Sunday, March 14, 2010

Spring Break

A much needed week away from school, student problems, and district money issues is what spring break is providing me this year. Tuesday night I got the "stomach flu" -- that 4 hour misery of vomit and diarrhea and 18 hours of exhaustion that nearly everyone dealing with the public gets at least once a year. This however is my second bout in the last month. I can't really complain because I've not had colds or flu, just the stomach problem twice. Anyway, I'm exhausted -- and I was beastly tired before I got hit. So . . . my goal for the next week is to cook a little, clean a little, do all the wash, and take plenty of naps.


Hubby and I took in The Green Zone on Saturday -- his birthday movie of choice. It was very loud. Honestly, you felt like you were in the middle of the war zone in Iraq. I'm divided in my opinion of the movie -- I believe in the premise but the actual movie plot was just kind of "hum." Otherwise we waited to do the fun birthday celebrating today with friends. His presents had been arriving all week from Amazon and he liked his books very much (all business manuals and tour books -- nothing that the literary crowd would ever want to read).


I cooked a nice big breakfast this morning -- hash, scrambled eggs, toast, sliced bananas, hot tea. And then I got busy and made Martha Stewart's mac and cheese for the party this evening. Twenty-five dollars of sharp white cheese and Gruyere went into that dish. The darned stuff had better be delicious. The fancy cheeses had to be shredded and lately I've just been in the habit of buying pre-shredded cheese in those convenient packages but these fancy cheeses required actually grating. And darned if I discovered I didn't own a cheese grater any longer. I finally decided to haul out the Cuisinart and sorted through all the lovely blades I had for it. One looked a lot like a grater but I had to get Hubby to install it -- and voila! it was a grater and the cheese came out perfectly. The white sauce came out thick and gooey and seemed just the perfect accompaniment to the elbow pasta -- except that the sharp white cheddar made the dish very pale in color. I like my mac and cheese a golden yellow. Still I think it will be a hit.

2 comments:

Margaret said...

Yeah, the stress at school these days is pretty unbearable, but we don't have break for another couple of weeks. Happy Birthday to hubby!! I LOVE homemade mac and cheese; your choices of cheese were fabulous. I know what you mean about grating. I'm doing that too with cheese for salads(saves money) and it's a pain. I usually manage to grate a little bit of my finger into the cheese! :)

Donna. W said...

With all that's been on the news lately, you have been on my mind a lot. My prayers are with you.
I tried Pioneer Woman's mac and cheese with all the fancy cheeses, and guess what? I like the old Better Homes and Gardens recipe made with American cheese much better. I guess I just don't have high-class tastebuds.