My husband was away one day last week, so 10-year-old Tiani and I cooked up a plan for dinner – to prepare all the vegetables Daddy doesn’t usually like, but we want to have.
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Broccoli was top of our list, and then cauliflower, asparagus and finally, for something different, Brussels sprouts.
I had no concerns with the first three items, but grave reservations about those pesky little green balls of super flavour and aroma – those complicated sprouts from Brussels.
Broccoli only needed cutting and streaming, I chose cauliflower rice and the asparagus was good in butter. The small fellows from Brussels required further consideration.
Browsing through lots of ideas, I saw that teaming them with bacon was popular.
But I decided on roasting the little guys with potatoes, dressed in lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, oregano and chicken stock.
This sounded like a very flavoursome combination, and I hoped, fragrant enough to smell good too.
On returning from school drop-off and the supermarket, I realised that the slight whiff in the kitchen which I earlier suspected was the faint sourness from the chook bucket, had developed into a pong with a powerful punch. Clearly, it was the foul stench of a mouse carcass in the roof cavity. Darn mouse plague.
I kept calm and carried on, preparing my cruciferous cancer curbing vegetable feast, but constantly interrupted myself to express my growing disgust at the ever increasing odour, as the sun beat down on the day, warming the ceiling space.
My lemongrass candle was burning furiously, wafting gorgeous perfume around the room to no avail, the mouse corpse was heating up and then the real magic started – the fragrance of the cooking Brussels sprouts entered the equation.
Well, I nearly packed my bags. Apparently I am quite a sensitive type when it comes to my nose and the bouquet of the air surrounding it, and I was certainly offended by the smells in my kitchen that day.
Exhaust fans were applied, windows and doors were opened, but the reek remained.
When my candle burnt out, I resorted to some pretty potent incense.
You know what? I’m really cranky at mice in general and I’m never cooking Brussels sprouts again. They stink.
Yolande Grosser
