Chicken and yam bake

This one pan bake is so simple a traditional recipe isn't really needed. Sometimes that's the best answer for a weeknight meal.

There is almost nothing I love more than sheetpan dinners. Salmon, broccoli and ginger all roasted together with a little soy sauce. Bratwurst, onions, and peppers with a dijon paste and olive oil. And this – chicken thighs, yams, onions, olive oil (be generous), cumin, salt, and chile powder, 375 degrees F. oven for about 40 minutes. (That's your recipe. Sorry.)

It can go alongside rice or in tortillas. Or eaten with a few slices of avocado on top. I cooked this up today for a big family dinner we're having here on Tuesday. It's going to be the filling for enchiladas. I'll be able to come home from work and layer it with corn tortillas (I don't bother to roll them – just stack them like lasagne noodles), jack cheese, and enchilada sauce. And a sprinkle of cilantro and green onion when it gets out of the oven.

We are all about The Casserole at the MK house lately. Yancey's gone on his yearlong residency, and I am discovering just how unmotivated I am when there isn't another adult to cook for. The longer a casserole lasts, the better!

There were ominous storm warnings all weekend in western Washington and everyone who could stay home did. Our house ended up being Grand Central Station – my parents slept here, Loretta's (wonderful) babysitter was here most the weekend studying, many neighbors came and went, Wyatt and Loretta had friends spend the night. The power never went out, no trees fell on our roof, but we got all the benefits of huddling together. And, not for the first time, my dog modeled wisdom and community best. Here's a poem about that. (And thank you, Mary Oliver, for making poems about dogs its own art form. You speak to me constantly.)

Dog in a Storm

The winds have come,
just as the forecaster said they would.
You've picked up on my anxiety, it seems,
and want to come inside
the moment I let you out.
You press your nose against the glass,
follow my every move,
commence with whining,
wanting, as we all do,
to be let in,
to find the square of light
that even the worst of storms allow.

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