Speaking of good, I have  never had so much good seafood as I have in the past 4 days. Wow. Everyone, from the little place here in our new hometown with the wood paneling that reminds me of the restaurant which was my first job, to the beach restaurant insanely popular with tourists with the way-too-loud band and the servers who wear Hawaiian shirts, knows how to cook the best seafood you’ve ever eaten. In fact, we’re going back to that local place for lunch again today, because you can get a great piece of fish, 2 sides, and a couple of the most divine hush puppies ever for $6.

But all this eating out, on the road and here, is hard on my stomach, and on our wallet. You see, one of the great things about military  moves is that, well, the government will actually pay for a contractor to move all your stuff. It’s great! But they take your kitchen gear, and don’t deliver it for a week and a half, or more! I’ve been tempted to drive down to the base and borrow some kitchen stuff from the lending closet, but The Hubster gets really weird about borrowing kitchen stuff.

What’s the solution? Hobo dinners! They’re great; potatoes, carrots, and ground beef patties wrapped up in foil packets. Salt, pepper, Worcestershire sauce. Pop ‘em in the oven for a half-hour or so, around 375-400. Even if you have to buy new aluminum foil because your  roll is in a box somewhere between Virginia and Florida, you will be eating healthier and cheaper than you would at a restaurant.

I have some cooking goals while I’m here. First, I want to make really great fish. Fish is one of those things that I consistently make poorly, unless I’m using something from a yellow box with a blue label and a kindly looking old man wearing a yellow raincoat on the front. I also want to make grits; the little local place makes the most amazing smoked gouda grits. Yum and a half! I recognize that these are very southern-style cooking goals, and that’s ok. Southern food is good food, except when all you’ve eaten is the fried variety and your digestive system says, seriously? Enough.

A vegetarian meal my husband actually mostly likes

When my parents came to visit us a few months ago, we went out to an Indian restaurant in Woodbridge. Kevin and I try to make a point of finding interesting, un-chain places to eat, and love taking my parents to holes in the wall.

This place beyond qualified, thanks to its storefront location in a run down strip mall, the dim lighting, the server who had a barely rudimentary grasp of the English language (complicated by a thick accent), and enough typos in the menu to make my eye twitch. But the food, oh the food. I had an absolutely divine chickpea thing, loaded with turmeric and flavor, and maybe some sort of ridiculous heavy cream. Not spicy, but rich, and a great bite to the chickpeas. I ate my weight of it, and had the rest for lunch the next day.

The dish haunted me, and I vowed I would re-create it someday in my own kitchen. That day arrived earlier this week, when I finally decided to make a recipe I’d found on the Betty Crocker website. Now, this recipe called for curry powder, but as we are moving and I seriously don’t have the money or inclination to buy one more bottle of spices that we have to move, I improvised my own “curry powder.” Anyone who is a true connoisseur of Indian food will cry with shame, but I thought the results were delicious, and even better the next day (and the day after!). Even Kevin, a devoted eater of meat, thought it was pretty good, though he’s no fan of whole chickpeas.

Please make this. It’s not exactly what I had in Woodbridge, but I like it even better without the cream. It’s just plain yummy.

*Edit: I used fire-roasted canned tomatoes, which really add some serious yum to the whole mess. I should’ve put that in. My apologies. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.*

Chickpea Curry My Way (adapted from Betty Crocker’s Chickpea and Tomato Curry)

olive oil

3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

1/4 onion, minced

2 cans garbanzo beans

2 cans whole tomatoes

large pinch of coriander seeds

cumin

ginger powder

turmeric

ground red pepper

salt

lemon juice

cooked white rice

Put the coriander seeds in a plastic baggie and crush with a can or rolling pin. (If you are not a loser and have a fancy-pants spice grinder, feel free to toast the seeds, and toast cumin seeds, and grind them all up together. That’s not me. I use a baggie and a can.) Heat a skillet or big, shallow sauce pan over medium heat. When it’s hot, add the oil and let it heat up. Saute the onion and garlic, adding the crushed coriander, cumin, ginger, turmeric, and red pepper. Because I didn’t measure, I can’t tell you how much I used of anything. There will be a good chance to taste and adapt in a few minutes. Just make sure it’s good and yellow by adding plenty of turmeric!

