The last real, home-cooked meal in this house, anyway. This week will be the Week From Hell as we slide toward the move date. Although I don’t hate moving with the passion of a thousand fiery suns, I don’t consider it to be a fun process, either. Along with the moving issues, I also have two followup appointments with my oncologists, one of which will no doubt be ready to schedule another PET scan to see how we’re doing.
But back to Sunday night and the last real meal I’m making in this house. On tonight’s menu, a trio of items requested by one of my sisters.
Blackened mahi (grilled during a very light rain that won’t do much to assuage our current drought-like conditions)
Stuffed tomatoes (as she missed the first round of these zucchini, portabello, and gruyere-stuff beauties)
Brown rice (not very exciting, but what she wanted)
I also made a remoulade sauce and a mango-papaya salsa, as that same sister had not yet carved up the mango and papaya I had gotten her for some kind of fruit bowl she was going to put together. Before they completely disintegrated into mush on the counter, I thought it might be time to throw together something using them.
Here’s a closeup of the mahi with some of the salsa.
I seasoned the mahi the way I used to eat blackened mahi. I neglected to keep in mind that not everyone likes food as spicy as I do, so my sister and her boyfriend got a bit choked up over their first bites. With a couple squeezes of lemon, some judicious scraping off of the seasoning, and some remoulade, they both enjoyed it (and he took the leftovers home).
And then, the tomatoes. I mentioned that my sister had missed them last time (she was ill). This time, however, she ate hers and then took half of mine, when I could not finish it. It’s quite a tasty dish, and I can see this one becoming a most-requested item.
As everything is being packed this week, this was the last full meal I’ll prepare. I’m considering doing a couple of slow cooker recipes, since there would be minimal prep and no requirement of my full attention. Slap it on a disposable plate, and there you have it: dinner. I must say, though, that I can’t wait to get into the new house, especially because it means I’ll have my own cooking utensils back at my disposal. I still need to buy a refrigerator for move-in, though.
Sunday night also marks almost two weeks since I’ve fed anything down the tube but water, to flush it out and clean it. The problem with this, of course, is that I’m generally unable to eat very much at a single sitting and thus unable to consume as many calories over the course of a day as I am by dumping a few cups of formula down the hatch during the day. As a result, I lose weight fairly rapidly. Stepping on the scale at the grocery, I found myself shaking my head in disbelief: 115 pounds, down from 118 just a couple of weeks ago when they weighed me at my surgeon’s office. No doubt Monday will bring with it a lecture from one of the medical oncology nurses when they weigh me in there as part of my followup, and another lecture on Tuesday from the radiation oncology nurses when I have my followup appointment there. But I did have my daily dose of ice cream!
I know you would rather be able to eat the calories you need, but have you thought about a product called Boost Plus? It is a high calorie liquid drink, but at least you wont need to use the tube! It will help get you thru the next week or two of stress and extra activity without losing much more weight! I have other ideas on more calories in ice cream and milk based shakes if you are interested. You do not need to post this message!
Good luck with your move!
Annette,
I had no idea you had been ill, (my blog reading has gone way downhill this last year, and I have spent next to no time on web design either), and am so glad you are on the mend. Please stay well, and remember to make time for pure relaxation time through the move so you don’t get run down. Take care
Pardon me, Miss. But didn’t I see you indulging in some raw fish-type food at a local eatery recently?
Maybe it was someone else, but I think not.
Thanks for the well wishes, Cal. Thought you’d fallen off the face of the planet or something. Trust me: the people around me will force me to take it easy now and again, completely against my will.
And I did indeed partake of some raw tuna, courtesy of my dear friend, who took me to dinner for my first dinner out since before all this started. The texture thing still bothers me a bit, and of course it tasted like nothing at all. The crawfish roll, though, was spicy enough to make a dent in the old tongue, and was delightful, as was the california roll, since avocados have that buttery taste that I can still thankfully sense. A nice Chardonnay would have gone well with that avocado, were I able to actually drink anything with alcohol in it as yet. Thanks again for dinner.