Encore

"Mmm, these pan drippings would make a good gravy to go with that left-over chicken tonight," I thought as I cleaned the kitchen after making a fried chicken picnic that morning. I had some baking mix, so we could have biscuits as well.  I love bonus meals, and that seemed like a good one.  Also, I had bought strawberries that needed to be used, so maybe there would be enough baking mix to make a shortcake, too.

This being April 15, we had plans to go to our son's house that evening so our daughter-in-law could figure our taxes.  I was sure they wouldn't be complicated, but it felt good to know that a CPA would be doing them.  "Maybe I could take strawberry shortcake over there," I pondered, then thought better of it since I couldn't make biscuits and enough shortcake for everyone with the little bit of mix I had left. I had a relaxing afternoon, still resting up from being gone nearly two weeks, and a little later I made six individual shortcakes.

As it drew nearer to supper time, I made a half-dozen biscuits. Just before Howard came in, I made a pan of chicken gravy, and it kept growing as I added milk, getting it too thin, then adding flour to compensate. "What am I going to do with all this gravy" I asked myself. 

"Last night at church, I told Greg that we would take them out to dinner tonight, since Joanna is doing our taxes," to which I answered , "What? Why didn't you  tell me about it?"  He said he'd forgotten, and Greg wasn't sure they could go anyway.  I needed to know, so he tried to call our son, but he wasn't home yet.  He found Joanna out shopping, and she would let us know as soon as she heard from Greg.  Meanwhile, I wondered if I had enough prepared to have them eat with us, Howard was wanting to go ahead with supper and take them out later.

Just then the phone rang that they were on their way over.  Howard and our daughter-in-law sat down immediately and started doing taxes, and I wondered what to do about supper.  "We'll just eat here," I told them.  The taxes wouldn't take long, so I went into the kitchen and made four plates of the biscuits and heated-up gravy, (thankfully I had some good pieces of chicken left for their plates), added some green beans and iced tea, and finished with strawberry shortcake for all.  It turned out surprisingly well.  Howard always says chicken is the the gift that keeps on giving, and tonight was no exception.