I looked in every room, every closet, every drawer, every shelf and couldn’t find the stupid thing. At this point, I was so hungry that my stomach was about to start eating itself and the hunger was affecting my brain function. In my altered mental state, it seemed perfectly reasonable that Nick’s highly sophisticated digital camera was hiding at the bottom of my bowl of WITFP, so I had no choice but to start eating in order to unearth it. The food was tasty and satisfying, but the camera was, shockingly, not lying in wait at the bottom of the bowl. So, I don’t have a photo to share with you of a best bite, but I can assure it was attractive, delicious, simple, and far less than $19.

As a post-script to my story, I did eventually find Nick’s highly advanced digital camera. He had put away in the closet, where it belonged. The nerve.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Please post a pic of the empty bowl.

Pam said...

Hi,
I found your blog on chowhound and had to check it out. As a new food blogger myself, I know exactly what you mean... I want to document everything now, but I know that it's 1) too time consuming and 2) probably boring for any reader to hear about how much Equal I put in my coffee.

Anyway, I like what you're doing... I want pictures if you ever do end up with Pork Fried Rice in a Diet Coke Reduction ;)

shannon said...

Wow, my friend is so much more tech savvy than I - I'm proud of myself for finding your blog and figuring out how to post a comment. Your pasta sounds divine - will you make it for me when you come visit?

Charlie said...

don't you have a camera phone? you can just e-mail yourself the photo!