While the onion and garlic are softening and cooking down, put the tomatoes in the blender with the juices and puree them. (Whole tomatoes taste better than the diced ones, and Kevin won’t eat tomato chunks. If your friends and family eat chunks of tomato, lucky you; you can skip this step if you want, and just break them up into more manageable pieces with a fork.) Drain and rinse the garbanzos. Add tomatoes and garbanzos to the onion and garlic. Stir. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes. Taste it about midway through; is it spicy enough? Smokey? Do you just want more turmeric (that’s me, always)? Go ahead and add it. Curry is a personal thing, so just go with how you’re feeling today!

At the end of the simmering time, put in a good pinch of salt and a squirt of lemon juice. Taste. Maybe a tiny bit more salt. Good.

Serve over rice, maybe have some falafel on the side, or pita bread. Whatever your heart desires.

I suppose I can tack it up to poor judgment, lack of time management, and all of those other character flaws that plague my particular generation. Not to mention that nasty sense of entitlement, which I bet manifested itself in my own life by my thinking that this blog would update itself, because I’ve earned it.

At any rate, I have some interesting posts coming up focusing on (I’m hoping) delicious side dishes. Pesto, anyone?

Please remember that I am simultaneously preparing to move, so things are getting a little hairy on my end. Conveniently enough, in my world, I think the week before we move to another state is the perfect time to get back into blogging. Go figure, right?

And in keeping with my blog’s title, I am preparing for a race in my soon-to-be new hometown. I’m very excited, as it should be a fun, laid-back, scenic race; the best kind.

Our FRO put on a coffee last night, which was tasty Subway sammies and a session on family care plans and deployments. Kind of icky stuff, although the lady who spoke on family care plans did remind us, “Put on your big girl panties and make some big girl decisions.” True. And yes, families who don’t have kids or even pets yet need to make a family care plan. For example, what if your hubby is deployed or on TAD for 30 days and you break your leg? You’re not in the hospital for those 30 days, you’re at home. Who is going to help you? Better be someone you really trust, if they’re going to help you toilet and bathe! It’s not fun to think about, but it is necessary.

Right now, Kevin is never going to be in “that box” to work on our will, getting me special power-of-attorney, and creating our family care plan. However, after TBS is over, I will be insisting we make an appointment at Base Legal to get all of our stuff squared away. I think I’ll feel better when everything is all prepared and ready.

As I previously mentioned, Kevin is in the field. Which means I get to spend a lot of time at home, chilling by myself. The temptation to snack is almost unbelievable. And no, these aren’t the healthy snacks either!

“Kari…How about a bunch of chips and salsa?”

“Kari…Why don’t you go down the street to McDonald’s and get a Big Mac?”

“Kari…You should consider eating Nutella straight out of the jar. Really.”

It’s pretty tough to keep myself from just constantly eating. So that’s why I’m blogging. If both hands are busy typing, I can’t eat. Unless I allow myself to take breaks.

Uh oh…I’m running out of things to write about!!

Wish me luck as I’m dragged back into the kitchen.

Labor Day was amazing. Kevin got a 96, (which translates to a 4-day weekend!!!); there was much rejoicing of the local peasantry about these parts. He got home early on Thursday, and we got to hang out, relax, and enjoy each other’s company for the whole afternoon! I worked out Friday morning, and got my gorgeous hubby up so we could clean our apartment. Truly, it was a holy wreck. Thanks to a few episodes of Top Gear, we got through it all before my parents showed up on Friday. Kevin and I were so excited to see them! We went to La Rosetta on Friday night, which is our favorite local restaurant. It’s tiny, but the food is absolutely, positively amazing. Sure, the decor isn’t totally upscale: there are plastic dinosaurs in the fountain against the wall! The food is rich, decadent, delicious, and in my humble opinion, way better than Olive Garden. So there.

