Attempting to Cook

Alex has had his heart set on eating chili in Chile on a chilly day. So I really want to make some for him. Canned beans are not an option. So after soaking beans overnight, I am currently attempting to cook REAL beans in batches in the pressure cooker. Yes it is 15:17 here (I'm working on figuring out military time as that is what they use here. So I've switched my computer clock. 15:17 is 3:17pm for normal people.)

Last night was the first time I tried to cook a meal here. I'm fighting with the altitude, the new gas stove (I've only ever cooked on electric), the worlds smallest electric oven that reads in celsius, and lots of foreign ingredients. Yeah, it wasn't the greatest experience.

At about 2pm yesterday, I decided to make brownies. I intended to make chocolate chip cookies, but not only did they NOT have cookie sheets, but they don't have chocolate chips either. So I bought a Duncan Hines brownie mix. I mixed the brownies in the new mixing bowl that I purchased since the house did not have one, and turned on the oven.

To back track just a little, when we purchased the transformers and heaters from the family moving back to the states, they gave us a few other things. One of which was an oven thermometer. She told me that I would thank her for it later. She warned me not to trust what the oven temperature said. MAN, she was NOT kidding! What would I do without that little dude?

I turned the oven on around 2pm and at 7pm - yes, seven p-to the-m it finally reached the desired 170c (350f). We had to crank it up to "max" and let it sit for about 25 minutes before it started getting up there. And while were talking about this oven, let me just mention that the reason that there are no cookie sheets to buy is because a cookie sheet is waaaay to big for this little oven. It is only slightly taller than my microwave but about the same width. Cookies are not in our future. Once it got up to temp, the brownies cooked as usual. Greg sighed and said, "I guess no turkey for Thanksgiving..." Thanksgiving? Really? You're worried about Thanksgiving? I can't figure out what to cook for dinner...

So today I am attempting to make chili. I started around 13:00. The boys have church tonight at 7:30pm so I am hoping to have dinner ready by 6:30pm. If not, there is a McDonalds on the way there. Maybe a Nana isn't such a bad idea.