Waste Not, Want Not

I think my mom taught me that saying. Thanks, Mom. 

For the last 10 years or so, I have been working really hard, "trying to make it in America" style. So even though, now times are good, I still like to practice my resourcefulness, just to keep it sharp. I mean, you never know.

I get on these kicks where I am all about using what we have. I can be a teeny bit indecisive so it is helpful to me when deciding what we will have for dinner, to look at what we already have and go from there. I dont like stuff laying around for too long, so I am all about putting stuff to use. Just ask Jeff.

This came into play last week and resulting in an amazing meal. First off, I had been craving lasagna. Back in Dallas, I had made a great lasagna and I remembered that I found the recipe by googling "best lasagna ever", and it was. Since I had lasagna noodles left over from the last time, I decided it was fate. Here is the recipe.

Since I am sure you are dying to hear all about my own personal lasagna making experience, allow me to share. First, of all if you make the recipe exactly as is, it is perfect. Everytime I make it (twice), once I get the sauce made and start putting it together, I think- This would be so good if I added mushrooms. I have not done it yet but if I ever do I will let you know how it turns out.

Considering my obsession with allowing things to cook ALL DAY, I made a little adjustment. First I cooked the meat sauce. Then I moved this yummy creation over to my new crockpot (Thanks Jessica!) and had it simmer on low all afternoon. I also love no boil noodles and that is what I had so I used them since that was the basis how this whole thing got started. BUT- I did not consider that when you use no boil noodles, the lasagna must be baked for 60 minutes instead of the 20 minutes the recipes says (you would boil them before). So that threw off my timing a bit but that is ok, we can work around this. Just eat later.

In my own humble opinion, no meal is complete without a divine dessert. Given that I have my very own ice cream maker now (Thanks Cydney!), it is my responsibility to put that sucker to use. Part two of Project Use it or Lose It, was choosing an ice cream flavor made of ingredients we already had that would also complement the best lasagna ever.

This takes me to my herb garden. I started this little herb garden with 6 plants in Dallas. Five survived (good odds for me) and I insisted on carrying them by hand to our new home in Virgina since the movers would not take them and I wasnt going to throw them away. I dont throw out a perfectly good herb gardens after we have been thru so much together.

I decided on Honey Rosemary ice cream since I had rosemary that I had grown my very own self and a giant gallon jar of honey from Catahoula Parish that my Dad had given me awhile ago. FYI, Dad, not that you will ever read this, I use this honey almost every day on something. It is SO good. You can see I have made a dent in it and I must like it since I moved it to Dallas then Richmond. Good Stuff!

The ice cream was very good. Creamy and an interesting flavor. Very good compliment to the lasagna. I added some chocolate chips to my bowl, because that is what I do. I dont know that I would make this often but Im glad I tried it out. I mean, if you can make your own and you have the ingredients lying around, why not.

I recommend this recipe, of all the rosemary ice cream recipes this one was the most simple, even though it was  a two day process since it required chilling overnight. Each step only took about 30 minutes, the same amount of time it would have take me to drive to the store and pick out a flavor, check out and drive home.  By the way, if you want the recipes, you should probably click on the words in a different color (maybe blue or orange?) above since those are links directly to the websites where I got these recipes.