Asparagus Carbonara

All work and no cooking makes Leah a dull girl.

It also makes her spend way more time/money at Teaism than is healthy for a normal human being.

Often when I get home in the evening at 8 p.m. (or later), I have little desire to cook. One can only make scrambled eggs so many days, though, before a certain CCO begins to protest. Then, one has to get creative with the egg recipes. ;)

In the vein of the Honest ABE, I present to you the Asparagus Carbonara.

Eat Rating: Delicious. Nothing goes better than asparagus and bacon.
Difficulty: Very easy.

1 lb of asparagus, ends trimmed
4 slices of bacon, diced into small pieces
2 eggs
1/2 cup of parmesan cheese
3/4 lb of long pasta such as spaghetti or fettuccine

In a skillet, cook the bacon pieces until browned. (LN: Alternatively, you can cook the bacon in whole strips and then chop it. It's quicker with the little pieces, though.) Drain on a paper towel and set aside.

Cut the asparagus into 1 - 1 1/2 inch chunks. Set aside.

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook until there are 2-3 minutes left on the recommended cooking time. Then add in the asparagus.

In a small bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the cheese.

Once the pasta/asparagus is done cooking, drain in a colander. Place the pasta and asparagus in a large bowl and add in the bacon pieces. Pour the egg mixture into the hot pasta and toss with two forks or tongs. Serve immediately, topped with parmesan or red pepper flakes if you like.

Pasta with Butternut Squash Sauce

Don't leave out the lemon juice. It adds a nice acidity to the otherwise very heavy cream sauce. (I followed the recipe exactly, so click the link to get it)

Adapted from Simply Recipes

Eat Rating: Delicious. Very heavy though, so prepare to be filled.
Difficulty: Easy to Medium.

Butternut Squash Gnocchi

Nothing says comfort like an enormous bowl of squash, butter and cheese.

Eat Rating: Delicious.
Difficulty: Medium. Be careful not to add too much flour or overknead. You want it to be light and airy, not thick and chewy.

Adapted from Apples and Butter

1 butternut squash, about 2 lbs
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 - 3 cups of flour
3 tbsp butter
2 tbsp parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Peel the butternut squash, cut in half and scoop out the seeds and membrane. Cut into 1 inch chunks, toss in olive oil and then place on a baking tray. Bake the squash for about 30 minutes, turning the pieces or tossing after about 15 minutes, or until the squash is easily pierced with a fork.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool. (This step can be done a day or several hours ahead of time)

Place the cooked butternut squash in a bowl and mash until you have a thick puree. Add in the nutmeg and stir until thoroughly mixed in. Gradually add in the flour, 1/2 cup at a time, until the squash forms into a thick dough.

Flour a cutting board or the countertop and turn your dough out onto it. Divide into four pieces, then roll each piece into a long, thin cylinder. Use a knife to cut the strand into 1 inch pieces.

Bring a large pot of water to boil. Drop the gnocchi into the pot of water. The gnocchi should drop to the bottom. When they are finished, they will float to the top.

While the gnocchi is cooking, melt the butter in another small saucepan. Once it's melted, remove from heat.

After gnocchi floats, remove from the water using a slotted spoon. Toss with butter and parmesan cheese. Serve immediately.

Any uncooked gnocchi can be frozen for up to a month.

Minestrone

How could you not get off the couch for that?

Lately, in the war of Leah versus inertia, the inertia has been winning. When I get home at the end of my 10+ hour days, I just want to sit on my couch and stare at the wall. It's almost embarrassing to think about how much time I spend staring at the walls. And it's not as though I haven't been cooking. A girl does, after all, eventually have to stop staring at the wall, get off the couch and eat. But lately there have been a lot of meals of cheese and crackers. Or cheese and bread. Or sometimes just large chunks of cheese.

To get me out of the funk, CCO and I cooked up a batch of soup, minestrone to be exact. Minestrone is my absolute favorite soup. I don't really know why. Probably something to do with it having both pasta AND beans. Also it's one of the only foods (along with carrot cake) where I willingly eat carrots.

This recipe has sausage added in. You can leave it out to make it vegetarian. Use veggie broth in place of the beef broth if that's the case.

Eat Rating: Awesome.
Difficulty: Easy. You just need a big pot.

