Sometimes just doing the most basic of tasks can bring back a memory that has been stored away for a long time. I just love that. It makes me enjoy whatever I'm doing so much more. There is just nothing like a nice walk down memory lane to make me smile. That happened to me today when I was working in the kitchen.
All of my life, practically, Saturdays have been set aside for chores and getting things done around the house, both inside and out. Michael normally handles the outside stuff and I do the inside, but not always. Today I put my list of things to get done on the white board that is on our refrigerator. I got most of it done, including running a few errands.
One of the things on my list was to make chicken salad. Today, I made it out of thigh meat because I had gotten a great deal on boneless, skinless chicken thighs. I actually really enjoy chicken salad with dark meat. The chicken does not tend to dry out as easily as breast meat does, but I still enjoy that as well. Anyway, I made the salad the way that Mom taught me to do it.
The chicken is always poached. That's how she taught me. For one, the chicken tends to stay juicy and you can also get other things done while the chicken is cooking. I always do it on medium heat. It takes a good long time for the water to start boiling, but that way it does not take as long once it starts boiling for the chicken to be done. So, it's just chicken, mayo, pickle relish, salt and pepper and celery.
What brought me down memory lane was the celery. Strange, no? LOL But I had my little cutting board out and was getting ready to chop my celery. I cut each stalk down the middle then sliced it. And while I was doing that, I suddenly remembered how Mom did hers. Not like that. She used scissors. Always. She had this pair of all metal kitchen scissors that she had for as long as I remember. She would cut down the celery twice, so that there were 3 sections. She didn't cut all the way down so that she could hold it easier. Then she would cut the 3 sections across. I don't know why she did this, but it always worked and it was a lot easier than dicing it.
As I was slicing my celery, I thought that at some point I should try it Mom's way. This may be a technique that lots of cooks use, but for me it will always be Mom's way. The chicken salad is in the refrigerator chilling and I will soon transfer it to the yellow tupperware container that Mom always put hers in. Now, I just need to get a good pair of kitchen scissors!
That is all.
No comments:
Post a Comment