I made you a cookie. But I eated it.

In honor of my dear internet friend, Lindsey's, upcoming nuptuals, I thought I'd share with you all my most recent adventures in domesticity.  I'm not sure if I've mentioned this, but I have the honored position of Bridesmaid Extraoridnaire for not one, but TWO, friends who are getting married this year.  Both of their showers are coming up (like, SOON), and for shower #1, I'm a co-host.  My co-hosting duties involve cooking for a fancy-pants shower.

(GULP.)

I am determined to wow everyone at this fancy-pants shower with my three delicious side dishes.  It's not going to be at all like last month, when I showed up to the joint Mother's Day/Future SIL's birthday BBQ with the cookies I'd promised to bake for the occasion.  I was psyched about these cookies, let me tell you.  I sorted out green (my mom's favorite color) M&Ms for my mother's day batch and kept them in a bowl right next to the blue and brown (Future SIL's possible wedding colors) M&M's I'd sorted out for the birthday cookies.  Cute idea, right?  I sure thought so.  

I carefully measured all the ingredients, and put them in little containers next to the sorted M&Ms, I even remembered to take the butter out of the fridge to soften!  I did everything right.  And yet, the cookies turned out like cow patties.  Melted, crumbly cow patties. I guess I should have just stuck to the boring old chocolate chips that the recipe called for. 

(But all those leftover M&Ms sure were delicious.)

So, yeah.  This shower is going to be NOTHING LIKE THAT.  You see, I've gone and recruited myself a coach.  And like any good student, I've been practicing.  

The first recipe my coach suggested was this Spinach and Artichoke Salad from the Food Network.  I printed it out dutifully and made it that weekend.  I learned quite a bit.  For instance, did you know that you can buy roasted red peppers in a jar?  And sun-dried tomatoes?  And baby artichoke hearts?  I did not know these things.  But now I do!  This is what I like to call progress.

Also, did you know that Rachel Ray is a damned dirty liar? 

EIGHT MINUTES, MY ASS.  It took me more than eight minutes just to peel and chop the garlic.  (Of course, it turned out that it took so long partially because I didn't realize there was a difference between a head and a clove of garlic.  But, whatever.  There is no such thing as too much garlic.)

Also, note to other aspiring chefs with no natural cooking instincts:  When a recipe calls for fresh thyme, you're supposed to pick the leaves off of the stem.  Ahhhhh.  That makes sense.  Oops!

The first batch still came out surprisingly well, despite the thyme stems and the entire head of garlic.  It was a little spicy, sure.  But still, very good.  And I learned several things. Like, when it says you can use dried thyme?  Use the dried thyme.  Don't get fancy.  Also, when Rachel Ray says a recipe should take 15 minutes from start to finish, you'd better go ahead and budget an hour.

I made this recipe a second time when Jenny came over a few weeks ago, and I got the amount of garlic right AND I picked the thyme leaves off of the stem before tossing them in.  I forgot to buy the artichoke hearts.  And the red peppers.  But still!  It was very good.  Lessons learned from trial numero dos: make a damned shopping list, woman.

Next, I plan to perfect RA's Pasta Primavera Salad.  Um, before I start, can someone tell me what the difference between a coarse julienne and a fine julienne is?  Actually, I can figure out the difference myself if you can just tell me what the hell "julienne" means.  And also... prosciutto: it's ham, right?

So, dear Lindsey, my gift to you for this Virtual Bridal Shower is this did NOT cook you anything.  You're welcome.  

Comments

[Audrey]

I think julienne means to cut thin, long slices? Maybe? And coarse vs. fine would mean thicker rather than thinner? In reality, I have no idea.

And yeah, prosciutto is ham. But it's, like, cured ham or something. Which, in my humble opinion, makes it taste plasticky and icky. Or at least that's what it tasted like on all those damn prosciutto bocadillos my senora insisted on making me in Barcelona.

But anyway, happy virtual wedding shower, Lindsey!

[Julie]

I cannot tell you how much this post made me laugh!

Rachel Ray is a damned dirty liar! I just double all of the time that she says it takes for things to finish.

[Betty]

I think that Julianne means cutting things finely (??).... I remember is being mentioned in my year 12 hospitality class. Luckily for you I attended a few classes. Good luck with the recipe.

[Kassie]

That salad sounds so good. Sun dried tomatoes are my new fave!

[Jennie]

This made me laugh so hard.

[Kristabella]

I hate Rachel Ray. The end.

[janet]

Audrey has it right: julienne is long skinny strips. So coarse would be like the "leftover hair" version of that. Funny post...still sounds delish* to me.

*I hate Rachael Ray-isms. I just had to say it.

[Laurel]

No real human can make meals in the amount of time that Rachael Ray does. That woman certainly is indulging in the CRACK.

[RA]

I think you should pass off the garlicky version of the salad and call it something like "whole head of garlic salad." Who doesn't like garlic?

And, I apologize for not warning you about the deceitful cooking times. Her estimates are a bunch of hooey.

[Sarah]

So you're officially like a professional chef now. I am way impressed :)

As for Rachel Ray prep/cooking times, I add them together and double it. She is a LIAR.