Saturday was a glorious day. I made cranberry muesli the evening before, so in the morning, I had a delicious, healthy breakfast ready for everyone to enjoy without having to put a ton of work and time into it (quiche lorraine, anyone?). We spent the day in Olde Town Fredericksburg; beautiful area with amazing restaurants, and with a philosophy about antique shops that you generally find true of fudge shops in other tourist destinations: it ain’t complete till there’s one on every corner. We went to a decadent and amazing French restaurant for dinner, and I had poached eggs Benedict for the first time in my life. It was deeply satisfying and glorious, and I feel that nothing in the world can make me feel like that dish did.

Sunday was wonderful. We went to church, I made tuna pasta primavera for lunch, and we went the Marine Corps Museum. My parents hadn’t been yet, and Kevin and I wanted to show the place off. That museum still gives the Relief Services Assistant at the NMCRS chills every time she goes, and it’s no surprise. It is moving, stirring, and inspiring to think of what such a small group of men and women have d0ne and accomplished since 1775.

Today was a rough day; I was late to my doctor’s appointment because I got lost, and they couldn’t fit me in until 2 weeks from now. Super frustrating; 2 hours of my morning completely lost! I still had fun hanging out with my downstairs neighbor and getting to know her, since I was sad and miserable and needed some cheering up. I made a delicious, amazing dinner, and now I will share all with you!

Cranberry Muesli (adapted from eathealthyyourway.com)

1 and 1/2 cups plain yogurt

1 and 1/2 cups old-fashioned oats

1 and 1/2 cups cranberry juice

big handful dried cranberries

long squeeze of honey (you can always add more in the morning)

dribble vanilla extract

big pinch salt

Mix thoroughly in a bowl and let it sit overnight in the fridge. Deliciousness will ensue in the morning. Serves about 4.

Garlicky Grilled Chicken

4 minced garlic cloves

Small spoonful of stone-ground mustard (I like Grey Poupon)

big splash of olive oil

big pinch of salt

plenty of ground black pepper

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Mix the first 5 ingredients, and rub thoroughly into the chicken. Let sit in fridge for several hours (I let it go all day!), and grill for dinner. (I got to try out my George Foreman grill, and it was absolutely glorious. I don’t know how I survived without it!) Serve with buttery green beans and mashed potatoes (prepared with a big dollop of sour cream mixed in; it absolutely made it one of the happiest moments of my life.)

Run Amuck is a 4-mile obstacle course through woods on board MCB Quantico. It took place on Saturday, with a recorded total of 2224 finishers. First off, this is the biggest race I have ever participated in; heck, they had wave starts. I’ve NEVER been a part of a race that required waves! Chip timing, sure. Wave starts were a new one for me. My neighbor and friend Meagan and I signed up for this race and decided to run in the same wave, even though technically, she was in a wave a few minutes before mine. The starting area, on the infield of Butler Stadium’s track, was really keyed up-lots of loud music playing (which inspired a dance party by the 2 of us), mud-covered runners sprinting across the finish line, Marines ensuring everything was running smoothly. Meagan and I took our places on the track, waiting. 90 seconds…60 seconds…30 seconds…3…2…1…*siren* and we were off!

