Fun with Leftovers

So, it's been well over a year since I have added anything to this blog.  Sigh.

I can't promise I will stick with it now, but I'm going to try.  I really miss this blog.  I refer to it all the time when I make my weekly meal plan.  So, without further ado, I shall jump right in.

I love left-overs.  I really do.  I try really hard to make food that will last a while when I cook.  Big pots of soup or stew are good.  Casserole-type things like lasagna are good.  Slow cooker meals.  That sort of thing.  That way, I don't have to cook as often.

Some things are really good left-over.  In fact, some things, like lasagna and jambalaya, are actually BETTER left-over because they sit in the fridge and get all happy, as Emeril would say.

But some things aren't that great left-over, like risotto.  Just re-heating it is always sort of disappointing.  

I made a big ol' batch of risotto for Sunday dinner last weekend.  I had to make something sort of soft, because I got my wisdom teeth out on Friday, and anything crunchy was still out of the question.  The recipe I used, which I will share in my next post, made enough risotto to feed my neighborhood, so I had to figure out how to make the Tuesday Night left-overs as good as the Sunday Dinner serving.  And, after looking around on the trusty internet, I mixed and matched some recipes and ended up making the risotto cakes in the picture above.

All I can say is Thank You, Trusty Internet!

First of all, Kev said my plating looked like restaurant food!  This PROVES that all these cooking competition reality shows I watch are good for something!  Unfortunately, Kev also has a pretty bad cold, and couldn't taste anything.  So you will just have to take my word for it...these risotto cakes were GOOD!  Daphne even liked them!

And to make them even better, I used left-over pasta sauce from Monday night.  Kev calls this "food synergy."  It's a way of making different things in the meal plan work together.  He should really write a book.

Anyway, here is how I did the risotto cakes (the sauce recipe is elsewhere on this blog in a post called Time to Make Sauce, but any good tomato or marinara sauce will do.  Trader Joe's pizza sauce is good).  

RISOTTO CAKES

Ingredients:

Leftover risotto (that has been in the fridge at least overnight)

flour

eggs (1 or 2, depending on how much risotto you have)

bread crumbs

seasoning herbs and spices of your choice

olive oil

tomato sauce or marinara

parmesan cheese

Directions:

1.  (Do this 4 to 24 hours ahead of time) Take a small hand full of the cold risotto and form a patty, maybe the size of a hockey puck.  (Your risotto should stick together easily, but if it is falling apart, you can add an egg and mix it in to bind the rice.  I didn't need to do that because mine was really sticky).

2.  After you have formed all your patties, it's time to bread them.  You need three shallow bowls:  one with flour, one with a beaten egg (or 2 if you have a lot of risotto), and one with bread crumbs.  I usually add a little water to the egg to thin it out.  You can season all three with salt and pepper or Italian seasoning, or whatever you like, and that you think will compliment your risotto.  For example, a little sage would be nice with butternut squash risotto.  Basil and oregano with parmesan or mushroom risotto.

3.  Dredge the patties to coat in the flour (shake off excess), then the egg, then the bread crumbs, and place on a platter or dish.  After all your patties are breaded, cover with plastic and chill in the fridge for a few hours.  This will help the breading stay on and the patty to hold together during cooking.

4.  When you're ready to cook, heat your oven to 350 and remove the risotto cakes from the fridge.  Add a tablespoon or two of olive oil to a nonstick skillet, and when it's pretty hot but not smoking, cook the patties until golden on each side, flipping once.  Don't crowd the pan...do it in batches.  I did three at a time.  Put the finished ones on a parchment-lined cookie sheet in the oven to keep them warm until it's time for the best part - EATING them!

5.  Serve on a plate on top of warm tomato sauce, and topped with freshly grated parmesan cheese.

Left-overs are awesome!

One of my Favorites

On Tuesday, I spent the afternoon volunteering at Daphne's school and knew I wouldn't have a lot of time to cook, so I decided to make one of my favorite easy meals, Pappardelle with Pork Ragu.  I found this recipe last year on one of my favorite food blogs, Dinner A Love Story (link on sidebar).  I usually make this in the oven, but this time I tried doing it in the slow cooker.  It was still good, but not quite as good as if it had been braised in the oven.  This recipe makes a LOT of food, so it's great for guests, or for weeks when you need leftovers.  The only things I change are swapping the tomatoes for tomato sauce, and adding some garlic.  It's better with garlic. I served it with this salad made with lettuce from our garden!  Yay! 

