New Year’s Eve was a quiet affair.
We spent a large portion of it sitting anxiously in front of our entry-level mini oven - as Richard, my husband (sometimes it still feels weird to say that), likes to call it - keeping an eye on the chicken we were roasting. The chicken was poulet de Bresse, which meant it enjoyed running around a farm throughout its life, and it cost us €35. So, you see, we wouldn’t want anything bad happen to it. In addition, if we screwed up, we had no plan B for our NYE dinner. We had no other options but to succeed.
Because one hour and a half felt incredibly long when one spent it waiting for their chicken to be roasted to perfection, Richard decided to open a bottle of wine. It was a bottle of Chenin Blanc from Loire Valley, particularly from Touraine area. Or, basically, delicious white wine, from my layman’s point of view!
We sat at our counter and also dining table, facing each other, joined by our wine glasses this time. The honey and fruity taste soon dominated my senses as I sipped my wine. Cold liquid running down my throat and started to warm my body. My body started to relax, chatter came much more easily, each anecdote more amusing than the one before. That definitely helped with the seemingly endless waiting.
When our chicken was finally ready, its skin glistened from the melted butter that we brushed all over. The golden brown color was excitingly seductive. The carrots and leeks that were roasted on the bottom of the chicken sizzled as if begging for attention. The syrupy caramelization made it hard for us to look away.
We both stared at the roasted chicken in amazement. It might sound like it wasn’t a big deal but we surely begged to differ. Roast your first chicken, if you don’t believe me. And when the carving was done, it was the moment of truth.
Right there, in our little Parisian studio (and no, unfortunately, the Eiffel Tower is not visible from our place), myself in an oversized white T-shirt with questionable old stains on it, my legs, at times, crossed on the bar stool, we began to eat. And let me tell you, that first bite was out of this world. When I sank my teeth in the juicy and impressively succulent roasted chicken that we made ourselves, nobody could convince me otherwise. No one else’s opinion would have mattered.
It dawned on us that our fireworks-hunting-on-NYE selves existed no longer. I was sincerely contented spending New Year’s Eve in my PJs, blissfully eating homemade roasted chicken that in my not-so-humble opinion, tasted better than what we’d tasted at some restaurants, serenaded by Jazz songs from our speaker. The hopes and dreams for the new year contained in unrestrained laughter and greasy fingers. The fears drowned, even if temporarily, when we proposed a toast to the future before us.
I realized that happiness, for me, is just that.
Happy New Year 2020!