Living on my own, as have done for the last five and a half years, there are times when I yearn for the Missus to take command of the kitchen again.
A man can only live on `sausage egg and chips’ for a while, and those exotic aromatic smells and flavours that the Missus could whip up in ten minutes soon become a dream of some far distant era.
Sitting here munching a cold Hawaiian pizza reminded me of one of the Missus specialities, `Kidney bean soup’.
The upper crust of society call it, “Windsor soup.”
Its brown, its thick, and has the kind of flavour that makes a man go for seconds.
So without ado, I go out to our local super market and I buy a packet. Speckled Red Kidney Beans were printed on the packet, and I ran home with my prize, fully intending to make myself a saucepan full of kidney bean soup.
That’s as far as it got!
That packet of beans graced my cupboard for some six months, and only cleaning up the shelves (a twice a year event) did I come across them. For some reason, possibly an International Exchange arrangement, the beans came from far distant China. I held them in my sticky hand for less than a second, as a dramatic peal of thunder in the far distance prompted me into action. It could only have been The Missus speaking…
“Plant them in the garden you chump! They will keep you going in beans forever and leave the cooking to me.” Now I don`t ever argue with the Missus. I planted a whole handful of those beans in a spare patch of newly dug garden and in three days they were up!
Only God knows how life can be stored up for months in a kitchen cupboard, but my beans are growing daily and are a constant reminder that somewhere and somehow miracles do happen, not to mention that the Missus is never far from this old man.
