Day 18: Raising the Bar

Since we were eating Italian food for dinner, I decided to make soft breadsticks. With any luck, they would be as tasty as the Olive Garden's. I am sure there are better breadsticks out there, but my boy friends (my sons), love the O.G.'s. That's the standard to which to rise.



I found a yummy recipe in my Southern Living Cookbook (yes, I use that one book so often that the other 31 cookbooks rarely see the light of day. Why do I keep so many cookbooks? Why do I buy more? Why can I stay engrossed in a cookbook for hours, like I can with maps and a dictionary and an encyclopedia and the Twilight Series? A friend gave me this little credit card holder made from a portion of a Texas map (because if it were the whole map, it would then be luggage) and she didn't know this, but that little holder held my rapt attention for 30 minutes! Ok, don't pyscho-analyze me now, just read about my breadsticks, please).

I used minced garlic from a jar (and something like a whole heaping tablespoon of garlic too. Emphasis on heaping.I like garlic. Funny, I like vampire stories too. hmmmm...). I also didn't make the sticks 8" long because I thought they'd end up too skinny. In the picture, you can see my lovely, garlic-y dough ball. (And don't get me started on the stinky bread boogers this created!). I divided this ball in half and then from the two halves, divided those into half, so that I had fourths of this one beautiful ball. That's about all the fractions I could handle. I had a headache. Well, even without the headache, fractions I guess would've given me a headache. I'm rambling. This is how I made A's in English Composition in college. Beef up the paper with B.S. And of course I used better grammar than I do now. hahahaha! I hear crickets chirping.

Next, I used a knife (though some have nifty scissors with which to cut dough, pie crust, chicken, etc.) to slice 5 or 6 strips from each of the four dough balls. Let's see, that made between 20 and 24 sticks. Yay, I can still multiply too! I rolled them like I used to roll cigarettes. Just kidding. I didn't ever do that. But what I did do is roll Play Dough into little cigarettes (or worms). Why was smoking cigarettes so glamorous to me as a child? Does it have anything to do with the sort of reading materials I find interesting? I was saying I rolled them like cigarettes but they were more chubby like cigars. The big Cuban kind, not the Swisher Sweets. For a non-smoker this is the extent of my knowledge of cigars and cigarettes. I'm done with this paragraph. Snuff said.

I dipped the "cigars" worms snakes ropes in melted butter and placed them on a greased cookie sheet to go rest in Bob for 45 minutes.

(They don't double in bulk, they just spread out a little wider, like my butt has done since beginning this 40 days for 40 loaves trek.) My eldest boy friend suggested I sprinkle the tops with salt like they do at the O.G. What a great idea! I did.

The house smelled of garlic-y bread. My two boy friends announced that these were better than the Olive Garden's. And the breadstick bar has now been raised.