A Frightfully Frugal Food Flaunt - Bones 'n Blood -

Serving any kind of treat for an event deserves a clever presentation.  Each year at our Elementary school our 4th graders have a fun afternoon feast of “Gross Grub” around Halloween time and the feast features healthy foods for the kids to snack on as sort of a counter attack on all the candy they tend to consume at this holiday.  This year, my daughter decided her contribution for this event would be “Bones ‘n Blood”.  It sounds terrifying but really it is just bread sticks dipped in Marinara.   For more of a meal and not just a side you could serve these with Tomato Soup. 

But how could I serve a huge pile of bones straight from a… boring Rubbermaid container???  And what about the blood?  I searched around home to see what I had already and then glanced at the store.  Nothing inexpensive was striking my fancy. 

After mulling this over (I dream about problems like these to solve… their solutions come in sleep or while driving for me or sometimes just as I sit at the desk and begin working) I decided that a simple canning jar that my daughter could decorate with leftover Halloween stickers would be just the thing for the blood.  And a large paper bag was just the solution for serving bread stick bones in IF, and only IF, it were decorated to look like Frankenstein.

I snipped the top of a paper bag in a zig-zag to look like scary hair, I found some artsy black foam and a scrap of green ribbon, two milk bottle caps in my recycling bin and a couple of googly eyes in my craft supplies.  For the nose I simply used a small colored band aid I happened to have on hand in the medicine cabinet and the mouth is a shred of red ribbon although I would have used rick-rack if I’d had it.  I drew in a scar with black permanent marker and shaded the entire bag face with white chalk, rubbing it in with my fingers when I was done.
 
This is my inexpensive way to cleverly present spooky food at a Halloween Party.



Serving containers were free with what I already had on hand combined with some creativity.

I stretched the recipe to feed more people by dividing the dough into twice as many strips for biscuits as the original recipe suggests for its twisted bread sticks.  A triple batch of these, now serving 72, cost about $1.50 using just 5 typical bread ingredients readily found in the pantry: water, sugar, yeast, salt and flour which produced a very soft, easy to work with dough.  If you choose store bought dough to shape yourself the price will rise.  Barilla Marinara Sauce was on sale for $1.77.  The main cost was my time.  I was home for 2 hours getting other things done while the dough was raising.  I spent the last 45 minutes of that time giving them undivided attention as I cut and formed one batch of bread sticks at a time and pushed them through the oven while I approached the next batch and repeated the same process allowing them to raise, covered and on the warm stove top, only while the previous batch was baking, two trays at a time until all three batches were cooling.

To make more of a meal with these I suggest dipping these into an accompanying homemade tomato soup, also blood-like if that suits your occasion, which is super simple to make and more satisfying than its canned counterpart.

Zucchini Pasta Sauce

Many gardeners find themselves with an overabundance of zucchini at some point during the summer months.  Perhaps you are that home gardener or maybe you find yourself being the lucky recipient of a friend or neighbor's harvest who has a greener thumb than you.  For me, what comes out of my tiny garden depends on the year and what seems like pure luck to me.  If you somehow find yourself without a garden fresh zucchini it is also inexpensive and plentiful in the grocery stores at this time of year.
Combining a White Sauce with the typical Red, this recipe is a great way to use some garden produce up and is a delicious way to sneak a few healthy vegetables into the most reluctant veggie eater's diet. Besides serving up a portion of hidden vegetables here, I also like this recipe because it serves a lot of people without using a lot of meat.  I'm sure you could omit the meat completely if you are vegetarian and still partake of dairy or if your budget simply does not stretch far enough to allow you to use the meat you have in your pantry at the moment.  Either way, serve this with a spoonful (or two) of mozzarella or freshly grated Parmesan over a cup of Bowties or other favorite pasta.  Along with freshly baked bread sticks and a garden salad you've got a complete meal.  Serves 7 - 8.  Enjoy!

Red Sauce

1/2 lb. ground beef or Italian sausage
1 onion, chopped (or 3 Tbsp. dried onion)
5-6 garlic cloves
2 (15 oz.) cans diced tomatoes (Italian Style works nicely)
1 (15 oz.) can tomato sauce
1 zucchini, chopped or shredded
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
2 tsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. baking soda (to neutralize acid)
Salt and Pepper to taste
Dried Parsley or Italian seasoning, to taste

In large saucepan, brown the meat.  Saute onions until tender once meat is cooked through.  Toss in garlic and lightly cook until fragrant.  Add the remaining Red Sauce ingredients and simmer on low with lid on for about 1 hour, stirring occasionally.  After one hour, vegetables should be tender.  You can use an immersion blender at this point if you intend to really disguise the vegetables or you can keep the texture of the sauce if you like.  Make the White Sauce and boil the noodles at some point while the Red Sauce is simmering.

White Sauce

1/4 c. butter (no substitutes)
1/4 c. flour
2  1/2 c. milk (try using powdered milk for at least half if you are trying to rotate it out of storage. Powdered milk incorporates nicely when you cook it on the stove top.)

In a medium saucepan melt butter over medium-low heat.  When melted, whisk in flour until combined.  Slowly add milk, whisking constantly until slightly thickened.

When Red Sauce is prepared stir in the White Sauce until combined.  Serve with a box of prepared Bowties or other favorite pasta and sprinkle with mozzarella or Parmesan.