Extra Touches

Today my slowing down routine included putting more a little more thought into the food I served we3@home. For breakfast I made egg, ham, and cheese croissant sandwiches. This caused certain people to raise their eyebrows in surprise and delight. One of them posed the question, "Wow, what did we do to deserve this?" I don't think I gave a direct answer, but I could have easily and truthfully said, "Oh, nothing, I made them just because you're you!"

I felt so domestic roasting butternut squash from our very own garden and a large apple from our very own orchard to use in a soup for supper. I took the time to haul down my white soup tureen from the cupboard's top shelf so I could serve the soup from bowl a touch more special than plain everyday. 

But being thoughtful about the food I cook and the dishes in which I serve the food does not guarantee a perfect spread, I found out. 

The squash halves roasted superbly, but the apple pieces I added to the pan later quickly turned to mush in the hot oven. But it really didn't matter - eventually everything got blended up in the soup anyway. 

The savory muffins looked pretty amazing, but they had their issues. Regarding them, I have already made mental notes for the next time I try that recipe: Add more savoriness (garlic powder, for one thing, and ramp up the other seasonings) and don't use cupcake wrappers, so as to avoid a good quarter inch of muffin stubbornly clinging to the bottom of the papers.

I slowed down enough to make a homemade chicken rub that should have been called chicken sprinkle, seeing how I sprinkled it on the chicken pieces rather than rubbing the seasonings into them. I didn't distribute the rub over all the pieces very well, and therein lies the rub - we encountered some rather zippy bites among the more bland bites of chicken in our thoughtful, extra touching meal.

After supper, I did a rather spontaneous thing - said yes to Kerra's asking if I wanted to help her do a bit of Christmas decorating in her classroom at school. We strung lights around one window and hung blue and silver baubles from the top of another. She had already arranged an incomplete nativity scene in one corner of the room. (Only three pieces of the set could be found in the Christmas decorations stash.) Oh well, at least the wise men have their act together.