Funeral Potatoes

What does this Southern California girl know from Southern cooking? Butkus, that's what!

Once a month, a group of friends of mine get together for a sort of Family Dinner. The person in charge of coordinating it has gone all crazy with our themed meals. I mean, what else would you call it when we were asked to bring a Southern dish. The midwesterners were all, "Do you mean a hot dish" (but they said it with that cute little Meenah-sooo-dah twang) and I was all, "Do you mean like Southern, like South of the border?" Our coordinator was like...

No.

I wasn't about to go looking for a recipe. Not when I had access to real live Southern people (like REAL ones!) in my Twitter stream. Within five minutes of asking for a good southern recipe, I had my choice between all kinds of really great casseroles, but I needed something easy. You know... since I waited until the morning of the party. Then popped up a tweet that said: Hash Brown Casserole.

High Carb Heaven!

I have been really enjoying hash browns lately... way too much. So when this recipe came across, I was incredibly excited. I'm serious. Excited about potatoes. How sad, yes? You don't understand. I live in the land of Low Carb. Having a reason to eat a food item that is equivelant to base jumping just got my insulin pumping! And you know what? All my other Low Carb friends agreed. This casserole, aka Funeral Potatoes, was gone in like five minutes. Next time I'll make two!

Please enjoy this Southern dish courtesy of Sugar via Jess, aka Triple J.

1 32-oz bag frozen shredded hash browns (you can use real potatoes, too. boil, peel and shred about 6-8 potatoes and use 4-6 cups shredded potatoes)
1 can cream of chicken soup (you can use any cream soup but mushrooms are gross and i always have cream of chicken in the cupboard)
1 small onion, diced fine (i'm usually forced to leave these out. damn kids! use onion salt or powder if you don't wanna use an onion...)
1 16-oz container sour cream
1-2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese (depends on how cheesy you like your potatoes
4 T butter, melted
3/4 to 1 cup crushed corn flakes (you can use crackers - cheese crackers are good, too!)
salt and pepper to taste

preheat oven to 350. in a large bowl, combine the soup, sour cream, onions, cheese and salt and pepper. stir in the shredded potatoes, coat well. put potato mixture into a greased 9x13 baking dish. in a separate bowl, mix the crumbs and melted butter together. sprinkle evenly of the top of the potatoes. cover and bake at 350 for 45 minutes, or until hot and bubbly. remove the foil the last 10-15 minutes of baking so the top can get crunchy.

I made some modifications, because I'm just a crazy rebel. Instead of chopping up an onion and getting my hands all smelly, I tossed in a packet of Knorr Onion Soup. Also, instead of the Corn Flakes topping, I crushed up a bage of Kettle Sour Cream & Onion potato chips. That was soooo yum!

Now back to my regularly scheduled low carb lifestyle... until Thanksgiving, of course!

Holy S*it!

I hate it when I chicken out of something and blame it on someone else.

So a few weeks ago, I was at Saddleback Church for something other than the candidates' Q & A with Rick Warren. Ignoring all the TV trucks and buzzing helicopters, I sat and listened to Kay Warren, Rick's wife talk about a subject that I had been discussing with my inner critic for quite some time now. When I got one of the random passes, it was only for that specific time, but rather than feel like I got the fuzzy end of the stick, I had this awesome feeling that there was something at that specific time on that particular day that I needed to hear. As I sat there in the sanctuary, I understood why.

She was talking about the fear of stepping up.

Then she referenced Aztlan from Narnia. May mean nothing to you, but I fully expected her to look right at me. I got that feeling in my chest you get when someone randomly calls you out and makes you come up on stage to answer an awkward question. All from a Lion in some kids' movie? Yep! See, I've been using guided imagery in my daily trials with difficult people since I have a few of them buzzing around at any given moment. The picture in my head that I call to mind is the part where Aztlan (The Lion) belts out a roar and shuts the witch up. She is frightened back into her seat and he goes back to his pose of strength even thought she thinks she has won. That whole roar thing and the witch backing down... that's the visual I use when people start to cross my boundaries. Sorry ahead of time if I ever let out a loud roar when you ever happen to "should" on me. At least you'll know why. Back to Kay... she brings up Aztlan and how Lucy, the curious little girl asks one of the Narnians, "Is he safe?" The answer...

"Safe? No. But he is good."

Kay's point was that sometimes, doing what we're supposed to do may not be safe and may be scary, but we know that we are supposed to go in that direction... and that it will be good, and that God is right there with us. I've been wanting to become a group leader in our recovery team for a while now. That was why I went to the summit that day. The problem is that I didn't think I was good enough to go the next step... to ask. I was paralyzed by the fear that I wasn't ready. I didn't know if I would ever get the courage up to ask. See, once you ask, you are open to rejection. That rejection might sound like criticism to a sensitive ear. And I can be... sensitive. I hate that. A LOT! But supposedly, I'm not concerned about what others think anymore. And there was Kay reminding me that my Lion is good... So why then, did it bother me when the woman (leader) sitting next to me (also listening to Kay speak) got all snarky and said I was merely getting there? Because it tapped into that crummy fear.

"I'm not good enough."

That afternoon, we had the opportunity to nail a note to a cross. Each of us wrote what we were going to leave behind, nailed to wood, never to haunt us again. In next year's program, there will likely be a picture of some crazed woman pounding a nail in as far as it could go eliciting giggles and stares from some bewildered attendees at this summit. No matter how much she resembles me... don't be fooled. That woman was someone who was brave and strong at that moment. The woman typing this post still holds that fear in a little velvet box, wrapped up in a plain brown wrapper, tied with some twine, tucked away in a dark spot, somewhere deep in her heart.

What a pathetic loser.

But then I sat there at church on Sunday, a week and a day later, and heard a message of how many other leaders were afraid. Afraid of not being good enough. Afraid of change. (Woah! Didn't I just post something about that? Creepy...) Now, I don't mean to say that I am equal to Moses or Abraham, but I'm also not being asked to go smack down some big old Pharoah or build a massive nation. Nope. Just being nudged to help out with a small group of women that want to recover from life's hurts. Not a big deal. *big sigh* But I still worry... and I still care a teensy tiny bit about the opinion of others... and I'm still afraid to hear "No, Sugar. You're not good enough."

How many times do you suppose I need to hear that I am good enough? Only one more...

In comes The Pilot this morning, one day after the Fear of Change sermon, coffees in hand. Did you know we have a Starbuck's within walking distance from us? Did you know that sometimes, I'm still tempted to go to the Starbuck's Drive Thru like three miles away? Way to be green, huh? Anyway, today's installation of The Way I See It on the back of the coffee cup was #17. Look it up. I'll wait... Oh, never mind... I'll just show it to you:



Huh! Serendipity comes in 16 oz. coffee containers, too!

Here, I got all worked up about someone else being snarky and allowing that feeling of not being good enough to spill on to me and get me all yucky with their stuff almost to the point of not stepping out and stepping up. And all this time, the truth... (according to Keith Olbermann, but not Starbucks as they clearly state that this is the authors opinion... big chickens) the truth may actually be that they, the dream stealers, the nay-sayers, the grumpies are simply not very smart. Huh! In fact, they may actually be stupid! So you know what? Me and my lion are going to step up and just keep on roaring at all the stupid people in the world.

Even if sometimes, I still get a little scared...

...

Stories are great for encouragement. I'd love to hear stories about overcoming fears, ignoring dream stealers, or eschewing the snarkiness of others.

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