How to Keep Hostessing Skills Honed During Covid Lockdown

So, obviously, we are living in a surreal time of lockdown, quarantine, curfews, vaccine shortages, closures, restrictions, uncertainty, fear, anxiety, loneliness, burn-out, boredom, increased drinking (just me, then?), Netflix dependency and smaller social bubbles.

How in tarnation does a hostess survive with her hosting skills intact, then?

How does one hostess when there is no one to host?

What does one do with all that pent-up energy (and here I speak for you because I don't have much lately) and occasional bursts of manic creativity? 

How does one keep the dust from thickening on one's recipe card box?

If you have the answer, please share with me!

Ha ha...

Like all of you, what I've been doing to stay sane during this pandemic is, well...to eat. 

A lot.

A lot lot, as my weight scale will cheerfully confirm (because it hates me).

And in order to eat, you have to have some recipes and if you can find or create new ones just to keep your GOOGLE search skills sharp, all the better. 

But recipes aren't enough. What about ambience? So, you've cooked yourself and your SO (significant other) a delish dinner oozing with flavour and heady with tantalizing aromas and now what? Are you going to plunk you in from of the TV in your tattered sweat pants or pyjamas to polish it off?

NOOOOOOO!

Once in a while, you have to change out of your depression costume and make an effort. 

That means slipping into something half decent (sweat pants will do in a pinch as long as they are clean and make you feel pretty), pulling out your best plates, lighting a few candles and cranking up some Jazz tunes. Remember that we're not aiming for high romance here (although if it leads there, go for it); we are simply remembering how to live. 

Which is why I continue to experiment in the kitchen like a mad fiend on fiend tablets even when there is only myself or my hubby to cook for and why I continue to search for the best  and coolest hostessing gadgets and do-hickeys and whatchamacallits that are available on the planet. And why I may have to admit to an addiction to ordering on Amazon (Gulp!).

We're all tired and sick and sick of being tired but it's vital to continue to have a semblance of a normal life inside our own abodes. We can't control what's out there, but we can control what goes on in our own home. We need to make an effort to entertain even if we are entertaining our dang spouse or dang dog. And if you have the good fortune of having a small family bubble to entertain, how lucky are you?

Spoil them with your gift or flair and flavours even if you're making a grilled cheese sandwich because you're broke.  Make their taste buds sing with some extra never-before-imagined ingredients. Fill their bellies with gullet-tickling foods that make them lick their fingers and sigh with bliss. Dazzle them with your creative genius at table setting. 

Celebrate holidays from around the world. Celebrate being healthy and alive. Celebrate having recovered from Covid. Celebrate any good news in your life with a small and simple dinner party for two. I celebrated my cat's birthday and I do not apologize.

We had tapas, my cat had his favourite stinky fish.

My girlfriends and I have started a Zoom Dinner Party night whereby we Zoom while eating dinner from time to time. We watch each other cook and decorate and set the table as we chat. We share tips and we ooh and ahh over our efforts.  It's not for everyone and some months it's too tiring for me, but I get a kick out of it and it saves my sanity on occasion. 

Here's how it is for me: I can't bring a quick end to the bloody pandemic, I can't shed all my stress and alleviate all my anxiety, and I won't always be perfect (in fact, I'm rarely perfect), but I can't allow lockdowns and the unknown stop me from being who I am: a stressy, messy but awesome hostess.

The Rona will never take that away. 

Comfort Foods To Die For.

OMG.

For all of you cheese lovers out there, I just found the latest happy-belly snack. 

Battered deep-fried cheese curds! 

When you eat this, your belly will thank you by producing big happy  cheese burps of joy and isn't that what eating is all about? No? Why not? 

Never mind. I don't want to know.

• Ingredients: cheese curds, bread crumbs, flour, salt, Italian seasoning or seasoning of your choice.
• Freeze cheese curds for one hour before frying.
• Make a coating for the curds by combining flour and baking powder. Use 1 tsp of baking powder for every cup of flour. Add your seasonings of choice to the flour.
• Add some breadcrumbs to the flour.
• You can make a thicker batter by using eggs and milk. I chose not to.
• Fry in at least 2 inches of oil.
• Fry on medium-high heat until golden brown.

Cooking for One During a Quarantine

Wow.
Has it been a year since Rona paid us an unwelcome visit?
Time flies.
Except when you're quarantined or isolating. Then it drips at the speed of molasses dripping off of the side of the Grand Canyon. 

I have been in quarantine twice already all by my lonesome, cut off from family, scared, sick, moody, angry. But those experiences and being too exhausted and or slothful to stand at a stove for longer than 10 minutes forced me to find easier ways of filling my gut with good food. I couldn't afford take out every day and I didn't want to eat unhealthy. So, I turned to crock pots and soup pots and one pot oven meals. 

That's right, I would empty out the contents of my fridge into a vessel of choice, light a flame under it, put my feet up and have myself a big 'ol glass of wine. 

"Ahhh...this is the life", I would say to myself as I binged my way through Netflix.

Afterwards, I'd pour my soup into several jars and freeze it.

Ditto for the crock pot chill, stew,  chicken wings roast, etc.

FYI: There is nothing you CAN'T cook in a crock pot. Tell all your friends!

My third strategy when laziness gets a grip on me is to put take a small cast iron pot and fill it with one serving of meat and veggies. I pop that into the oven and voila. Totally fuss-free. 

                                                    Chicken Vegetable Soup

• Ingredients: 2 Litres of chicken broth (you can use water and bouillon powder), 2 chicken breasts, Cabbage, yellow onion with skin on it, celery root, celery, carrots, red bell pepper, bok  choy, leek, garlic clove, ground black pepper, whole allspice, salt, a few drops of Maggi seasoning and a teaspoon of Vegeta bouillon.
• Cook on low heat until it boils, then simmer for about an hour.
• When soup is cooked, I add rice noodles, a few drops of hot sauce (Tabasco or Sriracha) and scallions for garnish. BAM! 

Crock Pot Chicken Drumsticks with Rice:

• In a crock pot add: a few dribbles of olive oil, 6 chicken drumsticks, chilli sauce, a splash of lemon juice, 2 cups of orange juice, 1/4 cup soya sauce, chopped garlic clove, fresh chopped ginger root, hot sauce, 1/2 cup red wine, ground black pepper, Italian seasoning, onion powder. 
• Slow cook for 4-6 hours. 
• Dump everything into a deep pan and cook on low to medium heat until the sauce thickens and reduces by half. 

Hamburger Soup

• 2 Litres of beef broth (you can use water and bouillon), ground beef, a bag of frozen vegetables, 1 red onion, 4 cloves of chopped garlic, Onion soup mix (you can use onion salt or onion powder), Italian seasoning, 1/3 cup soya sauce, 3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce, a few tablespoons of Ketchup, 1/2 cup tomato sauce, 1 bay leaf, ground black pepper, salt.
• Cook the ground beef first on low heat.
• Add everything except the frozen vegetables.
• When soup is almost done, add the frozen vegetables. If you cook them too soon, they may get mushy.

VOILA!

How beautiful is this? And it tastes better than it looks!

One Pot Meals:

Steak, Taters and Carrots

You can throw everything into one pan or spread it into two.

Two Pans for Two Peeps

Quiche

• I buy ready made pie crusts because making crust myself sounds like work.
• In a bowl, I add 6 eggs, a splash of milk, Seasonings of choice (Italian, black pepper, garlic powder, onion powder....whatever the heck you like).
• I add chopped onions, red and green bell peppers and shredded cheese.
• Bake for about 35 minutes on 375F or until crust is golden brown and the filling is puffed up.

Naan Pizza for One

• Buy some Naan bread (it comes in packages of 3-4).
• Spread with pizza sauce or spaghetti sauce.
• Add seasonings (Italian seasoning, chilli pepper flakes, etc).
• Add the toppings of your choice: cheese, bell peppers, onions, meat.
• Pop in oven for 15-20 minutes. I use a toaster oven.

And that's it for now, folks.

I'm off to put my feet up and have another glass of wine.

Stay safe and healthy and BON APETIT!