Longer days and a Winter Dinner suggestion

It is always such a blessing to turn that corner of darkness and stroll towards the light. I grab those few minutes and hold them tight this time of year. We've had a pretty warm January after a week of very intense cold temps - way below zero. The snow that came in December is still on the ground, which is unusual. Usually the ground is so dry that the snow just goes away. This year there are lots of puddles of melt during the day and ice at night. Lots of people falling and getting hurt. Be careful out there, people!

I made this the other night and couldn't stop eating it.

Winter dinner
(this served 2 with some leftovers which I ate cold the next day which were yummy!)

1/3 head of cabbage, chopped roughly
olive oil
1 teaspoon of yellow mustard seeds or to taste
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
Fresh ground black pepper and salt to taste

Angel hair pasta
Boiling salted water per package directions

Chicken thighs, de-boned and skinned - I think I used about a pound
Packet of instant miso soup

Hydrate the miso soup in a cup of hot water, cool a bit, and toss over the chicken thighs to marinate while you do the rest of this.

Heat the skillet a bit, add a nice glug of olive oil, heat it a bit, add the mustard seeds and toast for a few seconds. Don't let them brown or pop. Then toss in the cabbage, turn the heat down to medium low and let it cook until very tender. Add cider vinegar, salt, pepper. Cook a few more minutes. You can use this as a side dish, eat it cold, or use it as I did.

As the cabbage is cooking, boil up some angel hair pasta. I bet left-over rice or any other grain-type starch would work well if you are GF.

Grill or other wise cook the chicken. I used our tiny gas grill and the smoky taste was wonderful. A tip about grilling chicken - cook the chicken in a bowl in the marinade in the microwave until it's about 3/4 done. Then drain them and throw on the grill. The chicken is done without burning.

Chop up the chicken. Toss the pasta and chicken into the cabbage and simmer for a few minutes to bring it all together and serve it forth. Nom nom nom.

You could eat up all the bits separately for a dinner and then mix the left overs together for next day lunch. The cabbage is like a hot fresh sauerkraut which is really refreshing on a cold winter day.

The hard part about writing these recipes is getting hungry during the process. (tummy rumble)

We have a tiny house, about 900 sq ft. ground floor and a basement. I woke up mad the other day because about half of the space we have is unusable - that basement. It's full of the crap that just builds up. The ceilings are really low and there used to be water flowing regularly through it. The first 5 years we live here, almost every time it rained the basement flooded about 4 to 5 inches. Not good. I think we've got that controlled through some landscaping and new gutters. We had a wet summer last year and the basement stayed dry. Yay!

So I am plotting getting the basement cleaned out. I wish I has Hercules to carry stuff out to the garbage/ARC/away. I'm not sure how to stage the stuff I want to keep but get the rooms clean enough to sheet rock, paint and maybe tile. I looked into renting one of these drop-off storage units. Yikes. I could almost buy a little garden shed for the price. I could store some stuff in the shed then have it for my garden stuff after.

Still thinking about what to do, but I think I'll tie up my hair and get a start. Wish me luck....