Running out of Gas!

Hi all!  I'm back!  I haven't written in forever, but now I plan to make at least one weekly blog post :)  This post is dedicated to my dinner disaster that happened the other night.  So I was making chicken and noodles with a creamy garlic sauce when my propane tank ran out!  We have a regulator on our tank but it doesn't work so well and I never check it.  It is just one of those things that when it runs out it is out and you have to go get another tank.  So mine ran out at around 6pm while I was cooking and it was too late to get another tank, all the stores are closed.  Luckily I had already cooked the chicken and the noodles.  All I had left to cook was the cauliflower and the sauce.  I didn't have any great ideas on how to finish my meal with just chicken and noodles so I decided to cook filipino style.  Let's just say I'm not so good at it.  We have this clay pot/bbq thing that Filipinos call a stove.  You fill the bottom with charcoal and then place your pan on top.  It doesn't seem too difficult, sort of like bbq'ing, so I thought I would try it.  The charcoal that you get here is not like the charcoal in the states.  I don't really know what the difference is because I have no idea how they make charcoal in the states, but what we have there burns longer and a bit easier.  I found out in order for this charcoal to work you have to constantly have air going to it.  So I filled the "stove" up half way because there was a clay plate with holes on the inside that is about half way down so I just assumed you filled it that high.  Then i poured some kerosene on the charcoal, lit it and off we go!  So I started fanning the charcoal to keep the flame up and it was getting to be loathsome.  Sierra had this brilliant idea to bring out a fan and have it do the work for me (that worked way better! Thanks Sierra =} )Well, I had it going for about a 1/2 hour and nothing....my cauliflower is not even close to being done!  Then I have the brilliant idea that I can cook the cauliflower in the microwave (why I didn't think of this earlier I don't know, but hey).  So then it was time for me to cook the sauce.  I know I couldn't do that in the microwave.  Well, luckily right before I started cooking the sauce the girls that stay with us came home.  Rhiena, the oldest, asked if she could help me and I graciously accepted her help.  She told me that I needed to fill the entire "stove" with charcoal (so that was my problem!)  Well she took over and my dinner was complete within about 5 min of her getting the heat going.  Thank God for Rhiena!  It was a pretty comical scene (at least Sierra and I thought so).  Here are some pics of the wonderful cooking night I had!

Yes!  What a fun night of cooking ;)

not too excited...can you tell!

Pretty awesome!

The stove and pan of cauliflower.

Sierra is so smart!