The Awesome Life of Erika

I feel awesome for a ridiculous reason, but I think that Brent is getting sick of me saying that I'm awesome, so I guess I just want to tell the Blogosphere!

Last night, I had planned to make Sloppy Joes. So, I sauteed the green peppers, and I was part way through browning the turkey (what, you don't use ground turkey in Sloppy Joes? Weirdo.) when I looked in my cabinet and lo and behold: no Sloppy Joe seasoning.

So, what to do? The answer is NOT to run to the store. The answer, of course, is to make it up. This might not be very impressive to some of you, who are probably the most amazing cooks ever, but it's a little bit of a big deal for me. I'm a good cook if I have a recipe, but I'm not always the most adventurous, and so making up my own seasoning for something that I'm accustomed to having taste a certain way through pre-blended seasoning packets was a big deal. This is what happened the last time I tried to step out of my culinary comfort zone and do something creative:

Yeah, that's frosting on Brent's head. I had piped it onto the cupcake to be all fancy (I think it was actually in the shape of a heart...) and then I accidently (or, as Brent tells the story "accidently") dropped it while handing it to him as he was sitting on the couch. Because of the overwhelming amount/weight of the frosting, it landed frosting side down. The picture doesn't do the sheer amount of frosting justice. End of frosting story tangent.

So I got out my spices, smelling them to see if they smelled like something that would go in Sloppy Joes. Season All, onion powder, garlic powder, chili powder. I got out a can of diced tomatoes and a can of tomato sauce. And I went to town. Part way through, things were tasting good, but too tomato-y. I decided to look up recipes for Sloppy Joes online (which I probably should have done first, but I felt fairly confident that my spice mix was a good one) just to see if I was missing anything important. Turns out I was: dry mustard. So, with a few dashes of dry mustard (yeah, I had it on hand. Again, impressive, since how many of your recipes feature dry mustard? I've only used it for meatloaf), and 10 minutes of simmering, I'm proud to announce that my Sloppy Joes weren't only tasty, they were better than the seasoning packet. Take that Western Family!

I guess the reason I feel awesome is that I was able to figure out what should go in Sloppy Joes mostly just by smelling. That seems like a good skill to me. It's probably not that cool. Oh well.

In other, less-braggy news, we thought that Brent might have gluten intolerance, so we went gluten free for about 4 days. This prompted me to finally venture into an Asian market and find the spring roll wrappers I love (the ones you soak in water that resemble a membrane, not the ones you fry), and as soon as I've figured out which vegetable combinations and peanut sauce I really like (I think I need to invest in some thai chili flakes!), I'll post the recipe here. Or link to it. Let's be honest, this is one that I probably won't make up myself.

Also, the rose garden is coming together. The dogs are currently covered in paint, which does not come off their fur with just a bath. We haven't been posting pictures, because the "before" is just a bunch of grass and a brown fence, so we've just decided to wait until it's finished and then we'll WOW you. Or something.

Also, my brother comes home from his mission on Monday! Yay!

Also, all my Wallflowers spontaneously stopped working. Boo!

Also, Brent only has two weeks left of school. Yay!

Okay, I'm done.