300-word draft:

Every birthday in my family we get to choose which meal we want for our birthday dinner. The one I chose for my last three birthdays was chicken parmesan with spaghetti. My mom makes the best chicken parmesan I have ever had even though she hates making it. I normally cook the spaghetti while she makes the chicken. She starts off by setting up the chicken we usually do about 5-8 chicken breasts because my family loves chicken parmesan. She then will make the breading and put that on the chicken while I am boiling the water for the spaghetti. She only puts sauce on a few of the chicken breasts because my sister doesn’t like the sauce. I love the sauce on the chicken as does the rest of my family. We don’t really make the sauce we just use regular spaghetti sauce for it. Then she will put the mozzarella cheese on all of the chicken breasts. At this point I am boiling the spaghetti which is one of my favorite types of pasta. Then she cooks it for a while, and I do the pasta on low heat, so they finish around the same time. We all used to eat this with my grandparents when they came over, so it is a special meal. My Pepe showed a trick which is very unhealthy, but we put bread with butter and put the spaghetti on top and it is delicious. This meal is my all-time favorites, and I will continue to pick it for every birthday meal.

600-word draft:

Every birthday in my family we get to choose which meal we want for our birthday dinner. The one I chose for my last three birthdays was chicken parmesan with spaghetti. It has been made for several dinners with my grandparents and even this past New Year’s Eve. This home cooked meal is one thing I look forward to having when I get to go home. My grandparents especially make this special for me and my sister when we get to enjoy this meal from time to time. This dish has always had a significance stance in my family for being a go-to meal to cook for family events and how special it has become over the years.  

My parents used to make this meal regularly when my grandparents came over for dinner. Now that they are no longer here, this meal has grown to be very special to my family over the past years. Although we do not eat it regularly anymore, it makes it more significant when we get to have this meal. My Mother normally makes this meal for the family as she has said “it is the only dish the whole family will eat together”. My family is normally fairly picky about what we have dinner and rarely do we all end up eating the same thing. This dish on the other hand is one that we all enjoy because of the past times with whom we have enjoyed it with. It is often nostalgic when eating it for me and my sister as we used to make our meals with our grandparents very special, decorating the house and giving them gift bags. My Pepe even used to do this one trick with the spaghetti by putting butter on bread and then spaghetti on top and eating it like a taco. Although incredibly unhealthy it is a memory I always look back on when having this meal with my family.  Hence showing how significant this one very simple meal has become so much more for my family. Personally, I find myself fairly attached to this meal mainly because of all the memories it holds. 

This dish is made by my mother, but past years was made my father, he pretty much gave up on making it. It is very time consuming from what I have heard from my mother, which is why I try to help her a lot in the process of making it. I normally make the spaghetti while she does the chicken just to help her out a little bit. She has made this for my past three birthdays as a good home cook meal. She said the reason I love to eat this meal “is because its pasta, chicken, and cheese.” She also said that “chicken was the only meat you would eat when you were younger.” Which is still very true and continues to prove that my family is very picky and why this meal has been very perfect for that reason. One little thing we must do when making it, is having all the chicken parmesans have sauce on it besides one because my sister will only eat it with cheese on it. That is the only picky opinion we have when making this meal.  Although I help her it still takes a lot of time and ends up being a family effort and my father putting his two senses in, resulting in him getting kicked out of the kitchen. Yet it is still the best meal we all get to enjoy, not even just its significance but because it tastes so good when finally done.  

1000-word draft:

Every birthday in my family we get to choose which meal we want for our birthday dinner. The one I chose for my last three birthdays was chicken parmesan with spaghetti. It has been made for several dinners with my grandparents and even this past New Year’s Eve. This home cooked meal is one thing I look forward to having when I get to go home. My grandparents especially make this special for me and my sister when we get to enjoy this meal from time to time. This dish has always had a significance stance in my family for being a go-to meal to cook for family events and how special it has become over the years.  

My parents used to make this meal regularly when my grandparents came over for dinner. Now that they are no longer here, this meal has grown to be very special to my family over the past years. Although we do not eat it regularly anymore, it makes it more significant when we get to have this meal. My mother normally makes this meal for the family as she has said “it is the only dish the whole family will eat together”. My family is normally fairly picky about what we have dinner and rarely do we all end up eating the same thing. This dish on the other hand is one that we all enjoy because of the past times with whom we have enjoyed it with. It is often nostalgic when eating it for me and my sister as we used to make our meals with our grandparents very special, decorating the house and giving them gift bags. My Pepe even used to do this one trick with the spaghetti by putting butter on bread and then spaghetti on top and eating it like a taco. Although incredibly unhealthy it is a memory I always look back on when having this meal with my family.  Hence showing how significant this one very simple meal has become so much more for my family. Personally, I find myself fairly attached to this meal mainly because of all the memories it holds. 

This dish is made by my mother, but past years was made my father, he pretty much gave up on making it. It is very time consuming from what I have heard from my mother, which is why I try to help her a lot in the process of making it. I normally make the spaghetti while she does the chicken just to help her out a little bit. She has made this for my past three birthdays as a good home cook meal. She said the reason I love to eat this meal “is because its pasta, chicken, and cheese.” She also said that “chicken was the only meat you would eat when you were younger.” Which is still very true and continues to prove that my family is very picky and why this meal has been very perfect for that reason. One little thing we must do when making it, is having all the chicken parmesans have sauce on it besides one because my sister will only eat it with cheese on it. That is the only picky opinion we have when making this meal.  Although I help her it still takes a lot of time and ends up being a family effort and my father putting his two senses in, resulting in him getting kicked out of the kitchen. Yet it is still the best meal we all get to enjoy, not even just its significance but because it tastes so good when finally done.  

