My Husband Proof Eggplant Parmesan

Well, the title is pretty straight forward. I love eggplant parmesan! I didn't like eggplants before but starting liking them last year and now, I always have some in the fridge. The only problem: David doesn't. So, in order to pass through the batch I had and didn't want to waste, I decided to put a twist on the recipe: small pieces, meat and mixed with pasta :)

The eggplant parmesan (Melanzane alla parmigiana) is a traditional italian dished made with tomato sauce, eggplant (usually fried with batter but I roast it to make it less greasy), mozzarella and, obviously, parmesan cheese. Basically, it's a veggie lasagna noodle-free.

So, here is my version:

Meat & Eggplant Pasta Parmesan

Ingredients:

2 eggplants
500grs pasta (I used penne)
500grs ground beef
1 or 2 green onions
1 can of tomato sauce
mozzarella cheese
parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
garlic powder
parsley
oregano
oil


In a large pot, add some water and salt and bring to a boil.

Dice the eggplant and onion.

In a large pan, heat some oil. When ready, add the eggplant and onion.

Sweat for a few minutes until tender.

Add the meat.

Cook until the meat is browned. Add the tomato sauce.

At this point, add the pasta to the water and cook. Drain it and keep it aside. If it is finished before the sauce, add a bit of oil to prevent it from sticking together.

Add the seasonings (garlic powder, parsley, oregano and any others). Cook for about 15 minutes.

Add the sauce to the pasta.

Mix well.

Pour the pasta into an oven dish.

Add the mozzarella and parmesan cheese.

Broil at hight until crispy.

Yum Yum Yummy! David did sort of complain about the tiny pieces of eggplant but he ate the whole thing :) Mission accomplished!

Enjoy :)

Quesadillas

I love quesadillas and I used to make them quite often. Since living here, I have not made them as much since I have been too busy absorbing the wonderful spanish culinary culture. I made some a few weeks ago and have decided that these needed to get back on my regular menus :) They are just delicious.

The original meaning of quesadilla comes from queso and tortilla. You can basically add whatever suits your fancy to the tortilla bread and cheese and it will come out good!

I made these little rockers and they were to die for:

Wild Mushroom and Shallot Quesadillas

Ingredients:

4 shallots
100grs wild mushrooms
oil
100grs grated cheese (I used a mixture of cheddar, emmental, swiss)
2 tortilla breads
salt
pepper


Slice the shallots and wild mushrooms.

In a pan, heat oil. When ready, add the shallots. Sweat for a few minutes.

Add the mushrooms.

Season with salt and pepper.

Place the filling on half of the tortilla bread.

Add the cheese.

Close the tortilla bread.

Place both breads onto a cooking pan and broil at high in the oven until brown (or until the cheese has melted).

And there you have it. Cheesy and good :)

Enjoy!

My Mom's Tortellini Alfredo

My Mom is half Italian (from her Dad's side) and having italian blood in our veins makes us huge pasta fans. I could eat pasta EVERYDAY :) I love that stuff; it's really an addiction of mine! Sadly, I've had to control it since David isn't that huge of a fan. He likes it but once a week is more than enough for him. Poor me. Oh well, I get to try new recipe and have found that if I add enough meat to pasta, he doesn't mind at all! haha Boys will be boys. He has surprised me when I often ask him if he wants to eat tortellini and with what sauce he wants it. He keeps on asking for my Mom's alfredo sauce. :) Why this surprises me: it holds no meat whatsoever! He loves it but with reason. It is such a simple sauce but sure makes one heck of a tasty meal.

This is the typical easy and fast sauce to make with some meat or cheese filled pasta. It also works great with fettucini or linguini.

Tortellini Alfredo

Ingredients:

500grs tortellini (I had jamon/proscuitto filled on hand)
250ml cream (I use 12% but it works great with 18%)
1/2 cup pecorino romano
1 tbsp butter
1 tsp garlic powder
salt and pepper

In a large pot to cook the pasta, heat some water to a boil.

In a saucepan, add the butter and melt.

When it has melted, add the cream, cheese, garlic powder, salt and pepper.

Mix well and slowly heat. Do not bring to a boil. When it is hot (right before it starts simmering) and has a nice consistency, remove from heat and cover.

Cook the tortellini in the boiling water.

Drain and add the sauce to the pasta.

