I Guess I'm the Turkey. (The Long Road to Domestication. Take I).

Ok, first off, if you haven't given me feedback about yesterday's post, please go there and do so! Thanks. (This is because Handsome likes the bracelet, Kelley likes the pearls, and Brittney likes the black necklace... which means I am in the same situation I was before I posted! And... time is still running out!)
Anyhow.
Now its time for a Thanksgiving-related story.
For Thanksgiving dinner, we headed to my Nana and Grandad's house, as my family has done almost every year of my life. Handsome joined us for the very first time and it was a fun occasion for everyone. Not all of my aunts and uncles and cousins were there, so it was definitely more relaxed than usual.
Now, you see, I'm honestly not that big of a fan of "Thanksgiving". I know its a nice idea an all: giving thanks. And I really do like the idea of giving thanks to God, but that is something I would like to do all year, and not just on one day. (That is too much pressure for me for one day). So its a good concept, Thanksgiving, but I just haven't gotten into it.
I even like America, so you would think I would like a holiday that is purely American. But I just can't get into "Thanksgiving dinner." Being a foodie, self-proclaimed, if the food that goes with a holiday or memory is not that great, the I don't get into it. Okay, so I am completely and totally superficial in this way. (And I'm not exactly proud about it, but its me, for now. I'm being translucent here. Please don't pounce on me for it). So Thanksgiving dinner. I think turkey is okay, I'm kind of "bleh" about dressing or Thanksgiving-style gravy. I don't have courage to try ambrosia or cranberry sauce again, as I really disliked them both the last time I did try them.
Now, I don't want you to start thinking I am really negative so there are a few things that I do like: for instance, mashed potatoes and rolls! (Call me a carb girl?) And I will say I love the casseroles. I like brocolli and cheese, asparagus, and green bean! Any of the three is good with me, and its primarily the only thing you find much of on my plate each and every year. (Funny that those are, of course, the most calorie-dense foods! Eh., what can you do? Its only a few times a year that I actually eat the stuff and I could use a little extra padding during the cold winter months anyway!)
So this past year, like most years, my dear mom made a casserole and an appetizer tray to take to my Nana's. She and my brother were running a little late so my dad, husband, and I all made the short two-ish mile drive to the family affair to begin chatting before the meal.
Oh, I suppose I should go into the backstory, that is the actual story, because this isn't a story about the actual dinner, but about the pre and post dinners.
My mom was busy cooking up a storm Thanksgiving morning and our lunch at my dad's parents is usually around 12ish. Or 1ish. My mom and I and brother and husband all thought we were going around 1ish this year, but turns out, our presence was requested around 12:30. So my mom had arranged or planned her morning schedule for a 1ish arrival, but around 11 a.m. I happened to mention something about the time to my dad and he said we were to arrive earlier than we had been planning. So now you can understand more why my mom and brother were running late. She had planned out her shower, cooking, etc. all based on the 1ish time and didn't find out in enough time to rearrange.
But rearrange we tried! My dad and I started scurrying around in the kitchen with her to prepare the deviled eggs and other things my mom had planned for us to take. In the process of getting everything ready, we likely probably created more confusion than we helped, but we definitely tried to speed along the process.
My mom was going to make both an asparagus casserole and a green bean, because she loves me very much and likes for me to have some variety on my plate, but I thought that in the interest of time we should just make one. So while she was in another part of the house, I gathered all of the ingredients for the g.b. casserole. Now, this may have been the first time in eleven years that I had looked at the recipe for it, and I'm not sure if my mom has a written out recipe somewhere or not, but I decided to look to the wisdom of French's Fried Onions and got those ingredients ready.
Its a very simple recipe really. All you need are a couple of cans of green beans, some fried onions, a little milk, a can of cream of mushroom soup, and a bit of pepper (I think).
So I gathered and got together the appropriate measuring utensils as well. And off I went. I had helped aplenty!
Some time later I returned to the kitchen to find my mother assembling the casserole. And I promptly made the statement about how she mustn't forget the milk in it and she said something to the point (or at least I took it this way) that she didn't realize you used milk in it. (Now, looking back I think she was just joshing with me because its such a simple recipe) but let's just say I took her to heart.
So flash forward, post-Thanksgiving, and post-me-not-enjoying-enough-g.b.-casserole-to-satisfy-myself-for-the-year-apparently, to Monday afternoon. As I sat, dazed and confused from a strange Sunday drive averting some snow storms that took a few hours extra than normal, and an *almost* sleepless night as I finished another paper that was due, and this girl was totally craving the g.b. casserole.
So I text Mr. Ruggedly-and-oh-so-sweet-sometimes Handsome and said that in my tired state I thought we should get a rotisserie chicken and I would make the g.b. casserole for dinner. So we went to the store to get the ingredients once he came home from work and we came home and I whipped it up. And I definitely didn't bother with the extra step of measuring the milk, since apparently that is how my mom does it, and she probably for sure knows more than French's because her casserole is completely creamy and delish!
So I separated the g.b.'s from the juice and I stirred the juice in with the condensed cream of mushroom soup, just like I thought I saw my mom doing last Thursday. We found a nice casserole dish to bake in and before we both knew it, dinner was cooking and things were starting to smell wonderful.
We cut the chicken and I spooned up the casserole after it finished baking. It looked completely divine. I could hardly wait to eat it as I had been craving it for a solid like four hours after the idea popped into my little head.
But when I tasted the first bite, it was, umm how do I say this? ... Well, it was not so creamy at all. And it mostly tasted like g.b.'s and did I mention it was so not creamy at all?
And I'm not even going to mention that the chicken was cold by the time we were eating.
And that is the moment I realized that I must not try to tell my mom things about how to do things in the kitchen, because she has soooo much more experience than me. And she must have been kidding with me. And gosh. dang. it. WHY did I not just add the milk?
So the moral of the story: Don't act like you know more than your mother in the kitchen. And when in doubt (ok, here I wasn't in doubt, because I thought I was doing what she would do, but in the event that you haven't made something on your own before) at least follow the recipe the first time. Or better yet, call your mother.
I'm here. And I'm still writing...
post. script. What makes this even more ironic, is that we had a "how-to" writing assignment in high school. The assignment was to write a recipe that was important to you and your family from Thanksgiving and give a "how-to" make it story. So of course, I wrote about g.b. casserole since it is basically the only Thanksgiving food I eat. And my teacher thought it was totally lame, because people were sharing their secret family recipes for sugary sweet potatoes or stuffing that their great-great-great-grandmother made perfectly ever since she arrived to the Untied States on the Mayflower(!) and here I was, sharing a recipe that apparently, every, American family knows and uses all the time. So the shame I feel now is even heightened by this!
second. post. script. Mr. Handsome gobbled it right up. And he was so sweet saying how he liked it and then he even ate it for leftovers the next night.