The Armchair Critic

I love rainy weekends. I have the perfect excuse to stay in bed and cuddle with my kids under the warm blanket. When a gray curtain of rain falls ouside the windows, nothing else exists except me and my family. Nothing can compel us to brave the heavy rains and go elsewhere. We're quite warm and comfy where we are.

Rainy days also make me crave for certain food. This month I have been craving for baked macaroni. I used to have a crush on a guy who runs a snack house where their best seller is the baked mac. I loved that baked mac served with homemade pan de sal. I would finish off the very satisfying meal by mopping up the extra sauce on the plate with the pan de sal. Hmmmm...yummy. I think my love for the baked mac outlasted my like for the guy. So even when we weren't talking anymore, I would sneak into his store when I know he's not there so I can take home a bilao of baked mac. Of course, some people would think I was actually hoping to get a glimpse of my crush and was just using the baked mac as an excuse. Eh! Not really!

So the past few days had me reading recipes on baked macaroni. I found an easy recipe from Potluck Hidalgo Bonding, A Family Heritage Cookbook, edited by Jaime C. Laya and Adelaida Lim. I so heart cookbooks that evokes thoughts of family, traditions and good appetite. Already I can see myself sharing this passion for baked mac with my kids. I could only hope that the daughter who doesn't eat pasta with sauce would make an exception.

A storm is raging outside and I had never made a baked macaroni before. But I wanted to satisfy this particular craving, so I braved the rains to get the ingredients from the neighborhood grocery. I grabbed some butter too, to make cookies. No sense wasting all the residual heat from the oven.



One large pyrex dish of baked macaroni, chorizo de bilbao, vienna sausage and queso de bola goodness. Certainly more than my family can eat in a day. I will be having baked mac for the rest of the week. Nice...



One taste and I was brought back to the past. I was a young girl with a crush again. I open my eyes and see my family around me. The baked mac I made is richer, more flavorful and more exciting than the one in my past. I kiss and hug everyone as we settle down to partake of the food and make new memories.

POSTCRIPT:

When I turn on the oven, there's no stopping me. I also baked chocolate revel bars, choco chip oatmeal cookies, and even tried to make molten lava chocolate cake. Unfortunately, I overcooked the latter and no molten chocolate oozed from the cake. but it tasted quite good. I will try that again and if I am more successful, I will post photos on this blog. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to photograph the revel bars and the cookies before they were gone.