Pass The Sushi!

We’ve all danced around our kitchens fan­ta­siz­ing about being the next food net­work diva (I mean some of them are so bor­ing a log could be more enter­tain­ing). Per­son­ally, I’m con­vinced they are miss­ing a mar­ket. Sunny is close, as she cooks for her­self and friends often enter­tain­ing. Brian Boi­tano would be close too if he were a lit­tle younger, as he caters to crowds.

The scene food net­work is miss­ing is the girls who are still in col­lege, not mar­ried, don’t have kids, are on the high­way to the career of their dreams that want to be the hostest with the most­ess. The girls that have pink crap plas­tered on their walls, pho­tos of their high school prom and soror­ity sis­ters tucked away every­where, match their over­priced bras with their over priced panties, spend 45 min­utes doing their makeup just to slap sweats that say juicy acrossed their bums to trek to class as if they woke up that way.

Well, I’m not one of them, but in my mag­i­cal dream world I could be the host­ess of the food net­work show that did. The young crowd that wants to be sophis­ti­cated and still end the night too drunk to remem­ber what really happened.

Yeah, I could teach them what their toaster oven is really capa­ble of.

Chicken Man­i­cotti — adapted from myrecipes.com

1 (8-ounce) pack­age can­nel­loni or man­i­cotti shells
4 cups finely chopped cooked chicken
2 (8-ounce) con­tain­ers chive-and-onion cream cheese
1 (10-ounce) pack­age frozen chopped spinach, thawed and well drained
1 cup (8 ounces) shred­ded moz­zarella cheese
1/2 cup Italian-seasoned bread­crumbs
3/4 tea­spoon gar­lic salt
1 tea­spoon sea­soned pep­per
1 jar red sauce
Gar­nish: chopped fresh basil or parsley

Prepa­ra­tion

Cook pasta accord­ing to pack­age direc­tions; drain.

Stir together chicken and next 6 ingredients.

Cut pasta shells length­wise through the other side. Spoon about 1/2 cup chicken mix­ture into each shell, gen­tly press­ing cut sides together. Place, cut sides down, in 2 lightly greased 11– x 7-inch bak­ing dishes. Pour Roasted Red Bell Pep­per Sauce evenly over shells.

Bake, cov­ered, at 350° for 25 to 30 min­utes or until thor­oughly heated. Gar­nish, if desired.

And then it hits me as I am mak­ing my chicken man­i­cotti, Food Net­work would never have me, because I’m pretty much a 14 year old boy on the inside — because,  as I’m slic­ing and fill­ing these tubu­lar hand sized pas­tas, I real­ized how I would describe how much to put inside each and laughed out loud know­ing I will never been the next food net­work star.