Ronald says if my brothers bought an elephant, I’d think I needed one too.

Steve swears by his food dehydrator. Ken swears by his air fryer.

I bought a combination of the two. I just swear!

Granted, I did buy one of the lower priced machines at Walmart because I don’t have much luck with nice things sometimes. You may recall my blog about melting my last air fryer. And it was such a pretty color. Sigh.

The leaflet that came with the appliance was pretty much useless. Not that I would have followed the few instructions anyway. Probably. I did look up the product online, but there wasn’t much there either.

I started out with a lovely tromboncino squash (which Steve did introduce me to). It is the best flavored squash I have ever had with a firm texture and distinct flavor. Because of the size of these suckers (30-36 inches average), I decided to make the whole thing which would then guarantee leftovers I could rewarm in the air fryer. The first version was a tasty (though unhealthy) deep-fried, typical cornmeal coated delight so popular in this part of the South. I carefully stored the remains to be used for supper.

I laid the precooked slices onto the four wire trays of the air fryer, pushed the button with the French fry icon, and walked away to finish the rest of the meal while the fancy Dan machine did its thing.

Imagine my surprise when it dinged and I opened the dern thing! The top layer contained the squash above. Each succeeding layer was somewhat better, but all were overcooked.

Ronald is used to my ‘when it’s brown it’s cooking, when it’s black it’s done’ style and resigned himself to eat some of the eatable pieces. My philosophy is if it has enough remoulade sauce on it, pretty much anything is eatable. We didn’t eat it all, but we didn’t waste much, either.

So the moral of the story. #1 Forget the mess of fried squash. #2 If I do make fried, make only enough for that meal. #3 Try to find better directions how to use the machine. Maybe that should be number one.

But maybe from now on I’ll make sautéd tromboncino that is easy to nuke if there are leftovers. Better yet, make the old man take me out to eat. Or better yet, leave the cooking to him!

I swear! I’m having as much trouble getting this blog to post as I usually do my cooking to succeed. Argh!!!

In the New Living Translation of 2 Thessalonians 3:16, Paul says, “Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every situation. The Lord be with you all.” I’m claiming that for me today, for sure!!!

Blessings

Kara Beth

Just so you don’t think I am the only one getting old, take a gander at these two!