Itchin' for the Kitchen

Ever since swearing off shopping and overindulgent drinking in an attempt to healthy up my body and my bank account, I have been somewhat hard-pressed to find things to do with myself on weekends to replace shopping trips and nights out in Boston bars.

Enter: cooking. This may seem simple to a lot of you, but while I am not entirely inept in the kitchen, the boy and I are normally so busy with work, spur of the moment weeknight dinners out and traveling on the weekend - and dinner is almost always some flavor of baked chicken, sautéed veggies, and pasta/rice/couscous (mostly the latter).

He has almost always made fun of me in the past when I’ve decided to embark on a cooking endeavor because I always pick complicated recipes with a lot of fresh, opposite-of-basic ingredients – which generally has resulted in me trying not to cry as my sautéed sage butter burns onto the pan and my gnocchi dumplings won’t stop sticking to my hands – all after spending at least double what we would on a normal, nightly dinner at the grocery store (can you tell this is a true story?).

And while it has often resulted in a fit of tears (or more often, unwarranted rage toward anyone in my path), I love to cook. And I like to delve into more complex and time-consuming dishes (to make it worth it, duh), so it should have been the obvious solution to my newfound boredom. When coupled with al fresco dining on the deck, it really is the perfect summer night activity – less moolah, less unnecessary cals, and we still get to enjoy each other and the weather – the latter arguably more of a priority? Kidding.

My first major endeavor since the spending freeze was Cooking Light’s Chicken Souvlaki recipe. I fell in love with this dish when I went to Greece and I’ve been dying to have it since I went.

I majorly failed at photographing the process of this dish – mostly because it was more complicated than I was expecting. Lots of chopping, lots of monitoring the chicken (we don’t have a grill and grill pans are temperamental). You can do a lot of this ahead of time – I am just dumb and suck at planning.

That all said, while this tasted good – it left something to be desired. I’m still not 100% sure what that is, but I don’t think I will attempt this one again until I get a proper chicken souvlaki meal from a real Greek restaurant to refresh my memory. Bostonians – any suggestions?