Middle Aged and Living Well

With work being done on our back splash this weekend, the kitchen was closed, which meant I couldn’t create any fabulous meals.  So I was relegated to the outside, white washing our patio cover both on Saturday and Sunday.  I think I got more paint on me than I got on the ground, but most of the paint got on the structure, which is a good thing.  So with the kitchen available to me, I was able to come home from work and prepare a meal on Monday evening.

So with a little inspiration from a wine dinner we attended on Saturday night, I concocted a cassoulet for the four of us home for dinner.  The chef at the wine dinner created a faux cassoulet using Israeli couscous with duck confit and andouille sausage.  I went more classical with white beans, andouille and chicken.  My little take on the dish was to create some porcini bread crumbs by blending some stale bread with some dried porcini mushrooms and then toasted them in a skillet.  The nice thing about it was it took only 40 minutes to create a tasty, filling, low carb meal.  Paired with a northern Italian white wine, it made it a wonderful weekday meal.

With a more stylish back splash, and a new Vent-a-Hood liner installed, we fixed the shortcomings we found in our original remodel.  So the only thing that can stop my cooking is a lack of inspiration.  By attending a couple of wine dinners over the last several weeks, I have lots of inspiration.  I smell a marinière in my future.