Domesticity Fail

I had high hopes for tonight.

I prepared in advance for one of my family's favorite meals: Chopped cabbage rolls. I planned the menu, shopped for the ingredients (choosing lean ground beef, the prettiest cabbage, and hitting the farmer's market for fresh tomato sauce), and had everything read to assemble in plenty of time.

Then I remembered I had to cook the rice. Only the ground beef was already browning. So I stuck the rice in the microwave. (Don't do this. God didn't intend rice to be cooked in the microwave.)

And then I realized why you don't brown ground beef in a teflon-coated skillet. (In case you don't know, you can't separate beef that is sticking to itself and then what little bit of fat was in that 95/5 basically deep fried everything.)

So an anxiety-ridden 10 minutes later, I mixed the rice and beef. I spooned it over the cabbage. Then I mixed the homemade sauce and a tablespoon of sugar with a bag of my own tomatoes. Only I drained out the excess liquid. Meaning that when I poured the liquid over the rice and beef, it didn't go very far. But I decided the cabbage would do just fine under some tightly wrapped foil and in a hot ass oven.

Only it didn't.

I mean, we ate it. But the cabbage was a little crunchy. And the whole meal was dry. And Javi cried when we told him he had to eat it anyway. (That happens more often than I'd like to admit.)

Then I decided to mix up some spinach dip since I was done and everyone else was still trying to chew through the cabbage.

Only I brought home ricotta cheese instead of sour cream. Why do they put the ricotta right beside sour cream anyway? Also, if I had been trying to find fat free ricotta, I'd've come home empty handed. So of course when I see a fat free label, I just take it for granted that I've got sour cream in my hands. Because they are stupidly side by side.

But I'm standing my the sink and I've already squeezed the liquid out of a cold as hell box of chopped spinach. And I've opened the packet of Ranch powder.

So I do it. I mix in the ricotta. And, as you might have guessed, it tasted like nothing worth eating. So I added in some minced garlic and the tail end of a soon-to-expire container of sour cream that's been hanging out in the side door of the fridge.

And it's ... better. But no one seems excited to taste test. I put a lid on it and put it in the fridge. Because I've had enough already and it's only 6:30 pm. There's another 2 hours before I'm whine-free and that kid is still crying at the table.

This evening was a total domestic fail. I'll let you know when I build up the nerve to try again.