Snap Crackle Spinach

No one told me that Spinach crackles when you put it in a skillet to wilt. I have found that recipes don’t tell you those things. Today’s Red Currant-Glazed Chicken and Spinach was a pretty basic recipe, but it left out some, what I would consider, very useful information. Whoever writes all of the recipes is a sadist. I assume it a “she” who writes them all because no man is this passive aggressive. The recipe writer lady LOVES surprises. She gives you the basic ingredients, measurements and times, but she doesn’t give you all of the necessary information. She doesn’t tell you that spinach wilts in 3 seconds (and doesn’t stop wilting until you get in onto your plate. Another thing the recipe lady doesn’t tell you.) That’s how I ended up with teeny tiny spinach leaves that made the accompanying craisins look like apples.  You got me on that one, Recipe Lady. Well done. Recipe Lady: 1; Me:0.

Recipe Lady also didn’t tell me that garlic smokes and transforms into the consistency of chewed gum if the oil you put it in is too hot (mostly because she didn’t tell me what the oil temperature should have been.) Way to go Recipe Lady. Could have used a heads up on that. Recipe Lady:2; Me:0.

Lucky for me, I’m a pretty bad cook, which makes me a chicken expert. It’s hard to put one over on me when chicken is involved, so the poultry portion of the meal went off without a hitch. Take that, Recipe Lady. Recipe Lady:2; Me:1. Hopefully she won’t remember the time I set the oil in the oven on fire the first time I tried to bake chicken. My general approach to the first chicken go-round was to fill a baking pan with oil, put some chicken in it and turn on the broiler. That was apparently not the best approach to baked chicken. It made one hell of a kitchen fire, though. I bet Recipe Lady was impressed. She loves kitchen fires too, I’m sure. If she didn’t, she would provide better instructions to new cooks. Recipe Lady:3; Me:1.

In spite of myself and in spite of Recipe Lady’s spite, I successfully produced a tasty dinner made of yummy chicken and tiny spinach, which Jeremy loved by the way. Recipe Lady:3; Me: 45. Whataya think about them apples, Recipe Lady?! This wasn’t an earth shatteringly amazing meal, but I feel like I eeked out another win over my inexperience in and fear of the kitchen. We also survived another night without total destruction or a run-in with salmonella (so far as I can tell.) So I win, Recipe Lady. I win.