I am hiding from the bathroom reno by cooking. Enjoy!

Posting two days in a row? Who am I and what has happened to my slacker ways?? Basically I'm hiding from my construction beleaguered husband, who claims he loves to do renovation projects around the house yet turns into a world class grump while in the middle of them. God forbid I actually take a moment to drink my coffee after making him breakfast; don't I know there is work to be done?! Guaranteed he'll be full of the the passive aggressives when he gets back from the latest Home Depot run because I'm still sitting, mug in hand, and not out buying a vanity. However, I need to shower before going out and he has turned off the water. Impasse! Luckily, he's almost always pretty great, tremendous wedgies in his cranky construction pants aside, and he happens to do a pretty nice job on these projects, so I guess I'll keep him.

It has been a very kitchen-y weekend so far. It started with Friday Pizza Night. My fridge is a mess, as I have been thrown off of my cooking game of late, and I wasn't sure what I would have to work with in the way of pizza toppings. After perusing the inventory, I decided to chop up some tomatoes and scallions and toss them with a little bit of EVOO, salt, pepper, and garlic powder. I rolled out the dough and covered it in a thick coating of freshly grated mozzarella, then sprinkled on the tomato and scallion dressing. It went into the 525 degree oven until it was golden and bubbly, and OMG -- amazing. This is definitely going into the regular rotation.

The cooking continued last night, with another old family classic -- sausages sautéed in red wine. This is SO easy, and really delicious. I bought a half dozen sweet Italian sausages from the butcher and popped them into a sauté pan with a little EVOO over high-ish heat (about an 8 on my crappy electric stove (OH HOW I AM COUNTING THE DAYS UNTIL I HAVE A GAS STOVE IN THE NEW HOUSE) (APPROXIMATELY 146)). Pour in red wine, any kind you would be happy drinking, about 1/3 of the way up the sausages. It's going to be very bubbly, so just keep turning the sausages every minute or so until the wine is nearly absorbed. Once the wine is almost absorbed, add in another blob of wine and turn the heat down to medium. Cover the pan and let the sausages simmer until nearly cooked through, flipping them once or twice (about 15 or so minutes). At this point, pull the sausages out of the pan, turn the heat back up, and add in about 3/4 c of water to deglaze. Throw the sausages back into the bubbly sauce and keep flipping them to coat. Once it reduces enough, it will start spitting grease, so throw the cover back on and let the outside of the sausages caramelize a little. That's it! I served them with TJ's asparagus risotto and lightly roasted, garlicky haricot verts. Awesome.

The best part of the sausages is how good they are left over. My gram would make sandwiches from very thinly sliced sausages on lightly buttered bread (this is possibly a beloved childhood treat from Grandma that is actually gross to adults other than Gram's grandchildren, a la boxed chocolate cake with Cool Whip frosting). Today I decided to humor my resident construction worker with an egg scramble for breakfast. Mark hates eggs, basically. He will eat them as a binder for a whole mess of meat, cheese, meat, and more meat, and very much enjoys them this way and only this way. I never make them this way because, dude, how much grease do you really need before noon? Today I relented though. I took applewood smoked bacon from the butcher and laid it out on a baking rack on a foil-covered sheet pan. Stick it in a cold oven and turn it on to 400, bake for 20 minutes, flip, and cook 5 minutes more and it's PERFECT. Still flexible, yet fully cooked and crispy. While the bacon was cooking, I diced up some red potatoes and got started on home fries. I also sliced some of the sausages left from dinner. Once everything was ready to go, I stuck the sausage, chopped bacon, and potatoes into a big skillet and scrambled in some eggs. A dusting of cheese, and Mark's ideal egg breakfast was ready to go. Pretty tasty, but UGH. I feel mentally fatter already.

(OH MY GOD, THE NOISES COMING FROM UPSTAIRS ARE TERRIFYING.)

Next up is a sirloin and bean chili that my mom sent a recipe for last week. She claims it is fairly low in fat/calories while also delicious. I certainly hope so after the nutritional atrocity that was breakfast. I will report back...

Keep Your Candy Coated Hands and Feet Away From My Mouth

DANGER! DANGER! ALERT! ALERT! This post is going to address my wonky lady bits and plans to address the problem. Please feel free to avert your eyes.

