Pot Roast
The blizzard of the century has hit. And gone. It was a quick storm. It left almost a dusting of snow. Almost.
But the hype.....
PennDot is salting roads. The official snow-fall accumulation in Bryn Mawr - just a couple of miles from us - was 1/10th of one inch. That's right - a tenth of an inch. How do you even measure a tenth of an inch of snow?!? It boggles the mind.
TV news folks live for disasters. In the freezing nether-regions, they're the ones who harp on the totally meaningless "wind-chill factors" to make the weather sound worse than it actually is. Out west, it's the TV crew at the 7-11 trying to find the one knocked-over bottle of ketchup after a 2.3 earthquake.
But snow or no, it has been cold the last few fays and a pot roast seemed to fit the bill for warming us up.
I had the other part of that top round I used for pot pie the other night so we had our start.
Pot roast - like soups and stews and the like - really don't have recipes. They come together based on what's in the house.
Tonight, I started by browning the beef in a bit of bacon fat. I cut a small onion in 8ths and browned it a bit.
I then added a couple of tablespoons of tomato paste and cooked that up for a few minutes and then stirred in about a half-cup of red wine. I cooked that for a minute and then added about 2 1/2 cups of beef broth and a pinch of salt and pepper.
I covered it, owed the heat, and let it all simmer for about an hour.
I then added one potato cut in 8ths, 2 carrots and 3 stalks of celery. (I virtually never peel vegetables going into soups and stews.) I cooked that for about 45 minutes, removed the meat, and then thickened the broth with a bit of cornstarch. I usually use flour, but the cornstarch was handier tonight.
Served with a couple of thick slabs of the homemade bread from a few days ago. (If there's any left in a day or two, it will make for a great bread pudding!)
Victor just lit a fire in the fireplace so it may be time to grab the Kindle and curl up with something fun to read.
The maniacs from the township just salted our street. Looks like I won't be able to call in to work tomorrow "snowed in."
Beef Pot Pie
Ya know how sometimes you can just surprise yourself at how good something turns out?
That is exactly how I felt tonight with the Beef Pot Pie! It came out G-O-O-D!
Surprisingly good. And made all the better because it wasn't what I had originally planned for dinner! Well... mostly. I had planned the pot pie, but I was going to go easy on myself and use frozen puff pastry for the crust. Except... when I got home and looked in the freezer, there wasn't any puff pastry in there. Oh well.
My first thought was to make a half-batch of pie dough and just do a top crust. But I immediately threw out that idea in favor of a two-crust pot pie. Two crusts really is the way Mother Nature intended a pot pie to be, after all.
I used a braising pan just slightly larger than the casserole I was filling because I wanted to try and contain myself. Soups and stews and the like tend to grow under my tutelage. They easily swell to the size of the vessel they inhabit - and can often require larger quarters.
Tonight, I just wanted to make enough for the pot pie. And I almost succeeded.
I cubed about 3/4 pound of beef from a top round and dredged it in a mixture of flour, salt, pepper, and garlic powder. I then browned it all very well in about a tablespoon of bacon fat. Yes, bacon fat. Remember those BLT's yesterday? I save my bacon fat as did my mother before me and her mother before her. I never throw it away.
But I digress...
After the meat was browned I deglazed the pan with a cup of coffee. As I scraped up the bits of fond in the pan, I knew I was on to something, It smelled great. Into the pan went a quart of beef broth and I brought it all to a boil and then let it simmer for about 30 minutes.
Next into the pan went about a cup of chopped celery and 6 red-skinned potatoes that I quartered. mIt simmered for about another 15 minutes and then I added about a half-bag of frozen mixed vegetables. Frozen mixed vegetables are the perfect soup, stew, and pot pie ingredient. I always have a bag or two in the freezer.
When the potatoes were just about done, I made a paste of the leftover dredging flour and a bit of water and thickened the filling a bit. No exact measurement, here. I probably had a third of a cup of seasoned flour before adding the water and possibly used half of it to thicken. It's a judgment thing. Don't add it all at once.
I spooned it into the crust-lined dish, added the top crust, brushed it with egg, cut steam slits, and put it into a 425° oven for 45 minutes.
I used my favorite pie crust recipe but I didn't add the sugar and used all all-purpose flour. It was light, buttery, flaky, and just the perfect crust. (Why I bought that frozen crust the other day.....)
