Swiss chard gratin

"Did you ever think of the number of things that had to happen for me to get to know you?"


Don Draper says this in Mad Men. That is how I feel about this Swiss chard gratin.

FreshDirect had to have a free delivery promotion
Every once in a while, FreshDirect has a free delivery promotion and those are the only times I order from them. [Shh, don't tell. I don't want them to stop these promos! Otherwise I may never use them. Ok, that's not true - whenever I need cases of water, bags of flour, sugar, or rice, or cans of tomatoes, I will order from them. Sorry in advance to the delivery guys. But I tip well!]


Because of this promo, I ordered my groceries, including some Gruyere because I love it and because I had been making a lot of cheese omelets on the weekends for breakfast.


I had to order take-out
I got so busy, so suddenly, with work that I found myself with hardly anything to eat at home. And sometimes when I've been working that hard, I feel like I deserve a little take-out, something indulgent, and no dishes to deal with later. So I ordered some General Tso's with brown rice... because somehow brown rice brings down the guilt quotient.


I had to make only one trip to the farmer's market
Again because of work, I was too busy to go to the farmer's market two Saturdays in a row. I cannot even begin to describe what a travesty this is. So I visited the Bowling Green market near my office during my lunch hour and, oh my, they had three different kinds of Swiss chard - white, red, and yellow - plus onions, tomatoes, potatoes, lettuce and so much more. I showed amazing restraint by buying just one bunch of white Swiss chard.


FreshDirect had to have another free delivery promotion
Another free delivery promo! This one was a little different - it was for two months of some delivery pass thing, so essentially, two month of free delivery. The expiration date of the promo was looming so I quickly signed up and happened to include two bunches of spinach in my order because they were on sale. I am such a sucker. [But I must say, the spinach was really good.]


On the day of my FreshDirect delivery, I was feeling some pangs of guilt for now having too much food and an unpredictable work schedule ahead that may or may not give me any time to do any cooking. As I was mentally running through my stockpiles of food, I realized that something felt familiar... and I dug up this gratin recipe that I had bookmarked months ago. Swiss chard? Check. Spinach? Check. Onions, garlic, thyme? Check. Rosemary? Skip it. Eggs? Check. Gruyere? Check. Cooked brown rice? Ok, not basmati but, check.


Usually I plan in advance what I want to make, and get the ingredients all at once. Or, I'll have one thing I want to use up and I'll build a meal around it. This may have been the first time where I randomly bought different foods at different times and they came together in a recipe that I wanted to try. It was like it was meant to be.

For Don, on the other hand... I thought he didn't go for those kind of shenanigans.