After a brief stint on the track, the course took off into a back road, which was fairly innocuous (except for a major hill that reduced others around us to a walk). We had to stop at a station to do jumping jacks. The first obstacle was a stack of hay bales, which I got over without too much trouble. A Woman Marine was standing at the hay bales, yelling at us that it shouldn’t be hard, it used to be higher, so get over it already! Farther down the road was tires. The course curved to the left, sending us off-road and immediately into the first mud pit. That was some serious mud. The water only came up to my knees, but the mud underneath was both sticky and slippery. It tried to pull my sneakers right off my feet! Keeping my knees high as I ran through helped, but it was still tough going. The smell was unbelievable; I wondered out-loud why it smelled like the state fair. We faced some serious hills after emerging from the mud, “encouraged” by a Marine at the top yelling at those weaker individuals around us who had slowed to a walk. The downhill sections worried me exceedingly, as it was covered in the same slippery mud. I was constantly worried about slipping, falling, hitting the orange barrier wall at the bottom of the hill, and being done for the race. Somehow, I kept to my feet and threw myself over the wall. We got to our hands and knees and crawled through more of the mud underneath ropes stretched over the trail, again encouraged by a Marine telling us to keep our heads down so we wouldn’t get shot. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the mud hadn’t been full of sharp gravel. The last few meters were pretty painful. But we were soon up and running again, flinging bits of mud from our fingertips into the woods around us. We had to do situps, crawl through a tunnel, run more, do flutter kicks, run under a firehose spraying water, and finish on the track. Official result? I finished 958 out of the 2224, with a chip time of 38:49. After we finished, my shins started stinging. Meagan and I cleaned off in another fire hose that was running to clean off the participants. Final damage report: my shins and knees are cut, scraped, and bruised; my elbow hurts to fully extend or put weight on it. That was awesome! I’ve got my eye on a 10K (that’s 6.2 miles) Turkey Trot in November. Doing one race makes me want to do another. If anyone is in the DC area this time next year, try to get over to Quantico to compete in Run Amuck 2011. It’s fun, it’s well-organized, it’s definitely beginner-runner friendly with a competitive but welcoming atmosphere; plus, it’s very affordable ($35, with t-shirt and entrance to the beer garden. But seriously, beer at 9:00 AM? Right after a tough race? Not for me!) If you’re interested, sign up as soon as registration opens; it’s a popular race so it fills up quickly!

I’m really trying to laugh about this. Honestly. If I don’t laugh, I’ll curl up in a ball under the covers and never leave the apartment again, not even to go to the pool; Kevin can do all of our grocery shopping on the weekends! (Yeah, right; kid would come home with boxes of Pop-Tarts and cheese danishes from the bakery, and we’d have no veggies or fruit in the house.)

Let me explain. Yesterday, some other wives and I went to an all-day-informational-extravaganza-session-marathon-of-ridankulousness that was focused on TBS wives. At the end, with my brain full to bursting with information, and my blood sugar level hovering just above the soles of my shoes, I was ready to get the heck out of there. Unfortunately for my stomach, we still had to listen to our guest speaker, Colonel A., who is the commanding officer of TBS. He was very nice (but as another wife explained it, “totally bad-ass”). After a brief Q&A, we had to go up, one by one, shake his hand, and get a “diploma” for managing to sit and behave ourselves all day long. Honestly, we only did that for 16-18 years of our lives already-it’s called school. Most of us already have our bachelor’s degrees, and some have their masters or law degrees. My point is, we didn’t get a certificate for every day we went to school and didn’t catch the girls’ bathroom on fire. To add insult to injury, we also had to get our picture taken with the colonel. I’m not even sure the man likes photo-ops to begin with; it was hard to tell.

From my vantage point on the side, I couldn’t see what he was doing with his arm nearest the wife who was getting her certificate. I thought maybe he was putting his arm around them. I’m a touching kind of gal myself, and have really no issues with patting someone on the shoulder, hugging someone if they look like they could use a good squeeze…you get the picture. When my name was called, I went up, made eye contact, shook his hand, and got my diploma (woooo….). So far, all was well. Then the photo.

For a moment, he looked like he was going for the reacharound side hug, so I did too….but he wasn’t.

It was a fake-out, where he tricked me by doing an exaggerated stretch of the arm, and putting it behind his back. Uh, well, crap, so here I am with one arm around him, he has both hands behind his back. I have two options at this point. I can either remove my arm, making an awkward situation worse, or, I can keep my arm there and act like I meant to do that the whole time.

