Jenny Garland

You know how on facebook, there is a new “theme” each week and you can change your profile picture for fun? This week’s theme is siblings.

I found this picture circa 1987 (?) of my sister Amanda and me. I’m in the front. We used to choreograph skate dancing routines (there’s a niche) to Whitney Houston songs. I kid you not, we were convinced we would rise to fame on Star Search. I can see now why our mother never allowed us anywhere NEAR an audition! ha. And in case you were wondering if it is really possible to sport both a bowl cut and a mullet at the same time, here’s your answer:

And if that doesn’t make you laugh, here’s another classic.

Sadly, there are oh so many more…

So tonight’s dinner. Yeah. About that. This is how it went:

Bleh. I made three things: London Broil, popovers, and a salad with homemade Caesar dressing.

Let’s start with the steak. Okay, seriously. Where did I go wrong? The recipe said to broil my tenderized flank steak 4 inches from heat for 5 minutes. Then, I was supposed to turn the steak over and broil for another 3-5 minutes. I did 5 minutes on the first side and 4 minutes on the second side. I even measured to make sure the broiler pan thingy was 4 inches from the heat.  The steak was a rubbery mess. Edible? Kinda, sorta. Tasty? No. It tasted like a steak you would get at the Sizzler that was under the heat lamp all day. I snapped pictures but it turns out poorly cooked steaks are really gross to look at so I’m not going to make you suffer.

That’s okay though, because I still had opportunity to shine with the popovers, right? Here’s what my cookbook told me my popovers should look like:

Cute, right? I was feeling really optimistic as I put them in the oven, looking like this:

My optimism dwindled as I took them out of the oven looking like this:

You think that’s funkified? Wait until you see what they looked like after I popped them out of the ramekins:

What in the world? How is that even possible? My poor, pathetic, tumorish popovers They tasted good but were so fugly.

Finally, my salad. I used Dole’s Sassy Baby Blend:

I added tomato, orange bell pepper, croutons, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese. So far so good. Enter homemade Caesar dressing. The recipe called for one tin of anchovies. I’ve never made Caesar dressing before so I didn’t think anything of it. Um, one tin of anchovies is way too much. After eating the salad, I smell like a fish died inside me. Not kidding.

Overall… solid effort, miserable results. I gave myself a C- because I think trying counts for something, right? We’re having leftovers tomorrow (wow, everyone is so excited about that in my house as you can imagine) and Thursday I’m going to try roasting a chicken. God help me.