Cooking? Me?

Okay anyone who knows me knows that I absolutely HATE cooking! It's one of my least favorite chores. It's up there with cleaning the toilet and washing dishes lol. I would rather muck out the barn. :)

Unfortunately due to health problems that I've had over the past five years (yeah it took me that long to figure it out lol) I have to cook and eat my own food. I haven't eaten fast food in two weeks (okay I had fast food on the day Chrome and Zep got in the feed shed because I was stressed but it was from a small eating place that has decent food - not fried or fatty) and I feel fantastic!! I still have some issues, but I've been destroying my system with nasty, fatty, fried, artificial fast food for so many years (I ate real, home cooked food growing up, but started eating fast food when I left home) that it's going to take a while to recover.

So anyway I've been trying new, easy recipes to help alleviate boredom and tedium. The one I tried today is soooo good I had to share it. :) I'll write the recipe how it is in the book (Eating For IBS by Heather Van Vorous) and then tell you what I did differently and give my opinion on it.

Italian Lemon Tuna Sandwiches

3 tablespoons onion, finely chopped
1 medium garlic clove, minced
2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
Juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon dried parsley
2 teaspoons dill weed
6 oz. can of olid white albacore tuna, packed in water, rinsed
Salt and pepper to taste
Small bunch of fresh basil, stems removed, finely shredded
Small tomato, thinly sliced

One 18" long narrow French bread baguette, halved horizontally, toasted

Whisk the onion, garlic, oil and lemon juice together, then whisk in parsley and dill. Stir in tuna until well blended and season with salt and pepper to taste. Assemble sandwiches with fresh basil on the bottom, tuna in the middle and tomato on top (this will keep the sandwiches from getting soggy).

Okay, here are the deviations I made and the result. I used minced dried onions because I HATE fresh onions. I don't like the flavor or texture of them, but I love the crunch of minced onion. I also used jarred minced garlic because I'm out of cloves (you must be a garlic addict like me to like this recipe lol). I used dill seed because I don't have dill weed. If you do this keep in mind dill seed is a LOT stronger than dill weed (I just put in five or six little seeds and crunched them up). I only put in half the amount of lemon suggested (used bottled lemon juice) because I generally do not like a lot of lemon. I also didn't use tomato because I don't like them (are you beginning to see how picky I am?). I used regular white bread because I didn't have french bread. I think the french bread would have been much better, but I didn't have any. I also didn't toast it (I forgot). I think that would have made it better, but regardless I LOVED the result. It was delicious.

If you decide to try this let me know what you think of it. :) It takes literally no time at all to put together (if you already have the ingredients lol) which is a huge bonus for me (especially with no cooking lol). Hope I didn't bore you too bad. :D