Mix well. Let it rest a bit so that the pasta absorbs the sauce. Add some more pecorino cheese if you want :)

And there you have it. A wonderful meal in less than 10 minutes. This recipe is a classic in my family and always pleases a crowd. :)

Pizza Fun

Who doesn't love a nice pizza?! Be it the American version or the Italian version, these babies are just crowd pleasers. You can basically put whatever you want on dough, add some cheese and pop it in the oven. Magic before your eyes :)

After my few trips to Italy, I have tried many varieties and I must say that the most impressive and yummy was with potatoes. But that was just too heavy for supper time in Spain. People here eat supper around 10pm usually and I hate it. You go to bed with a full stomach and don't get a good nice sleep. Not to mention adding on the pounds! It is true that most people eat very little at night, no rice, no pasta, no beans... but still, that's not much of a supper to us... So David and I have "created" our new supper time. Starting at 8h 8h30. Great balance with a less bigger portion than Canada, lots of time afterwards to take out Santo for his walk to the park (a bit of exercise to work that food down), a bit of TV time and bed time. Perfect combination between Canadian and Spanish schedules :) We know quite the amount of people that eat at that time as well because of the kids or for the same reasons as us. This is one of the things that Spaniards should learn from the other continent or as they say: del otro lado del charco (on the other side of the puddle)!

Ok, back to my pizza! I wanted some veggies on there but knew that if I put only those, David would look at me with devil eyes stating it is not pizza without meat... So I worked with what I had: bacon, eggplant (for me, David delicately removed it from his slices and threw it onto mine), leek and mushrooms. :) Miam!

David and I are big fans of the stuffed crust at Pizza Hut. The perfect way of making it is using Ficello. The shape and size is perfect and I have heard rumors that is exactly what they use. So since looking for ficellos here is like looking for water in the desert, I use some of my grated cheese to fill it. Not the same effect as you have WAY less cheese, but at least you get a bit of it :)

Stuffed Crust Veggie and Bacon Pizza

Ingredients:

1 cup of flour with yeast
1/2 cup of luke water
3 tbsps oil
1 tsp salt
1/2 eggplant
4 slices bacon
1/2 leek
50gr mushrooms
200gr grated cheese
1/2 cup grinded tomato
1 tsp garlic salt
1 tsp oregano
salt and pepper
oil


In a bowl, mix the flour and salt. Form a hole and add the water and oil. Mix well and knead the dough for about 5 minutes.

Cover the bowl with a rag and let the dough rest for 1 hour.

Preheat your oven at 240C.

Slice the bacon, leek, mushroom and eggplant. I precook my eggplant and bacon in order to have it perfectly cooked on the pizza. Since my oven was already hot, it was easy to do so when the dough was resting.

In a small pan, cook the tomato sauce. Add the garlic powder, oregano, salt and pepper. Cooking it reduces it to a paste and preventing the dough from getting soggy.

Roll the dough out forming a thin crust big enough to cover your pizza pan.

Place some cheese around the edge of the pizza. This is where the ficellos would be super handy!

Fold the dough back onto the cheese and close well. It kinda looks messy but the filling will hide the mess ;)

I popped the dough into the oven for about 2 minutes just to get the dough starting. This helps keeping it firm and not soggy from the ingredients.

Add the tomato sauce.

Add the ingredients.

Add the cheese and brush the crust with some oil.

Cook for about 20 minutes until you got a golden crust and look.

And here is the masterpiece seconds before disappearing :) Pizza is such a TV/couch supper ;)

Burger Fun

Who doesn't like a nice burger?! Burgers have really gone a long way nowadays. Beef, pork, chicken, veggie, tuna, turkey... grind your meat, grill it, place in a bun, add your condiments and voila! Burger heaven :) There are sooooo many ways to making a burger and I like mixing my ingredients to always give it that nice little touch.

I had some ground beef in the freezer and decided to make some good old burgers this week. I always prepare the meat the way my Mom makes it: breadcrumbs, spices and egg. It makes it soooo moist and yummy :)

Since I didn't have lettuce and I like adding veggies to the burger, I decided to use some of my spinach. I chose to cook it slightly as I love my grilled onions in a burger and what better combination than with spinach? :)

So I thought I would share my awesome burgers :)

Spinach Mozzarella and Bacon Burger

Ingredients:

500gr ground beef
4 burger buns
1 onion
1 egg
3 tbsps breadcrumbs
8 slices of bacon
8 slices of mozzarella
200gr spinach
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp parsley
salt and pepper
oil

Cut half of the onion into small pieces and slice the other half.

