Sunday, October 01, 2017

I'm Baaaaack. With Food. And "Company's Coming."

Today is Sunday, a day when I sometimes blog about food, and since I was saying when I left for what I'm calling family leave that this summer I was going to help give a baby shower, one with a children's book theme, I'm going to begin my return to blogging with that.

Now, if you go to Pinterest, you'll find that children's book themed baby showers are a thing. You frequently see some of the same books mentioned over and over again, and the other hosts of our shower, who were more on top of things than I was, picked up four or five of them right away. This left me going, What shall I do? What shall I do?

I have no recollection of how I came up with this idea, but to cut to the chase, I decided to cook something related to Company's Coming by Arthur Yorinks with illustrations by David Small.  I don't think you're going to find this one on any of the Pinterest baby shower boards or in a board book edition for baby readers. But I love this book, it had a big impact on my life, and spaghetti and meat balls figure in its story.

This almost alien invasion story most definitely deserves to be a baby shower staple.

Spaghetti Sliders Are A Thing, Too


So we're talking spaghetti and meatballs at a shower that was not planned as a sit down affair with a plate on a table. Meaning a thoughtful host shouldn't be forcing a messy meal choice upon her guests. How could I make spaghetti and meatballs into finger food? You know, like a sandwich?

Well, somehow I got from spaghetti sandwich to spaghetti sliders.

Feasibility study.
My computer guy had some serious doubts about this project and suggested I check out its feasibility. So the first step was the feasibility sliders, which I think I took to someone's house for some event, though I can't remember those. It turned out, spaghetti sliders are, indeed, feasible.

You, Too, Can Make "Company's Coming" Sliders


Spaghetti sauce, in case you can't tell.
When shower time came around, I began the sliders by making sauce. Instead of meatballs,  I used ground beef. Though Company's Coming describes meatballs, I didn't think they'd fit on a slider roll with spaghetti.

I didn't use slider rolls, either. Even if I could have found them, I thought I'd go nuts filling mini rolls. I used hot dog rolls instead and then cut them into sliders after they were filled.

I broke the spaghetti up into small pieces before cooking it, because the feasibility batch of sliders taught me that I didn't want enormous strands of sauce covered spaghetti dangling out of little rolls. Then I mixed it with some sauce before making the sliders.

Start big, then go small.
I scooped some bread out of the rolls to make a hollow for the spaghetti. I also brushed the rolls with some margarine and Italian seasoning, though garlic butter would be an option, too. Then I filled the rolls, put them together, and cut them into thirds, so they looked slider-like.

Finale.

I buttered the tops with some more seasoned butter, covered the baking dish, and brought it to the shower site where I heated it  just before serving. No, I don't know what I set the oven temp for or how long I kept the dish in the oven. But, come on, this isn't brain surgery. Heat the sliders at some temperature or another until they're hot enough to suit you.

Next Sunday: All the children's book shower food.


For the first time in nearly a year, I'm taking part in Beth Fish Read's Weekend Cooking meme.



4 comments:

Beth F said...

Great job in your modifications. I especially like the idea of using hot dog rolls and cutting them. What a time saver!

Gail Gauthier said...

Oh, a time saver. I could do this post in my Time Management Tuesday feature. Though, really, I was more interested in keeping myself from going crazy stuffing little rolls than I was saving time.

Mae Travels said...

I like that your spaghetti and meatball sliders weren't exactly sliders and didn't exactly have meatballs .... but... but...

FUN!

best... mae at maefood.blogspot.com

Gail Gauthier said...

They were like Impressionist spaghetti and meatball sliders. If you stood well away from them, they LOOKED like spaghetti and meatball sliders.

Yeah, I've gotten a lot of laughs from people over the whole idea of spaghetti sliders.