Foodie, Formerly Fat

Sometimes a friend will ask me the innocent question, “How do you come up with what to cook?” It’s an innocent question because they have no idea what a crazy person I really am (although some of the lucky ones have a clue). So today’s post is all about taking another peek inside my mind.

Ok, so, here goes… How my mind works: I’m thinking about the dinner I’m getting ready to cook (in this particular case it was the stuffed peppers from last Friday) and I start to think that it might be nice to have cookies for dessert. I ignore the fact that there are 5 different kinds of cookie batter (prepped and pre-scooped into individual cookies) in my freezer and start to brain storm about what kind of cookies I could bake.

Next I think, “Oh, darn, I don’t have any butter in the house.” (Side note to self: “How did I let that happen?”) Then I remember that I have shortening (non-hyrdogenated vegetable shortening I might add) leftover in the pantry from the Passover egg yolk cookies. I consider baking a batch of cookies with the shortening and my mind wanders back to my grandmother’s baking and the tub of Crisco she always kept in the pantry. At which point I start humming/singing to myself.

Turns out I’m humming/singing “Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ shortnin’ Mama’s little baby loves shortnin’ bread.” Once I become aware of this I start wondering what the heck “shortnin’ bread” actually is in the culinary world. I go look it up because I can’t allow my curiosity to be unsatisfied for long. “Huh,” I think, “it’s just like a butter cookie only with shortening…” (insert light bulb here), “Oh! Like shortbread!” Next thing you know I’m pulling stuff out of the cabinets and 30 minutes later I’ve got a pan of Shortening Bread coming out of the oven. So, to answer your next question: Yes, I know I’m a loon! 🙂