Roasted Chestnuts

I love roasted chestnuts. (Hubby hates 'em, yay, more for me.) A few days ago I read about roasted chestnuts sauteed in butter on Gastronomy Domine. Sauteed in butter, people. And then I found these beautiful Italian chestnuts at Trader Joe's. I think it was a sign.















OK, so everyone knows you have to cut the shell a little before roasting, otherwise you'll have exploding chestnuts, right? And everyone knows that you should never use a dull knife for anything, right? But you know what I didn't think of? You should probably use a towel or something underneath your chestnuts when cutting them, to keep them from shooting across your kitchen, leaving the knife to slice through the place where the chestnut used to be. Wanna know how I know this?















Good thing my knife is sharp, otherwise it would really hurt.

Here are my cuties after roasting.















I've always read that you should peel chestnuts as soon as you can handle them, because the papery stuff under the shell will come off easier that way. If that's true, then I believe it may be physically impossible to peel a cold chestnut, because even hot, it was a pain in the ass. Be careful when peeling, because you'll get little bits of the papery stuff jammed under your fingernails, and your hands will hurt for 2 days.

After peeling, sauté in butter. Sprinkle with salt.















Worth the sliced finger? Worth getting paper bits under my fingernails?

You betcha.

Another Kitchen Injury

Hubby and MIL both wanted banana muffins, so I made these Banana Crumb Muffins. Tasty!

However, when reaching into the oven to retrieve my stupidly floppy silicone muffin trays, my arm hit the top of the oven.





















I've never had a burn like this before, with untouched skin inside and outside of a ring-shaped burn. Then there's the redness surrounding the ring, which couldn't have touched the oven, it was probably just from close proximity to blazing hot oven walls.

I think I could start a separate blog just to chronicle my injuries.

Non-Kitchen Injury

If you're squeamish, don't scroll down.

My husband and I were playing around 2 nights ago, and I grabbed a roll of shop towels and swung at him. He snapped out with his hand to block my swing, and hit my wrist. I didn't think anything of it, until about 2 minutes later, when I noticed my wrist was throbbing. I looked down, and saw what looked like a blue egg growing underneath the skin on my wrist.















I've always bruised easily, and it's gotten worse as I've gotten older. But to have a vein pop underneath my skin? I almost couldn't believe it, except for the fact that I was watching it happen.

So I iced it, wrapped it, and elevated it all night (ever tried to sleep with your arm above your head all night?). The next morning I was ok for a few hours, until I noticed the swelling getting worse - I couldn't get my ring off, and I was losing feeling in my fingers.

I was so useless! I couldn't type, couldn't even use a mouse. Lifting and moving boxes? Forget it. Paperwork? My handwriting was illegible. Inspection of assemblies on the production floor (I'm a Quality Assurance Manger)? How can you check if wiring and hardware are connected properly when you can't feel them?

I left work early, took three ibuprofen, and elevated once again. Pretty soon I could once again pick things up without dropping them.

Today it's ugly, almost uglier than the blue egg from 48 hours ago.















The dark red lines are from where I wrapped the gauze - the blood was trying to swell wherever it could, but since it was wrapped the first night, it chose the path of least resistance, between the layers of gauze.

Moral of my story? Don't try to smack your husband with a roll of towels, even if you are just playing.

Foiled Again...

Look! A picture! Quality kinda sucks, but that's because it's from my phone.
















I cut myself on aluminum foil. Didn't even know that was possible. But when it comes to injury, I'll find a way...

Post #41 - White Bean and Tomato Dip, and a Rant

I made this recipe from What Did You Eat? for Herb Pita Crisps and Sun-Dried Tomato Dip just now. It's wonderful. I also have lamb-feta burgers refrigerating, tzatziki sauce mellowing, and spicy green chutney doing whatever it does.

However, no pictures because I just got a call from my doctor - the x-ray of my knee showed evidence of fluid buildup. I'm supposed to rest the leg, elevate it, ice it for 20 minutes out of every hour when it hurts, and compression-wrap it if I have to move around.

WTF? I never realized how much I move around until I had to make a conscious effort not to. And what about work? It would be lovely if I could sit at my desk all day (with my leg elevated, of course), but there's no way in hell that's going to happen.

Getting old sucks.