In a bowl, mix meat, egg, breadcrumbs, parlsey, diced onion, garlic powder, salt and pepper.

Mix well and form into 4 patties using your hands.

In a pan, heat a bit of onion and, when ready, sweat your sliced onion.

Add the rinsed spinach and let it reduce slightly. Do not overcook it as you still want that bright green color.

Place your bacon slices in between 2 sheets of paper towels. Cook in the microwave for about 2 minutes. Ok, I barely use the microwave (not a big fan) but, seriously, cooking bacon in it is the cleanest and fastest way to do so.

In the same pan we prepared the onion and spinach, add oil. When ready, cook your patties. I have to do 2 at a time as my pan is not big enough.

When they start being cooked well on the sides, flip the patties.

When they are about almost done, add the bacon and mozzarella slices. Let the cheese melt.

Toast your patties while your cheese is taking shape.

Place the bun in your plate, add the meat cheesy wonder.

Add the spinach filling and there you have it! A wonderful green cheesy meaty heaven :)

Top it with ketchup, mayo, mustard, honey mustard... have fun with it!

It was DELISH! Just look at those colors:

A Nutty Italian Touch

Since I went to Italia last month, I bought back a whole bunch of goodies. I still had some tortellonis frozen and decided to take them out and prepare them the way I had them in Italia with my friend. A nut and cheese sauce :)

So here is my take on the recipe:

Tortelloni con Noci e Pecorino Romano

Ingredients:

250grs spinach and ricotta tortelloni
100grs nuts
100grs pecorino romano
1/2 cup of white wine
salt
oil

In a large pot, bring water and salt to a boil. Add the tortelloni and cook for a few minutes.

In the meantime, add oil to a pan and heat. Add the nuts. Roast for a few minutes.

Add the white wine and let reduce. Add a bit of cheese.

Remove the pasta from the water and add to the pan.

Add the remaining pecorino and serve.

Such a fast and simple recipe but filled with flavor. The mixture of pecorino and ricotta topped with some nuts just makes the perfect pasta combination.

Hope you enjoy it :)

Kraft Dinner... or not?

Ah, the famous KD (Kraft Dinner for the non North Americans)! Some people could not live without it! I have to admit I still have a few boxes in my pantry from Canada that we use once in a while. You aren't American or Canadian if you have never eaten this stuff haha. The KD box comes, just like the Hamburger Helper, with the pasta and the sauce mix. You add a bit of milk and butter and done. It's that simple!

I had some leftover chicken breast from the roasted chicken and brocoli that was starting to get old. What better way to use them than with mac&cheese? Usually I do some garlic mayo and make some chicken wraps but the brocoli just didn't work well in that mix. So off to the mac&cheese I went. I figured that it would be much like the hamburger helper. Milk and cheese :) After a bit of googleing, turns out a bechamel mixed with cheese is the base for the sauce. Off to cooking I went!

Chicken and Brocoli Mac & Cheese

Ingredients:

500grs macaroni
1 brocoli
1 cup cooked chopped chicken
2 cups of milk
1/2 cup of cream
2 tbsps of flour
2 tbsps of butter
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp of garlic salt
1 cup of cheddar
1/3 cup of pecorino romano
2 tbsps of breadcrumbs
salt and pepper
water

Chop the chicken if not already done and cut the brocoli into florets.

In a large pot, bring lots of water and salt to boil. When boiling, cook the pasta until al dente. Don't overcook it as it will continue to cook in the oven. If you want, you can rinse the pasta with cold water to prevent it from cooking and sticking.

At the same time as the pasta is cooking, in another pot, steam the brocoli until it turns a bright green color. Some people add it to the cooking pasta but I find it removes a lot of the flavor from the brocoli compared to steaming it.

In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the flour. Mix to form the roux. Add the hot milk (heated in the microwave) and mix well to form the bechamel. Add the nutmeg.

When the milk sauce is done, add the cheese.

Mix well until all the cheese has melted. Add the salt, pepper and garlic salt.

Add the chicken and brocoli to the pasta.

Mix and add the sauce.

Mix well to coat the pasta. Transfer into your oven dish. Add a bit of grated pecorino romano and breadcrumbs.

Broil in the oven until a nice golden crust has formed.

Another delicious homemade meal that David approved! He even said it was better than KD :)!