So on Sunday night, December 23rd, the night before Christmas Eve, I felt the urge for a midnight snack.
I foraged through my refrigerator and found eggs and chicken and apple sausages.
Cool! This was gonna be fun. I was going to make a simple meal of scrambled eggs and grilled chicken and apple sausages with ketchup on the side.
I started by cracking an extra large organic brown egg down the middle, then pulling it apart and pouring it into a bowl. I did this with a second egg, and then a third.
Next I used a fork to whip the three eggs in the bowl for about 10 seconds or so. I sprinkled salt and pepper into the egg mixture, then put the whole thing aside on the kitchen table.
I opened up a package of aidell’s all-natural smoked chicken and apple sausage. The directions on the package said to saute or grill the sausage for 8-10 minutes, rotating every minute or two.
I pulled out my slatted grill pan, poured two tablespoons of olive oil onto it, lifted the pan and let the oil coat it, and then turned the heat on the burner to medium-high.
After about two minutes, I placed two sausages on the grill pan and let the accumulated heat of the pan work its magic.
A few minutes in it started to smell really good. The aroma was meaty, salty, smoky, and sweet.
I took this opportunity to flip the sausages and let them grill on the other side.
I pulled out a skillet, sprayed it with Pam Original Canola Oil Blend Cooking Spray, and let it heat. After a minute or two I poured the egg mixture into the pan.
So now I had the sausages going on the grill, and I had the eggs going in the skillet, and any way you slice it I was cooking a quality breakfast.
About eight minutes in the sausages looked like they were starting to burn just a little, so I cut one open, tasted it, and determined that they were absolutely great. Kudos to me.
I pulled both sausages off the grill and placed them on a plate.
Then I stirred the eggs around in the saute pan with a spatula, allowing them to heat up and solidify, and while I did this I chopped them up with the spatula. Two minutes later they were ready.
It was time to eat.
I poured myself a tall glass of Coke Zero with four ice cubes, served myself three eggs and two chicken and apple sausages, and accompanied the plate with a healthy dollop of ketchup. I love ketchup on eggs, sausages, and just about everything else.
Now I dug in.
Holy Christ! These sausages, dipped in a little ketchup, were absolutely incredible. My mind was blown. I mean they were a slightly fancier brand than the one I usually buy from my local supermarket, but they were far from gourmet.
Somehow, though, they had hit that sweet spot between mass-produced unhealthy yet tasty crap and artisanal single batch healthy stuff that tastes like crap. They had won the game with this product.
The eggs were good too, and I poured ketchup over them as I ate.
While I enjoyed my late-night breakfast, I read the New York Times app on my Samsung Galaxy S9.
The news was bad, worse, and awful. Jim Mattis had stepped down, and then been fired, as Secretary of Defense by our teenager-in-chief, Donald Trump.
The economy was, finally, starting to show signs of weakness. The planet and the environment were in major distress, accelerated by the Trump Administration’s vast and rapid rollback of environmental regulations.
It was enough to make you want to scream!
But what gave me comfort, and what took my mind off these dark days in Trumplandia, is that I had cooked a meal, a humble meal, and it was delicious.
I had created something out of nothing. I had escaped New York City Seamless and Grubhub takeout hell.
So I felt good.
And sometimes feeling good is all you need.
***********
