Easy Pasta Bake

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Easy_Pasta_Bake_IMG_7221Tonight was one of those nights, I was feeling overwhelmed and needed something easy. Easy pasta bake is indeed easy. It’s not quick, but the hands-on time is extremely minimal. I like to bake half of it on the night I make it and put the other half in the freezer for an even easier weeknight meal, sometime in the future.

I’ve posted about Easy Pasta Bake before, the original recipe is from the Kitchn. I don’t know if I deliberately left out the prosciutto the first few times I made it, or if I never noticed it before. Whatever the answer, the vegetarian version is as follows:

• Easy Pasta Bake (meat-free version) •
adapted from the Kitchn with sauce from Marcella Hazan via Smitten Kitchen

1 (16 ounce) package pasta shells, or similar shape
1 28oz can whole, peeled, San Marzano tomatoes
1 small to medium yellow onion, peeled and halved
5 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 (8 ounce) ball fresh mozzarella, chopped into bite-size pieces
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese, divided
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan or Pecorino cheese
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Combine tomatoes, butter and onion in a medium sized pot or dutch oven and bring to a simmer. Cut up the tomatoes a bit or crush them with a wooden spoon as you cook the sauce. Simmer gently for 45 minutes. Taste and season with salt and pepper. Set aside

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease one large glass baking dish or two glass pie pie dishes or casseroles with olive oil.

Bring a large pot of generously salted water to a boil and cook shells until al dente. Drain, and return the pasta to the pot.

Stir the tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, and 1 1/2 cups of the shredded mozzarella into the cooked pasta. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Pour into prepared baking dishes and top with the remaining shredded mozzarella and Parmesan. Bake*, covered, for 20 minutes, and then uncover and bake for another 10 minutes, or until bubbling and light golden brown. Serve with a simple green salad.

*Note: If you are making half for tonight, and another half for the future, use two dishes and prepare per directions above up until baking. Bake one and cover the other and freeze. When ready to serve, remove from the freezer in the morning and let thaw on the countertop during the day. Then bake as directed above.

Perch?!

By in failures, quick 3 Comments

Perch&MustardGreensSalad_IMG_7214“Perch!?” Shane exclaimed, incredulously, when I told him the type of fish I’d purchased at the farmer’s market today. Apparently, Perch is the fish they used to throw back, when they caught them in Ireland (where Shane is from).

I was sure the Perch would be fine, because it was fresh, unlike the flounder we had earlier this week. And it was fine, good even. I cooked it in a totally ad-hoc way, in a saute pan, with olive oil, butter, lemon, white wine and capers. The fish came out tender and buttery in flavor, and the sauce was just right.

The salad was not so good, I should have used kale. If I had, it would have been great, but I used mustard greens. They were really good, spicy, horseradishy, mustard greens, and they were totally wrong for this particular salad.

Below is a better look at the salad. Doesn’t it look like it should have been good? Sheesh!
MustardGreensSalad_IMG_7210

Britta’s OMFG I’m having twins party

By in dining out, parties 4 Comments

Britta_Harpers_DobbsFerry_IMG_0903My good friend Britta is pregnant with twins. Yes, twins! On top of that, she already has two preschoolers who are 16 months apart. As a parent of just one child, I can barely wrap my mind around this.

Britta writes the blog Hudson & Hill, she’s also book coach at her very own Year of the Book, and partner and co-founder at EAT. She’s the person who encouraged me to start this blog, one of my favorite people, and she’s a trooper! Apparently, it’s not easy to have two babies in your belly at one time.

Last night, Britta’s husband Ian—also partner and co-founder at EAT and another one of my favorite people—threw her a surprise party. A whole bunch of us met up at Harper’s in Dobbs Ferry to celebrate Britta and distract her, for a while, from the discomfort of having 9 pounds of baby all up in her business.

It was a really lovely time. Great people, delicious food. There were lots of fried and poached eggs on the menu, which seemed apt considering Britta’s obvious propensity for egg-making. Even Shane’s burger had a fried egg on it. Bits of salty pork and brussels sprouts featured prominently.

Most importantly though, I think Britta felt incredibly loved, which she certainly is, beautiful round belly full of babes and all.

Poached fish & an asparagus recipe medley

By in picky eaters

PoachedFish_Asparagus_IMG_7203Tonight’s fish recipe, Oven-poached Pacfic Sole with Lemon Caper Sauce is from the New York Times. My dad will be so proud, he’s an avid NYT recipe-clipper. I used flounder instead of sole, because we have a big bag of frozen flounder in our freezer.

We got the big bag of flounder filets at Costco, and I don’t recommend them. We will eat them all, because I hate to waste food, particularly food that was once an animal, but they’re just not that good. They taste fishy in a way that fresh, good-quality fish never does.

To mask the inferior flavor of the fish, a recipe like tonight’s, with strong flavors—garlic, lemon, capers—works really well. We were out of white wine because I drank it, so I used broth instead. The broth worked well but I bet wine works even better.

I couldn’t decide on an asparagus* recipe. I considered Absurdly Addictive Asparagus, but it has pancetta in it, and I am wary of pine nuts because of pine mouth. I was tempted by Nobu’s Fried Asparagus with Miso Sauce because I’m a sucker for anything with miso in it, but I wasn’t in the mood for deep-frying.

In the end, I made Absurdly Addictive Asparagus but left out the pancetta, added extra butter and half a teaspoon of miso paste, used the leek because both recipes called for leek, left out the garlic and orange zest and added extra lemon zest. It was really, really good.

