Broccoli Shock-o-ly

I don't like broccoli.

My mom makes broccoli and cheese sauce for holiday dinners, and I always ask her serve the sauce on the side, so I can put it on other stuff, because it's just wrong to take a perfectly good cheese sauce and fuck it all up by putting broccoli in it.

Because I don't like broccoli.

So, you can imagine how disturbing it is to me that I've eaten broccoli two days in a row now, and it wasn't gross at all. And that I'm planning to have some again tomorrow.

That's so fucking wierd. I don't like broccoli.

Now, mind you, I'm not having a plate of broc-and-cheese or dipping up a big gob of ranch dressing with one of those funky little trees, but I ate stuff with broccoli in it. And kind of liked it.

But, but, but . . . I don't like broccoli.

Here's what happened: Although it's not exactly "cooking" per se, we've been having those "meal-in-a-bags" a couple of times a week, lately. They are really quick to prepare, which is nice when we're trying to sit down to lunch together between walking the dogs and Shrike leaving for work.

We usually have a rather limited selection of "bag meals" to choose from at the store, because I automatically rule out all the ones with broccoli in them.

Because, as I may have mentioned, I don't like broccoli.

However, when I was at the grocery earlier this week, they had a broccoli one on sale.

Ruh roh.

It's on sale, and yet, it's broccoli, and I don't like broccoli.

So, knowing that Shrike is all about the broc, I decided to get it, and planned to just pick it out - or eat something else if it turned out to be nasty.

You know, since it would be all broccontaminated.

And I don't like broccoli.

I fixed that for lunch yesterday, and it turned out the brocs were chopped up in tiny little bits. Not very pick-out-able, but also small enough to pretend they weren't there, if one tried very hard.

I cautiously took a bite, fearing the worst, but it turned out to be quite good. I couldn't even taste the broccoli!

Which is a good thing. Since I don't like broccoli.

Today, I made a stir-fry (more on that in a moment). We'd bought broccoli to put in that for Shrike, but I had planned to cook that separately and add it just to hers.

I thought "what the hell - let's live dangerously!" and threw it in the pan with everything else.

Now, granted, I didn't just scoop out our servings willy-nilly (heavy on the broc for her, more bell peppers for me) but it was just fine. Quite good in fact.

Despite the fact that I don't like broccoli.

I even - voluntarily - made a chicken/broccoli/rice concoction this evening for lunch tomorrow (more to come on that, as well). It still needs to be baked, but the tastes I had of it while cooking were pretty damn yummy, and the broc is all through-out it.

Are you listening, taste buds???

I don't like broccoli.

(Much.)"Whozat+In+The+Kitchen"