Smells and Aromas

Weather's been a bit touchy lately. It was getting a little cooler early this week and I was feeling "Fall". Bought some meat and veggies and made a stew. It was nice and I was feeling all warm and cozy eating it. But before I get a chance to finish the whole pot (I even gave a bunch away to other people), "Indian Summer" finally hits. Temperature reached 80 or so the last couple of days. Good thing I work in an air conditioned building and really don't know what it's like "in the real world".

Anyhow, back to the main subject ... it's amazing what smells triggers. While my stew was cooking, I was hooked. I wait and wait and hope the thing will get done as soon as it can so I can start chowing down. No such luck (I used a crock pot) and it's slowwwww cooking. I woke up to a wonderful smell (food!) and promptly started dishing portions for future consumption. That was a couple of days ago.

Last night, I took one of the portions and heated it up for my dinner. I guess I should have kept my bedroom door closed like I did the night before. The greasy meat smell kept me up all night and I ended up having to get up in the middle of the night, rubbbed some smelly ointment stuff under my nose before I can go back to sleep peacefully.

Same dish, two different results. Go figure!

Took my staff out for dinner a few nights ago. Ended up dragging them to "Hot Pot". It was fun. One guy discovered lamb for the first time in his life. Liked it. The other guy told me a little psychological trick that the restaurant may be playing. Apparently, when a person sits there and keeps smelling the aroma of food cooking, the person just naturally feels more satisfyingly full (ummm ... satisfyingly ... is there such a word?) I haven't really tested his theory as I'm basically eating all the time. At least snacking on stuff. Who knows? Maybe he's got a point there. I don't normally feel hungry when I'm cooking. But then ... maybe it has more to do with my "testing" the food while I'm cooking though.