Tuesday, January 6, 2009

My Weekend In Review


Well, it was the first weekend of 2009 and let me tell ya - it was pretty much great! We got off early Friday, were picked up by my parents, and on to Tunica we went! After arriving and checking into our hotel - we stayed at the Grand Strike (great, great rooms. very impressed. thats a picture from the website) - we went and ate a yummy buffet at the casino! It was seafood and steak night - which, I don't eat seafood and I wasn't in the mood for steak...but I ate some good sides! :)

After chowing down, we gambled the night away. We weren't there to win big money (although it would've been nice) - we were just there to celebrate my dad's 48th birthday! We gambled at the Grand Strike and whatever the name of those two others are called thats connected to it! ha! We ended up making it to bed around 2:30am! Yes, we were night owls!!! After sleeping a few hours, we checked out of our rooms and headed over to Harrah's for Paula Deen's Buffet!

Now, I'd heard great things about this buffet, but let me just say - Man was I blown away!! That was the absolute BEST buffet (or meal even) that I have ever eaten! It was only $24 for two of us and we ate and ate and ate! It was soooo good! It's all southern food and it's some of Paula Deen's best recipes! My family was definitely impressed! And to top things off, I bought a Paula Deen cookbook - and opened it up and it was autographed!!!! Yes, it was autographed by the Cooking Goddess herself! :)

After eating a zillion pounds of food (seriously, we stuffed ourselves), we headed back home. I slept the entire way back!! We spent the rest of the day resting and eating our leftover Southern Caviar dip and watching movies.

Then on Sunday, we got some major housework accomplished, our Christmas stuff put away, and I made two dinners for this week - so that I can focus more on working out than on rushing home to cook dinner (atleast for part of the week!)!! Then, hubs decided we would fix our grill and cook some steak and baked potatoes!! He can make a great steak!! We were having a great night, until I received the call about my storage unit! Oh well, it was a great weekend otherwise. And hey, it could've been worse, it could've been our house that was broken into, right?

Oh, I almost forgot - I made Paula Deen's Squash Casserole -D-e-licious!!! Below is that recipe and the recipe for Southern Caviar! Enjoy!!


Paula Deen's Squash Casserole
Serves 4 (big helpings)


2 cups cooked, mashed yellow squash
2 cups Ritz Cracker crumbs
1 cup evaporated milk
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1 cup chopped onion <--could use less

2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
pinch of sugar
6 tablespoons butter

Place the squash in a large bowl. Add the cracker crumbs, milk, cheese, and onion, and stir well. Stir in the eggs, salt, pepper, sugar, and butter, and pour into a greased 1-quart casserole. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.

Southern Caviar

2 cans black-eyed peas, drained
2 cans shoepeg corn, drained
2 cans Ro-tel, drained
2 tomatoes, diced
2 bell peppers, diced <--I left this out

10 green onions, chopped <--didn't use as much
2 teaspoon minced garlic <--used garlic salt and garlic powder instead
1 16oz bottle Zesty Italian dressing

Mix all ingredients. Refrigerate 1 day. Serve with tortilla chips.

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