food cookin', cookin' them foods again.....

(NOTE TO READER: it looks like a lot of words, I know, but don't worry, pictures are buried "deep" within the contents so it will aaaaall be worth it)

For those of you who know me at all, you know that I'm not one to......cook. Or at least not until more recently anyway. I was spurred to change that in myself recently by a trip to see my family in Kansas this past Thanksgiving. I teamed up with my mom and Kevin to make potatoes au gratin, deviled eggs and pumpkin pie. Now while the pumpkin pie making process is not much more than pouring and mixing, it was still the first one I ever made, and I was proud of myself. *beam* And the potatoes - shwew! Now that was a' cookin'. So I stored that little recipe nugget in my brain to take home and make for Kevin's family Thanksgiving and it was a hit! Seconds abounded! (in that people got seconds-sometimes I don't make sense)

So I got a bit of the cooking bug, but I've begun to realize how ill-equipped our kitchen was for......cooking. Not the kitchen itself, it's been equipped just fine, but rather the utensils were lacking. Like, oh I don't know...a CUTTING BOARD. And a NON-SERRATED KNIFE for, let's say....CUTTING POTATOES! All of these epiphanies came to me while I was getting preparing the potatoes au gratin for Kevin's side of the family. It was then that I realized that a serrated steak knife was simply not going to work. I wasn't making potato chips au gratin after all.

Luckily (and unluckily) we have a Tom Thumb within walking distance from our apartment. (don't worry I drove) I say luckily obviously because of the proximity, and I say unluckily because Tom Thumb is ridiculously expensive and I prefer the flagship Kroger any day, and it's still pretty close, but not close enough when your potatoes are turning brown with every passing second you're out buying all the things reasonable, cooking people already have in their homes!!!

So I stock up some and things are fine. Plus I learned about the whole "put the potatoes in water" trick. Also I learned that I should check my utensils before I begin preparing ANY meal.

All that to say, on Tuesday, our office got out a wee bit early because of the impending inclement weather, and Kevin's been on a mini-vacation of sorts so I suggest that we cook at home, where we can be cozy while the wintery arctic blast mix descends upon us. He naturally agreed. So I look in my allrecipes.com recipe box because I'm feeling in a chicken mood. They have one titled "Easy Garlic Broiled Chicken", and I like the word "easy" and so does Kevin. We also had some wild rice in the pantry so we collectively decide this is going to be our cozy night dinner of choice.

Problem 1: I don't know how to broil anything.

Now I know that I seem like a cute little fool to some of you (Annie) cooking connoisseurs, but I'm just learning. And I did go into this at LEAST knowing that when you broil something it cooks from the top burner of the oven, so I wasn't completely clueless - just to the nuances. So to fix this problem, we do two things - a) google the phrase "What is broil?" which leads us to this answer, which is helpful....then b) call my mom, who was more helpful and has broiled successfully many a time.

I should also mention that for Christmas, since we had been talking about cooking more, etc., Mom got us this amazing knife set, a cute little timer (seen later in pics) fancy tiny measuring spoons from William Sonoma (again I say FANCY!), a nice bread cutting/presentation board, cook books and most cutestly (work with me), matching personalized aprons for me and my boo. See adorable picture below:



So with Mom's insight and our determination, we set out to the store to get a baster (one of the aforementioned utensils we lack and don't know we lack it until something calls for basting), chicken thighs and soy sauce (low sodium, what what!) in one of those cute little restaurant containers and we're back in the kitchen cooking.

Oven hot! Broil on hot oven, broil on!


Controversial Kevin, always stirring the pot:


And after a quick 20 minutes of ovening, basting, turning, ovening, we get this:


And with the side dish:


And finally.......PRESENTATION!


The food was AMAZING and Kevin and I both think it might be the best chicken we've ever had!! Let's just say we'll be buying more thighs reeeeeeals soon!

Thanks Mom!

p.s. thigh is a strange word.

photo

I want to start taking more pictures during life. I always seem to leave my camera at home when I go places and inevitably something picture worthy happens. Por ejemple, the unicyclist I saw cycling around our apartment complex the other day.

Here's a photo I took of the bathroom in Kenichi, a restaurant where my friend Briana works. She actually works at the one in Austin, but was up in Dallas for our friend's wedding and picked up some shifts at the Dallas location in Yuppyville, USA, a.k.a. Victory Park. The restaurant was AMAZING, and we were able to enjoy some fine asian dining and sushi thanks to her generous discount. The atmosphere was so sleek and contemporary and we sat in a booth that had a little curtain you could pull closed. It was so much fun.

Anyhoot, here's the picture:


Camera phone isn't great quality, but the smaller the less grainy, right? RIGHT?!!? anyhoot, I hope this picture blog trend blows forth like the wind from the east! or........that I just keep doing it.