Besides the fact that this meal was mainly made during dinners for my grandparents it was also made for many family gatherings. Since it is my mother’s go-to meal she said, “although it is hard to make, it feeds a bunch of people which makes it a lot easier for our parties.” My family is very a large, and we used to all get together on the weekends, making this meal very popular as we had it very often. For events like birthdays, and even New Year’s Eve and no matter how complicated my mother continues to make it. This meal is simple but also so perfect for big events because it is a home cooked meal. Something I look forward to when I get home. Although my mother hates making it, she loves eating it even if it is not her favorite meal. It is so delicious, and a meal reminded of getting the family together. Not only do I get to have it for birthdays, but when I go home from college my mom will try and make it for me, so I have a real meal. They always ask what I want for dinner and majority of the time I always ask for this dish.  

This meal will always be my go-to meal for birthdays and any dinner I get to choose in my family. Although long processed my mother will always make it for us, as she knows it always brings us together. My Pepe is my main reason for enjoying this meal so much from all the memories we have created while enjoying this dish. Which is why I choose it for my birthday every year because it makes it seem so much more special when having it. 

Final draft:

Chicken parmesan with spaghetti is a simple home-cooked meal, but it never fails to be my favorite. My family and I, in past years, ate this meal with my grandparents for dinner on several occasions. With them no longer being here anymore, it has made this meal very special to my younger sister and me. My mom went from making this dish regularly to only for special occasions like birthdays or family events. This meal is not only delicious, but it is also a meaningful home-cooked meal full of so many memories I get to relieve every time I get to eat it.

In my opinion, my mom makes the best chicken parmesan I have ever tasted. My mom normally makes this on my birthday, or if I come home on the weekend from college, so I can have an actual home-cooked dish. When my mom does start preparing everything for the meal, I normally jump in to help her out. She has told me countless times that she “hates making this meal because it takes forever.” She primarily says this because it takes a long time to prepare everything and get it all set up. As my way of helping her out, I cook the spaghetti, so she does not have to worry about that part. She starts by setting up the chicken, my mom usually does about 5-8 chicken breasts because my family loves to eat this dish. She then will make the breading and put that on the chicken while I am boiling the water for the spaghetti. She only puts sauce on a few of the chicken breasts because my sister does not like the sauce on hers, then she will put the mozzarella cheese on. When the chicken parmesan has been baked for about 20 minutes, I will cook the spaghetti, so it is all done at the same time. The baking of the chicken is around 40 minutes, and the preparation time depends, but it is normally 20-30 minutes. My mom said, “although it is a little time-consuming, it does feed a lot of people, which makes it easier for our parties.” Since my family is very large, my mom has cooked this meal a few times for some parties we have had. On the days of these parties, I try to help my mom out a lot more when she makes this meal, so she has enough time for everything else. The only good thing about making this meal is that she doesn’t have to make a ton of other dishes because this is so filling.

When I was younger this meal was very appealing to me because I was incredibly picky and would only eat chicken for meat. When I was discussing this meal with my mom, she said I loved it so much because it tasted good. Except she also mentioned that “it was chicken, sauce, pasta, and cheese the only ingredients you would eat.” This comment remains to be true and completely understandable as to why it is my favorite meal. My family was and still is very picky eaters and we tend to eat separate meals for dinner because we have such different tastes. When it comes to chicken parmesan, my mom described it as “the only meal where we all eat the same thing.” Mainly because it is so simple of a meal and always ends up tasting great. This meal is the perfect mix of all of our tastes and meshes so well together, making it a lot more meaningful. It makes it seem like we are having the same meals we did in past years with the ones we have lost.

Besides the fact that this dish is so delicious, the main reason it is my favorite is because of all the memories that involve this meal. My grandparents used to come over every Friday night when I was younger for dinner. This was always a big thing for my sister and me, and we went all out for them. We had banners, decorations, and little goodie bags for when they left; it is always a special memory to look back on. This meal happens to be the only one I always remember eating with them. One memory I have of my Pepe was him putting spaghetti on a buttered piece of bread and eating it like a taco. It was very odd and unhealthy, but my sister and I still do it every time we have spaghetti. Thinking about this meal and the people I have shared it with brings back so many memories of getting everything ready for them. We had to make sure everything was perfect and that both my grandparents left with stickers and a handful of dandelions with colored hair elastic holding them together. These nights were so special and mean so much more now, which makes this meal so significant to me. It is like a portal back to when I was with people I miss so much and how simple everything was then.

This meal as simple and tasty as it is, it has such a deeper and more complex meaning to me for why it is my favorite. It is a flashback to my fondest memories of my childhood and makes me feel like I am reliving those same events again. The meal itself is so delicious and I am so grateful every time my mom is willing to make it. Having this meal will always be very meaningful and help me to remember the past times and how fun they were. This meal will always be my go-to favorite meal because of its tastiness and its significance from my past.