A college gal's reacquaintance with her lonely stove-- Shish kabobs with mushroom rice and watermelon

Despite the slightly higher temps this week, I wanted to experiment with a dish that would help me reminisce about warmer times.

So, on the menu this time: shish kabobs, mushroom rice and watermelon.

During my trip to the grocery store, I was much more confident walking up and down the aisles. I’m starting to feel more comfortable and I know where most items are at.

(I did have to ask the stock boy where the kabob sticks were at, but in my defense, they were by the paper plates and paper towels — a completely random spot).

Anyway, I bought steak, shrimp, red and yellow peppers, onions, McCormick Mediterranean seasoning, watermelon and Uncle Ben’s whole grain rice. I considered corn but I didn’t want to go too overboard.

All the ingredients were only about $25.

I cooked the steak on the stove on medium heat for about five or six minutes. It looks a little dark in the picture because I have this huge problem every time I try to make meat and pasta together.

I always under cook my pasta, and overcook my meat. But it didn’t taste bad because the McCormick seasoning was so incredibly tasty.

The steak came out just a little dry. So when cooking meat for dinner, don’t put it on a high heat, keep it a little lower than medium and cook it for a longer period of time.

And when you think your pasta is finished, leave it on the burner for another minute or two just to be safe. That way, it tastes softer. No one wants to chew their noodles like they do their steak.

After the steak and pasta was mostly done, I cut up the watermelon and cooked the peppers on another burner for just a couple minutes and threw some thawed shrimp in.

Finally, I just loaded up the shish kabob sticks with all my meat and veggies and viola — a perfect summertime meal in 30 minutes.

Recipe (makes dinner for three people):

2 steaks

1 lb. of shrimp

1 red pepper

1 yellow pepper

1 box of Uncle Ben’s mushroom rice

1 container of McCormick’s Mediterranean seasoning

½ of a watermelon