Reminded.

Last night was one of those scramble-for-dinner nights. Crawling toward payday and with nary a spot of food in the larder, I knew it was going to be an improv evening. Which is fine; I've always liked the let's see what we've got here school of cooking. I knew there was a set of chicken breasts waiting at home. The rest remained to be seen.

As I drove, I fixated on the idea of a simple chicken quesadilla. I was pretty sure there were tortillas in the fridge, and we've always got more than enough cheese on hand. (This is largely because every time we make burritos, we convince ourselves that we have no cheese, so we buy some, only to find out we had plenty.) There was an onion left over from a recent gathering, so using it before it totally shriveled would be wise. So there it was: chicken quesadillas.

Skip ahead a bit to this conversation:

"Hey, the tortillas... Uh, the date on the package says May 25."

"Oh."

"Do you think they're okay? There's no color on them. They smell okay."

[Silence, with an I dunno sort of face.]

"Hang on, let me look." [from the kitchen] "There's a flatbread from Trader Joe's. I could make a pizza with it."

"That sounds good."

"Hold on... Oh. The date on this says July 5. What do you think?"

[Silence, with an I dunno sort of face.]

Needless to say, we had neither quesadillas nor pizza. What eventually came along, however, reminded me of one of the first times I got creative with cooking. It was called Bucky's Chicken Shit.

Appetizing, no?

It was the mid-80s. For reasons I cannot remember--other than figuring it would impress women--I started taking an interest in cooking. I was reading cooking magazines and keeping a binder of recipes, I had gotten a recipe-making program for my Commodore 64 that could take one ingredient and offer a slew of possible dishes to make... I was discovering a new land.

Came a night when my girlfriend and I were hungry. I think there was another friend with us. Not that it matters. I went into action. We had egg noodles, which I've always loved. (Mom used to serve them doused with butter and sprinkled with a hint of black pepper.) I had a can of chicken meat. (I was not shopping for myself in those days.) I had an onion. I had tomato sauce.

As you might guess, Bucky's Chicken Shit was not exactly high-concept gourmet. The onions got a quick sauté in butter, the chicken was de-canned and dumped unceremoniously on top of the onions, the noodles got thrown over it all and then I smothered it in sauce. Oh, and lest I forget, there was (of course) cheese. Cheese aplenty, actually.

The girlfriend was suitably impressed. Clearly, it didn't take much. Cooking had the desired effect, and started me down the amateur culinary path I continue to walk today. And last night, out of necessity and scarcity, I revisited that early concoction. Running out of options, along with food that wasn't expired, I turned to the old standby: a half-box of pasta. We have several of them at any given moment. This time around it was wheat elbow macaroni. The chicken had been cooked up for quesadillas and sat waiting. It went into a baking dish with the pasta. A boatload of pasta sauce. A truckful of cheese. Into the oven at 400 degrees and out in five minutes for a simple, nostalgic, delicious delight.

I think the girlfriend was suitably impressed.