I went with option 2.

So Colonel, if you’re reading this, (no shame if you are, I Google myself regularly and there’s no harm in it), I’m really sorry for hugging you when you probably were in no mood for it. I’m just a hugger. (Of course, if there is a merciful God in heaven, and I firmly believe there is, the colonel will never remember this even happened.)

The saving grace was that Kevin laughed until he couldn’t speak when I told him about it last night. I’m glad he isn’t mad that I side-hugged his boss’ boss.

But honestly, this time it felt different. Everyone has talked to those friends who say that they feel younger than they are (“I still feel like I’m in high school, how can I be a college graduate/a mom/somebody with real responsibilities and a life that doesn’t involve remembering a locker combination?”). I think I had that problem, but now I don’t. Maybe living so far away from my parents has helped me to feel and act my age. Which brings me to my point-I actually feel like enough of an adult, an officer’s wife, a paying customer in this shop, whatever, to say that this was not appropriate. It used to be that I would giggle and think it’s funny, but now…it’s not.

And when I got the uniforms home, they were still wrong. I had to get on the phone all day today and get it all worked out, and tomorrow after the spouses’ picnic, I’m going back to the tailor shop to get a refund. For the record, this was a tailor shop that is operated under the MCCS on base, so the manager above the owner of the store was very helpful. I saw that some of the searches for this blog are “Marine TBS”, so if anybody who is reading this is near or around Q-town, be a little careful of the tailor shop at the exchange on Mainside. I’m sure they will be more careful now, but we have decided that Kevin’s uniforms are going to The Marine Shop. It’s just not worth the headache!!

On a completely different note, anybody want to know what we’re having for dinner?

Ok, probably not, because you’re wondering what on earth YOU’re fixing for dinner.

Never mind that. Remember that you’re here to read my blog. Worry about your own problems out loud on your own blog.

Juuuust kidding.

For serious. I have mentioned my love-hate relationship with Hamburger Helper. It’s a real issue, folks. The convenience…the unpronounceable ingredients that make it not really food…the need to feed my husband…the need to feed us something good. It’s a stressor.

Enter real skillet dinners, that are just as easy as Hamburger Helper, but you know what is actually in them, instead of combining meat, pasta, water/milk, and the ambiguously labeled “sauce packet.”

Yum: ground chicken, onion, tomatoes, garlic, basil, oregano, whole wheat rotini, and lots and lots of cheese. (When in doubt, melt cheese over everything.)

Well, when you’re not a terribly accomplished cook, this can be dicey. Add in the fact that my darling husband gets home late and wants a “real meal,” (i.e. not sandwiches to make up for the fact that dinner is fairly inedible), and you have a recipe (haha, NOT FUNNY AT ALL) for some serious conflict.

Yesterday, I decided that I would not let cooking beat me. I went to my Betty Crocker cookbook (fairly reliable and useful, honestly), and pulled out the Italian Tomato Sauce recipe. I might have almost doubled the garlic asked for, but that’s because I’m a garlicaholic. A recipe calls for 2 cloves, I use 3…or 4. Especially in Italian food, because if other people can smell your breath and not pass out, you were gypped.

I really enjoyed cooking it. I cooked a chopped onion and several minced garlic cloves in olive oil for several minutes, then added a large can of petite diced tomatoes that had gotten put in a moving box, 2 small cans of tomato sauce, and a WHOLE lot of dried basil, oregano, a little salt, a little fennel seed, and some black pepper. I don’t usually use fennel, but I knew it would really finish out the flavors. I brought the sauce to a boil and let it simmer uncovered for about 45 minutes while I did laundry.

Omgoodness. That stuff smelled amazing. I was drooling. Drooling like a teething baby who sees chocolate. After the sauce finished, I grabbed the pound of ground chicken I had in the fridge and cooked it with another chopped onion and a couple of minced garlic cloves. drained the fat, and added it to the sauce. This all cooked for a few minutes, and I tasted it to make sure it was good.