Onward! So, as I think I have mentioned, after much (rather invasive) testing, we have a diagnosis of classic PCOS. For added fun, in genetic testing, we also discovered that I am a carrier of CF.* Luckily Mark is not, which saved us from a whole new set of issues to deal with. The plan, such as it is, is medication -- metformin, clomid, ovidrel, and prometrium -- which are all intended to pick up the slack for my bum endocrine system. Right now, though, I'm on provera to trigger the lady times so we can get rolling on the whole thing. It means loading my system up with progesterone for a week, and then when it is suddenly withdrawn, the drop starts a period, as it would naturally if I worked normally. It's basically a week of medically induced PMS.

I did this once before, in preparing for the diagnostic testing, and I don't remember it being quite like this. I feel like I'm going crazy -- I legit wanted to rip someone a new one at work the other day, just for being as dicky as the nature of their job requires. I managed to quash this instinct (CONSUMMATE PROFESSIONAL AHOY), but then picked a fight with Mark when I got home. The poor guy took to greeting me at the front door with a glass of wine, despite our mostly eschewing the sauce during the week. And yesterday! I ... I don't know what happened to me, you guys. I am usually not a candy person. I'll grab a handful of dark chocolate chips on occasion if they're handy, and I love leftover Halloween candy, but otherwise? I never buy the stuff. However, all day long yesterday, I was desperate--DESPERATE--for peanut M&Ms, and very specifically the peanut ones; plain or pretzel simply would not do. I felt like an addict jonesing for some smack, and the closest I have come to addiction previously is very much enjoying a nightly glass and a half of red wine before falling asleep on the couch (GIRLS GONE ZZZZZ - woo!). I had to stop for gas on the way home, and there happened to be a Target next to the gas station. Before I knew it, I was at Target holding M&Ms and a Pepperidge Farm chocolate cake (what??), and I was powerless to do anything but pull out my wallet. It just seemed like the right thing to do. (I briefly contemplated picking up some tampons while I was there, but a girl's gotta draw the cliche line somewhere, right?) As soon as I was back on the road, I cracked open the M&Ms, and I swear to you, I could practically feel the serotonin pinging around my brain. By the time I was home, I felt practically normal, aside from the ridiculous box o' cake now taking up a decent chunk of my freezer space. Mark just kind of shook his head nervously and laughed, but later, light dawned and he looked at me in terror, asking, "If this is what you're like NOW, what will happen if this all actually works?" HA.

Hell if I know, buddy, but I bet that puppy isn't sounding so bad right about now, is it?

*I am wondering if my sinus ISSUES are at all related to the CF mutation. Dr. Google turned up a 2000 Johns Hopkins study that suggested a link between chronic sinusitis and a single copy of the CF mutation (carriers). I'll have to ask my ENT about it when I see him next.

Super Easy and Delicious

Nooo, not me (this time) -- I was talking about the dinner I made tonight. This is going to be a quickie, but it was too good and easy not to share. The general idea comes from a Boston area restaurant my family has gone to for as long as I can remember, where one of our favorite dishes is "Shrimp Special." Basically, it's shrimp wrapped in prosciutto, topped with a little mozzarella, and baked in a garlicky wine sauce. I had defrosted chicken for tonight, so I rolled with that.

I took one chicken breast for the two of us, butterflied the bejesus out of it, cut it into cutlets, and then pounded it out until it was super thin. I mixed a little flour with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and Penzey's Parisien Bonnes Herbes. While heating a little olive oil over medium high heat, I dredged the cutlets in the seasoned flour, then sautéed them until they were almost done.

Side note: Up to this point, I have basically described one of my favorite chicken methods. You can do almost anything with this kind of base. Throw in something to deglaze and make a simmery sauce with, then pop the chicken into the sauce to finish cooking. So easy, seems fancy. Tomorrow night I plan to deglaze with orange juice and pop the chicken back in to simmer while the juice reduces into an amazing glazey sauce. That's a Grandma classic for good reason.

Back to tonight! I pulled the chicken out of the pan and added in some minced garlic, sherry, white wine, and a blob of butter. While the sauce was reducing, I put the cutlets in a small baking dish and topped each piece of chicken with prosciutto and a slice of fresh mozzarella. (Where the amount of chicken seemed a little skimpy, I was a little more generous than usual with the prosciutto and cheese, and it worked out to be a perfect amount.) I poured the sauce over the chicken, then popped it into a 400 degree oven until the cheese was melty and golden. This plus a salad was so easy while still feeling indulgent.

DO IT. You know you want to...