Day 9: The Happiness Project

There are only so many times you can say your happy moment was, for example, oh, I walked into town or Thwacky sat for X minutes in his vibro chair before it becomes tedious and repetitive. But it is, actually. Repetitive. It’s not at all tedious. Just repetitive.

My life these days is surprisingly self contained and compact. A lot of loosely defined routines and paths. Aside from day trips to nearby pretty, cobbly market towns and windy follies while my parents were visiting, I don’t go far these days. No weekend train journeys up the east coast of China for me.

I am, however, trying to push myself in non-geographical areas of interest. Things that can be accomplished while the urchin is snoozing or vibrating in the corner.

Like cooking.

I noted before that we’re doing a month of sensible eating- something that can be a bit boring and repetitive if you don’t put a lot of thought and effort into meal planning. Like, how to make chicken and veggies exciting after 15 consecutive meals?

First of all, skip the chicken and buy a good loop of proper chorizo. That’s served me very well in the past week. Chorizo-kale-sweet potato soup with spicy coconut broth; baked avocados with eggs in the stone hole and scattered with grilled chorizo bits; mega fritatta with chorizo and most of the veggie drawer in the fridge.

That was yesterday’s happiness, mostly because M. was off wrangling Thwacky in the living room so I didn’t have to cook whilst anticipating his imminent howl from the vibro chair on the kitchen floor next to me. I had half an hour to myself to chop a million veggies and break a lot of eggs. It was strangely meditative.

This was my fritatta, in case you were wondering. It makes 8 portions.

• 1 purple onion, diced small
• 1 sweet potato, peeled and sliced into discs
• Garlic- I used a big spoonful of the pre-minced stuff in a jar from the Indian supermarket
• 4 long red hot chilies, chopped up fine
• Half of a red bell pepper, diced
• Big handful of chopped cilantro
• Two handfuls of chopped up savoy cabbage- about 4 leaves cut into thin strips
• 1 length of a chorizo loop (maybe 6 inches? 12 cm?), cut into 1 cm pieces
• 8 eggs

I sauteed the onion in a bit of oil, then added the chorizo and let it go until browned a bit. Added chilies, pepper and garlic. Let it sizzle away on a medium low flame so the garlic didn’t burn. I nuked the sweet potato slices in the microwave for a few minutes in a closed bowl with a little water for steam. Added the cabbage to the veggie/chorizo mix and let it cook down a bit until soft. Added the al dente sweet potato slices. Stir. Remove from heat. Let cool for 5 min.

Turn oven to 375F/Gas 5/I forget how many C. Grease up a cake tin or pie plate or something similar, with at least a 4 or 5cm rim to hold everything in .

Break eggs into big bowl and whisk them til a bit frothy. Toss in cooled veggies.Stir. Add cilantro or parsley (if you hate cilantro). Stir again. Pour into baking receptacle. Bake for 20-30 minutes. I did 30 because I liked my eggy bits firmer.

When you take it out of the oven, have a cooling rack ready to tip it out onto, as the bottom egginess will get a bit sweaty if you leave it in the pan to cool.

The whole Happiness Project collection of posts can be found here.