Cooking

Every day I wonder about our distant nature towards food. Part of our escape from America was due to the lack of contact or care for what we put in us. Moving to Spain, I hoped to find a new perspective on our most basic need.

Last night I made a chicken. I rubbed it with dried thyme, some garlic, salt, pepper and lots of butter. Putting it in the oven I waited an hour and took it out cut it up and served it on a simple platter. Served with a mushroom risotto and steamed broccoli drizzled with good olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper. Basically a Betty Crocker dream meal.

When I served it to our group our American roommate made the comment, "How did you make it taste so good? If I did this it wouldn't be the same." Different is nice too. There was just enough food left in the end, for our late arriving roommate.

Shouldn’t food always be this way?

To drink we had a simple Albariño wine from the northwest of Spain. Light and crisp with fresh fruit and a playful nature, the wine paired perfect with our communion. For dessert, yogurt, a strange but favorite after dinner treat of La Familia (our pet name for ourselves).

I'm not sure if it’s the fact that we eat together almost every night or if it’s just being in Spain, but meals have become fun again. We don't always make it to the “good” market to buy the best vegetables. Somedays we just throw 2 or 3 leftovers together creating something of old rice, steamed vegetables and random hunks of sausage. It always tastes good. Not to mention we laugh together, learn a bit, and always sit together.

Without our families in America, or language we can speak, or our cats to pet, it's been hard. I'm glad we have this, simple, basic and priceless. Time to see what's in the fridge...

till soon, Ryan