Accidental Cooking

I was coming home to a frozen Pot Roast

I had hopped out of the truck and mosied up to my apartment. Seeking the quiet and solitude and expecting peace. So... my phone rings, of course. Voice on the other end is annoying me with a request. "I know... I know... I'll get to the shed right away. ...No ... no, I'm NOT "forgetting" all about you. ...STOP it already, you sound like a damn old lady... allright, Bye."

I hang up. Finally, peace.

The phone call was from a friend of mine. He's completely incapable of any type of handy work what-so- ever. Doesn't know which end of a screwdriver to hold to turn the stinkin' screw.

God, I had to "rescue" him from his attempt to caulk his own tub! He could not even put "shmutz" into a corner well.

By the time I got to his tub, it was too late. It was a true horror show. I exaggerate not! Listen, this guy, seriously, smeared caulking about TWO INCHES up the tiled walls above the edges of his tub! Two... inches! I was lucky that dried caulking wasn't all that difficult to scrape and cut off with a razor. But lord a-mercy. Anyway, this friend of mine seriously wanted me to help him around his house. And he'd been suffering some handyman-abandonment issues since my last visit. Honestly, he's not all that "energetic", Just not a physical guy. It's all pretty difficult for him and figuring out HOW to do stuff is a mystery to him.

He really doesn't even cook for himself either. He's got a Spanish wife, and she takes pretty good care of him in that respect. Unlike me. Cooking for myself. It's not all bad. The one good thing is you really don't have interference of someone injecting their opinion of what should or should not be eaten.

Other times it kinda sucks. Ok, most of the time I think it sucks. It's not that I can't cook. I'd just rather have the company... I had one woman shock me once, she truly shocked me. I am a true-blue card carrying meat eater. She wanted to prepare for me a veggie burger. Well, all my memories of a veggie burger were quite BAD. So I had little faith that she could produce something good.

She made me a Tex-Mex veggie burger. I took a bite. ...and I was frozen in place as I chewed. I was utterly shocked. It was good! I had that veggie burger analyzed for crack. It was TOO GOOD.

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UPDATED on Feb 21, 2014 / this small section added later, just ... because...

I just "destroyed" TWO!!! Count'em... Two! Chickens in a ROW, in my kitchen! Good Grief! I cooked one poorly. I did not even want to eat it. And I'm quite "tolerant" of "creative" preparation methods... (but not in this one case). Then, THIS second time? I just wanted to BAKE the thing. ... well... I usually do get that right. But, as it happens. I have a completely MUMIFIED chicken staring at me from the dining area now. Maybe I can chisel some off and turn it into chicken salad. But I am unsure if I have enough QUARTS of mayo to re-hydrate this Egyptian-Pharaoh Chicken carcass! The gods of cooking have bailed on me.

===== Back to our story (as initially written)

I do love my red meats though. Tonight was pot roast. I knew from previous experience that it'd turn out well, just because it's hard to mess up such a little "project". Pot roast comes out tasting great, very easily. A culinary dummy (such as myself) can prepare it and actually enjoy the results thoroughly. All I had to do was keep it simple.

Put the frozen thing in the pan, with a lid. A little water... low heat. I thought about it a minute, and I opened a can of peas, and dumped it in there with the roast. Why? No particular reason. To "help with the flavor", yeah... that's it! To help with the flavor. And away we go! Soon, the pot is steaming, bubbling a little. And the roast is starting to actually cook. I add a little more water. A touch of some hot sauce, salt and pepper... what? Hot sauce makes everything better. Don't you know that?

I put hot sauce on my cheerio's in the morning.

...Okay- I'm not that bad.

As the roast bubbled and churned gently...

I was working on some technical things. Writing some basic HTML lessons out, making a video of the work-in-progress. You know, stuff like that. At the beginning of the "roasting", it was only one-quarter or one-half submerged in water. After a good 45 min or an hour, it was nearly entirely submerged, and visibly the roast had shrunk. Fats being rendered out of the roast, along with releasing some water too. Soon enough that roast was done. On the plate, and taste-tested "Just Fine". It was good.

