Meals en Masse: Beef Lasagna

In preparation for the fact that in two months my life is about to get turned upside down and I won’t have any time or energy to do much, I’m trying to make it a little easier on myself. At least once a week I’m trying to prepare a meal that I can do in triplicate, where we eat one version and store the other two in the freezer. This week I made up a hearty lasagna to feed Papa John and Mrs. Nice, and the other two went into the freezer for some night this summer when we’re willing to brave the heat to get our pasta fix.

Of course I never measure anything when I make lasagna, but I’ll try to give you some approximations here for a triplicate recipe if you’re interested in trying it for yourself (and feeling very smug later when you realize you have two giant lasagnas sitting in your freezer).

First I mixed up the cheese layer, which was 2 750g tubs of cottage cheese (you can use ricotta if you prefer, but if you’re buying in this amount the cottage cheese is way cheaper), 3 rectangular packages of chopped frozen spinach, thawed and drained, the equivalent of 2 heads minced garlic (or however much you prefer), and a smattering of freshly ground salt and pepper.

Creamy cheesy goodness.

Then you can chop up your veg. I like to choose vegetables that add substance to the lasagna without competing with individual flavours, so mushrooms (8-10), eggplant (1), and zucchini (2 small) are favourites of mine, together with sweet red peppers (2) to boost the colour.

Next, a giant sweet onion gets chopped up and added to a large stock pot with a few tablespoons olive oil and a knob of butter.

Once those are soft and fragrant, break up your ground meat with your fingers and tip it in. This is about 2kg extra lean ground beef. If you use medium ground you’ll probably want to drain the fat off once it’s cooked.

When it IS cooked, tip in your veg and let those soften. Add in some of your favourite spices, like oregano and basil.

Next, about 3 jars tomato sauce.

Let that simmer down for a little bit.

Grate up about 2 large bricks mozzarella. When in doubt, err on the side of too much cheese. Always.

Now get your stuff organized for assembly. you’ll also need 2-3 boxes uncooked oven-ready lasagna noodles. Be smart and spray your pasta dishes before you use them. The glass one is the one I’m making right away, but the disposable aluminum pans are for the freezer – I don’t own enough Pyrex to put them all in the freezer at the same time. Plus the aluminum ones make great frozen tasty gifts for those of your friends who are in a similar situation to myself. HINT, HINT.

Layer on some noodles, flat in the bottom, then a generous helping of tomato sauce. You’re aiming for about 1/6th of your sauce for each pan.

More noodles, and then divide your cheese evenly between your three pans.

More noodles. I ran out of noodles at this point because I only had two boxes, so I had to run out and get more. And it was cold. Hooray for expectant mother parking spots.

Finally add in the rest of your sauce and smother it lovingly in cheese.

The ready-made version can be cooked in about 45-60 minutes at 350°F.

I’m putting in this same photo again so you can see how saucy and liquidy the sauce is, despite its thickness – that extra liquid means the noodles will cook through properly without drying out the dish.

The others need to be wrapped well and frozen. I recommend thawing them before cooking, and they’ll probably take about twice as long to cook through because they won’t already be nice and warm. Enjoy!

Mmmore Meatloaf!

Happy Birthday to Papa John!

One of the weirder, yet endearing things about my husband is the fact that if he goes to a fancy restaurant and they have meatloaf on the menu, he will order it. Every. Single. Time. Like a total weirdo. I’m carving my way through a juicy perfectly cooked steak. And he’s eating meatloaf. So we make quite a bit of meatloaf at home, too. Here’s another version of my classic: feel free to double it as I did and freeze one (or both) for later!

First ye grab yer meat. A lot of it. Enough for two loaves. I prefer the lean stuff – the extra lean is wayyyy more expensive and is harder to stick together.

Then ye take yer onions.

And yer mushrooms.

And ye put them in a bowl.

With a lot of other stuff: panko bread crumbs, Newfoundland savoury, oregano, salt, pepper. The works, really.

Then you chuck the meat in a bowl and add some eggs. Like, four or five.

