#1351 my cooking mojo was off balance

You know how sometimes you try out a new recipe and it works and tastes great and you add it into your regular recipe rotation and all is well? Then there are other times when the recipe doesn't really work out for whatever reason? I had one of those experiences this weekend.

I was so excited to make a recipe for mozzarella-stuffed meatballs. I made the meatballs pretty big, then I put a pinky-knuckle size piece of string cheese inside the meatball and enclosed the cheesy surprise inside the meat. Everything was going to be just fine until I overcooked the dang meatball. I lost track of the time, I guess.  When I pulled the pan out of the oven, I knew the meatballs were doomed. All of the cheese had just melted right out and had formed a cheesy-yet-crusty mess on the bottom of the baking sheet. Thankfully I had lined the pan with foil, so clean-up was easy. The meatballs still smelled pretty good, but they were overcooked so they were hard and not delicious. I felt bad about it. MT, who had to suffer through my culinary disaster,  said, "It's ok, hon. Usually you're a pretty good cook, so you're entitled to f*** it up now and then."

I know I can make those meatballs much better than my first try. I will do it again and they will be fantastic.

I tried another little recipe this weekend but I'm not sure if it was a success or not. I'd seen a recipe for roasted chickpeas and I thought that might make a nice snack. I followed the recipe, even taking a bunch of time to remove the hulls (they looked kind of like little garbanzo condoms). When the chickpeas were skinned and dried, I mixed them with some olive oil and seasonings: cumin, smoked paprika, chili powder and crushed red pepper. I wanted them to be smoky and spicy. I popped them in the oven at 400 degrees and set the timer for 40 minutes as directed, but I pulled them out after 30 minutes and some were burned. They are nice and crunchy, but I didn't really taste any of the flavors. They don't taste like much at all, in fact. They also don't look like the roasted chick peas in the photos that were posted with the recipe. In the photos, the chickpeas looked plump and delicious and covered with seasoning. Maybe the pic was taken prior to roasting. My chickpeas came out shriveled and shrunken and burned and without flavor, as I mentioned. I will take some to work tomorrow for a snack and let you know what I think.

I might have to try to make roasted chickpeas snack again sometime. The idea is appealing.

All in all, kind of a disappointing culinary weekend. I guess I just wasn't feeling it. I plan what I'm going to make the next week on Saturday or Sunday and usually I can look at my recipe stash and figure out more things that I want to make than I need to. This week I couldn't find anything. My menu this week consists of Trader Joe's orange chicken, grilled tuna sandwiches and a pasta dish that I've made before and we enjoyed. Very simple stuff.