The perfect dinner and Victor is now in the kitchen making macadamia nut-orange biscotti...
Life is good.
Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, and Peas
Ask Victor what his favorite meal is, and he will invariably say "meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and peas." Not even Italian meatloaf. Just plain ol' basic meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and peas. And basic is the key. Nothing fancy. No exotic herbs and spices. Just meatloaf. That's not to say that an exotic meatloaf would go unappreciated. We've made them and they've gone over quite well.
But basic works.
There's no real recipe or set amount of anything.
- ground beef
- chopped onion
- garlic powder
- bread crumbs
- catsup
- mustard
- an egg or two
- worcestershire sauce
- salt and pepper
Form into a loaf and bake.
It really is the most basic a meatloaf can be.
I've probably told this story a bazillion times, but the "Bayshore Diner Blue Plate Special" plates came from the Westin San Francisco Airport. They were a going away gift when I transferred to Indianapolis to open that hotel. The Bayshore Diner was the main hotel restaurant set up as a '50s Diner with jukeboxes, hostess in poodle skirts and roller skates. Typical over-the-top hotel stuff. (That restaurant is long gone and a stylish bistro is currently the main hotel restaurant.)
As we were developing the menu, meatloaf was an automatic. Problem was, our extremely talented German Executive Chef couldn't make a basic American meatloaf to save his soul. They kept coming out looking like perfect pâtés, terrines, or forcemeats. Definitely not what one would expect paired with mashed potatoes and peas. It took a while but we finally brought him around. And in the meantime, we had some great meals!
But back to tonight's dinner...
It's great that we both like basic meatloaf and it's equally great that we both like lumpy unpeeled mashed potatoes. No muss, no fuss, and all the good potato-peel nutrition balances the butter and fat in the gravy! Well... in my mind, it does. Have I ever mentioned that I am not a dietitian?!?
At least we don't have a clean-your-plate rule.
We need to save room for dessert.
Chicken-Fried Steak
Ever since that deep fryer walked into this house, I've wanted to make Chicken-Fried Steak.
Chicken-Fried Steak and I have a long history. My mom used to make a variation, but I think she made a brown gravy. And I definitely had it in Uncle Sam's Yacht Club. Frozen, pre-portioned steaks, deep-fried to a shoe-leather consistency and then held on a steam table. With a white paste called country gravy. We lost that war. In no small part due to the food, I'm sure.
But the chicken-fried steaks I remember the best were at Lyon's in Daly City - with my parents.
Back in the day, Victor and I had dinner with my parents probably once a week. We'd have them over to the house for a quick meal on any given day of the week. They were always the perfect guests - 90 minutes tops from walking in the door to dinner to saying good-bye. They liked to take us out, and the restaurant of choice was always Lyon's. Actually, it was often the default restaurant after the first choice - Joe's of Westlake. My father was of the opinion that there was no reason on earth that he should have to call a restaurant and make a reservation. He would show up and expect to be seated. Having worked in the business for more years than I care to count, I'd gently explain that every person of his age and generation within a 25-mile radius was descending upon Joe's at the exact same time. A little advance notice wouldn't hurt.
Alas, he chose not to listen to his Number Two Son. When we were inevitably informed that it would be a 40 minute wait, we were back in the cars and up the road to Lyon's. No wait.
We had grown up with Lyons. I knew the menu backwards and forwards. And 9 times out of 10, I would order the Chicken-Fried Steak. Looking back, I don't remember it as being all that overly-delicious. It was good, but I think ordering it became more of a tradition than a desire. Pop would ask if I was having the Chicken-Fried Steak and I'd say Yeah. Once in a while I'd throw a curve-ball and order a burger or a French Dip, but the Chicken-Fried Steak was my mainstay.
The secret to a good restaurant-style Chicken-Fried Steak is that they're deep-fried, not pan-fried. It makes all the difference. I've pan-fried them in the past but they're just not the same. So tonight, the deep-fryer came out.
Chicken-Fried Steak with Sausage Gravy
- tenderized steaks
- 1 cup flour
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp pepper
- 1/2 cup milk
- 2 eggs
Season flour with salt, pepper, onion, and garlic powders. Dredge steaks in seasoned flour, milk, back into flour, into the egg, and back into the flour. Let set for about 30 minutes.