Dump in the rest of the stuff too and give it a good stirring. Feel free to use your hands. Tip in some Worcestershire sauce as well for flavour.

When you’re ready, whisk up a concoction that’s a mix of barbecue sauce, Dijon mustard, and honey.

Spread that in the bottom of your two loaf pans.

Cram the meat on top and smooth it down. See how that sauce comes up the sides? That’ll keep it from drying out.

When you’re done, you can either cover it up and shove it in the freezer …

Or you can bake it at 350°F until it reaches an internal temperature of 160°F.

Then you eat it. Unfortunately cooked meatloaf does not photograph well. But you get the picture.

Mini Wonton Quiches

I finally did get to have that finger-food brunch I was trying for. These wonton mini quiches were a big hit.

I enjoyed cutting up all the vegetables super small to fit in the tiny muffin cup spaces.

I did scoop the seeds out of the tomatoes to avoid mushiness.

And I couldn’t decide on cheeses, so I went with both.

I grabbed some fresh herbs from my very own backyard, because it’s actually spring now.

In the end I had one set of quiches with mushroom, spinach, chives, and goat cheese, and the other was tomato, onion, cheddar, and cilantro. For amounts I kind of winged it, sorry.

Anyway, preheat your oven to 350°F and line your muffin tins with two wonton wrappers each. Align them so they are at 45° angles to each other for the largest surface area. I didn’t do this but I would recommend greasing the muffin tins before you do this.

Then I stuffed the tins with my vegetable-cheese mixtures.

Then I started cracking some eggs. For 24 mini quiches I used about 14 eggs. I also added in a few tablespoons cream, some salt and pepper, and some grated parmesan. Gave that a good mixing.

Then I ever so carefully poured the egg goo into the muffin cups.

It’s hard to get it so it doesn’t go around the seal of the wonton.

I baked them for about 15 minutes, until they were cooked through.

Because I didn’t grease the pan it took some persuasion to get them out.

But they were so good!

And even great for a cold quick breakfast or lunch the next day!

Spag Bol Redux

I have so many fun and exciting things to show you guys in the near future, but I thought I’d do a little bit of a retrospective today. My very first entry on this here blog, five-plus years and 900-odd posts ago, was a recipe for spaghetti bolognese. I make this spaghetti sauce all the freaking time, so I thought I’d do another post just to show you how things have changed over the years, but they still remain in essence the same. For one, the Pie and I went vegetarian for a month when I made that post so there’s no meat in that sauce. For another, I was way lazier when it came to chopping things up, so my sauces were much chunkier. I like them a bit more uniform these days.

Some things stay the same, though: I always load it down with diced onions to start. I made a crapton (a metric measurement of course) of this so that I could freeze it so I can’t give you exact measurements. Just lots.

I always add diced red pepper (I’m allergic to green) and diced mushrooms. You can add whatever you wish, though. Sometimes I chuck in whatever’s in my fridge that needs to be used: avocadoes (they add a nice thickness the sauce), tomatoes, sometimes even carrots.

And then of course a variety of tomato-based canned items. I used to use jarred spaghetti sauce as my base but I found they were sneaking green peppers into the mix and it wasn’t doing my digestive system any good so I switched to canned crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, and canned diced tomatoes.

First I start by sautéeing up the onions with olive oil and a little butter. I let them go until they’re smelly and soft. Then I pull apart a large hunk of lean or extra lean ground beef. I like to break it up with my fingers to ensure that there are no big chunks in the pot. You can also use ground turkey or pork or whatever works for you. If you’re going the veggie route and using TVP, add that last.

After the meat is browned to my satisfaction I tip in my vegetables, as well as some minced garlic, salt, pepper, and various spices.

I like a mix of italian spice plus extra basil.

I add in all my tomato things as well and give that a grand old stirring.

Let that simmer for at least half an hour so the flavours can mingle, and feel free to adjust the spices as you see fit. I like to let it simmer as long as I can, but it’s good either way.

Cool and freeze or serve hot on top of your favourite fresh pasta, baked into a pasta casserole, or glopped on top of bread as a sloppy joe!

