"What's for dinner?"
We've all heard it. This can strike fear into the hearts of even the most seasoned cooks.
I like to try new recipes - especially if they're good for you...and CHEAP. However, I'm not much of a cook. I used to blame it on my heritage: Irish and German. If I can boil it, or it's potatoes, I'm your girl. Otherwise, sample at your own risk.
It got so bad at one point, that Mondays used to be referred to as "Fear Factor Night" at my house. My youngest used to love that TV show and, apparently, that was my favorite night to try new recipes. Recently, I've discovered Pinterst. The cool thing about Pinterest, is that I can find recipes that have been pinned by many people. This is a fantastic feature!
I also like to save money. So, I try to combine the two (cooking and saving money) whenever I can. Sometimes I'm successful, other times not so much. Sometimes, I'm left with ingredients that I don't like and will not eat again ( I have a bottle of capers, for example, that could be as old as 10 years...) Other times, I'm left with A LOT of leftovers - that nobody will eat. This happens often.
So - when I stumble on a recipe that everyone in my house will eat (currently me, my husband and 3 teenage daughters) it's like striking gold! And if it's cheap or made with ingredients that I usually keep in stock - so much the better.
In addition, in my quest to save money - or refrain from throwing it out - I've learned about a "fiscal fast" from a variety of sources (including the TLC show Extreme Cheapskates). This is when you just don't spend money. It's harder than it seems. The place where I see my family (and others) is in the refrigerator and freezer. Leftovers. Old food that we bought for a recipe or that seemed like a good purchase at the time. It goes directly into the garbage. It's sad. We wouldn't throw dollar bills into the trash, would we? Heck NO!
So, in the spirit of making "something from nothing" (do you see a trend here?) I decided to go on a fiscal fast this week. So, I had to look deep into the freezer, refrigerator and cabinets to see what I could come up with.
Monday night this week, I happened upon two bags of shrimp. I'm not sure how old they were. But they were sealed and not freezer burned. It was a good find! The first thing that came to mind is Shrimp Scampi. Did I have pasta? Check. Did I have garlic? Check. How about butter? Check. I was in business! I went to Pinterest and found a recipe for scampi that used ingredients I already had and got to work. This is the one I used. But you could add variations. For example, I used peas for color and to get that vegetable in there.
In the future I'll be sure to snap pics of my ingredients and my actual dish. But for today (and since I'm a newbie blogger) here is a link (click the pic!) to the recipe from Pinterst.
This recipe has always been met with cheers from my crew. My oldest (Vegan/Vegetarian, who recently started eating meat again), my middle (not a really picky eater, my youngest (it's shrimp, what's not to like?) and my husband (he will eat a lot and loves seafood). I did actually add some flour to the butter to make a gravy of sorts, since I served it with pasta. This was a prior suggestion from my husband. The pasta I used was orzo (it had been in the pantry a while, but again, it was sealed and tasted fine...I have no idea what recipe it was originally purchased for!) - this was a nice change up and everyone loved it.
Enjoy!
Shrimp Scampi
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