Cooking Lessons

Yesterday my 20-year-old niece, Francesca, told me she wanted to learn to cook and bake. I told her she should come over anytime and I will show her a few things. I invited her for dinner tonight and when I picked her up, I told her this would be a cooking lesson too.

Basically- Chessie is starting at ground zero in the kitchen. Boiling water. So I didn’t want to get too complex- but she might as well make good tasting food – so we started with Nonno Chicken, AuGratin Potatoes, sautéed broccoli and banana nut bread for desert.

First, we boiled the potatoes while I cleaned up the kitchen. 6 Med size russets – skin on.  

After I got the kitchen cleaned up, we took the chicken breast and pounded them to about ½ thick. – And set aside. Then I cut the broccoli and par-boiled.

I shredded the cheese for the potatoes.

Chessie looked on while I explained why I was doing things in the order I was doing them- which is so everything would finish at the same time of course.

Next, I showed her how to peel the skins off the potatoes and cut them for the buttered casserole dish. Then diced a ½ onion to sprinkle in with the potatoes.

I took the par-boiled broccoli and put in a pan with minced garlic, butter, olive oil, salt & pepper. Set aside for later.

Then I made the cheese sauce for the potatoes with a butter/flour roux, and then added milk, the 2 cups of cheddar (shredded) and ½ cup of Romano/Parmesan.

Chessie and I were talking about all kinds of things while we were cooking. School, different careers, your forgiven screw up window (age 16-22) and family- she wanted to know about my mother- her Nonnie.

We poured the cheese sauce over the potatoes and then topped with bread crumbs and a little more cheese.- Popped in the over at 375.

We took our pounded chicken breasts and dipped them in egg with crushed rosemary, garlic powder, salt & pepper. Then dipped in seasoned bread crumbs.  We browned the breaded chicken breasts briefly in olive oil and butter – then placed them on a cookie sheet. We deglazed the pan with Raspberry vinegar and a little more butter and then poured that over the chicken.

We set the chicken aside for a bit and cleaned up the kitchen again.

The potatoes had browned perfectly- so I pulled them out and put the chicken in the oven for 10 minutes at 350. I turned up the heat on the broccoli.  

While the dinner was in its last few minutes of cooking- Chessie mashed the bananas for the Chiquita Banana Bread Mix. We took the chicken out of the oven after about 10 minutes and put the Banana bread in. (350)

We sat and ate our dinner. I think Chessie was happy- she cleaned her plate!

It was great to spend an evening with my niece. It was fun to share some of my recipes with her and show her how easy cooking can be if you plan a little bit. I did tell her sometimes it doesn’t always work out with everything being ready on time- but you learn to adjust (and BS ) your way through it.

I’ve always had a comfortable relationship with Chessie, but I think tonight we bonded a little more. In many ways, she reminds me of me- maybe a little less hard –headed. But if I can share anything to make her life a little easier- whether it’s cooking or something else- I’m happy to do it.

I’ve solved a lot of problems in the kitchen- I hope to share that recipe with Chessie too.