Working in a Fog

Rough night again. I stayed up until 11:00 and then never slept for more than an hour without waking up. Bad dreams and night sweats (I think somebody is trying to tell me something!) I gave up at 5:30 AM Thursday morning and got up (I set the alarm on Tuesdays and Thursdays for 6:30 AM).

I made a four-cup pot of coffee and drank some watching the morning news. I posted the Blog and then got shaved and showered. I left for therapy at 7:45 AM. When I went outside, I noticed we had a heavy frost overnight.

Therapy was a pain (it always is - and supposed to be, I guess. I have never met anyone who was "glad" to be in therapy). It was made even more difficult by the fact that Maureen was late, so another therapist started me off. Not really a problem, EXCEPT, she had a ton of perfume on! I don't know about you, but I associate heavy perfume with "late-night," not 8:00 AM. I did the first of my exercises, trying to hold my breath so I wouldn't gag.

Thank God Maureen finally showed up (she had car troubles). A simple Irish girl, she doesn't wear perfume. When we finished up, I went outside. But here's what was strange... The frost was all gone and in its place was a heavy fog (unusual around here, as I've said before). So, I drove home with some trepidation. I had two stops to make: Westborn for some more leeks and heavy whipping cream (for my potato and leek soup) and CVS to pick up this month's prescriptions. Pulling in and out of driveways in this fog was challenging and when I finally got home, I breathed a sigh of relief!

I changed into work clothes and then, well, got to work!

If you remember, I was disappointed to learn when I first tried to make my soup that I was out of my homemade chicken stock. Well, yesterday, I took out the last whole chicken I had in the freezer to thaw.

So, today, I washed off the chicken, discarded the innards and put it in my small stock pot. I covered it with 1 1/2 gallons of water (24 cups if you are like me and don't have "gallon" measurers), added a little (I stress "little" here) salt and some ground pepper, a bouquet garni of fresh cut thyme, parsley and two dried bay leaves and brought it up to a boil. Then I dropped it down to a strong simmer (I want to see the occasional bubbles coming up through the water, so I know it's reducing).

I set the timer for an hour and, using a slotted spoon, kept skimming off the fatty foam. When the timer went off, I took out the chicken with my big tongs. I cut off the two poached breasts and then returned the rest of the chicken to the pot. I rest the timer for two hours. I made myself some lunch (soggy hot dogs warmed up but this time with just yellow mustard and raw onions).

The next time the timer went off; I added some whole black peppercorns, two carrots, some celery, a whole head of garlic, cut in half and a big yellow onion, cut into quarters (everything was cut into large chunks and nothing was peeled, BTW. It will all be discarded). I reset the timer for another two hours and went to watch some taped TV.

When the last timer went off (just after 6:00 PM), I went out and turned off the burner. I waited a bit and then took out most of the veggies with the slotted spoon (these went into the trash). I untied and discarded the bouquet garni. Then I removed all the chicken and put it on a plate to be de-boned later (I think it's easier to de-bone chicken when it's cold).I poured the stock through a strainer and into my biggest bowl to cool.

Then I fixed dinner: fried eggplant. It turned out beautiful, BTW, with the best looking crust I ever made. It tasted as good as it looked, too.

After eating, I started finishing up. I wrapped the chicken plate with cling wrap and stuck it in the fridge. Then I ladled the stock into four-cup containers, (I got five, BTW), screwed on the lids and stuck them in the fridge to cool further. There's some reason you are not supposed to put warm stock directly into the freezer, but I forget why (it can turn rancid or sour or something). I just don't do it. I put the other half of the fried eggplant into a plastic baggie and the fridge as well.

Then I wandered in to watch TV for the rest of the evening. I'll wash up the knife, pot, bowl, ladle and strainer tomorrow morning.