A group of dishes is not a meal

I was fighting off a panic attack and was hungry, so it was time for frenetic cooking with minimal planning and a scattered group of dish ideas.

I grabbed a ton of veggies and got started cutting them up: celery was sliced (right-side clear bowl), baby bella mushrooms were peeled and sliced thinly (15 slices per mushroom; blue bowl), radicchio was chopped (red bowl), orange bell pepper (blue), radish (right-side clear), and onion (middle clear) were diced, parsley (red bowl) and basil (left-side clear) were minced, and the kale stem was sliced (right-side clear bowl) and leaves were chopped (left-side clear). Once the veggies were prepped, I took a handful of pistachios and chopped them up pretty well.

I covered my last salmon fillet with some extra virgin olive oil, seasoned the skin with black pepper, then coated the meat with grated parmesan and the pistachios. I put that on a foil-lined baking pan and, on the other side, put some halved grape tomatoes drizzled with olive oil and seasoned with salt, pepper, and also sprinkled with a little grated mozzarella (not pictured). The salmon and tomatoes were broiled, which was a mistake as the pistachios got a bit overcooked.

While the salmon was cooking, the veggies got sautéed. I started up some butter and added in the onion and sweated it a little before dumping in the right-side bowl. I got that bowl about half-cooked, then added in the blue bowl, then, a little later, the red, and finished with the left-side clear bowl. You can figure out the cooking times. I seasoned with salt between bowls 2 and 3, then added some olive oil after bowl 4 was added, and, finally, seasoned with a little more salt and some black pepper when bowl 5 went in.

Meanwhile, my rice cooker was going. I seasoned the rice with a few sprigs of saffron, some shallot pepper, a dash of salt, and some turmeric. I scooped a bowlful of it for my plate.

For the plating, I drizzled a messy loop of sesame oil and added a few spoonfuls of the veggie mix.

I placed some of the roasted tomato around the outside of the veggies, added the bowl of rice, and half of the salmon fillet (the rest was the next day's lunch). I cracked a little pepper over the rice, and that was that. Taken alone, each of the dishes was tasty, but they definitely did not go together. The plating had no cohesion, either; just three piles of food and a bit of oil. Scattered, disjointed, overcomplicated. Just like my brain tonight.

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