Cruel Daddy Dinners

Sometimes it's just too easy.

It had been a long day; we'd been out and about all morning, eaten a late lunch and gotten our nap biorhythms all out of sync. It was kinda warm and too late for a big dinner, but the kids weren't going to handle no dinner at all. On the weekends (and holidays) I try to do a measure of the cooking to offload Stacy. My initial reaction to the situation before me was to fall back to my usual standby in such cases: spaghetti - quick, easy and popular. A look through the freezer and pantry was disheartening - not enough of the right stuff. Stacy was busy performing ritual cleaning of the refrigerator at the time and indicated that she would be more than pleased if any of the stuff being yanked out of the various doors and drawers didn't have to be put back in afterwards. I looked through the inventory - it didn't look promising, but I never pass up on a "do something with this" challenge.

So Stacy went on with the purging of the fridge and I entered mad scientist mode. Thirty minutes later I called the crew to the table. The Pièce de résistance? Spaghetti with Creamed Carrot Sauce! OK, hold the gagging for a minute and trust me (against all better judgment) that it actually was pretty dang good! I boiled some carrots while sautéing some onions and garlic and fennel seed. I mashed them all together with a little frozen turkey stock and blended it with Stacy's immersion blender into a thick goo. A little salt, a little half-N-half, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and voilà! Dinner. I put it over pasta and sprinkled it o'er with the requisite Parmesan cheese and set it before the assembled masses. I artfully dodged any questions of "What is that, Daddy?"

You may have been slightly off-put by my description. You may have mocked me in your heart, or perhaps out loud to your computer screen. You may have simply smiled knowingly at my sad and foolish ambition. But to all of you doubters out there, I have only one thing to say. The proof of the (carrot) pudding is in the eating! While I may have only that one thing to say, I have several things to show you. Feast your eyes on this! (And considering it's carrots, feasting on this will conversely be good for your eyes. Pretty neat, huh?)









Take that, oh ye of little faith.