Grand Prize, My Foot

Its the final day of fish month! Its the final day of fish month! No one is happier about this fact than me.

To celebrate this occasion, I have been planning a very, very special fish recipe. In fact, this recipe is so special - it actually won Grand Prize in the 1971 Weight Watchers Magazine Gourmet Contest. So you know it is fantastic. Right?

Developed and submitted by Mrs. John E. Kelley, the Grand Prize winning Chinese "Egg Roll" recipe contains the following ingredients:

2 tbsp finely chopped celery
1/2 tsp instant beef broth mix
2 tbsp water
1 tbsp chopped canned mushrooms
2 tbsp chopped canned bean sprouts
2 ounces chopped cooked shrimp
2 ounces flaked cooked crab
1 slice white bread
1 cup water

The recipe starts out like many other Retro WW recipes: boil celery, combine remaining chopped ingredients in a bowl, and wait for further instructions.

I should have stopped here

This is where it gets tricky. I don't know if it was me or the annoyingly vague instructions, but I really botched things up. Bad.

I was supposed to soak the bread in water for 1 minute and then brown it in a skillet for 10-15 minutes. According to Mrs. John E. Kelley's plan, I should have been able to press bread firmly with a pancake turner, pressing it firmly until it became pliable, slightly elastic and transparent. Then roll it out as thin as possible between 2 pieces of plastic wrap. Uh huh. Here's how mine turned out:

The point of no return

It got stuck to the skillet, tore in half and then bunched up like an accordion. Oh - Then I dropped it on the floor.

For my second attempt, I simply took a slice of bread and rolled it flat with a rolling pin. I had no other choice-- I wasn't about to try cooking the watery bread again, and I had a bowl of canned fish and vegetables that had to be rolled up in something.

So I rolled it up, pinned it all together and stuck it in the oven for about 10 minutes. Here's how it turned out:

Vegas, baby

This recipe won Mrs. Kelley an all-expense paid trip for 2 to the fabulous Desert Inn in Las Vegas. Really? Five days and five nights in Vegas for rolling some chopped veggies and canned fish in a slice of wet bread? Am I missing something here? Oh--and just to rub salt in my wound, I read in Mrs. Kelley's bio that she actually had to gain 5 pounds just to join WW, because she was below the minimum allowable joining weight. Come on! She's Super Skinny! What's that all about?

Curse you, Mrs. John E. Kelley and your perfect hair

Well get ready, Mrs. John Kelley--because now that fish month is over, I'll have plenty of time to sample some of the other recipes that were submitted to the 1971 WW Magazine Gourmet Contest but didn't nab the top spot. And watch out, because Mimi and the Retro WW gang will decide who the "real" winner is. Oh yes we will.

Next up: Second Prize Winner "Macaroni" and Cheese Casserole. Hint: there is no macaroni in this recipe. But you knew that already, didn't you?