I've Been Mocked.. Again.

I've been made fun of. I've been mocked. It was a slightly traumatic experience for me. And this isn't the first time I've been mocked. Hubbs quite enjoys mocking me. Especially in front of guests. He thinks he's a funny guy. Okay well, he is a funny guy and I like the word "mock". After dinner on the 4th, the four of us could barely move because we were more than slightly stuffed. The Beavette, on the other hand, was just full of energy and was doing her best to make sure the dogs would sleep like babies later that night. While she was dancing around, hopping around, running around, throwing the balls for Nig & Chloe, teaching Nig to drop the ball on command, searching for frogs near our pond, rolling in the wet grass with the dogs, and anything else she could think of to make me completely exhausted just watching her, our conversation turned to my packed to the brim freezers, pantries and refrigerators. He just had to tell them how he built the second pantry because the first one was so jam packed that when he opened the door to it, something would inevitably fall out and smash his toes. Ward was looking on with a knowing expression on his face and June looked as if this was a completely normal scenario in their household as well. Hey - when butter goes on sale, I'm stocking up people! The same for canned goods, flour, meats, baking supplies and spices! One day something horrible will happen and we will be fine because I've got every imaginable food item on the planet well stocked in our house! He won't be mocking me then, will he?? Okay so yeah, I've got a problem. Instead of using up what we have, I tend to shop for ingredients I don't have for a certain recipe. I should skip that recipe for another time and find one that contains what I have on my shelves, but I don't do it. I admit I need food procurement therapy. Hi, my name is Lisa and I'm a obscure ingredient horder. I wonder if there is a 12 step program out there that will help me control my bingeing? My 2 pantries are on the verge of imploding, my freezers can not hold another item and my fridge is so packed that it's impossible to see what we have at times. I don't even want to talk about my spice drawer(s) and cupboard(s). *sigh* So, to save myself from future mocking, I've decided to NOT shop this weekend. I will use what I have in the house and will continue this "therapy" until I've cleared out some space. Most likely I will rush to fill that space soon after.. but hey.. baby steps! I am on vacation next week.. so I will have plenty of time to figure out what I'll make for dinner each night with already bought ingredients. I can do this! Right?? Which brings me to last night's dinner. I had a lot of London Broil left over (imagine that.. 4.5 people over for dinner and I cook for 20. Shocking, eh? - it's the damn restaurant life.. I'll never cook for a small group, no matter how hard I try - I've got too many years of cooking for huge groups in my system.) and I thought I'd make a stroganoff or a pepper steak, but noooooooo he had his fill of steak the night before and would it be too much trouble to find something else to make? Gah. All other meat was frozen and I hate, hate, hate defrosting in the microwave.. so I checked the fridge and continued on making quite a gourmet meal of hot dogs on the grill. Woo. In searching for the hot dogs, I found 2 quarts of strawberries that I had forgotten to use *blush* so I decided that I'd better get on that before they turned furry. Checking my freezer, I found a nice big bag of blackberries and blueberries that I had picked last summer and froze. In the pantry I found a big box of Bisquick and decided that I should make shortcakes to go with all my berries. Hey, what a fantastic summer dessert and all my ingredients were on hand! Party on! The berries thawed by the time the hot dogs were done, so I chopped up the strawberries, mixed in the other 2 berries and macerated with sugar and a little Grand Marnier. About an hour later, I took my potato masher to the mix and ended up with some tasty berries swimming in their kicked up juices.. yum! The "shortcakes" are a breeze to put together and really this Bisquick recipe is the only kind of shortcake I like. What it really is is a slightly sweet biscuit that holds up well to the fruit. Three Berry Shortcake 2 quarts fresh strawberries, hulled & chopped 2 pints fresh or frozen blackberries 1 pint fresh or frozen blueberries 1/2 c. granulated sugar 1/4 c. Grand Marnier (orange juice would work just as well) For the "shortcakes": 2 1/3 c. Original Bisquick mix 1/2 c. milk 3 TBS. sugar 3 TBS. butter or margarine, melted Preheat the oven to 425º F. Mix all the berries together with the 1/2 c. sugar and Grand Marnier, set aside for an hour or so. Stir the Bisquick mix, milk, 3 TBS. sugar and butter until a soft dough forms. Drop by 6 spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Mash berries to give more juice and spoon them over the warm "shortcakes". Makes 6 shortcakes.