1/2 pound pork sausage, casings removed
2 tbsp olive oil
1 white onion, chopped
2-3 medium carrots, peeled and chopped
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 bunch of swiss chard or other greens, ribs removed and chopped
3 roma tomatos, chopped (LN: You can also sub a can of diced tomato with the juice)
2 cans of white beans (Navy or Small White Beans), drained
1 cup of small-shaped pasta (LN: I think I used orecchietti)
7 cups of beef broth (LN: I used better than bouillon)

In a skillet, cook the sausage until browned. Remove from pan and set aside.

In the bottom of a large pot, heat the oil, then cook the onion, carrot and garlic until slightly softened. Add the tomatoes and cook until they release their juices. Add the chard and cook just until it begins to wilt. Add in the beans and beef broth and stir back in the sausage. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 10 minutes, until the broth has reduced some. Add in the pasta and cook for about 8-10 minutes, until the pasta is sufficiently soft. Serve with some crusty bread and red wine.

Roasted Red Pepper Sauce with Pasta and Mozzarella

Better than tomatoes.

In a fit of inspiration (insanity?), I bought five pounds of peppers at Eastern Market the other day. The intention was to pickle them, but then a recipe for stuffed peppers struck my fancy. After I made those, I was one pepper short of the pickled peppers recipe. Instead I roasted them and left them in a jar of olive oil in my fridge for a few days. I thought I might try making a red pepper pesto to use up the leftover pine nuts, but then I found this recipe, which seemed perfect. Pine nuts and red pepper might be weird anyway.

The recipe calls for you to use store bought roasted red peppers. You can obviously do that, but to roast your own, heat the oven to 450 degrees and place two red peppers on a baking sheet. Cook 10 minutes, flip over and cook 10 more on the other side. You want the skins to be blackened and shrivelling. Remove from the oven and use tongs to place in a bowl. Cover the top of the bowl with plastic wrap and let sit for about 15-20 minutes. Remove the plastic wrap. The skins should slide off easily. Tug the stem and the top and seeds should also remove easily. Use immediately or pack in oil in a jar and refrigerate.

Eat Rating: Awesome.
Difficulty: Easy. Requires food processor or blender.

Adapted from Food and Wine February 2008, via Kate in the Kitchen

1 lb dried gemelli (LN: I'm not even sure which one that is. I used penne)
2 roasted red peppers
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tbsp tomato paste
2 cloves of garlic
2 sun-dried tomatoes, packed in oil (LN: Omitted. I was out.)
9 fresh basil leaves, divided
6 oz. fresh mozzarella, cut into 1-inch cubes
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat a large pot of water to boil and cook the pasta according to the package instructions.

While pasta is cooking, place the peppers, olive oil, tomato paste, garlic, tomatoes and 3 basil leaves in a food processor. Pulse to combine.

Once pasta is cooked, drain and toss with the sauce and mozzarella. Tear up the rest of the basil and add to the pasta. Serve topped with parmesan cheese.

Orecchiette with Carmalized Onions, Sugar Snap Peas and Ricotta

Slightly creamy with peas (the good kind).

It is not yet June. There are, in fact, another two weeks before it becomes June. But last week the Bon Appetit that suggests what I should cook in June arrived in my mailbox. And though I probably should be cooking things from the May issue since, you know, it's still May and it features foods available in May, I am highly suggestible. So I started adding dishes from the June issue to the Meatless Monday list. Which is how we ended up with orecchiette with sugar snap peas even though it is May and even though sugar snap peas won't really be available till next month.

Orechiette is one of the little pastas, like orzo and conchigliette. The article that accompanied this recipe called it "ear shaped." I always think of it as shaped like a buttercup, which inevitably makes me think of the song. So orechiette and the Foundations, wierdly associated in my head. Anyway, it's a good pasta. So bookmark this page and come back to it in a few weeks when sugar snap peas are everywhere.

Eat Rating: Good. Not awesome. Slighly below awesome. But still good. Particularly because I love crisp snap peas.
Difficulty: Easy. The only weird instrument required is a zester, my favorite kitchen invention ever. If you don't have that, the finer holes on a grater would work.

