The Shallow End

Cooking Up A Storm

Well, what would you do if you woke up to find the neopolitan ice cream all over the floor? And a flood of water trailing back to the freezer? Agh!! When I discovered the source of the problem (a frozen Stouffer's Chicken Lasagna stashed in sideways, preventing the door from closing completely), I was able to trace it back to Thursday night when I insisted that the other household residents put away the groceries. But since there are two other residents, I was not able to place the blame squarely on just one (both denied putting away the lasagna, although this is difficult to believe...but then, if I had been in their shoes, I would not have wanted to confess either). Anyway, this meant the freezer had been open all night on Thursday, all day Friday and all night Friday. By Saturday morning, most of the meat was completely thawed. The ice was melted and all over the kitchen floor. And other various items were coated in a creamy film of neopolitan ice cream which found its way out of the freezer and onto the floor.

I quickly went to work appraising the damage, tossing things that needed tossing, wiping up the freezer and floor and pulling out all the thawed meat that either needed to be cooked right away or thrown away. A couple of the items were easy to assemble...another batch of chili, another tater tot casserole (oooh, yee haw!). Then I grilled up a bag of chicken tenderloins to make a cobb pasta salad, and made a marinade and sauce for the pork tenderloin (which I'll grill tomorrow)...both from my favorite cookbook. I'm soaking beans for ham hock/navy bean soup in the crock pot. We've still got a salmon filet to grill and a whole chicken to roast as well. Oh, and we also made a big pot of chicken/vegetable/barley soup. Sheesh. I haven't cooked this much in one day for a long time! There was more mostly frozen stuff that hopefully won't kill us when we do get around to eating it because I left it in the freezer, including the Stouffer's lasagna.

I was about to brag about how good the Stouffer's chicken lasagna is, especially for only costing $10...until I read this. Heh. Homemade stuffed shells are way better. But it sounds like Sisiggy and I spent our Saturdays in similar endeavors.

Labels: Food and recipes

posted by Gwynne @ 9:01 PM