Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Tuesday's Child is...Random...



I thought Michelle Obama did a great job with her speech last night. She looked pretty in her dress. Even though I wasn't moved to tears, and am not really sure why people in the audience were crying so hard (except her mom. She's allowed to cry. My mom cries at everything too), she was a great speaker. I also liked how Barack said she looked "cute" and how nice they looked as a family. I disagree with Obama on most of his issues, but you can't deny that they are a great looking family.

Sometimes it's not easy working at Babygap when you're on a budget. It's especially not easy when the new fall line comes in and every little thing is absolutely adorable (and would look so cute on my little red-headed daughter!). Here are some of the things I'd buy if I could. Maybe they'll go on sale....
















Anyway at least Hy-vee was good to me the other day. Raw frozen shrimp was on sale for $3.99 a lb. and Santa Sweet grape tomatoes were only $1.50. This made me happy because I could make one of my all-time favorite meals: Pesto Shrimp Pasta! I hate leftovers most of the time, but thankfully my husband is a leftovers fiend. He'll eat even the sketchiest of leftovers that I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole. He has leftovers for lunch and for a snack. Well, I'll fight him for these leftovers!

Here is the recipe (truthfully I never thought I'd be the kind of person to post recipes on my blog, but I really like some of these meals and I thought you might too. I love it when you guys post them, so please keep it up!)

1 lb. raw, frozen shrimp: (thawed & peeled. I learned this the hard way.)
3 cloves garlic, or less if you don't like things to be so garlicky. You weirdo! How can you not like garlic?!
some olive oil
1 or 2 cups of pesto sauce: I suppose you could make your own pesto with your own basil, grown in your own garden, but I only have mint in my garden (to make mojitos..mmmm, which I now cannot drink), so I bought 2 packets of Knorr Creamy Pesto mix found in the pasta aisle. You could get by with just one, but I think it's better with a little more sauce.
grape tomatoes, halved. I orginally bought a pint, but about half got eaten (by me). Maybe I'll grow my own next year.
Spaghetti: I used a little over half a box this time, but with all that sauce could have used a little more. It depends on what you like your pasta/shrimp ratio to be. I always buy Ronzoni's Smart Pasta. It has lots of fiber/protein, but doesn't taste so "whole-wheaty."

1. Cook the pasta in a nice big pot.
2. While that's cooking, saute the garlic in a little olive oil and add the shrimp. Cook until it's firm and pink/white.
3. Make the sauce (hooray for packets! I never said I was a gourmet chef! If you're looking for that go to Caela's blog)
4. Mix everything together in the big pot (throw in the tomatoes and a little salt and pepper)
5. Sprinkle a little parmesan cheese on top and enjoy this easy dish of deliciousness.

I'm seriously thinking about going and buying the stuff to make it again! The baby asked me to.....

Have a wonderful day!

4 comments:

Michele said...

i'm sure your recipe was yummy, but shrimp gross me out completely. they've got those little curled up tails. it's a creepfest for the eyes. and the smell...as j says, 'smells like low tide'.

Em said...

Thanks for the recipe! I love shrimp and have always been a tad intimidated by it for some reason. But it seems to cook up pretty quickly, right? And I always assume it'll be so expensive. So..you buy it frozen, thaw it, and then peel it first? Can you buy it peeled? Is it more expensive that way? Just trying to figure it all out...sounds wonderful! And I have such a huge surplus of basil in my garden, I've been making pesto all summer. We like a similar take on this recipe, but with chicken. I make pesto (thick) and smear it on chicken, Mark grills the chicken, we toss extra pesto on hot angel hair pesto...and yum! So I know we'd love this. Thanks for the idea!

Em said...

thanks for the comment response...
I just thought of you as I was skimming recipes on the Pioneer Woman's blog. I found this:
http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/09/cooking_with_my_punk-ass_little_sister_penne_a_la_betsy/
(Pardon the title of the recipe)
It looked so good and has several of the same ingredients...but this makes a creamy tomato sauce. Probably way more complex than your recipe. But I thought I'd pass it along! :)

Leigh Ayn said...

YUMMY!

Hey I have something coming for your "leftovers fiend"! I haven't mailed it yet though! Soon!