A good lesson

I learned a good lesson today.  Well, it's one I already knew, but it's a good reminder.  I grabbed some veggies at the Waterford Farmers' Market today and instantly started to crave kebabs on the grill.  I'd been focused on a grill-based dinner as I was planning to have friends over for some much needed quality time and it's an easy entertainment approach.   The larger gathering was postponed due to an under the weather munchkin, poor guy, but I had company nonetheless.  It had been a challenging day as a close friend is going through a rough time, and I really needed the therapy of standing in my kitchen preparing a meal.  I think there is little else in this world that can put me at peace as quickly as some quality kitchen time.  Sharing the meal makes it that much better.

How pretty are these?

I grabbed a london broil on sale and cut it up into cubes.  It soaked for a bit in a quick marinade I with onion, garlic, vinegar, oil and some char grill spice blend I had.  On my drive home from other obligations today it dawned on me that I'd probably discarded the package of skewers I had during my kitchen meltdown and was about to stop and grab some more when I remembered I'd received these grill/kebab/cage things for christmas.  I figured I'd play with a gadget and save myself a trip.  I didn't even snap a picture of them, but you know what I mean.

I only had two of the fancy grill cage thingies so that  limited the volume of meat and veggies I could cook at once.  They got hot and messy.  I may have dropped one.  I might have uttered an expletive.  I found myself missing simple bamboo skewers soaked in water.

Lesson:  Sticking with simple tradition is not always a bad thing.  Plus, there's something cathartic about shoving a skewer through big chunks of meat that loading up a metal cage just doesn't replicate.

Still, dinner came out pretty good.  I let a bit of olive oil soak up flavors from some onion, garlic, salt and pepper and then quickly tossed the veggies in it before grilling.  The orange and red cherry tomatoes may have made my week.  All in all it was a fairly healthy, fresh and satisfying meal and, as with any good kitchen time, I felt better when I was done than before I'd started.  Maybe there's a lesson in there too.