Deep-fry and smother in:
Sausage Gravy
- 4 oz bulk sausage (I used a sausage seasoned with sage and garlic)
- 2 tbsp flour (from flouring steaks)
- 1 cup milk
- 1/4 cup heavy cream
Brown sausage in skillet. Add flour and mix well. Cook slightly. Add milk and cook until thickening. Add heavy cream and cook until thick and creamy.
It was everything I wanted it to be - and more. And just like at Lyon's, it was more than I could eat. Cybil had her share and there's lunch tomorrow.
And OMG this is so not good for you! Even in small doses this is a heart attack waiting to happen.
So I have had my Chicken-Fried Steak fix. Lyon's is gone and so are Mom and Pop. This is one meal that will serve me better as memories. Really fun, very special memories.
Moroccan Beef Meatball Tagine
I planned on making hamburgers tonight. Somewhere along the line, I got sidetracked.
Actually, my thought process was quite simple. Burgers mean potatoes, whether they be fries, chips, or salad. I didn't have any potatoes and wasn't about to leave the house to get one.
I had rice, couscous, polenta, and just about every other grain imaginable, so I thought I'd find something that would go with one of them.
A Bon Appetit magazine came to the rescue. A cold day calls for something saucy and out of the oven. Besides, I had most of the ingredients and figured I could fake it with the ones that were missing. I didn't have the spinach or any fresh cilantro. I added parsley and a pinch of coriander.
It worked.
The meatballs themselves were nice and spicy. The half-teaspoon of cayenne was a perfect amount. Anything more would have been too hot. I also added a bit of harissa paste to the sauce. The sauce was slightly sweet with a hint of heat that offset the meatballs perfectly.
I had couscous but decided on serving it over white rice. It would have gone well with anything!
Moroccan Beef Meatball Tagine
Meatballs:
- 1 1/2 pounds ground beef
- 1/3 cup coarsely grated onion
- 1/3 cup panko breadcrumbs
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
- 1 large egg, beaten to blend
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 teaspoon turmeric
- 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
Stew:
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 3 1/2 cups chopped onions
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 cinnamon sticks
- 1 teaspoon turmeric
- 1/8 teaspoon saffron threads, crumbled
- 2 cups beef broth
- 1 14.5-ounce can diced tomatoes in juice
- 1/4 cup golden raisins
- 2 cups 1/2-inch-thick carrot slices (cut on diagonal)
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro plus additional for garnish
- 1 5-ounce package baby spinach leaves
preparation
For meatballs:
Line large rimmed baking sheet with plastic wrap. Gently mix all ingredients in large bowl. Using moistened hands and scant 2 tablespoonfuls for each, roll meat mixture into 1 1/2-inch meatballs. Arrange meatballs on sheet.
For stew:
Heat oil in heavy large ovenproof pot over medium heat. Add onions; sauté about 15 minutes. Add garlic, cinnamon, turmeric, and saffron; stir 2 minutes. Add broth, tomatoes with juice, and raisins.
Preheat oven to 350°F. Bring stew to simmer. Stir in carrots. Carefully add meatballs to stew; gently press into liquid to submerge. Sprinkle 1/4 cup cilantro over. Cover pot; place in oven. Bake until meatballs are cooked through and carrots are tender, about 35 minutes. Sprinkle spinach over stew. Cover and bake until spinach wilts, about 5 minutes longer. Gently stir to mix in spinach, being careful not to break meatballs. Remove cinnamon sticks. Season tagine with salt and pepper. Spoon couscous into bowls; top with tagine. Garnish with cilantro and lemons.
Crispy Gnocchi with Peas and Bacon
This was a two-person-in-the-kitchen dinner! My favorite kind.
Victor was perusing the internet looking at different gnocchi ideas when he came across a recipe for Crispy Gnocchi with Fresh Peas and Bacon. The minute I heard about it (yesterday) I knew I had to have it (today.) I shopped on a Saturday afternoon - stood in line - just to bring home the bacon.
We're talkin' dedication. Or something.
It was worth standing in line. I'd do it again.What a great idea!
Victor used gnocchi he made and froze last month. The recipe is really simple - and you can cut back on the butter considerably!