For Shane, we had new potatoes with butter, salt & pepper. He ate them all.

*If you have a young person at home who’s a ‘picky-eater,’ or is ‘unenthusiastic’ about veggies, use this trick. To get Rose to try asparagus I told her about the interesting after-effects (it makes your pee smell funny). She immediately wanted to try it. I used the same concept to get her to try beets. She now likes both.

 

A thing of beauty

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FarroAsparagusPestoAvocadoEgg_IMG_7199This is my kind of one-dish meal. Farro with Asparagus Pesto, Avocado & Fried Egg is amazing! What a wonderful combination of flavors and textures. It hits all the food groups, with whole grains to boot and it’s vegetarian. Did I say amazing?

I opted to reduce the garlic by half so that the more subtle flavors—almonds, asparagus, avocado & farro—could really sing. It was just the right amount of garlicky with only one clove.

Somehow there was way too much asparagus. Possibly because I bought two bunches, neglected to weigh them, and then used them both. Not really a problem as we all love asparagus. Just don’t expect yours to look quite as ‘asparagusy’ as my photo.

Note: where the recipe says to mix the farro, pesto & asparagus in a large bowl, they really mean a large bowl. It was unruly to mix in the medium bowl I chose to use.

A hankering for nightshades

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Nightshades_IMG_7190I love eggplant. I can eat an entire roasted eggplant in one sitting, I really can. Lately, I’ve also been going nuts for oven roasted grape tomatoes. I usually eat half of them while I’m preparing whatever dish I’ve decided to include them in. Tonight I wanted both, over arugula, with a side of lentils.

My friend Elana roasted eggplant on parchment when we ate at her home in San Francisco last week. Her eggplant was much better than mine, which I usually roast right on the baking tray. Tonight, I lightly oiled and salted some parchment paper, put the eggplant slices down, flipped them over and roasted at 400 until golden on both sides, flipping halfway through. This is my new eggplant roasting method, thanks Elana!

Rose had three meatballs in red sauce. Shane came home late* and had many meatballs, in red sauce, over spaghetti.

*Shane is currently trying to rent out half of his beautiful, light-filled art studio in Williamsburg. If you’re interested, send me a message via the contact link up top.

Prosciutto Chicken

By in quick

ProsciuttoChicken_IMG_7185We just got home, this was a fly by the seat of my pants kind of meal. Shane loved the prosciutto chicken. Rose did not, but that’s because she no longer likes chicken… until next week when chicken is her new favorite food. Ah, the joys of a fickle five year old.

We also had, simple pasta with pecorino, olive oil, butter, pepper and a dash of cream. And an arugula salad with roasted sweet corn and creamy mustard dressing.

• Prosciutto Chicken •
adapted from this Bon Appetit recipe
2 boneless, skinless, chicken breasts
8 slices prosciutto
salt & pepper
2 teaspoons flour
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter

Place the chicken breasts on a plastic-wrap covered cutting board, smooth side up. Lay four prosciutto slices on top of each chicken breast, making sure to cover the entire breast and leaving a bit hanging off the edge. Cover with another sheet of plastic and pound until the breasts are about 1/2 to 3/4 thick. Remove plastic, flip breasts over and season opposite (non-prosciutto) side with salt & pepper, then sprinkle each breast with 1 teaspoon of flour. Heat oil and butter in a large skillet over medium heat. When butter has melted, add chicken, prosciutto side up. Cook for about 5 minutes and flip, cook for another 5 minutes until cooked through. Serve with pasta.

Easter Saturday!

By in family, traditions

(click on the photos for slide show view, and description)

For the past several years, our family has celebrated Easter on Saturday instead of Sunday. We’re not particularly religious. When it occurred to us that Saturday might be a more convenient day to celebrate than Sunday, there were no objections. It even resolved scheduling conflicts for the Jews in our family who are married to Easter-observing gentiles.

Before dinner, which is more of a late-lunch, my aunt Gail makes Hot Cross Buns with the kids (see recipe below). The little ones adore rolling the dough and frosting the buns once they’re cooked. Then we have an egg hunt, this year there were 107 eggs to find!

Our tradition, for as long as I can remember, has been to have savory pies for Easter. Geraldine Ferraro’s Easter Pie, which is filled with ricotta cheese & Italian sausage, is a staple. My dad makes the pies with the help from my aunt Gail (or vice-versa). He says to use two pounds of sausage instead of one, it’s much better that way.

The Torta Verde was sorely missed this year. Instead, we had lamb pies which were reported to be underwhelming, but were very pretty, and disappeared anyhow.

To up the meat ante, there were Garlicky Pork Burgers with Red Wine, Prunes & Rosemary, from this recipe, but prepared as burgers instead of sausages, and made in the oven. Everyone raved about them, even the kids.

The Escarole & White Bean Salad with Fennel & Gruyere (see my post about it here), and Cilantro, Celery & Almond Salad, were both excellent. My parent’s neighbor Peggy, made her famous Eggplant dish, which I don’t have the recipe for. We also had roasted Cubanelle pepers.

Dessert was an assortment of candy and cookies, Strawberry  Shortcake, and my favorite, a Three-Tier Candied-Pecan Cake with Brown-Butter Pears, from Martha Stewart. (Note: it doesn’t come out looking like the photo in the recipe but is utterly delicious.)

Happy early Easter everyone!

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