I'm mad at Rachael Ray

Okay, I know most of my foodie friends probably aren't fans of hers, but we've been trying to eat at home more, and I needed some new ideas for fast meals. The library had a wealth of Rachael Ray literature, so I checked some out.

From one of the 30-Minute Meals books, I chose the Sausage and Spinach Stuffed Mushrooms for dinner last night. Because I'm a skeptic, I timed myself - I'm not an inexperienced cook, but it took me no less than 60 minutes to get these things in the oven, and I believe I dirtied every dish in the house in the process.

The end result was pretty good, but next time I'll use smaller mushrooms*, increase the amount of garlic, salt the stuffing, and add more cheese to hold it all together. Oh, I'll also use the Cuisinart, instead of making my sous chef (Joe) painstakingly chop up all the veggies. I thought about it, but the original recipe didn't mention the food processor, so I worried it would puree everything too much.

Interestingly, the online recipe does call for more garlic and cheese, as well as the food processor.

*Or I might skip the mushrooms and just put the stuffing on toasted, buttered bread, like we did with our leftovers. That was much less messy to eat and very good. Then I could call the recipe Non-Stuffed Non-Mushrooms, which is kinda fun.