What do you do when you get some bad news, when life just doesn’t seem to be going your way, you’re feeling under the weather? Usually I don’t do much of anything. Perhaps I will take in a mindless, feel-good movie. One that makes me think, no one’s love life is just so perfect. I’ll eat movie theater popcorn for dinner, wiping my greasy fingerprints on piles of crisp, yet diaphanous paper napkins. If nothing looks appealing at the cineplex, maybe I’ll rent a John Hughes, ’80′s era movie, one that makes me long for that old high school chum that never really existed. Call it wallowing, call it self-pity, it usually works for me.
This week my husband and I received some disappointing news (really it was my husband’s news, but disappointing for me by proxy). I’m not sure if it was the nature of the news, or perhaps just where I am in my life, but this time I was driven away from the cineplex and straight into the warmth and nurturance of the kitchen. Now we didn’t have much in the form of ingredients, despite leftovers from wedding fete this past weekend (more on that in upcoming blogs). But never one to let something as paltry as ingredients stop me from cooking when needed, I resorted to an old standby, something settling and soothing to untie my stomach– a frittata.
A little egg, some cheese, whatever vegetables happen to be lying about, and in a matter of minutes you have an ultimately satisfying, and a little bit gourmet (depending on ingredients), complete meal. I wasn’t actually hungry, although it was dinner time, so the frittata proved to be the perfect match for me to make as it is equally good hot as it is at room temperature. This frittata was a take on a recipe I found on the BBC Food website, very simple yet satisfying, with a touch of much-needed spring. With some frozen peas, a touch of fresh chopped mint, and some lovely Gruyere cheese left over from the party, a delightful egg dish was made in about one half hour.
And I must say, although the frittata itself was a comforting meal, it was the being in the kitchen that sort of did the trick for me. There was something soothing about the soundtrack of pots being bashed around, getting my aggressions out with a mortar and pestle rather than throwing myself down in a jag of screaming and crying, and having the oven on, the heat tenderly washing away the tumult of the day. Being in the kitchen just did it for me. Who knows, maybe I’ll have to save the John Hughes movies for when I am feeling nostalgic for the past, and the experience of eating movie theater popcorn for my main evening meal as simply a gluttonous treat.
