Moroccan Monday III

Well, let's just say that this weeks attempt evokes the saying,"It's the thought that counts." I made chick pea and lamb soup which was bla bla bland. The meat was tough. Of course I could have added more spices and salt but I didn't. I liked the base. I find that I'm starting to like these tomato based soups. I believe that people's tastes do change along the course of their lives. I abhorred tomato soup and everything tomato for the longest time. Now I love tomato soup. I made Tagine of Chicken with Olives and Preserved Lemon as the main dish.

I really need to remember to use my camera to take pictures of the real thing. My food looks really delicious. Sometimes better than these pictures stolen off the internet. Anyway, the chicken wasn't bad, just too bland for my husband.

Here are my translations for my husbands food likes and dislikes.

• I like it fine.= Please don't make this again.
• Bland= flavorful
• Good=too salty and too spicy
• Good brownies= gloppy sticky dough warmed in the oven
• A sweet golden delicious apple= sour
• granny smith=revolting

So the chicken was not too bad. It looked divine. It was tender. The kids ate it with no problem except for the complaint about the flat leaf parsley stuck all over it.

As a side dish I made a sweet grated carrot salad. It included grated carrots some sweet spices and orange juice. It was better than any of the other salads I've made for these Monday occasions.

For dessert I decided to make pomegranate juice. I took all the seeds out of the pomegranates. Unfortunately, four out of the five were unripe and therefore untasty. The juice turned out horrible. I even had my new juicer to help me make it but I think the culprit was the orange flower water. It added a detergent type taste to it. Or maybe too much of the skin of the pomegranate got into it. Next time I'll stick to the store bought pomegranate juices and fresh pomegranates.

As my husband was washing the dishes, yes, I know, he's awesome and great, he was musing on the amount of manpower put into making a meal.

1. Planning out your meal.
2. Shopping for your ingredients.
3. Preparing the food.
4. Eating the food, which sometimes takes a long time with kids involved.
5. Cleaning up after.
6. Enduring the leftovers.

This particular Moroccan Monday took a lot out of us. I felt bad for the kids because they weren't excited even about the dessert, which was the pomegranate juice. So we bribed them. Actually it was my husbands idea. "Whoever finishes their meal can go to McDonald's after for a second dinner!" So all the kids finished their meal, which is a real feat in our family. As I sat at the table and helped Cinci finish his food, I watched Atticus force and gag down his remaining soup. I shared with him all the knowlege I had about force feeding myself.

"The key is water Atticus. You need water. I've eaten a lot of foods in my life that I thought were nasty. But the point is not whether you enjoy it, the point is that you need to be polite to the person who prepared the meal. That's where the water comes in. You feed yourself a spoonful of food, they might ask you what you think, quickly take a gulp of water to wash it down, and then you're in condition to smile and say something nice. So use your water. Drink the rest of Shermy's if you need to."

And he did. And we all went to McDonald's. We didn't really have a second dinner. We did share a large fries though and the kids ate a few chicken nuggets. The kids screamed and played in the play place too. I don't know which they did more of. Scream or play. Then we topped off the evening with Baskin Robbins ice cream because McDonald's and Burger King don't sell milkshakes in Doha.