Posted by The Observer, MI on January 19, 2010 at 10:23:37:
Plymouth girl spreads hope for top prize in Jif contest
By Brad Kadrich • Observer Staff Writer • January 19, 2010
Whenever it’s time for family gatherings, Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners, Stephanie Hosko has definite ideas about place settings, decorations and the food.
So, when she found out about a contest for the most creative sandwich using peanut butter, it was no surprise she’d dive right in. The 10-year-old started talking recipe immediately with her mom, Lauren, and her grandmother.
Together, they put together some grilled chicken, sauteed red peppers, crushed pineapple, pineapple juice, lettuce and soy sauce, along with the requisite peanut butter, put it all on a flour tortilla, and Stephanie Hosko’s “chickenchita” was born.
The sandwich catapulted Stephanie, the daughter of Lauren and John Hosko of Plymouth, into the top 10 finalists in Jif’s “Most Creative Peanut Butter Sandwich Contest.” Jif officials notified the family last month, and Lauren Hosko was set to announce it in the family Christmas card before she was told she had to wait. She told Stephanie, but they couldn’t tell anyone else.
“I was like, ‘Really?’” Stephanie said, remembering the moment her mom told her she’d made the top 10. “I was excited. (But) It was hard not to tell. Kids would bring something up and I’d wonder, ‘How do I not tell them,’ but then they were talking about something else.”
The excitement wasn’t limited to the child, though. Lauren Hosko remembers being so excited, she lost track of what she was doing applying her makeup and used eyeliner around her lips.
“It was surreal,” Lauren Hosko recalled, smiling. “Our heads were spinning. You never think you’re going to win something like that.”
She hasn’t won yet. Jif is conducting on-line voting in their eighth annual contest through Feb. 12 at www.jif.com. The top five finalists in the on-line vote get a trip to New York for the final judging event. At stake is a $25,000 grand prize, and $2,500 scholarships for the other four runners-up.
Stephanie found out about it from her grandmother, Diane Roslinski, a dental hygienist who heard about it from a patient.
“We were talking about food, as we always do,” Roslinski said of her patient. “She asked me about my grandchildren, and how it’s fun when they get older because you can cook with them and such.”
The patient mentioned the Jif contest, and Roslinski told her husband about it when she got home. They went on-line and got the details, and Stephanie and her grandmother immediately set about deciding what should go in her sandwich. They talked about using beef, or maybe turkey, but settled on chicken because it’s one of Stephanie’s favorites. The other ingredients were chosen for factors such as taste, color and ease of clean-up.
Stephanie’s interest in cooking came as no surprise. She offers suggestions on family meals, she likes crafts - she once used a do-it-yourself craft kit to make her mom some soaps and bath salts for her 40th birthday a couple of years ago - and, being in a largel Polish family, she said she likes to eat.
Not all of the cooking has been quite as successful as the chickenchita.
“I like to cook, but sometimes I don’t read the directions,” said Stephanie, who admits to liking microwave macaroni-and-cheese. “One time a recipe called for two-thirds of a cup, and I read it as two or three cups.”
Stephanie, a fifth-grader at Canton’s All Saints Catholic School, has her eyes - and her hopes - on the grand prize and the trip.
“I want that really bad,” said Stephanie, who is also a figure skater who skates with the Westland Figure Skating Club. “You make a sandwich and you have a chance to go to New York. It’s unbelievable.”
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