Crispy Gnocchi with Peas and Bacon
- ¼ pound bacon or pancetta, diced (1 cup)
- 1 shallot, thinly sliced
- 1 garlic clove, thinly sliced
- juice of 1 lemon
- 2 cups shelled fresh peas (frozen works in a pinch)
- 12 fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves (left whole)
- 6 tablespoons butter, divided
- 1/3 cup grated parmesan
- 2 tablespoons water
- 1lbs gnocchi fresh or frozen
For the sauce, cook the bacon in a large sauté pan over medium-low heat until the fat is rendered and the bacon is crispy, about 5 minutes. (Pour off some of the fat if your pork is especially greasy. You’ll want about 2 tablespoons of fat.) Add the shallot and garlic, sweat for 1 minute, and then add the lemon juice.
Increase the heat to medium, add the peas, and sauté just until the peas brighten in color. Remove the pan from the heat and fold in the parsley and 2 tablespoons butter. Taste for seasoning and add salt if necessary, though you shouldn’t need much, if any, because the bacon adds a natural saltiness to the sauce. Turn off the heat and set aside while you sauté the gnocchi.
To finish the gnocchi, heat 3 tablespoons of butter over medium-high heat in a sauté pan large enough to accommodate all of the gnocchi without crowding. When the butter becomes brown and fragrant, add the gnocchi to the pan and cook, turning as necessary, until they’re browned and crisp on all sides, 5 or 6 minutes.
Pour in the pea and bacon sauce, turning to coat. Add the remaining tablespoon butter, the parmesan, and the 2 tablespoons of water while turning the gnocchi. Allow the sauce ingredients to emulsify and form a silken coating, 1 to 2 minutes. The sauce should cling to the gnocchi. Spoon the gnocchi and sauce into shallow bowls and serve immediately.
I made a swiss steak of sorts. Beef round steak sliced thin and pounded, floured, and sauteed with onion and mushrooms. A bit of beef broth and the final container of mushroom soup.
I covered it and put it into a 275° oven while Victor made the gnocchi.
So...
Did you notice the plate that tonight's dinner was on? It's from Teatro Zinzanni - a show that plays in Seattle and San Francisco.
The concept pretty much is a 5-course dinner served in a circus tent - and the diners being a part of the show. It's non-stop fun and possibly one of the best three hours you'll ever spend. It's fantastic.
They bill themselves as Love, Chaos, and Dinner. They are so right. We were so enthralled with everything that after the show, we went into the gift shop and bought 4 plates - two oval and two round. I think they were something like $40.00 a piece. We were flush back in those days.
Go to the website and click on the videos to see some of the show in action.
And then... if you're ever in San Francisco or Seattle - GO SEE IT!
Beef Stew and Stormy Weather
I love cold, gray, wet, and dreary days. They're the perfect excuse to bake some bread, make a soup or stew, light a fire in the fireplace, and, generally, be a slug. All of my favorite things to do. Especially the slug part.
And today was the perfect cold, gray, wet, and dreary day to do a couple of the above. I got home too late to make bread, but I had plenty of time to make stew and be a slug. And the fireplace is being lit as I type.
Life is good.
When I make soups and stews, I somehow think I'm still cooking on an aircraft carrier. I don't know what it is, but small amounts just do not compute. There are two of us. I do not need several pounds of meat, and even more potatoes, celery, carrots, etc... But I break out the pot and need to fill it. And we then have enough to feed the neighborhood.
My solution tonight was to just use a smaller pot. (I know... what a concept, eh?!?) I've tried it before with other pots - and ended up dumping everything into a larger pot. I decided to make a go of it one more time. And tonight, it worked! A manageable amount!
I also cooked the onions in bacon grease - and then because there just happened to be three slices of bacon in the refrigerator - I sliced up the bacon and added it to the onions, then browned the mushrooms and the beef. I generally don't use bacon in my beef stew - I save it for making Julia’s boeuf bourguignon - but it was there. And I'm really glad it was.
I wasn't vying for the complex flavors of boeuf bourguignon. I just wanted to add a bit more flavor to a Thursday night beef stew.
It worked.
Potatoes, celery, carrots, a quart of beef broth and a pinch of herbs d'Provence.
That was it.
Another thing I did differently was thicken it with rice flour. I picked up a box of it a while ago because it is especially good at thickening things that are going to be frozen. It keeps things from separating when they thaw. I added the same amount nixed with water as I would have with wheat flour and it worked just fine.
And warm cheese focaccia to dunk.
Time to slug.
Sweet Potato Latkes and Portobello Mushroom Gravy
It's amazing that dinner ever made it from concept to reality tonight. I had too many concepts.
