I asked my husband once to pick out some things from the pantry and freezer because I wanted to try my skills at this endeavor. Now, he doesn't watch the show much so I got things like fish sticks, mozzerella sticks, brocolli and cookies to try and make something out of. YUCK! Needless to say our stomachs were upset the rest of the night! Today I am going to try it again and pick some random ingredients out for myself. (Lesson learned last time!) I have some zuchinni, onions, and potatoes from the garden that need to be used and a steak in the freezer that was bought in April so here I go:
I just love the sautes of various vegetables you can order at restaurants, so I think I will go that route. I thought I had some green peppers to add to the mix but I guess not, so think I will just use celery instead and add some carrots. Those little round green things in the picture (that look like small pumpkins) are a new type of zuchinni I tried this year. I really liked it, because it grilled well and didn't have those big seeds that the long ones do. I cut all the vegetables up into like sized pieces and rubbed them with olive oil. I then sprinkled with the garlic herb seasoning salt (that I bought for $1.00 at Big Lot's, I might add) and popped them in the oven for 40-45 minutes at 350 degrees until they were tender. The kitchen started really smelling yummy! Don't I sound just like the hosts of those shows?
Then for dessert I thought I would make two parfaits. I did this all the time when the boys were growing up. In this case I used some vanilla pudding mixed with Almond Milk, crumbled chocolate coated cookies, cool whip and pears (in those little lunch containers) and topped it with some of my homemade strawberry jam (which a friend told me the other day could be eaten by itself for dessert with a spoon!) I used my single smoothie maker and crumbled up the cookies then I put them in the parfait glass first, then a layer of the pudding, then the pears divided into the two containers, then cool whip and ended with the strawberry jam. (Picture below) At this point I must confess that since I already had the smoothie maker out so I put a couple more cookies, a scoop of butter pecan ice cream and almond milk into it, and made a milkshake that would compete with Dairy Queen! (That was another "Round Two Idea" at no extra charge!)
Next, it was time to tackle the steak. I trimmed it and cut up into bite sized pieces. I had some Teriyaki Marinate in the pantry and seasoned salt so I sprinkled that over the meat and marinated it for 3 hours like the bottle indicated in a plastic zip lock bag. Then I got out my trusty iron skillet and put a little olive oil and butter in it and browned the steak. I tasted it and did not care for the Asian flavor I was getting, so I added a few tablespoons of brown sugar and that made the mixture too sweet, so I then added some Worchestershire sauce and A-1 Steak sauce to the mix and then it was just right! (I sound like Goldlilocks don't I?) Much to my delight, this also created a wonderful pan sauce to pour over it!
My mom was always good at making something from nothing, probably because with 7 of us in the family she had to really make the groceries stretch. She was the original "Semi-Homemade Sandra Lee!" Here's what my final creation looked like:
Now for our mentoring thought: I don't know if you ever thought about it, but God is the ultimate champion of making something from nothing. In Genesis 1:2-5 "Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, "Let there be light, and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and darkness he called "night". And there was evening and there was morning--the first day." He just spoke at it all came into being and it was very good the scripture says! If we serve a God like that, I think we can trust Him with our children at school this year, our struggles with our health, our disappointments and griefs that we must bear in this life. The thing about this wonderful God that we serve, once we trust Jesus as our Saviour, we will never be chopped!
No comments:
Post a Comment