It’s been a long time since I have actually been able to do this but let me lay out a vibe for you:

I work 2nd shift which ends at 10:30 pm and I used to live in a really rough neighborhood. The kind of place where people mind their own business as a matter of safety. The kind of place where landlords don’t do inspections so everyone has a grill on their patio even though it’s against the lease.

So I would go out every single night at 11:30-midnight, light up the charcoal grill, poor myself a cocktail and spend the next hour or two cooking for myself in the quiet empty dark.

So to actually answer the question:

• the food would change often but always grilled meats and vegetables. A hamburger and an ear of corn, skewered and marinated meats and vegetables with baked beans, everything you would think to pair with a steak, I even grilled cuts of fish on a salt brick a few times.

• the drink would be something seasonal. In the fall I would mix burnt sugar whiskey with hot apple cider. That was my favorite.

• what I listened to was always some audio horror fiction. I love music but there was just something about the fire, the moon, and the colony of feral cats that chilled with me for table scraps, that demanded I listen to ghost stories.