Platter Down!

Today my girls returned to school after a 2-week break. We had such a nice time over the holidays! Yesterday I decided to cook an actual 'Sunday Dinner' to celebrate. I called my dad for the low-down on roasting a chicken. Yes. I've never roasted a whole chicken. My dad does that for me. But now he's back in Colorado and gosh, roasted chicken sounded so good. So. I put the chicken in the oven and got to work on rinsing lettuce and peeling potatoes. Really. You cannot have roasted chicken without mashed potatoes. Remind me to give you my original mashed potatoes recipe- it's really good. So, after a while, the chicken is starting to brown and that delicious smell is permeating the kitchen. Oh, this is going to be so good! I pour a glass of wine. I set the table. I pour the drinks. I get the chicken out of the oven. M starts mashing the potatoes. She is my mashed potatoes student. She will carry on the recipe. I start cutting up the chicken on my cutting board. Oh! It's just right. Golden and crispy on the outside, deliciously moist on the inside. I transfer the lovely pieces to my platter. I cut some of the larger pieces on the platter. So tender! Tastes delicious! My family is going to love me for this!

Now. Fast forward 2-1/2 seconds. The platter is tipping, yes, tipping. It was cantilevered off the counter just a little bit. But seriously, I guess that's all it takes. Because the platter is tipping, tipping, the chicken is sliding off, the chicken is landing on the floor with the platter on top of it. Crash. M turns from her potato mashing. J runs from the other room. We all stare at the chicken and at each other in disbelief. This is probably the saddest thing to ever happen in this kitchen. Silence. Scooby is enthralled. What? What's this? All this for me? It isn't even my birthday! Then J says, "Uh, Dad! We have a problem! Daaaaad!" She is trying to hold Scooby back. The girls and I continue to look at each other and the chicken on the floor. I am numb with disbelief. Then I smile. Because really, what else is there to do? And the girls start laughing and that's when Jon shows up.

What he finds is chicken on the floor (yes, it's still on the floor- I don't know why I haven't picked it up yet), his ladies laughing, and his dog drooling. "It's ok!" He says. "We can still eat it! Our floor is pristine! It's so clean you could eat off of it!" You know, really it isn't. But we picked up the chicken, put it on the platter, and served it for dinner. Scooby even got a smackerel of chicken in his dish.

That chicken was delicious.