How to Make Valentine's Dinner for a Man Without Losing Your Mind (Almost)

There's a recipe in here somewhere, I promise.

 -- Get home from work/running errands and immediately collapse into bed turn on laptop to get some work done, only to discover that 1. the internet is out for the third time this week and 2. the laptop is acting suspiciously like it still has that virus that you spent four hours trying to vanquish last week. Give up, collapse into bed.

 -- Take blissful hour hour and ten minute hour and twenty minute nap. Struggle mightily to wake up. Jump for joy that the day's headache is, in fact, still with you. Pop a few Advil.

 -- Sleepily stumble downstairs in sweatpants and slippers. Grumble at the cat, who has a thing for scurrying under feet that are sleepily stumbling downstairs.

 -- Move piles of dirty dishes around the kitchen and stack precariously until you have a small workspace.

 -- Take one block of sharp cheddar cheese, 1 bag of pepperoni, and two cans of buttermilk biscuits from the fridge. Try not to look last night's dinner in the eye.

 -- Spread out a silicone mat.

 -- Go back to the fridge with a spoon, eat a few bites of last night's mashed potatoes directly from the tupperware. 

 -- Cut/hew/chisel surprisingly solid cheese into roughly pepperoni-sized squares. Complain to a napping puppy about your new blisters. Feel a little bad for yourself that not even the puppy cares.

 -- Freak out a little when you realize that you've never actually opened a can of biscuits by yourself. Follow instructions carefully while wincing and  holding can as far away as humanly possible. Chuckle a bit when can opens easily with a anticlimactic "pfffft."

 -- Remove one biscuit of dough. Cut in half. Roll one half into a ball, then flatten in a circular shape with heel of hand. Spread until the diameter is 5 or 6 inches.

 -- Stack a pepperoni and a square of cheese in the center. Gather edges of dough and bring towards center, pinch together to seal.

 -- Place ball (sealed side down) in a greased 9"x13" pan (or 8"x14" pan or 12"x12" pan or 26"x50" pan, whatever floats your boat... and fits in your oven.)

 -- Repeat approximately a billion times.

 -- Suffer a minor heart attack when the second can of biscuits pops open in your hands with a sound like several thousand fireworks exploding at once. Worry about puppy's hearing, as he barely batted an eyelash.

 -- Continue cutting, rolling, flattening, stacking, and pinching.

 -- Bid adieu to the cat, who has decided that even he is bored with the process and wanders off to stare at a wall somewhere.

 -- When the pan is finally full, stretch your arms and pour yourself a glass of wine in celebration. Pull out a second pan. Keep trucking.

 -- Frantically remember that the oven isn't even on yet. Set it for 450. Extricate the shredded biscuit can from the trash. Turn oven down to 350.

 -- Fill second pan. Raise white flag, place two remaining biscuits on a cookie sheet for tomorrow's breakfast.


 -- Brush biscuits with olive oil and sprinkle with garlic powder.
 
 -- Put pans in oven. Check every 30 seconds to ensure that crazy, tempermental oven is not a. on fire or b. set to “Easy Bake.”


 -- Remove one pan after 14 minutes, the other after 22 (from the same oven rack). Ponder the fact that the first pan is significantly more cooked.

 -- Put cookie sheet with two extra biscuits in the oven. Heat up leftover spaghetti sauce (from a jar, who are we kidding?) for dipping. Serve dinner. Sigh as you pretend that each bite of pepperoni roll is actually lobster, and that you're really in a fancy restaurant with candles, expensive wine, and an extensive dessert menu. Come crashing back to reality with every blaring car commercial. Remove cat from lap at least three times. Remove cat from table twice.

 -- Freeze. Remember biscuits in oven. Jump up from couch and race through thickening smoke to open oven door. Sprint to smoke detector and start frantically waving your arms. Make a face at the puppy, who is looking at you like you've finally lost it. Wonder if perhaps he's right. Extricate two rather hard, rather blackened biscuits from oven. Mourn for a moment over the passing of tomorrow's breakfast. Turn off oven. Pop another pepperoni roll. And maybe another Advil.

(Adapted from this recipe and this recipe. I made these super simple this time around, since it was my first try and I was hoping to thrill my pizza-loving husband (he wasn't disappointed). I will definitely branch out next time with different pizza toppings, and I'm envisioning a yummy barbeque version of these, too.)

*For those of you who worry, rest assured: I consumed only a half glass of wine and just one Advil over the course of the evening. I do know that these two things don't mix well in regular-sized doses. Also, know that I didn't actually set anything on fire and had not left the biscuits in the oven for an unreasonably long time... I just have a particularly crabby oven.

Happy (almost) weekend, everyone!

   Love,

    Meg