Here is the original recipe...all credit goes to DALS.  Check out their blog...really good stuff.  And a cookbook from them is coming soon!

Pappardelle with Pork Ragu

2 to 2 1/2-pound boneless pork shoulder roast
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small pat butter
1 large can whole tomatoes, with juice
1 cup red wine
5 sprigs fresh thyme
5 sprigs fresh oregano
Small handful of fennel seeds
1 tablespoon hot sauce, for smokiness (I used Trader Joe’s Hot Chili Sauce)
Pappardelle
Freshly grated Parmesean

Preheat oven to 325°F. Liberally salt and pepper the pork roast. Add olive oil and butter to large Dutch oven and heat over medium-high until butter melts, but does not burn. Add pork roast to pan and brown on all sides, about 8-10 minutes in all. Add tomatoes, wine, thyme, oregano, and hot sauce and bring to a boil. Cover, and put in oven. Braise for 3-4 hours, turning every hour or so. Add more liquid (water, wine, or tomato sauce) if needed. (The liquid should come to about 1/3 of the way up the pork.) Meat is done when it’s practically falling apart. Put on a cutting board and pull it apart with two forks, then add back to pot and stir. Cook 1 to 2 pounds pasta according to package directions. When it’s is ready, put into individual bowls and top with ragu and lots of Parm.

Stuffed

Sometimes, we just have easy snacky dinners.  Cheese and crackers.  Sandwiches and a smoothie.   Last night, I wanted to keep things light and simple, so we had a spinach salad with strawberries and fresh mozzarella, some good rosemary bread with dipping oil, and some stuffed mushrooms.  I am positive there are more complicated and much tastier stuffed mushrooms out there, but these are really simple and quick.  I usually just serve these right out of the baking dish, but this time I copied Fireworks Pizza...they serve their stuffed mushroom appetizer on a bed of tomato sauce, so I did the same, and grated some parmesan cheese over it.  Points for presentation.  To make these, all I did was cook some Italian turkey sausage and combine it in a bowl with some bread crumbs and grated parmesan cheese.  I took the stems out of some large mushrooms and filled them with the sausage mixture, put them in a baking dish, drizzled with olive oil, and grated some more parmesan on top.  I baked them at 400 degrees for about 35 minutes, heated up some Trader Joe's Pizza Sauce, and served as above.  Simple, filling, and pretty tasty for as easy as they are.  If you are more organized, you can chop up the mushroom stems and add them to the filling.  Sometime, I want to try using crab meat, too.  But that's way too complicated for a Thursday.

My quest for finding lighter springtime recipes continues.  You will be the first to know if I succeed.

Dear Ricotta Cheese,

I am so sorry that I misjudged you all these years.  You see, I never liked the cheap lumpy substitutes I was exposed to in the past.  But YOU, smooth and delicious Bel Gioioso Ricotta con Latte from Wegman's, YOU are delicious.  Thank you for allowing me to make this giant dish of lasagna to share with my family (at least the ones who will eat things with melty cheese).  I promise to continue to make you part of my meal plan, and to extol your greatness to anyone who will listen.  And if I ever make it back to the Dream Cafe, I most definitely WILL order the Cloud Cakes.  You are nothing like Cottage Cheese.

Your friend and fan,
Tara

PS.  And like almost everything else, you taste better when eaten on the front porch. Recipe below.

Lasagna on the Porch with Kev

Aaaaah, yeah.

Mommy Loves LASAGNA!

Layer the following ingredients in a baking dish, cover with foil, and bake at 400 degrees for about an hour.  Then remove foil and continue to cook until the cheese on top is all bubbly.  You can use the broiler for this if the lasagna is heated through. Yep.

