Me Make-a Lasagna

I do jumping jacks…

I do squats….

I lift dumbells until my arms become lasagna noodles…..

Then I come home and make a delicious, meaty, cheesy lasagna.

This may seem counter productive, but I torture myself so I can have a slice of this yummy lasagna.  I do however refrain from eating the entire pan.  I think we all can agree that Italian food is one of the most comforting foods.  In my opinion no meal gives you a bigger hug then a saucy, cheesy lasagna.

I have been wanting to make a lasagna for a while now and I have had the noodles sitting in my pantry for at least 2 months.  I finally got around to it after enduring 2 tortuous weeks of fitness boot camp.  Don’t get me wrong I enjoy being tortured 3 times a week at 5:30 am…..really I do.

No seriously…..I do. I feel great!  No pain, no gain….right?

I cannot express how much I love a saucy, cheesy lasagna and this one did the trick.  The original recipe called for carrots and brown sugar, but I thought that would give it a sweetness that I don’t usually associate with lasagna.  I am all about savory and cheesy when it comes to lasagna.

I made this lasagna in a 9×9 pan because there are only two of us and I thought a 13×9 would be a little much.  If you want to do a family size 13×9, I would use 15 noodles and double the sauce and cheese mixture.  Also when baking the lasagna place a baking sheet under it because the sauce and cheese may bubble over.

Mmmmm cheesy, meaty, saucy….need I say more?

Print Recipe

Three Cheese Lasagna (adapted from Bon Appetit – March 1997)

SAUCE

• 1 Tbs olive oil
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 8 ounces lean ground beef
• 6 ounces mild or spicy Italian sausages, casings removed
• 2 15-ounce cans diced tomatoes
• 1/2 cup tomato sauce
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
• 2 Tbs balsamic vinegar
• 1 Tbs dried oregano
• 1/2 tsp dried crushed red pepper

LASAGNA

• 12 lasagna noodles (you will have to trim the noodles for 9×9 pan)
• 1 15-ounce containers part-skim ricotta cheese
• 1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 cup fresh baby spinach, chopped
• 1 large eggs
• 2 cups finely grated mozzarella

SAUCE:

Heat oil in large heavy pot or saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and garlic; sauté until softened, about 12 minutes. Add beef and sausages to pan; sauté until cooked through, breaking up meat with back of spoon, about 5 minutes. Add remaining ingredients. Cover and simmer until flavors blend, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes. Cool.

LASAGNA:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Cook noodles in large pot of boiling salted water until almost tender, about 7 minutes. Drain; cover with cold water.

Combine ricotta and Parmesan cheese in medium bowl. Mix in spinach. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Mix in egg.

Drain pasta and pat dry. Spread 1/2 cup sauce over bottom of 9×9-inch glass baking dish. Place 4 noodles over sauce, overlapping and trimming to fit. Spread half of ricotta-spinach mixture evenly over noodles. Sprinkle 1 cups mozzarella cheese evenly over ricotta-spinach mixture. Spoon half of the sauce over cheese, spreading with spatula to cover (sauce will be thick). Repeat layering with 4 noodles, remaining ricotta-spinach mixture, 1 cups mozzarella and sauce. Repeat and top off with extra shredded cheese and fresh basil. (Can be prepared up to 1 day ahead. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerate.) Cover baking dish with aluminum foil. Bake lasagna 40 minutes; uncover and bake until hot and bubbly, about 40 minutes. Let lasagna stand 15 minutes before serving.

Heirloom Tomato & Basil Bruschetta

Is everyone excited to be back at the office or school after your long weekend?  Probably no…no worries me neither. The one good thing is that since we had a long weekend, that means a short work/school week.   I decided to take advantage of my long weekend and do some Spring…..well Fall cleaning. I also did some cooking, baking of course and Obed and I went out for dinner and a movie.    I finally got to see Julie & Julia.  I know I am a little behind but I finally got around to it.  I did enjoy the movie, I found it very funny and charming although I did find the story of Julia Child more interesting and fun then the story of Julie Powers, but it is definitely a movie worth seeing.

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Gazpacho

How many of you ladies have a husband what will not consider a meal, a meal if there isn’t some meat on his plate?  That when you order pizza it has to be the meat lovers or nothing.   He won’t even consider the veggie pizza.  How many times have you been making dinner as he has hovers around asking, “Is there any meat in it?”  I am sure I have many fellow sympathizers.  My man is a hard core carnivore, not only does there have to be meat in it but it has to be chunks of meat.  For example if  I am making something with sausage he protests if I cut the casing to break up the sausage, he wants it in slices. 

• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 large red onion, diced
• 1/2 large cucumber, diced
• 2 ripe tomatoes, diced
• 1/2 zucchini, diced
• 2 cups tomato juice
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1/8 cup red wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoons sugar
• Salt and Black Pepper to taste
• 1 Jalapeno, Finely minced
• Sliced avocado
• Cilantro
• 8 large shrimp
• Dash of Cumin
• Pinch of kosher salt

In the food processor, combine the minced garlic with red onion, cucumber, tomato, zucchini,  tomato juice, olive oil, red wine vinegar, sugar, Tabasco, and a dash of salt. Pulse until all ingredients are blended well.

Pour into a large bowl, stir mixture together and check seasonings, adding salt if needed. Chill soup for at least a 1 hour; soup need to chill to allow the flavors to marinate.

Remove the soup from the fridge and stir. Check seasonings one last time.

Season shrimp with cumin and salt, drizzle with a bit of olive oil.  Grill on grill skillet until pink.  Drizzle a thick slice of wheat bread with olive oil and grill on grill skillet.

Ladle soup into a bowl and garnish with remaining diced vegetables, a slice of fresh avocado and cilantro. Finally, place a grilled shrimp on the top and serve with grilled slice of bread.

Italian Sausage with Saucy White Beans

I have been dragging my feet about posting this recipe.  Unfortunately it is due to my own vanity.  There is nothing wrong with this dish, in fact it is incredibly tasty.  The reason I was dragging my feet is because I was not happy with the pictures I took.  However I decided my photography insecurites is no reason to deprive you of such a tasty dish. 

I made this over a week ago for Hubby.  I needed something quick and easy because he had a softball game that night.  Because of the rush there are no step-by-step photos and the ones I do have are “okay”.  I am probably just being really hard on myself.

Enough complaining let me tell you about this dish.  The inspiration for this dish was the Italian Sausages with Balsamic Tomatoes that I made the week before.  It is basically the same dishm just adding in some white beans.  Hubby and I were very impressed with how the beans came out.  They were flavorful and saucy.  This dish is perfect to serve with some bread to scoop up the beans.   It will become a new kind of comfort food for me.  Previous to this dish I had only had Spanish beans over rice.  In fact I thought it was weird when people would eat beans straight up, man was I missing out.

Ok so here it is, really simple.

 

Italian Sausage with White Beans  (serves 2, with leftovers)  Print Recipe

• 4 Italian Sausages
• 3 cloves garlic, sliced
• 1 green pepper, chopped
• 1 small red onion, chopped
• 1 can White Beans
• 1 can Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes
• 2 Tbs balsamic vinegar
• 2 Tbs olive oil
• 2 Tbs tomato paste
• fresh basil
• salt and pepper

Place the sausages, garlic, onion and peppers in a large baking pan, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.  Shuffle the sausages around until well coated.  Bake in the oven for 15 mins at 350 degrees. 

In a large bowl combine tomatoes, tomato paste, beans and balsamic vinegar, stir.  Pour the bean mixture over the sausages.  Return to the oven for an additional 15 minutes. 

Garnish with fresh torn basil and Parmesan cheese.  Serve with toasted bread.

Spicy Tomato Shrimp with Creamy Polenta

 Ahhhhh…the heavens have opened and I have found a new love.  For awhile now I have been curious about polenta but it was usually mentioned hand-in-hand with grits.   This made me hesitant and it was little bit of a turned off, because it was compared in likeness to grits and I hate grits.  I know to some people that may sound sacrilegious, but what am I going to do?  I just don’t dig the texture. 

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Bacalao (Salted Cod Salad)

Bear with me while I write the post.  I am suffering from a lack of sleep after piping that I think where 1,500 petals last night on to some cupcakes, which I will be posting later.  Me very sleepy, fingers a little cramped.

When I was a kid my grandmother would make this salad and it was one of the few things I would refuse to eat.  Great way to start off a food post huh? Of course I don’t think anyone can successfully feed a child salted cod.  If you have please let me know.  After much protest from both me and my sister this was no longer  offered in our household. 

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Chicken Salad Stuffed Tomatoes

If you didn’t know apparently the southern part of the Midwest is in the clutches of a heatwave…and it’s not burning in my heart.  Did you get that? It’s a little joke.  You know like the song…..ok maybe it wasn’t so great, sorry moving on.  Needless to say it is hot, like really hot, like if you wear shorts and sit on a leather seat or worse pleather seat, you and the seat are sure to become one and in this case it does not end in happly ever after.  Not to mention you may have 1st degree burns.