Sunday tends to be a bit of a clean out the refrigerator day in preparation for the Monday Shopping Trek. I had a lot of choices and a lot of ideas today. I have a single pie crust left from making the pumpkin pie the other night that would have gone great on my Mom's Steak Pie. But I needed to use brussels sprouts. And that yam. And those last few mushrooms.
There is chicken in the freezer - and several varieties of sausage. A pork tenderloin...
Leafing through the latest copy of Wegmans magazine, I saw a recipe for Apple Almond Yam Cakes. A sweet potato latke by any other name... That set the tone for dinner. Sweet potatoes go great with brussels sprouts, and tri-tip roasts and mushroom gravy go with everything.
A dinner was born.
The tri-tip went into the oven at 425° along side the brussels sprouts. I halved the sprouts, put them into a casserole dish with about a half-cup of chicken stock and just let 'em cook down. About 5 minutes before they came out of the oven I added dried cranberries and pine nuts.
While the roast was resting, I made a pan gravy using the drippings, a handful of sliced baby bella mushrooms, a splash of brandy and a carton of condensed portobello mushroom soup. Really. Condensed soup. Me.
It was something new and I thought I'd give it a try. I have to admit that the last time I used condensed soups in anything was back in the '70s when I lived at Lake Tahoe. I used to make a stuffed chicken breast dish with a champagne mushroom sauce for crowds (we always had crowds at that house!) but over the years just stopped using them. Since Victor just said my gravy is better, I probably will continue to stop using them.
The sweet potato latkes were good. Nice balance of potato with apple and onion. I used sliced almonds as the recipe stated, but will use probably use slivered almonds next time I make them for a bit more pronounced crunch. The recipe makes a dozen large potato cakes, so be forewarned. We'll have a couple for breakfast tomorrow and more are going into the freezer.
Apple Almond Yam Cakes
- 1 1/4 lbs yams, peeled, coarsely grated (about 7 cups)
- 1 medium Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored, coarsely grated
- 4 oz Chopped Onions
- 1 1/2 Tbsp Sour Cream
- 4 large Eggs, lightly beaten
- Salt and ground white pepper to taste
- 1 1/4 cups All-Purpose Flour
- 1/2 cup sliced almonds
- 1/2 cup Vegetable Oil
Directions:
- Combine yam, apple, and onion in a large mixing bowl. Add sour cream and eggs; season to taste with salt and white pepper. Stir to combine. Slowly fold in flour. Stir in almonds. Mix well. Form yam mixture into patties by scooping up portions with ice cream scoop (about 1/2 cup) and pressing firmly with hands. Set aside.
- Heat oil in large skillet on medium-high, 1-2 min, not allowing oil to reach smoking point. Reduce heat to medium.
- Add yam patties to pan (pan should hold 5 patties). Cook, 7-8 min until edges begin to brown. Gently turn patties over. Cook 5-6 min until browned and tender. Drain on double thickness of paper towels.
- Repeat with remaining yam patties, heating additional vegetable oil if necessary.
Can be made a few hours ahead and reheated in a 350 degree oven for 20 min.
It was an easy dinner to put together, but I did seen to dirty an awful lot of stuff. Fortunately, we have a great system. When I cook, Victor cleans and when Victor cooks, Victor cleans.
It really is a great system!
Steaks on the Barbie
The Midwest has been going through some of the worst weather in recorded history, the past 24 or so hours. Howling winds, blinding rain, flight cancellations by the hundreds. A total mess. Here, outside of Valley Forge, it's a warmish 73°, kinda damp, dark, and looking like it would really like to storm a bit.
Perfect barbecue weather.
I had picked up another tenderloin and, armed with a sharp knife, cut a couple of nice steaks.
I put some teeny tiny potatoes in the oven with a bit of olive oil and garlic, pulled some peas out of the freezer, and while I grilled, Victor cooked some onions.
Steak and onions. It is just such a great flavor combination. I don't even care what kind of onions they are - they all turn sweet in a skillet.
And speaking of sweet, there's pumpkin pie in the fridge for later on this evening...
And thunderstorms in the forecast.
Let it storm. We have an old egg beater to whip cream if the power goes out.
Always prepared.
Not Quite Joe's Special
I've been just a tad homesick this week. Getting married far from home. Watching the Giants. Seeing all of those fabulous views of San Francisco... Seeing our old season ticket seats at AT&T (nee PacBell) Park. Missing mom and pop... It's been pretty much a whirlwind of emotions...
