In the Kitchen: A Walk on the Wild Side

Credit me this much:  tonight, I did the food preparation thing without a recipe.   Yup, workin’ without a net.

No don’t go getting too excited, it wasn’t anything terribly complicated.  Tonight’s offering was tandoori chicken, which I made by lathering a pre-mixed tandoori paste (store bought) with some plain yoghurt (as per the directions on the tandoori paste bottle), marinading a couple of chicken breasts in the resultant mixture and then cooking the breasts in the oven.  That last thing is what I did without recipe details;  not exactly Sorbonne material, but a significant step forward in terms of my own self-confidence in the culinary arena.  I chose 375 for the oven temperature, principally because that seems to be a common request for chicken-cooking recipes, turned the breasts after ten minutes and tested them for completion after twenty-two. 

There was still a wee hint of redness internally, which could have been a signal of “not cookedness” or could have been a result of the hue of the tandoori paste.  I took no chances and fired the breasts back in the oven for another six minutes.   When I removed and checked them that time, they were moist – and obviously done.

I think it was quite delicious.  I augmented this small culinary victory by hitting the (new) elliptical trainer for twenty minutes tonight.  This was my first attempt at completing an entire exercise routine program, and I am proud to say that I managed to finish up without throwing up.

I apologize for things being a little slow around here – the last few days have been busy at work and all my leisure time is being taken up, believe it or not, writing a script for an educational video that is going to be made by a committee that I sit on.   The screenplay that I have to come up with is simple and prosaic in the extreme, but I am learning about the tyranny of the blank page nevertheless.   I am using an awesome freeware tool to help me organize the project and format the script – it’s called Celtx, and it’s available (for free) here.   The package seems quite powerful – it has features that allow you to organize all the various elements of an audio/video production (like the characters, props, locations, sets, shots and so on) as well as automatically formatting the finished product according to an industry-standard template.  It’s even got tools for converting stageplays to screenplays (and vice versa) and tools for compiling a comic book script.  Well worth exploring, if you’re at all interested in creating your own audio-video content.