First and foremost, I feel it’s my civic duty to inform you all that May 11 is National Eat What You Want Day. I’m planning to celebrate. Care to join me? I think I’m going to have these Basil Burgers with Sun-dried Tomato and maybe Loaded Waffle Fries. I’m drooling just thinking about it! What will you be having? Join the conversation here in our Facebook group!

Over the last few months I’ve noticed some of you expressing concerns about the worthiness of your recipes for submission.  Maybe you don’t think they’re good enough, original enough or you’ve found something similar on the Internet somewhere. If you and your family enjoyed the recipe, it’s good enough. We’ve taken the time to choose you as a representative for our readers. We fully believe that if your recipe is good enough for you, it’s good enough for us. Send it in! If there are other recipes out there like yours, that’s OK. We’re not interested in the recipes that are out on the net. We’re interested in yours. Worry about what’s on our site. If we’ve published 5 spaghetti and meatball recipes with traditional marinara, we probably won’t need yours. BUT if we’ve never published a Thai Meatball with Asian Noodles we most definitely want to have a look at yours. As far as originality is concerned, we’ve discussed this one over and over. You know how to make them original. If you’re still concerned, submit the recipe and make a note that tells us where you got the inspiration for your version. Then let us be the judge. If we love it but it needs a few more changes, we’ll work with you to get it right.

Last month we issued the Spring Lasagna Challenge. Let’s get those entries in by May 15. You have 8 days to put the finishing touches on your recipes and get them submitted. I’ll give you an entry for each fresh recipe submitted (I know some of you like to recycle recipes you’ve submitted before. Those won’t count for the drawing.). I’ll pull a name randomly on May 20 to make sure our system has had time to update.

This month we’re hoping you can turn freezer humdrum into Freezer Fabulous by taking ordinary frozen convenience foods and turning them into something extraordinary. Take fries and top a burger or turn them into crispy latkes, make frozen waffles into a Panini. Garlic toast might make a great breakfast strata. What could you do with toaster strudels? Add some ice cream and make a layered dessert! The possibilities are endless. I recently saw a baked pasta dish that used tortellini, cheese and a basil tomato cream sauce. It looked divine. One of you should most definitely re-create that! I’ll even be your guinea pig. Just let me know what time to be there. You guys know me–always ready to take one for the team. Before I forget, you must have these recipes submitted no later than June 1. Submit them to Miscellaneous and put “Freezer Fabulous” in the notes section. Ellie and Emily have told me that they have some awesome goodies tucked aside. They’ll pull a name randomly from those of you who send in submissions. Send in as many recipes as you want. Just make sure they’re in our system by June 1. One more twist to this challenge: You’re limited to 7 ingredients, and you must use something fresh to go with your frozen ingredient choice.

Let’s recap:

• Use a frozen convenience food (waffles, pancakes, French fries, chicken nuggets, fish sticks, tortellini, etc.) Ask me for clarification if you need to.
• Combine the frozen ingredient with something fresh along with no more than 4 ingredients (So 7 total).
• Put the words “Freezer Friendly” in the notes section.
• Submit to Miscellaneous no later than June 1.
• One entry per original recipe for a random drawing to be held June 5.
• Have fun!!!

Happy cooking, my friends!
Sue Stetzel
sue.stetzel@tmbi.com