I am a sinner and I have a confession to make. Yesterday I committed the worst sin a good Ukrainian could commit. It’s terrible. If my Baba were still around she’d probably tell me I’ll burn in hell. Each time I think about what I did I get a twinge of guilt in my stomach. Heck, I might even kneel down and pray the rosary a few times for penance. What did I do, you ask? Well, it was two things really. One of my resolutions was to try 3 new recipes each month. I haven’t tried any yet in January, so I looked through my cookbooks and picked a recipe from a French cookbook. I’ve never had French food, but it seemed good enough – root vegetable ragout. Sounds yummy and hearty, right?! Rutabagas, turnips, parsnips, carrots, shallots, and some chard thrown in there just for fun. I’ve never had most of those vegetables, but let’s be adventurous!
I went to Whole Foods on Saturday and did my grocery shopping. I spent a decent amount of money buying all the ingredients (root vegetables are heavy!). My Sunday was spent making the dish. It was gorgeous. It was art. My casserole dish (which is actually a crock from a broken crock pot, so it’s rather large) was filled to the brim and overflowing so much I couldn’t even mix the ingredients. There must have been 5 or 6 pounds of food there. Meals for a week, woohooooooo! I took my first bite and…it was so disgusting I couldn’t even swallow it! “Well, maybe it’s that vegetable I don’t like. Let’s try another one.” *gag* Oh boy. My eyes bugged out. “I just made all this food and I can’t even eat it. OK, Tamara, think of the starving people in this world and take another bite.” *GAG*
I was so distressed by the situation I seriously called my mom for moral support. I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away. If there are two things I’ve had drilled in my head from growing up in a Ukrainian household they would be to never waste food and to never waste your money. Sin number one and sin number two.
The ragout did end up in the garbage. I won’t be praying any rosaries for it, but I do feel guilty. I guess I learned my lesson that when I’m trying a new recipe, I shouldn’t make the whole thing! EEP! I realize it’s probably the chard I don’t like only because I vaguely remember making something early in the summer that also may have had chard in it, and it had a similar disgusting and pungent flavour to it. I’ll be steering clear of the leafy green for a while. ICK!
Living Is Motion 
Yikes! I’ve totally done that
What’s worse is that I was making mine for a party! I ended up tossing it and bringing something else. Don’t feel bad! I think that part of living the best life you can is to yes, try new things, but also listen to your body. Yours happens to despise Swiss Chard :0)
I just started another blog as well, specifically for recipes. I’ll be posting the first ones on there tomorrow. The address is http://imnojulia.wordpress.com.
I’d love to chat this weekend. Will you be around? :0)
Yeah! I’ll be around! Sunday is probably better because Saturday I’m at the gym, doing a long run, and doing errands later on. Sunday I’m home all day until church at 5:30.
This happens all the time to me. I only feel guilty when it’s summer… because then the food will stink up my apartment, or, if I don’t want to be selfish, it’ll stink up everything outside, the area around the garbage cans, the street near there, where ever they eventually throw the stuff. I don’t like throwing away food to stink up places. So, my remedy, bag it… and, this uses up superfluous grocery bags! Two birds, one stone. Bam.
Don’t feel guilty.
Vegetarian garbage doesn’t smell. : ) haha…but, for real, it doesn’t smell nearly as bad as other garbage, especially if I put most of my stuff in my compost bin!