by your command

So, you want to know about pre-cooked frozen hamburger patties? Let me tell you about them. I'm not going to lie, it's not the prettiest story.

The Omaha burgers that Mom sends us (HI MOM THANK YOU FOR THE BURGERS) do not have cooking instructions on the back. I guess because there is really no way on Earth you can fuck them up! You're probably meant to grill them, ideally. Like, outdoors in the sunshine while your children run around your manicured lawn and you have a beer, I guess. Shayne has cooked them on the stovetop in a skillet before, but I think that makes the whole house smell like a fast food restaurant. I don't want to smell like I've had to take a night shift at Wendy's to make ends meet (though now that I think about it, that might not be a terrible idea. DAYCARE IS EXPENSIVE AM I RIGHT?)

Thaw the burger patties (overnight or something). Preheat the oven to 350, and line a pan with heavy-duty foil. Plop the patties into the pan and salt/pepper/Tony's them up some. Cook them...well, I didn't time it, and it probably depends on how many patties you have in there, so let's just say...cook them until the GREASE CONGEALS ENOUGH TO SCRAPE OFF. Seriously. When they are browned and covered in chocolate-covered glop, pull them out of the oven. Scrape off the glop with a spatula. I move mine kind of over to one corner of the pan, like it is now in exile. Flip the burger patties over. Now (optional choice here) you can drain and rinse a can of mushrooms and spread them out in the pan around the burgers (shunning the grease glop that's in time-out in the corner). Salt/pepper/Tony's the mushrooms and other side of the burgers to taste. Stick them back in the oven and continue cooking until they are done. I always have to cut one open to see if it's still pink. I can't tell just by looking at the blasted things.

When they're done, you can slice up some cheese (we like Swiss) and melt it on the patties real quick. Serve on whole wheat buns with mustard. Shayne is usually sad that I don't mix my grease glop WITH the mushrooms (for FLAVOR, don't you know) but I'm sorry, I can't do that. I consider that little pile of congealment the "oh God, I'm going to become a vegetarian" side of the pan. The burgers, though, they are the "never mind, meat is freaking awesome" side of the pan.

All of this should take less than half an hour. And then you have dinner and the baby stops crying and you get to sit down for a minute!

I wanted to make the sweet potato fries to go with the burgers last night, buuuut. I didn't. We had some potato chips. GREAT VALUE potato chips (which are actually pretty good and not made with any weird additives, I was pleasantly surprised.)

Dessert? We all sat around the kitchen table picking through a bowl of Jelly Bellies. Even Curt. He'd put one in his mouth, chew it up a while to get the flavor, then spit it out.

It's been that kind of week.

WHAT DID YOU HAVE FOR SUPPER, SISTER?