Sausage Rolls

I made these for our end-of-the-year softball team potluck, and despite me making four dozen of them, they were gone within five minutes of opening up the container. I’ve never made sausage rolls before, but I do love them, so it was easy to figure out what should go in them. I will definitely make them again, and probably tweak what I throw in, just for variety’s sake – you should, too!

I started by chopping up a bunch of end-of-season herbs from my garden: a bit of sage, parsley, and chives. There is probably about 1/2 cup chopped fresh herbs here.

Then I chopped up 1 package white mushrooms, about 3 cups minced. Ordinarily I’d probably mince up 1 large onion and do half onion, half mushroom, but one of the potluck attendees is allergic to onions so I left it out.

Then grab some (500g) uncooked sausages. These are a little on the spicy side, but nothing too crazy.

Slice through the casing and remove the meat.

Chuck the sausage meat in a bowl together with your herbs, the mushrooms and onions (if you used onions and/or mushrooms), 2 large eggs, 2 tablespoons minced garlic, and about 1/2 cup panko bread crumbs. Feel free to season with salt and pepper as well. It turned out that I had bought pre-seasoned panko so I didn’t bother.

Mix the sausage up thoroughly with the other ingredients. I found it was easier (if more disgusting) to use my hands, but you could probably get away with doing this in the bowl of a stand mixer as well.

Now, remove from the fridge that package of puff pastry sheets that has been defrosting in there overnight.  Slice each sheet into three equal strips.

Grab some mustard. I bought this fancy Tarragon Dijon stuff and I don’t regret it.

Brush a line of mustard down the length of each strip of puff pastry.

Evenly distribute all your sausage meat on top of your mustard line on each strip.

Bring the edges of each strip of pastry together to seal the meat into a long tube. You may have to stretch the pastry a bit to do this, depending on how full it is.

Shove your sausage tubes into the freezer for 15-20 minutes to firm up the dough and the meat and make it easier for you to slice them. You can preheat your oven now, to about 425°F. My oven cooks a little hotter (you’ll notice the finished ones are slightly charred on the bottom) so feel free to reduce the heat to whatever you need to if you have the same problem.

Slice the now-firm tubes into 8 equal pieces – this will give you 48 sausage rolls.

Bake the rolls for 20 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown and puffy and the sausage is cooked through.

Allow them to cool slightly before you stuff them all in your face. I don’t know how long they will last after baking them, in terms of storage, because I never got the chance to find out.

Mysterious Mushrooms

Two days after we came back from our week in NYC, I pulled aside the back of the curtain hanging at our balcony door and discovered a giant pile of orange dust. Everywhere.

A MUSHROOM was growing on the inside track of my balcony door.

And I looked outside and there was its twin, growing happily between two of the boards on the deck.

Inside mushroom, outside mushroom.

I hazmatted up and sprayed everything inside and out with bleach, which turned the orange spores pitch black. Gross. I took down the curtains, too, and washed them with vinegar.

Post bleach inside.

Post bleach outside.

The thing is, the day before we left, we finally had eavestroughing installed on our roof, which meant that now we didn’t have water pouring at a million pounds per second onto the planking of our (now rotting) deck. So because it was now protected, I figure it gave the fungus a chance to show itself. I’m less clear on how it got INSIDE the house, though I suspect the seal on the door isn’t that great, seeing as I’m forever cleaning up water spots on the interior of the one downstairs.

Just in case this ends up being alien spawn or the portent of the next apocalypse-bringing plague, let the record show that I’m keeping the mushrooms in a Ziploc bag in my garage in case the CDC or NASA needs them later.

Sizzling Summer Skewers

Skewers are fun to eat and simple to construct; however, if you make a large number of them, then you will probably get annoyed with both the assembly and cooking, because it will take forever.  If you’re making skewers in large numbers I suggest making it a team activity.

Start with a marinade.  I had chicken and pork, so I decided on two different marinades.

For the pork: I peeled the membrane off this pork tenderloin and cut it into bite-sized cubes.

Then I assembled the marinade: buttermilk as a base (and tenderizer), sriracha, teriyaki, pineapple juice, fish sauce, and garlic.

