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First off, I would like to say that I did finish this project? and it was delicious.

Tuesday was a long, exhausting day, and I desperately wanted a home cooked meal. However, I live in an apartment and have to fend for myself. So, I decided to find my dinner on Pinterest. I mean where else would I go?

My mouth watering, I scrolled through Pinterest Food & Drinks. I clicked some links, but nothing looked perfect. Then I found Penne Rosa with Shrimp, it said it only took 15 minutes. PERFECT!

This Penne Rosa would be my first home cooked meal in my apartment, and I decided to invite over some friends, A.K.A. guinea pigs, for dinner.

Like most of these expeditions, aside from the t-shirt rug disaster, I started at the store. This project was more pricey than usual because of the shrimp and healthy over-priced ingredients.

There are two things wrong with this photo. Can you figure it out?

Give up?

1) I didn?t include the marinara sauce and 2) I used Baby Bella mushrooms instead of Button mushrooms

Before I started cooking, I decided to time myself. While the recipe was delicious, 15 minutes was a gross understatement; let?s try 2 hours.

Like most of these projects, it started off simple. Boiling pasta: idiot proof.

The pasta is whole wheat for all you people whom the coloring confuses. I like whole-wheat pasta and the recipe called for it. Double win.

When I went searching through the silverware drawer, I realized we only had serrated edge knives, which wouldn?t be a problem for the mushrooms, but we had tomatoes and garlic. Things were about to get messy up in my tiny kitchen.

Another issue arose because I had to cut things. I?m not particularly graceful, and sharp objects have a tendency to cause injuries in case you were wondering

That knife looks pretty ominous to me?

Luckily, while I was mincing garlic at a snail pace, one of my dinner guests decided to help.

This is what we have friends for: to take the risk for us.

The chopping took forever? or it felt like forever because I was starving. I went to soften the garlic after years of watching my friend chop, but I realized my roommate and I didn?t have a large saucepan.

Fail. The things you probably check: the pans. To save the day, I called my two friends, who I knew had a saucepan, and invited them over for dinner. Evil? Maybe, but hey it worked.

I got my pan and soften the garlic with the red flakes, the seasoning pizza parlors use as pepper. Then literally dumped a liquid mess of tomatoes and mushrooms. The instructions for this part say: ?cook for 5 minutes, or until mushrooms release their water.?

Instructions say what? I didn?t even know mushrooms had water that would release. I spent about 10 minutes staring into the pot, impatiently waiting on my mushrooms to release their water.

The sauce looked tasty already, but the mushrooms? They were being stubborn.

The mushrooms refused to release their water. So, I threw my arms in the air and said screw it. Then dumped some shrimp in the pot.

Yes, the shrimp looks gross. It was raw in this photo.

Now that the meat was involved, my guests decided it was time to make their expert chef opinions known. The instructions had a stupid simple explanation of cooked shrimp: ?cook until the shrimp are pink and opaque.? I thought that was pretty clear, but my guests hovered.

Finally, my shrimp cooked, but I had to taste the shrimp to reassure my guests. I also added in the spinach, which happens to be my favorite veggie in case anyone was interested in that captivating fact.

Although the sauce looks done, it is a trick. We haven?t even added the Greek yogurt and marinara!

I dumped the pasta in and then tried to eyeball the marinara and Greek yogurt because we don?t have cup measurers, and I couldn?t think of any other friends to invite over with cup measurers.

It looks a little funky in the pot, but I blame the lighting.

Finito! After two hours my pasta dish was done, and my guests were passed out from starvation.

It was delicious, and no one died from undercooked shrimp.

My first home ? well, apartment ? cooked meal was a success, but I did realize some things about cooking real meals.

? Healthy ingredients are really expensive? I can?t foot that kind of bill every night. I am obviously not Warren Buffet (a link for people who don?t know what Warren Buffet looks like).

? Check the pots and silverware. I would rather not have to wait for cooking utensils; I?m far too impatient.

? Be open to criticism. If I wasn?t open to my friends criticism, I might have slapped someone in my kitchen.

? Be flexible. Cooking is not like baking because you have more wiggle room. If something doesn?t taste right, add something to fix it up.

? Food brings people together. I realize that is obvious, but its fun to look back and think about a meal with six friends that I made with love and some frustration.

_____
Marylee Williams
Contributing Writer

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