On Memorial Day, as is the tradition, my sister-in-law Carol and her S.O. Marc (his woodwork featuring carved wooden bowls and sculpture make great gifts) hosted a lovely picnic at their place. They decided that we should all get back to our somewhat redneck roots and have a jello contest along with the other festivities.
You may want to try something like this at your July 4th celebration or other summer gathering.
I suggested someone try this garden salad or meat entombed in gelatinous horror from the Gallery of Regrettable Food. But the description scared everyone off.
While not jello, Bob and Ginny got us off to a good start with a Costal Ozark Sushi appetizer — basically pickles and cream chees wrapped in white bread. Not bad.
Our artist friend Lori made this All Star entry from scratch.
One of my favorites, my brother-in-law Charles’ dish had a key favorite ingredient: Spam. He definitely won the ‘Savory’ category.
My mother-in-law Eunice used to serve this to her kids. They called it glop then. They call it glop (endearingly) now. They don’t hold it against her. It’s jello powder, cottage cheese, canned fruit and CoolWhip. Mmmmm…mmmmm.
This is my Pond Scum. It’s a riff on my Mom’s standard lime jello/7-Up/canned fruit mix. The evil guy is my Mexican tequila cork.
Marc was just coming off a sinus infection. You don’t want to know.
Carol’s entry was my favorite. It tasted like an orange creamsicle. Maybe she’ll link to the recipe in the comments.
Friend Helen brought a specially blessed dessert: If you look carefully, you can see the Virgin Mary in the nut topping.
I don’t remember much about this layered entry from Bob and Ginny, but it was all starting to blur together by then. But that’s what happens when you put six or seven gelatinous desserts on top of a big meal. We were all starting to get a little whoozy.
And the winner was: Jello-Wello. A true oxymoron, this healthy jello concoction by Liz has fresh fruit, splenda, granola and all sorts of stuff you won’t find in most jello dishes.
Got any favorite jello or other redneck recipes? Share ’em.
