That's right, I said it. It's in the 50s and I am freezing! I could turn on my heater, but I don't want to because I feel like I should be better at this. I just moved from Chicago where this would be a perfect fall day! Gnat says this means that I'm assimilating- I say I'm getting soft. Is feeling cold in mild weather on my Angeleno check list???
Regardless, since I was feeling chilly I decided that today would be the perfect day to cook my favorite Chicken Curry Soup from college. This soup would appear about once a week or so in The Grill in the UMC where I worked. When it was there, I would eat it regardless of what I had brought for lunch (or get it and save it if I had already eaten... or eat it anyway...). For my graduation present from CU, Jan, one of the women I work with managed to snag the recipe for me. It apparently took some effort to get the chef to release the recipe and because of this I'm going to keep it a secret. I will post pictures of cooking it though.
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| Finished product, delish! |
Soooo, the recipe is meant to be sold in a cafeteria-like atmosphere, and therefore, it makes 6 gallons. I quarter it to make 1.5 gallons, which is still a lot. Hopefully I can share some with my neighbors to try and make friends with them :) Otherwise I guess I'm just eating it until January...ish...
The chill in the air right now has me happy and in such a fall mood- which made shopping at Trader Joe's especially fun. I nabbed a fall flower bouquet, spiced apple cider, butternut squash and pumpkin spice while I was there. Unfortunately, there was no turmeric and they only had expensive organic sugar and cilantro so I had to make a stop at Ralph's too. Where I ended up with this:
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| 9 oz of ...well...Delish... |
This baby was a dollar cheaper then your run of the mill 2 oz spices so I'm apparently in the market for things to cook with turmeric... Anyway, back to the soup. Cooking is one of my favorite activities, it always manages to de-stress me and and give me piece of mind when I'm freaking out about something or feeling bored and useless. Today I wasn't stressed or feeling useless after putting in a full weeks work (finally!) so it seemed like a good day to relax and cook for fun.
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| Ghee (actually hot butter- oops?), curry paste and spices |
Ironically, I had actually forgotten how stressful cooking this recipe can be. It's got a lot of veggies to chop (in great quantities) and takes quite a while for the whole thing to come together. I burned the butter when I first started because I was trying to be too much of a muli-tasker by prepping and cooking at the same time (does not work with this- too much to prep. Prep first. I'm writing this down...).
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| Veggies and chicken in the sauce |
Cooking also reminds me that I need to breathe and be patient. I would probably not do well on Top Chef or anything like that. I like to take my time and spend hours making complex stuff and trying new things- drives my mom nuts when I'm cooking at her house because it usually entails me making a huge mess in the process.
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| Simmering with broth and rice |
So at some point while cooking the soup, I always panic and think I ruined it. (And forget that this happens every time apparently or you would think I would stop freaking out). The soup takes a while to thicken and as I have established with previous posts, I'm not a very patient person.
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| All ingredients in... waiting to thicken... |
When the soup looks like it does above, I am not a happy camper. And there is really nothing active I can do to "fix" the soup. Actually doing things seem make it worse. I turned up the heat, aaaannnnd it boiled over. Oops. All I can do is let it sit, check it every once in a while, and stir it until it turns in to this (which take about twice as long as the recipe says):
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| Yes I know I already posted this. |
With patience and persistence, things eventually come together. With November starting, I'm finally feeling like my life is "thickening" up and things are falling into place. The job is great and will keep getting better as I get more comfortable and obtain more responsibilities. I went out with friends last night and have started getting other things on my social calendar. I managed to talk Verizon into giving me a new phone to replace my broken one despite the fact that my sister stole my upgrade (last time I mention it Ken, I promise!). I'm getting a paycheck next week.
Is life perfect? No. But it rarely is. And the parts that aren't perfect take time. You can't force things to happen faster, but you shouldn't give up on them either. I think it's important to focus on your goals and where you eventually want to be, but I especially need to remember that life is, in fact, a process.
So tonight, I'm going to enjoy my soup and think about all of the crazy, wonderful things that have gotten me where I am today. Life, and my soup, may not be perfect, but all in all, they are pretty damn good.
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