1. Kev's Sauce  (follow this link to the recipe)
2.  Cooked lasagna noodles (I used fresh Wegman's noodles)
3.  More sauce
4.  Cooked ground Italian turkey sausage
5.  Bel Gioioso Ricotta con Latte
6.  Shredded mozzarella cheese
7.  Grated parmesan cheese
Repeat from number 2 in as many layers as you want.  Leave out the ricotta on the top layer, but use lots of mozzarella and parmesan, and sprinkle on a little dried oregano if you want.  Bake according to directions above.  Let it sit for several minutes before cutting.  It's even better left over.  Next time I will make two and freeze one for later.

Valentine Ravioli!

Happy Valentine's Day.  As I type this, I have Butter Chicken in my slow cooker and Nutella Brownies in the oven.  There is a lot of love going on in my kitchen right now.  I'm looking forward to dinner.  But we also had a nice pre-Valentine's Day family dinner on Sunday.  Everyone pitched in, and we made mushroom ravioli.

Kev and I went out to dinner at Palio a couple of weeks ago, and I got some really good mushroom raviolis.  I've been wanting to make pasta lately, so I looked around on the internet and found a couple of mushroom filling recipes which I used as guides.  One thing I really wanted to do was copy how the restaurant sprinkled crumbled up amaretti cookies on top of the pasta.  It was a really nice touch.  It added a little texture and a little sweetness.  So, I went to Wegman's, where I have purchased amaretti cookies before, and - no cookies.  I looked all over town - Super Target, Giant, Safeway - no cookies.  So, I gave up on that idea, but that's OK.  The ravioli must go on.

So, Sunday morning, I made the filling.  Then, I made some pasta sheets while Kev and Daphne filled them.  I can't say enough good things about the KitchenAid pasta attachment and the Norpro ravioli maker.  Both are so easy and fun to use.  Daphne can almost do the ravioli maker by herself:

Aaah...the army of ravioli is complete:

Later that afternoon, when I ran out to Safeway on my final quest for cookies, THIS happened:

I came home from the store, and when Daphne heard me, she came running downstairs all dressed up, ready for a fancy dinner.  This was all her idea.  She got herself dressed and put clips in her own hair.  I love that kid.

Eventually, dinner was served.  Since there were no cookies, I toasted some pecans to sprinkle on top.  I also made a sage butter cream sauce that I am proud to say I made up all by myself without a recipe.  The Force was with me.

The pasta, filling, and sauce all got rave reviews from Kev, who said it was better than the restaurant.  I liked it too and was sad when I took my last bite (22 raviolis are in the freezer for another day, though...woohoo!).  Daphne really wanted to like it, but didn't.  The filling was mushy and there was cheese.  Not really her thing.  I didn't expect her to like it, but I am so proud of her for trying it without any battling or complaining whatsoever.  In fact, for tasting the ravioli, she got her 20th Star Wars point, and finally earned the privilege of watching Star Wars.  Next Saturday, we're having Family Star Wars day, which will include Star Wars themed foods, so stay tuned for that.

Below are recipes for the mushroom filling and sauce.  Follow the KitchenAid directions or your preferred method for making the fresh pasta, or use wanton wrappers and seal them with water (you can google how to do that if you haven't done it before).  Top with lots of freshly grated parmesan, toasted pecans (or amaretti cookie crumbs), and serve with a nice salad.  Yum.

Mushroom Ravioli Filling

Ingredients:

Mushrooms (I used one pint-sized container each of button, cremini, and shitake mushooms) thickly sliced or quartered
2 or 3 cloves of garlic, chopped
1/4 cup butter
1 Tbsp olive oil
salt
pepper
1/4 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp garlic powder
2 Tbsp beef broth 
1 cup ricotta cheese
1/2 cup parmesan cheese (freshly grated if possible)


Directions:

Melt butter over medium heat and add olive oil.
Add mushrooms and saute, stirring occasionally, until they release their juices and the pan is no longer sort of all watery.  This takes several minutes.  Be patient.
Season with salt, pepper,  onion powder and garlic powder.
Add garlic and cook for about 30 seconds.
Add beef broth and let it reduce.
Set mushrooms aside to cool.
Add ricotta, parmesan, and cooled mushrooms to food processor and blend until smooth. (Or if you like the filling to have a little texture, don't blend as long).
Taste and season as needed.
Use mixture to fill pasta according to your preferred method ( I used my Norpro press).
Let pasta dry for about an hour before cooking, or freeze in a single layer.
This made 44 raviolis.


