Artery Clogs

There is a huge snow storm going on right now and our car is buried under it. No trips to the grocery store, no real possibility of leaving the house; I'd say it's a good excuse for some artery clogging comfort food. We've got ourselves some Southern cookin' tonight. However, this isn't food that I really like. Of course, there are some Southern comfort foods that warm my heart (like corn bread) but in general the country cooking thing just doesn't do it for me.

Someone asked me why I keep eating foods with ingredients (or in this case, a theme) that I know I won't enjoy. It's because I like trying to overcome that. Tastes change over time and sometimes I like to try and force them to (see the whole Cilantro Fiasco). It's only really been successful this year with eggplant (the Mediterranean Eggplant Cakes are possibly my favorite discovery so far) but there's really no way to know whether or not you truly hate something until you've tried it every way possible; and every possible way is likely impossible to try. So, I try.

If you're wondering if I liked tonight's dinner, I didn't. Not really, anyway. The Buttermilk Chicken was crispy and tender on the inside, but it's very plain. Part of that is my fault for choosing a recipe with such basic seasoning, but I wanted to be able to tell if the buttermilk had any significant impact on its taste. It was good, but it's not good enough to justify a flour dredged and fried meat. I guess part of my reasoning for whether or not I like something factors health into the equation, which makes it a lot harder to like something that isn't good for me; unless it's exceptionally good.

I tried to add some greens to the plate, but Lima Beans with Bacon had everything stacked against it. The recipe called for rosemary and even the slightest amount seems to taint a dish. I haven't found a rosemary recipe yet that I've enjoyed. It also involves lima beans, the pasty and tasteless cousin of every other bean I happen to enjoy, and bacon, which I'm not particularly fond of either.

The Country Corn Bake wasn't anything like I had imagined. Aside from the taste of corn, it really wasn't like anything at all. Well, it was like tasteless baked egg whites, which is the closest thing to nothing at all in dietary existence. It's safe to say that tonight's dinner was not comforting at all, despite the desire to yield comfort food. However, that's nothing a good bottle of wine could not fix, so my rosé colored glasses either tint this meal for better or for worse.