My Favorite Recipes (part 1)

Well, upon reflection of the events of yesterday's Thanksgiving, I decided to share my favorite recipes.  I know that I only have a few that I call my own, but that is mainly because I tend not to spend a large amount of time in the kitchen.  I also guess that I did not really learn a great appreciation for food preparation in my life.  But anyways, here is my favorite recipe.  I'll post the other two in a second post later today.

First, here is my favorite recipe.  I'll call it James's Strawberry Jello Salad.  (FYI, I got the recipe from a book that my mom owns.  It was published by Kraft many years ago, and is surely out of print.  So I can claim it as my own.)

INGREDIENTS:
1 large box (or 2 small boxes) of Strawberry Jello
1 20 oz can of crushed pineapple (drained)
1 16 oz container of frozen sliced strawberries
1 16 oz container of sour cream (I prefer to use reduced fat sour cream)
2 cups of boiling water
I also recommend having two large bowls on hand to prepare this dish, and a ladle really helps out.

1) Mix the boiling water and the Jello in a large bowl.  Stir for 2 minutes.
2) Add the frozen strawberries, and stir until the strawberries are no longer frozen.
3) Add the drained crushed pineapple and stir until well mixed.
4) Ladle around half of the mix into a second bowl, and place the serving bowl in the refrigerator.  Check on that bowl every few minutes until that one is set.  Keep the other bowl at room temperature, stirring it every few minutes to keep that one from setting.
5) Once the serving bowl mix is set, remove from refrigerator.  Layer the sour cream on top of that bowl, and then pour the second bowl's mix on top of the sour cream layer.  Place the entire dish into the refrigerator.  Serve when set.

I've seen recipes on the internet that call for adding bananas to this.  I prefer to not do so.  And my results have borne this out.  You can also save some of the sour cream to make a top layer.  I personally have not done so, if only because of the results above.

I took this dish to several dinners at work, and never came home with leftovers.  This has also become my signature dish for family dinners.

I'll post my other recipes in a second post.

Thanksgiving

Once again, it's been ages since I've posted here, so it's time for another update.

Thanksgiving has come and gone.  I like the holiday, but it's been hit and miss over the last couple of years.  For a couple of years I was going to Thomasboro Peace Lutheran Church for Thanksgiving dinner with the pastor there and with my family members in the area (my parents, and my brother and his wife).  Last year I spent Thanksgiving alone with a turkey dinner for one.  This year I went to my parents' house for dinner.  They had ordered a dinner from County Market, and it was very good.  Turkey, mashed potatoes with gravy, stuffing, cranberry orange relish, green bean casserole, deviled eggs, and pumpkin pie.  I brought with me what is becoming my signature dish, a strawberry jello salad.  I'll put the recipe up on a future blog post.

We had dinner together, with a trip for seconds, and then watched a Shirley Temple movie on Turner Movie Classics.  Afterwords, my mother went to play solitaire on her Nook, while dad went to do some early Christmas shopping on his computer.  I was content to watch a couple of episodes of a downloaded shows on my computer (before the battery went dead).  Just as I was leaving tonight, my brother arrived from their visit to my sister-in-law's parents.  I gave them the rest of the jello salad (she loves it).

Finally, to top the evening, I went over to the local Wal-Mart and participated in my first Black Friday event.  I saw that they had an office chair on sale for $39 (well, technically the sale was on Thursday, but you get the idea).  It's likely the only time I'll be a part of a Black Friday event, unless I hear of a super deal in the future.  All of the other offers for this year do not interest me one bit.

Well, time for me to get back to reality.  I need to check on my Wizard 101 game.  Have a happy Thanksgiving!