My food blog moment of fame!

So a few weeks ago one of the food blogs I follow (doesn’t that sound nerdy) was asking for recipe testers for their upcoming cookbook. I submitted myself and said I was interested AND that my family was NOT unfamiliar with me testing new recipes on them. Nothing, I heard nothing for almost a month.

Then amazingly enough while enjoying my first cup of coffee in our cabin in the sticks, I relish in the still secret joy that not only do I have internet my email came through and I was chosen to test a recipe! Then I think, oh no! I am in the middle of nowhere – where will I find ingredients, cookware, camera, laptop – I am seriously overwhelmed.

I do knock a few of these out of the way…my laptop-working! I bought a camera at Target in Boise – left mine at home. Ingredients? Well let me take a breath and finish reading the email, oh yes, here it is – the recipe!

Lazy Day Beef and Vegetable Soup. It was the 4^th of July, on our menu was burgers, beans, potato salad – the American Fare. But *said exaggeratedly* it is cloudly…probably going to rain…we are on vacation which means lazy day…but I thought for sure Ben would TOTALLY veto my plan.

We needed ingredients, only a few…Ben was on board – can you believe it? He thought it was a cool idea. Of course we’d have to go into town and search for the few ingredients I needed. Thankfully they were basic.

1. Beef – stew meet, I found a rib eye, I cut it up – YUM!

2. Noodles – they wanted something fancy but said any small noodle would do. We were happy with elbow.

3. Beef broth – really in a town of less then 1,000 – found it bought all 3 cans on the shelf @ 1.49 a can!

4. Tomato sauce – found it too, next to the beef broth who knew?

5. Frozen vegetables – found them, only to bring them home and discover they were totally freezer burned – so I substituted fresh veggies – carrots, celery and onion.

6. I amazingly had, Italian seasoning - should I ever leave home without it (read former blog post on – “we decided to drive”)

7. Pepper, from the cabin, garlic – brought some along, the basil was optional – shhhh it called for chickpeas – which I omitted.

I did write to them and explain that I was in the sticks of Idaho on a family vacation., that I was willing to forgo my USA BBQ for the cookbook but I did not have a slow cooker, I needed to substitute a stockpot. I did not tell them about the chickpeas…

I am waiting to hear from them. I HOPE I still get to submit my pictures, commentary and overall experience as a recipe tester. If not, I’m posting on on my on blog darn nit! I feel so lucky to have been selected anyhow I figured it deserved a post somewhere! If it does make the food blog and cookbook I’ll let you know:)