Now, the next morning...

Yeah, I did the "guy thing" and I awoke, and this morning I made a "guy breakfast". Three eggs over-easy, -sprinkled with some hot sauce- while it cooked... salt, pepper, sharp cheese sliced on it. And then you slide it onto a plate... with some steaming-hot roast right next to it!

I'm sorry if you vegans just do not "get it", or... if you actually go "ewwww". I'm sorry. But, it's actually GOOD, and some of us humans have a metabolism that's good with fats. Honest. Very nice way to start the day. And yes, I'm a fairly lean body type. I don't "get fat", I do workout/run etc... and I AM physically active. And yes, I do feel like my body -appreciates- the high protein diet.

But anyway, my point is. I like the stuff so much I WILL have a breakfast based on it too. Along with a bowl of cereal like raisin bran, an apple, some vitamins... Mmmm Mmm Mm. THAT's the way to start my day! That and a two mile run.

I was genetically driven to Eat This Way...

And now, I see the reason behind my instinctive eating.... To continue with the "beautiful accident in this story...

But "this" ... is the technical justification for those who go "Ewww". You are entitled to your own diets. I merely am posing how Fortunately I can cook sometimes. There's a good reason that a high protein and even high fat diet may work ~Beautifully. And be very healthy.

Three days later, I had my "accidental" cooking experience. You see, I had not "nailed it" the previous evening, and a fair amount of the roast was left. When I say "nail-it", I mean, I did not come home and DEVOUR IT IMMEDIATELY. I actually left it alone for a whole day. Just sitting in it's own juices. Aging. I'd say about half of it, remained. In the original cooking pot, with all the original juices that had rendered out of it.

But now, I'd come home again. As usual, and just fired up that pot-O-beef. And commenced my desk work, again, as usual. Mixed something to sip. Working, typing away... after a while I get this bright idea to crank up the heat a bit. To "really cook it". So I fire up the gas burner. And I go settle down to start a new video.

Big mistake.

I totally, and utterly, FORGOT about the burner being "up-higher". Completely slipped my mind. So I'm at my desk, just doing this video on software... until I smell something. I jump up out of my seat (still recording) "Oh Sugar!" (except I did not say "sugar", yes it's on video...).

No harm done.

It had merely begun to ...uh, "vigorously cook". Yeah, that seems to be a good description of the "condition" I found that pot of roast in. It had boiled off a fair amount of water, it was beginning to get a little bit dry. But it was still a long way from dry and burnt. But it was really really well-cooked now, if you know what I mean.

Actually... It did not smell bad at all !!!

Found out, I was in for a real treat. All by accident. And this would not have happened to me if I had not been single, and cooking, and NOT paying attention to it. I laughed to myself. I tried it.

It was dee-Licious.

I had some left over for my manly-man egg breakfast the following morning. I could barely scoop what was left of it out of the pot. The beef chunks were falling apart so easily. And after a night of sitting in those mildly overcooked juices.

Goodness gracious. It was actually a perfect complement to eggs over easy and sharp cheese. Again, my apologies to the veggie-max types out there. But "this" was "Accidental Cooking" at it's best.

I think I might even be able to duplicate it. I hope.

I came back to add this last paragraph. Before writing this article, I had dumped out the pot of savory juices from that pot roast. I am saving the leavings for a stew I intend later... In the meantime, I had started preparing for some spaghetti sauce. So I'd pre-cooked some nice fatty chopped meat, and had added one jar of a pre-formulated spaghetti sauce. And while I typed this entire article I did kinda "overcook" that first little bit of sauce. Not badly. But I've since added some freshly diced tomato and another bottle of sauce.

It seems that sooner or later, this keyboard is going to result in me, performing a smoke-alarm test.