It was.

I put it in the fridge for later, and baked a half-batch of lemon shortbread cookies. (That is another post. Nom nom nom!)  Closer to 7:30, I put water on the stove for our whole-wheat pasta, and I waited.

And waited.

Kevin calls when he’s on his way home, and it only takes 10 minutes. I wanted to cook the pasta after he called, so he could have nice hot pasta. But after 8:00, I was so hungry. I cooked a large amount of whole wheat pasta, heated the sauce, and put it on a plate with some awesome shaved Parmesan cheese. I had a Romaine salad with some olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, and pepper.

I was in heaven. Dinner was amazing, and I knew Kevin would love it. He deserved it, after putting up with my kitchen disasters.

After 9:30 (!!) I finally called him to see what was up. He told me he would call me back, and after 10:00 he did call and broke the news that he wasn’t coming home, but would instead stay in his BOQ. By that point, it was very late, and his on-deck time was 5:30 AM. Staying there would allow him to get more sleep than coming home.

At least I have really nice leftovers waiting for him. And the good news is that I have reboosted my confidence in the kitchen. I think part of it is finding reliable recipes. Some of the cookbooks I was using were good and other people like them, but they don’t really work for us. I have used them before, and sometimes gotten good results, and other times not. For now, I might stick with my Betty Crocker and allrecipes.com. Also…measuring. I want to be one of those cooks who can just eyeball stuff, and make up stuff, and blah blah blah. At least right now, I can’t. Girl’s gotta measure. And that is ok. If the food is good and gets on the table when it needs to, that is fine.

Mom never lets these failed forays bother her. Her motto is, “There are too many recipes out there for me to spend my time worrying about this one.” She moves on, and dinner the next night will be something wholly different. I admire her for being so casual and playful in the kitchen. I am not like her.

When I got married, I had plans to spoil my new husband with delicious (but also nutritious!) food every night. He would always be blown away by the perfection of my cooking, and everything would be made from scratch. (Also included in these plans was the our-home-will-always-be-spotless clause, the I-will-never-wear-sweatpants-past-8:00-AM clause and the we-will-never-argue-about-anything clause.) Unfortunately, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and my cooking turned out to be like my mom’s, except without tasting good. It was always adventurous, especially for my poor husband, who had to try to eat a little before he gave up and put a pizza in the oven as a last resort against starvation.

I finally discovered the wonders and joys of…the boxed dinner! With just a pound of beef (or chicken, or a couple of cans of tuna) and some water or milk, I could create some dish that tasted like food. I got all the satisfaction of “cooking my husband dinner,” and my husband got all the satisfaction of having a meal he could actually eat.

Fast forward several months, after turning to boxed dinners and frozen pizza each appearing on the dinner menu at least once a week. I read the most amazing book on the way to Virginia: Michael Pollan’s “In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto.” This book reads like an extended essay on the intangible (and admittedly tangible) benefits of eating real food in the context of traditional diets. Pollan observes that many of the items filling the shelves at the grocery (or grocery section of your local supermarket) are not actually food; they are edible food-like substances, manufactured by scientists who cannot quantify the benefits of eating an apple, a carrot, or a small piece of beef. The fact is that many foods and the chemicals in them interact in ways when they are digested by the human body that scientists cannot reproduce in laboratories. As one scientist was quoted, “You can’t do a study on broccoli.” (But you can do one on folic acid, or beta carotene, or omega-3’s!)

I have been inspired to cook real food, and to cease relying on boxed dinners or frozen pizza to keep us from starvation. Bye, chemicals whose names I can’t pronounce, and high-fructose corn syrup. If the item isn’t what it says it is on the label, better not to buy it. Over the next few months (let’s say 6) I will post what I’ve been cooking and how I am doing with avoiding processed food. I will probably have a few posts unrelated to food, because I don’t exclusively think about cooking. (Or I try not to. Yeah.)