somewhere in the middle: It looked good in the picture...

There are some people who can look in their pantry, create a meal, and put it on the table with no exact measurements or instruction. I am not one of those people. But I am really good at following recipes, and have had much success coming up with new meals by using the direction of those who have tried it before me. As long as everything goes according to plan.

I like to use the internet now to look for recipes. I've learned that if I keep them in my email inbox with the intention of printing and keeping them, I end up deleting them a few weeks later. If I print them and put them on the counter with the intention of putting them in a book, they end up being used as coloring pages. So, I created a folder in my email creatively called "Recipes," email the link to myself and file it away. When it's time to cook, I bring the laptop in the kitchen, and presto, the recipe is there for use.

To get new recipes, I don't have the patience to just browse and find something that looks good. I search based on the ingredient I want to use, which in the case of tonight's dinner, was baked beans. I found an easy recipe with a yummy-looking picture and was very excited to try it. The Deen Bros (of Food Network fame) Ground Beef and Baked Beans Casserole seemed to me to have a lot of promise. (pic to the left) Looks good, no?

It was easy to make, hard to screw up, but it turned out just ok. The problem, I think, was the sauce. The majority of the liquid that makes up the sauce comes from the baked beans. When I opened the can of baked beans I used for this, I even thought to myself that the sauce was pretty watery, but didn't realize it would matter as much as it did. The taste itself, I thought, was very good. So I guess next time I have to use a fancy baked bean brand to make sure that the sauce is nice and thick like the picture. I also have to move the oven rack down one before I put it under the broiler so the bacon gets more overall crispy instead of crunchy tips and just-cooked middles. And I bet it would help the picture if I made it at 3 pm and put it on a pretty tablecloth as the sunshine beams in. But alas, here is my version:

Thanks to my husband and brother-in-law for thanking me for the lovely meal, even if they didn't actually think it was so lovely. If you'd like to try and make this even better than I did (please send pictures, I'd love to see it), here is the link: