Wow. My stuff on Zazzle was selling yesterday. My best item are the Hard of Hearing buttons. I guess they are filling a need. I know I need to get one. I hope the upward trend continues.

I also had a wonderful miracle last week. A woman I met online offered to send me some yarn that she didn't need. I said I would use it. When the box came, I thought it was awfully heavy for yarn. It was 3/4 full of FOOD including packages of dog treats. There are truly angels out there!

Pizza and Zazzle. Too Many Zs

Today I am still waiting for my truck to be fixed. It has been a month now. I hope that's it for a while but I fear not.
I hitched a ride to the church food pantry today. My neighbor was given a pizza but she didn't like it so gave it to me. It was pretty bad. The crust was good, but the topping looked and tasted like it had been painted on. I cut a piece and put it in a frying pan and added some tomato sauce. I didn't have any cheese but had anchovies (of all things to get from a food pantry....) I happen to like anchoves so I threw some on. Not bad. At least it pretends to be a pizza. If I had more milk and some vinegar, I could have made cheese, but I'm down to my last four dollars. No money to squander on vinegar.
I've been working like crazy on my Zazzle store. If you haven't been by in a while, come by and take a look. I've been really cleaning it up and redoing the look as well as adding a ton of new stuff.

Keeping Sheep

I've never understood why someone would crank up a noisy machine belching fumes to mow a lawn when they could have .SHEEP.  I miss my sheep. Here's a little bit about them. Keeping Sheep.

Mushroom and Stuffing

I'm still experimenting with some recipes and thought to share the results with you. I was given a box of canned and boxed foods which were pretty close to what I would get at the pantry but some a little different. (Right now I'm eating noodles with Alfredo sauce. Much as I love tomato sauce, it's nice to have a change.)
One of the treats in the box was instant stuffing. I like it in moderation and can even almost eat it as a meal. I tried first adding mushrooms to it. That was a big mistake. It was too slimy. I don't recommend it.

Last night I tried adding cream of something soup. I don't think it matters much which cream of it is. It might have been cream of mushroom, my favorite. Anyway, that was pretty tasty. I'm thinking next time I have stuffing, I might just make soup and use the stuffing as sort of a crouton. I'll keep you posted.

Recipes for Food Pantry Food

I'm not a cook, have never been interested in cooking, but I do like to eat. I'm reaching a food crisis though. It is becoming necessary for me to invent some new ways to use the same old ingredients. I'll be sharing some recipes as I discover them.

Food pantries are not all alike. Even in the New England towns I used to live in, there were differences. Some loaded you up with meat and cheese before doling out the canned goods. Some were canned goods only. Some had bread, but most did not. Some let you pick your own. That I loved. I didn't end up with 20 cans of my least favorite vegetables
Down here in Texas, the lines are longer and the bags are already filled. Everyone gets the same thing. I'm accumulating a closet shelf of food I don't particularly care for or have eaten so much of it, I'll gag if I eat it again.Two dishes I simply cannot face again are pasta and spaghetti sauce and rice and beans.

 Some months ago I had been keeping grated Parmesan cheese on hand. It seems to make everything taste better. I had ramen noodles which I was getting heartily sick of, but it is cheap. This time it was from the pantry along with chickpeas which I do like but not by itself.

I had a flash of inspiration. I discovered Ramen Noodle and Chickpea Soup.

I prepared a bag of ramen noodle by pouring hot water over it in a bowl and letting it sit for 5 minutes.
Add the chickpeas and sprinkle on grated cheese. Simple, filling and tasty!