So, of course, I think of food. It''s what I do.
One of the things that has kept coming forward is "Joe's Special" - a scramble of ground beef, spinach, mushrooms, and eggs. Tradition has it that the Joe's Special was created at "New Joe's" on Broadway in San Francisco back in the 1920's. New Joe's was the precursor to "Original Joe's" on Taylor. Folklore has it that a customer ordered a spinach omelet very late on night. The customer asked the chef if he had anything else available to cook. The chef replied he had some hamburger left. The customer asked him to throw some of the hamburger into his omelet. The dish became so popular that they eventually put it on the menu.
Why I've been thinking of this, I don't quite know. It's not something my mother used to make. It was on the menu of at least three restaurants I worked in in my youth, but it's not something I would immediately associate if someone said "quick, name a San Francisco food."
So... I decided to do what I normally do when irrational thought enters the brain... Run with it!
Except I really wasn't in the mood for a scramble.
So I took the same basic ingredients and just put them together a bit differently. I fried up the mushrooms with a bit of garlic and added the spinach. Toasted 2 slices of bread. Grilled 2 burgers outside and fried 2 eggs, inside.
The result was a layered dish of toast, spinach and mushrooms, and a burger patty topped with a fried egg.
What a treat. Charred burger with egg yolk dripping into it. And spinach and crunchy toast...
Can we say outrageously good, boys and girls?!?
It did everything it was supposed to do - and more.
And one more win and the Giants go to the World Series.
Life is good.
Stuffed Peppers
When we were shopping Monday, the idea of stuffed peppers came up. We saw a couple of great peppers, nice flat bottoms so they would stand up... Perfect peppers.
Well... wouldn't you know that the perfect peppers stood up perfectly in the 'fridge, stood up perfectly in the pan, stood up perfectly in the oven, and refused to stand up once I took them out of the oven. Standing up perfectly in the pan. Falling over on the plate.
Go figure.
But standing up or falling over, they were pretty good.
Stuffed peppers are one of those dishes I never use a recipe for - and I don't think I have ever made them remotely the same way twice. I've stuffed them with raw meat and uncooked rice, cooked meat and uncooked rice, raw meat and cooked rice, meat and breadcrumbs, chunked vegetables, with rice without rice, brown rice white rice, gound beef ground pork ground lamb, and various combinatiuons of the above.
They always seem to come out just fine, no matter what I do to them.
Tonight was a mixture of ground pork, ground beef, onion, and cooked rice. And leftover pasta sauce and grated cheese.
Stuffed Peppers
- 2 bell peppers
- 1/4 cup chopped onion
- 1/3 lb ground beef
- 1/3 lb ground pork
- 1 cup cooked rice
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp sage
- 2 cups pasta sauce
- 1/2 cup shredded romano cheese
- salt and pepper, to taste
Preheat oven to 350°. Slice off top of bell pepper and remove seeds and membranes.
Saute onion until translucent. Add beef and pork and cook through. Add rice and mix well. Add seasonings, 1/2 cup pasta sauce and about 1/4 cup grated cheese. Mix well and stuff into peppers.
Put remaining 1 1/2 cups sauce in baking dish. Add peppers and cover with foil.
Bake for 1 hour.
This is a "play-with-it" recipe. Have fun. Cut the peppers in half if they're really big. You'll probably have better luck getting them to lie flat. Put lots of cheese on top and stick them under the broiler to finish.
Go crazy!
Pansotti with Fresh Tomato Sauce
Several weeks ago, Victor made Pansotti con salsa di noci for his Monday Pasta. The recipe made quite a bit of the pasta, so into the freezer it went - until tonight.
Victor had made tomato sauce a couple of days ago from the horde of tomatoes we've harvested and I was in the mood for EyeTalian. A dinner was born.
I had about a half-pound of mushrooms and about the same amount of filet tips, so I sauteed them off in a bit of olive oil and garlic, added a couple of cups of the fresh tomato sauce, a couple of ounces of grated grana padano, and a pinch of fresh herbs. I cooked off the frozen pansotti, tossed everything together and sliced up some of yesterday's bread.
It was a treat not to really have to cook, but have a fresh-made dinner.
So to celebrate not really having to do anything, I made a Bananas Foster Bread from Cooking Light Magazine.