emsk

It occurred to me this evening that I MIGHT want to review my definition of ‘easy’, where cooking is concerned.

I made devilled sausages, with spinach served over rice. I considered this a very easy dinner to make.

If I explode the process out, though…

Put rice & water in saucepan, apply heat. (This bit: actually easy by anyone’s standards.) Less straightforward: saucepan is cast iron and holds heat beautifully, making it harder to burn rice.

Heat cast iron pan with butter & olive oil. Yes, both, I like mixing my fats in the cast iron. (Have cast iron pan. Have appropriate heat source for cast iron pan. Know how to clean cast iron pan, rendering it usable in future.)

Chop onion, apply to pan. Remove sausages from freezer (buy sausages, place in freezer…), nuke briefly, chop into half rounds, apply to pan. (Have sharp knife and good chopping boards.)

Apply tomato paste, water, jar of home-made apple sauce (.. yeah, that easy thing?), home made chilli sauce (… again), stock from freezer (…).

Turn to spice rack, add celery seeds, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. Previously, have spices organised enough that they actually live in that order in spice rack. Spice rack has ‘herbs’ in top layer, ‘less used herbs’ in bottom layer. Other spice rack has ‘curry’ in top rack, ‘baking’ in bottom rack. There is also a herb drawer. We will not discuss the herb drawer. You could get lost in there and go on adventures.

Simmer until sauce magically occurs. Thicken with potato flakes.

Apply spinach from freezer to pan, simmer until spinach melts.

Serve over the rice, which you have supervised and ensured cooked & not stuck to saucepan.

Dinner took me about 40 minutes in clock time. About, oh, ten minutes of that was active cooking, the rest was dishwashing, stirring, drinking wine and talking crap with Kazz…

Yes, I consider this an easy dinner. But there is a shitload of work, preparation, skill, and I don’t know, How Food And/Or Kitchen Works 101 under the hood there.

Easy for me, but that’s quite a privilege.

Originally published at kiwi geek. You can comment here or there.