From Bon Appetit Magazine, June 2009

2 tbsp olive oil
3 cups onion, chopped
1 cup (8 oz) sugar snap peas, cut into pieces
1/2 cup ricotta cheese (LN: They recommend whole milk, but we used fat-free)
Fresh basil leaves, torn
1 1/2 tsp lemon zest (About one lemon's worth)

In a large skillet, heat the oil and then saute the onions until lightly browned, about five minutes. Reduce heat to medium and saute the onions for another 15 minutes. You want them browned all the way through. While the onions are cooking, boil a pot of water for the pasta. Cook pasta according to the package directions (mine took about 8 minutes.)

Once the onions are thoroughly cooked, add the cut peas and saute until slightly tender, about 3 minutes. Remove skillet from heat until pasta is cooked.

Drain the pasta, reserving about 1 cup of liquid. Add the pasta and 1/2 cup of the water to the onion/pea mixture and return the pan to medium heat. Cook for about 1 minute, then stir in the ricotta, basil and lemon zest. Stir until well-incorporated, adding additional pasta water if necessary.

Serve immediately.

All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up.

Italian Meatballs

Tiny balls of buffalo meat.

The farmer's markets have returned! Which means I should probably use up the ground buffalo I bought last fall in order to buy fresh. Having exhausted CCO on my favorite recipe for ground meat, we decided to make meatballs instead.

Eat Rating: Good. The buffalo makes them nice and savory.
Difficulty: Easy. No fancy instruments, just get your hands dirty

Adapted from Christie's Corner, "Italian Meatballs"

1/2 cup bread crumbs
1/2 cup skim milk
1 lb ground buffalo
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 egg yolk
1/4 cup fresh oregano, finely chopped (LN: I subbed 1 tbsp dried oregano)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/8 tsp nutmeg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a small bowl, combine the bread crumbs and milk. Set aside.

In a medium-sized bowl, mix the buffalo, onion, garlic and egg with your hands until well mixed. Add the oregano and milk/bread, and mix again until combined through-out. Add the parmesan and nutmeg. Break off small clumps of meat and roll into balls. You can get up to 48 bite-sized meatballs. (I got more like 25)

Set out the meatballs on a cookie sheet and cook for 20 minutes.

Add the meatballs to the sauce and mix with pasta, or cool and then freeze to use later.

My hands.

Pesto!

Basil + pine nuts + garlic + oil

For Meatless Monday this week, I made CCO some pesto. It's apparently his favorite sauce. I am not an enormous fan, but we ate it on some of the leftover gnocchi from a few weeks ago and it was delicious.

Eat Rating: Awesome (if you like pesto, of course). Very basilly and nutty.
Difficulty: Easy. Requires either a blender/food processor or mortar and pestle (for the hard-core among you)

45 fresh basil leaves, about 1 cup packed
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
2/3 cup olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted
1/2 cup walnuts

Combine the basil, garlic, salt and nuts in the bowl of a food processor (or blender) and pulse several times. You want the mixture to be a little mealy, don't overmix or the basil will turn to liquid. Through the feeder tube, gradually add the oil while pulsing. Pulse just until combined. Add to 1 lb of cooked pasta (gnocchi) and serve.

Gnocchi with Mushroom Sage Ragu

Gnocchi. Not as hard as you think.

Last weekend, I was flipping through the May issue of Bon Appetit (the "Travel the US" issue) when I came across a recipe for gnocchi. A perfect recipe for Meatless Monday, I thought. Then I noticed there was something a little strange about the recipe. For one thing, there was no picture. That's not enormously weird, after all only about half of the recipes in any given magazine have accompanying pictures. What was weird is that instead of a picture of gnocchi, there was a picture of a wine bottle and the words "EXPERIENCE ARGENTINA." This was not a recipe in Bon Appetit, this was an Argentinean wine advertisment. I was more than a little bit disappointed because I had gotten myself all psyched for making gnocchi. I looked around online for a different recipe, but then I decided it could be a little experiment to see how good the recipes are in random advertisments. Besides in tiny print in the corner it said "Recipe created by Bon Appetit Chef de Cuisine Jonathan Lindenauer for Trapiche," and he was wearing a chef coat and, according to the internet, he's an actual CIA grad even if his hair could use some work. So yeah, I made a recipe from an advertisement. And it was damn good.

Eat Rating: Absolutely awesome. It's a little heavy, so definitely break it into four or five servings.
Difficulty: Medium. The recipe calls for a potato ricer. I'm not even sure I know what that is (See Annie, I don't know everything). Instead I used the food processor.

