Adventures in deliciousness
I love to cook supper for myself. It’s probably healthier than eating out all the time, and I enjoy working in the kitchen, even if my apartment kitchen is only barely bigger than a breadbox. I like to cook, but I’ve never been able to get into the habit of packing a lunch. I don’t have particularly regular habits at any restaurant, but there are a handful of places in Roswell that I rotate through frequently enough for the people there to know at least my face, and maybe even my name and a usual order. There’s the burrito place down the street, the pizza joint run by the Moroccan guy with an Italian grandmother, the Greek place, and the old people restaurant.
The old folk’s restaurant is a little place off of Holcomb Bridge run by a lady from Dutchland (it took me a while to figure out why everything is served with carrot slices as a garnish) that serves soups and sandwiches and stuff like that. They have a menu, but I honestly don’t know what’s on it. They always have a lunch special of a cup of some kind of soup, a choice of some sort of entree, and a dessert. It’s a neat little place. For whatever reason, the usual crowd it attracts are old enough to be my grandparents, but no one’s ever complained about the young punk coming in and eating their quiche, and there a lot of interesting people there. The restaurant also has cooking classes about once a month or so, and I signed up for one of those.
I’ve since found out that the soup class is famous, but the one I joined was a new idea and a lot less specific; it was about cooking with herbs. The class crowd was about the same as the lunch crowd as far as age, but I did end up sitting at a table with someone who graduated from Tech the same year I did that I sort of knew through Strick. Apparently his wife works at the restaurant. Crazy, man. Anyway, it was an educational experience. The class was basically a series of lectures followed by eating the item discussed, and most of the dishes were just regular things jazzed up with some extra plants. There were a couple kinds of pesto, an herb butter, a vinaigrette and some lemon sherbet with rosemary and lime peel and juice for dessert. I could have done without the chewy rosemary bits, but it tasted mighty nice. I learned a lot, and I got to thinking that maybe I should use that balcony space to try to grow some things. I guess I probably shouldn’t put that off until my foot heals like everything else that I’m procrastinating.
At one point, while making one of the pestoes, Ms. Annelies asked whether everyone had a food processor. I was the only one who didn’t, which I guess isn’t a horrible shortcoming, but can make things difficult. The guy from Tech confessed that he only had one because he took the soup class a few months before. I don’t really know what to think about it. Electricity is great and all, but I usually like the visceral experience of doing everything by hand, kind of like that crazy carpenter on PBS. I guess convenience is nice too, though. I have been known to use a microwave on occasion.
So, for anyone reading this looking for Christmas present ideas (I’m looking at you, mom), I could probably use a Cuisinart.