MacMichael’s Monday Night Chicken Pot Pie

By the second six weeks of school, the new-backpack smell has worn off and Monday night has resumed its rightful place as the day that asks the most of everybody with the least amount of notice.

The boys come home with the comforting news that they have no homework. I want to believe them. I also want to believe that somewhere in this house there is a matching lid for every plastic container.

At our house, homework tends to arrive twenty minutes before bedtime. Ask Olivio or Jameson what they learned, and you get the sort of carefully limited answer a politician gives at a Senate hearing: “Stuff.” Ask why they can’t have games on their phones when other kids can, and suddenly their memories are astonishing.

MacMichael cooks in our family. While I’m hearing the latest evidence that our phone rules are an outrage, he’s trying to answer the far more difficult question of what five people might eat for dinner. Neither boy is hungry for anything he suggests. Both are hungry enough to open the pantry every seven minutes. If asked what they would like, they have no idea.

Nana has seen enough family dinners to know better than to join the negotiations. She waits to find out what MacMichael is making.

Then there’s the cleanup. MacMichael has cooked, the counter is covered with the evidence, and the boys—whose jobs include the dishwasher—disappear as completely as a full bag of Halloween candy on November first. If I ever need to find either of them quickly, I may start carrying a dirty plate.

That is why chicken pot pie made it into our Monday rotation. MacMichael starts with cooked chicken, stirs the filling together in one bowl, and puts a crust over it. There aren’t separate pans of things the boys have already announced they dislike. There is a hot meal in the oven and enough time to get through at least one discussion of how unfair our house is.

The first time we served it, Jameson went for the crust. Olivio looked into the filling, found the peas, and began eating around them. A few minutes later he was eating the chicken, too. Jameson asked for another scoop. MacMichael and I kept our faces perfectly still. Parents know better than to celebrate while a child is chewing; the slightest sign of satisfaction can make the whole meal suspicious.

Nana had seconds, which made the review official.

The pot pie didn’t fix Monday. Someone still couldn’t find a pencil, and the boys still needed reminding about the dishwasher. But everyone ate dinner, and MacMichael didn’t spend the rest of the evening cleaning up from making it. Around here, that is enough to put a recipe in regular rotation.