I Don't Enjoy Cooking

As I attempt to jump back into blogging, I figured I could start with a post that you will most likely see only once from me:  a recipe!  I am pretty convinced I don't belong in the kitchen with laborious recipes.  I get overwhelmed when there are more than 4 ingredients and multiple steps.  You wonder how my family survives?  I LOVE grilling and I can make a great salad and simple side dishes.  I even asked for a grill for mother's day one year.  I own the grill in this family.  In fact, I tried to let Jeremy grill the other day and honestly experienced a little anxiety.  But, my control issues are another blog post entirely so, back to the kitchen!

So, a dear friend gave me some vegetables from her garden which included an enormous zucchini.  The first thing I said to her was "What do I do with this thing?" She said, "You cook it".  Ha ha...yes.  But, how?  Two other kind friends were already googling recipes and giving me tips about baked zucchini and asked me to take pictures of the finished product.  As I got in the car with my daughter, I said to her "Well shoot, now I'm going to have to do something with this thing".  Culinary pressure at it's finest.  So, I googled a few recipes and most were all vegetarian and required cheese and bread.  Well, I have to have protein with my meal and I like cheese and bread with wine.  So, I {drumroll please} combined different recipes I read and made up my own!  Yeah, I still get excited thinking about it.

Everything went pretty smoothly except that I broke a plate, grabbed the hot baking dish with my bare hand and stepped on my chihuahua twice.  She's a scrounge and I drop a lot of stuff.  We work well together but, sometimes she misjudges my swift movements.  As exciting as it was to try the finished product and have my skeptical husband say, "I actually like this", I think that experience will hold me over for a month or two.  I'd rather throw meat on the grill and sit down and watch some football.

Sunshine's Zucchini:

Zucchini
Organic ground beef
Italian season
Garlic powder
Red onion
Spaghetti sauce
Basil
Salt
Pepper

Preheat oven to 350
Slice zucchini lengthwise and scrape out insides and set aside
Bake zucchini for 20 minutes face down
Meanwhile brown ground beef and add italian season, garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste
Mash insides of zucchini in a mixing bowl (yeah, I thought this was weird because of the seeds but, one recipe called for it and I justified it with retaining all the nutrients of the vegetable)
Sauté onion and add to mixture (I also salt and peppered a bit here and added a dash of italian seasoning)
Finley chop basil and add to mixture
Add one cup spaghetti sauce to mixture

Since I had more meat than I did space in the boats, I made side batches of mixture and ground beef for each individual boat.  I will use the leftovers for pasta and some meat sauce for my son tonight.

Fill the boats and return to oven for 20 minutes.  You could top with mozzarella before returning to oven which would probably be delicious.  But, I am selective in my cheese consumption.  Cheese=calories in my brain and if I'm going to enjoy it, I want to splurge when the time is right.  i.e. pizza or straight up on a cracker.

Enjoy!  (I hope)