Journal #36: Favorite Meal

My favorite meal is very delicious. Steak, corn, and mashed potatoes.

I prefer to have my steak cooked on the grill, medium, with a light dusting of seasoning and spices for a flavor explosion when you bite into it. My preferred size for a steak is eleven ounces, so that I have just a little bit left over for a snack, and I do not feel so bad about eating an entire steak. Typically, my steak comes from County Market or from Sam's, but there have also been times when my farmer cousin gives us fresh steak from her cow farm- I would prefer not to think about that any further. The steak I like is pretty typical- brownish on the outside with a pinkish inside (because it's cooked medium) and no blood dripping from it. That is very unappealing to me to cut into my delicious steak dinner and see that my meal is still bleeding a light pink, watery substances.

In my favorite meal, I like my corn to come from a can, and my favorite is of the Green Giant variety. I do not like eating corn fresh of the farm, which is what my grandparents always try and get me to eat. The corn is pale and I think it tastes like grass, which is why I enjoy store bought a lot more. The kernels are a beautiful shade of golden yellow and roughly the size of my pinky nail. My favorite way to eat these kernels is to stab the fleshy, light yellow bottom part with a prong of my fork, pick up three or four kernels, and eat them like that. And I also add a little flavoring to my canned corn with a pat of County Crock butter (about a teaspoon), and a sprinkling of salt. I usually eat the corn out of a itty bitty little casserole dish, and then put the leftovers in the fridge so I can have them the next day for breakfast, lunch, or a delicious little snack.

Mashed potatoes are the last element of this wonderful meal. My mom is very good at making them non-lumpy, so sometimes I have to take over. The mashed potatoes I like are fairly simple- you cut up a couple of nicely sized potatoes, after peeling and washing them, and then put them in a mixing bowl with some milk. I usually just splash some Prairie Farms Skim Milk (the kind with the pink label) in there, but I suppose that would amount to about a cup. Probably a little less. And then I turn on my white Pampered Chef mixer and go to town, trying to ensure that there are no lumps left in the potatoes when I am done. But you have to be careful because while lumpy mashed potatoes are not appetizing, neither are mashed potatoes that are practically liquid. I do not like my potatoes too lumpy or too smooth- it's more of a happy medium. After dishing the mashed potatoes onto my plate, I add some Country Crock butter (a little more than a spoonful), and some salt. And then I mix it all up and eat it and it is delicious.