From Trapiche adverstistment in Bon Appetit, May 2009

Gnocchi
2 lbs russet potatoes (that's about 4-5 medium-sized ones)
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp grated nutmeg
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

Ragu
1/3 cup olive oil
4 cups wild mushrooms, thinly sliced
1 1/2 tbsp garlic, chopped
1 tbsp minced fresh sage
2 tbsp mince shallots
1 cup white wine (predictably they recommend Trapiche Torrontes. I used Chardonnay)
1 cup heavy cream
1 tbsp minced fresh parsley

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and bake potatoes on a bed of kosher salt for 45 to 50 minutes (I have no idea what the kosher salt is supposed to do except make a mess). Let cool a few minutes so you don't burn your fingers then, while still warm, halve the potatoes and scoop out the flesh. Pass the flesh through a "potato ricer" if you actually know what that is. If not, stick in the bowl of food processor and pulse a few times until the potatoes are mashed up. In a large bowl, add the egg yolks and spices to the potatoes and mix until thoroughly combined. With your hands, add the flour to the potato mixture. It will form a dough. You'll know it's ready once it no longer sticks to your fingers. Transfer the dough to a generously floured surface, then roll into a 3 inch thick log. Cut the log into eight pieces. Roll out each piece of the dough on the floured surface until you get a 1/2 inch thick tube. Cut up the tube crosswise into 1/2 inch pieces, about the size of a large cashew. You don't want them to be too big because they will expand some when boiled. Let dry at room temperature for 20 minutes. You can make the sauce while they sit.

Heat a large saucepan and add oil. Add the mushrooms and without stirring, cook for 7 to 8 minutes. Stir and season with salt and pepper. Add the garlic, cook for 1 minute, then add the sage and shallot and cook for one more minute. Add the white wine and cook until the wine has reduced by about half. Add the cream and simmer until reduced to sauce consistency, about 5 minutes.

Bring a large pot of water to boil. Add the gnocchi and continue to boil. The gnocchi is done when it floats to the top of the pot, about 1-2 minutes after added. Use a slotted spoon to remove from the pot. Pour sauce over gnocchi. Garnish with parmesan and parsley. Eat immediately. Makes 4-5 generous servings.

Baked Ziti with Walnut Sauce

Almost like an exotic mac n cheese.

I am a tomato and pasta kind of girl. I might consent to a creme sauce ala alfredo, but in general if it doesn't have tomatoes I wonder what's wrong with it. CCO, however, is an exotic sauce kind of guy. He's always trying to convince me to add strange things to our pasta like canned tuna or bacon (I'll admit that one was good). So when he said he wanted to make walnut sauce for pasta on meatless Monday, I balked a little. True I had a 10 lb bag of walnuts I bought at Costco on a whim, but still they didn't need to be used for pasta. He eventually wore me down and I consented to replacing tomato with nuts.

Eat Rating: Good, but not stellar. The walnut sauce is very subtle, you could almost miss it entirely. The dish overall ends up almost like an exotic type of mac n cheese, except it would need more cheese.
Difficulty: Medium. Requires a food processor or blender. Also a lot of cheese grating. Note: You can make the walnut sauce ahead of time, if desired.

Adapted from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman

For the walnut sauce
1 slice of Italian bread
1/2 cup milk
1 cup walnuts
2 gloves of garlic
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp dried marjoram
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

For the baked ziti
1 lb ziti
1/2 lb fresh mozzarella, grated or chopped
bread crumbs

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Place the milk in a small bowl and soak the bread in it. In a food processor, combine the nuts, garlic, cheese and marjoram. Gradually add the oil while the machine is still running. The mixture will form a thick paste. Squeeze out the bread and add it to the mixture, combining until the bread is completely diced. Add the milk. If your sauce is still a little thick (ours was) add a few tbsp of water. You want the consistency to be about that of thick tomato sauce, not like tomato paste.

Walnut sauce

Bring a large pot of water to boil and cook the ziti, about a minute or two less than the instructions on the box. (If you start this at the same time as the sauce, you won't have to wait as long).

Once the ziti is cooked, toss it with the sauce and half the mozzarella. Grease a baking dish and pour the ziti mix in. Top with the remaining mozzarella and bread crumbs. Bake for 20 to 30 minutes until the top is browned.