Sage Butter Cream Sauce

Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup AP flour
dried sage
salt
pepper
about 1 1/2 cups chicken stock 
heavy cream
nutmeg

Directions:

Melt butter over medium heat.
Add flour and stir constantly, once combined, cook for a minute or two
Add chicken stock,  stirring constantly until combined and there are no lumps of flour, bring to a simmer to thicken
Season with sage, salt, and pepper to taste
Add 1/4 or 1/2 cup heavy cream (whatever you like). 
Taste and re-season as needed.  Warm through, but don't let it boil.
Grate some nutmeg - just a little - into the sauce and stir to combine.

Add to ravioli, top with toasted pecans (or crumbled amaretti cookies if you can find them) and freshly grated parmesan cheese,  and enjoy!
 

Time to Make Sauce

This weekend, I decided it was time to start teaching Daphne how to make her favorite thing:  Spaghetti and Meatballs. I already had some meatballs in the freezer from last time we had it, so we started with learning the sauce.  She was already in a groove from her cooking class at Wegman's earlier that day, and she had the perfect hat!  So, things went pretty smoothly.

We are a two-sauce family.  My mom's meat sauce is awesome for plain pasta and I'm hoping she will teach it to Daphne. But for meatballs, we make a smooth tomato sauce with mushrooms.  Kev taught me this one, so if you're reading this, you are being let in on one of his Top Secret Kev Recipes.  So, don't tell anybody.  Actually , it's not so much a recipe as it is a guide.  When he first showed me how to make it, I was not very fond of cooking and I was definitely not confident in the kitchen.  I wanted to know the EXACT amounts of things and the EXACT steps.  If you have a recipe, then you can blame the recipe if the food turns out crappy.  But if you're winging it and it's bad, it's all on you. WAY too much pressure.

I am happy to report that 10 years ( and hours and hours of Food Network shows) later, I am not quite as inflexible as I was then, and I am definitely more confident when I cook.  While Daphne and I were making the sauce, I was telling her that you have to season it, and taste it, and see what it needs, and season it again.  Kev had a good laugh when he heard that, remembering all the kitchen panic of days gone by- "But it doesn't say how MUCH oregano!"

Above, we were having a little lesson about salt.  I was telling Daphne not to go too crazy (she loves grinding the salt) because you can always add more, but you can't take it out once it's in there.  Last night, I was watching "Worst Cooks in America," and this poor guy poured a whole bottle of soy sauce into a stir fry he was making for Crazy Ann Burrell.  Good grief.  She refused to even taste it.  I like that show.  Compared to the people on there, I think I'm in pretty good shape in the kitchen.

Our sauce turned out good and Daphne was pretty proud of it.  And we have a LOT left, so we're making baked ziti tonight.  I love left-overs.

Below, is the basic idea for making the sauce.  Serve with your favorite meatballs, some pasta, lots of freshly grated parmesan, and a nice salad.  And make sure you have plenty of napkins handy.

Kev's Sauce

Ingredients:

Olive Oil
Mushrooms, sliced
Garlic, minced
Salt
Pepper
Oregano
Basil
Bay leaf
2 large cans of tomato puree
tomato paste
red wine
sugar

Directions:

Heat a couple tablespoons, maybe a little more than that, of olive oil in a dutch oven.  Add the mushrooms and cook until slightly softened.  Season with salt, basil, and oregano, add as much or as little garlic as you like (I like a lot) and continue to cook for about 30 seconds.  Add the tomato puree and about 2 tablespoons of the tomato paste.  Add some sugar to cut the acidity of the tomato (maybe not quite a quarter of a cup), and about a cup of good red wine.  Stir it all together, throw in a bay leaf, cover and simmer for a nice long time, maybe two hours or so.  Check the seasoning now and then.  Add salt if it's too sweet, add sugar if it's too acidic, add herbs if it's too bland, add wine if it's too thick.  You can add black pepper too, if you want.  Use the Force.  You can do it.  Trust me.  If I can do it, you can do it.