Well this heat doesn’t give me much of a desire to cook.  Especially since my kitchen is so well ventilated…..NOT!  Unfortunatly in order to say alive we must consume some form of sustanance, which therefore requires me to cook.  In an effort to keep myself and Hubby alive and well norished, while at the same time trying not to pass out from a heat stroke, I came up with this light yet filling dish.  Oh and there is a bounus, it is actally healthy.  I stayed away from anything heavy, starchy,  cheesy or fried. 

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Italian Sausage and Balsamic Tomatoes

Sundays are usually my biggest cooking days, it is how I “rest”.  Although now the summer is here and my kitchen has no exhaust system, so I am sweating like a piggy in my kitchen.  Especially if I am using the oven.  Although pigs don’t sweat so um…. yeah, maybe like a dog?  Well this was an oven roasting recipe and my kitchen felt like an inferno.  Opening the windows does very little because it is so stinking hot outside.  The kitchen has a ceiling fan, but it blows the flame on my gas stove and just swirls around hot air.  It doesn’t really cool off.  Oi, vey!  

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Chicken Parmigiana with Zucchini Noodles

This is for you Susan!

Upon request from one of my bestest friends I created this dish.  She has been requesting a high protein low carb recipe and this is what I came up with.  If love Italian food, but need to cut the carbs you are pretty much up a creek, but this dish is the perfect cure for that pasta crave.

I got this idea while watching Iron Chef America the other night.  It was battle zucchini and Bobby Flay made a dish were he used zucchini as noodles.  I filed this in the back of the recipe box in my head.  I was very, very pleased with the results it was absolutely delicious.  The zucchini noodles were light and had just a bit of crunch.  I breaded the chicken breast in panko bread crumbs which are surprisingly very low in carbs, 1/2 a cup of panko bread crumbs only has 24 g of carbs.  I was able to bread 3 chicken breast with just 1/2 cup of crumbs, which means each breast only had 8 g of carbs.  Sweet right?  The panko was great on the chicken breast, made them light and crunchy.

Here we go….

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I Love a Good Panini Mmmmmm

About a week ago I came across a recipe for a Grilled Eggplant Panini with Tomato Olive Spread on The Secret Ingredient.  I saved it to my favorites for when I had an eggplant. 

Today was a busy day and I had an eggplant in the fridge so I thought it would be day to try the Grilled Eggplant Panini with Tomato Olive Spread with a few adjustments. 

To start I was out of fresh tomatoes and I did not have kalamata olives.  Instead i grabbed a can of stewed tomatoes and some green olives for the paste.  Because I used the stewed tomatoes the paste was a little watery, so while I grilled the eggplants I put it in a cheese cloth, in a colander to drain some of the water.  I prepared the eggplant by brushing it with olive oil but I also grated some fresh Parmesan cheese and coated the eggplant with it.  I placed it on the grill for about 4 mins on a med-high heat.

Once the eggplant was ready I assembled my panini, but because I was going to feed this to my husband I had to add some meat.  I added some geona salami and used provolone in place of the mozzarella.  I was very pleased with the result and my husband enjoyed it too, although he would have liked some more meat.  

Below is the original recipe from The Secret Ingredient

Grilled Eggplant Panini with Tomato and Olive Spread
Serves 4

For Spread:
1 cup grape tomatoes
1/4 cup fresh basil
1/4 cup kalamata olives
Olive oil
Salt/pepper to taste
Add the tomatoes, basil and olives into the work bowl of a mini-food processor. Pulse to roughly chop. Add olive oil, salt and pepper and pulse again until a chunky spread is formed. Set aside.

For the Eggplant:
1 large or 2 small eggplants, cut into 1/2″ to 3/4″ rounds
(Note: by leaving the skin on the eggplant, it helps it to not fall apart on the grill)
Preheat an outdoor grill to medium-high heat.
Brush each side of eggplant rounds with olive oil and sprinkle with salt.
Grill for approximately 3-5 minutes per side, until softened and grill marks appear. Set aside.
(Alternatively, you can grill these on the panini press to save a trip outdoors.)

To make the panini:
8 slices country-style bread (Italian, peasant, etc) OR 8 pieces of flat bread
8 slices of fresh mozzarella cheese
Olive oil for brushing
Preheat panini press to high heat.
Brush one side of each piece of bread with olive oil.
Placing the oiled side down, lay one slice of bread on heated panini maker.
Spread 1-2 tablespoons of the tomato & olive spread on top of the bread.
Place one layer of grilled eggplant rounds over spread.
Place 2 slices of mozzarella cheese over eggplant layer.
Top with another slice of bread (this time, oiled side UP). Close panini maker and press until heated through (cheese should be melted), and bread is nicely grilled.
Repeat with remaining 3 sandwiches.
Cut in half and serve hot.