Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel

So at the end of August, I ran out of food.  Or, really, ran out of "planned" meals.  I had plenty of food in the house...I just had to get creative with the preparation.  I read an article in a very old "Taste of Home" magazine (2003, I think) with zucchini and although I knew my family would wrinkle their nose at it, I decided to give it a shot.  A quick Google search and I was in business!  Go here for the link.

These two zucchini were given to me (along with two others - four total!).  I put a salad fork next to it so you could see the scale.  These suckers were huge!  I split one in half length-wise and although the recipe didn't say to, I scraped out the seeds in the middle.  (It smelled like pumpkin...made me want to start brewing some apple cider!).  Then I mixed up the sausage mixture and spread it on the inside of the zucchini.  I baked it as described, although I had to cook it longer than the recipe said and it still was a bit "crunchy" once I took it out.  I also did not have mozzarella cheese in the house, so I sprinkled on the cheddar!

Here's my Sausage-Topped Zucchini in all it's glory!  My husband wrinkled his lip when I first told him what was for dinner, but he ate every last bite of his portion!  He said it "wasn't that bad".  I think it may have tasted better if the zucchini was a little more mushy.  I had it for leftovers and it was still just as good (our family of four only ate one half of this!).  The kid's verdict was what I expected, but they did eat the sausage mixture, although my oldest which must have been switched at birth balked at the cheese.  She hates melted cheese in general (WHAT IS WRONG WITH HER????).  My youngest gave up eating it only because Big Sister declared she was done!

SAUSAGE-TOPPED ZUCCHINI

Ingredients

• 1/2 pound bulk spicy pork sausage
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1/2 medium green pepper, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 cup spaghetti sauce, divided
• 2 medium zucchini, cut in half lengthwise
• 1/4 pound sliced mozzarella cheese

Directions

• In a skillet, cook sausage until no longer pink; drain. Remove sausage and set aside. In the same skillet, saute onion, green pepper and garlic in oil and butter until tender. Stir in sausage, Parmesan cheese and 1/2 cup spaghetti sauce.
• Place the zucchini halves cut side up in a greased 8-in. square baking dish. Spread with sausage mixture. Cover and bake at 350° for 35-40 minutes or until tender. Top with cheese and remaining spaghetti sauce. Bake, uncovered, for 5 minutes or until cheese is melted. Yield: 2 servings. (2 servings my foot...this thing could have fed 10 people)

For dessert, I scrounged around in my pantry again and found some boxes of pudding.  Whipped those bad boys up and found a buried package of graham crackers.  While the pudding was firming up, I crushed the crackers into bits and then began my layering process.  Graham crackers, vanilla pudding, chocolate pudding, crackers, vanilla, chocolate, crackers.  Put them in my fancy "margarita" glasses only because I wanted to show off the layers! :)

So I was nervous on Sunday of last week knowing we had to make it until Friday before I could go shopping, and I managed to make it all the way through!  My pantry was gutted and my freezer was inventoried and my family was fed - which was really the point!  Here's to the scraping the bottom of the barrel!