Mix that sucker up and shove it in the fridge overnight.

For the chicken: I trimmed the fat off several boneless, skinless chicken thighs (cheaper than breasts) and cut them into chunks.

This one I cheated and used a store-bought teriyaki marinade that I got from Farm Boy.  It was worth it.

Pour that over the chicken, cover, and refrigerate overnight.

I also set a package of bamboo skewers in water and left those to soak overnight as well. This is so they don’t catch fire on the grill.

Assembly time!  For the pork I used onion chunks, fresh pineapple and some red pepper.

I always use two skewers to prevent the food from rolling around when I’m trying to rotate the suckers. It’s a bit trickier to put together (I did stab myself with one of the skewers) but worth it in the long run.

For the chicken I had onion chunks, button mushrooms, and cocktail tomatoes.

The button mushrooms turned out to be too small and kept breaking off, so I would use a bigger mushroom next time.

Grill!  I made so many skewers I had to do about four batches.  It took FOREVER.  Make sure to check that the meat is fully cooked before serving.

Tada!  All lovely and crispy!

Rice Pilaf with Tomatoes

I’ve been on a pilaf kick recently, ever since I had one at the Savoy last week and I can’t even deal with how good it was.  They’re really easy to make, too, just a few extra steps more than plain Jane rice.  Why not? This version serves 6 comfortably, with leftovers.

I had half a 28oz can of diced tomatoes in the fridge as well as some shallots left over from probably Christmas so I figured I’d do something to use them up and take advantage of my overstock of Trader Joe’s Wild Rice Medley.

I chopped up a handful of mushrooms and shallots and set those aside.

Then I dumped a hunk of butter and some olive oil into a skillet and let that melt on medium-high heat.

When it was all melted and foamy I tipped in 2 cups wild rice medley (you can use whichever rice you wish, of course).  I had a bit of black rice hanging around as well so I chucked that in too.

Stir that around until it gets all coated with butter.  You’re basically toasting it here, so you want it to get a bit brown and smoky.

Now you can add in your vegetables and stir them around a bit.

I left the tomatoes until last because I wanted the onions and mushrooms to soften a bit.

Now you add your stock.  Any stock you like.  Just make sure that it works according to your rice’s cooking directions.  This rice requires 2 1/2 cups liquid for every cup of rice.  I had 4 cups broth in my little carton here, plus a cup of liquid in the tomatoes.

Give that a stir, then cover it and let it simmer for the allotted time given in the cooking directions (with mine it was 40 minutes).  I stirred mine occasionally, but only because I’m paranoid about burning rice.  I’m really good at burning rice.

When it’s cooked take the lid off and remove it from the heat and let it sit for about ten minutes.

We served ours next to a bed of greens and topped with a pan-seared half chicken breast.  It was lovely!

Hot and Sour Thai Chicken Noodle Soup

This comes from The Foodess and it might be THE BEST THING EVER.  I love hot and sour soup, as does Atlas, so I made this with her in mind and everyone who ate it LOVED it.

Start with with a giant pot and chuck in 2 litres of chicken broth. I like the low-salt stuff. Add 2 cups water to that.

Now slice some stuff up. Take some ginger, a 2″ knob.

Peel that and slice it up.

Grab 2 stalks lemongrass, and peel off the outer bits.

Slice it into 2″ lengths. I also cut mine in half lengthwise, to increase the lemongrass flavour’s exposure to the broth.

Grab a handful of kaffir lime leaves (about 8-10). You can freeze the other ones for later.

So you’ve got all this stuff.

Chuck all that in the pot with the broth and bring it to a boil. Reduce the heat, stuff the lid on and leave it for 30 minutes.

In the meantime, grab yourself some mushrooms. The recipe called for 2 cups whole button mushrooms but I had shiitake on hand, so I cut off the woody stems and sliced them into strips instead.

Slice up a cup of cherry tomatoes as well.

Grab 2 oz dried noodles, any kind. I liked the look of this ditali stuff.

You’re also going to need a cold roasted chicken, like the kind you get at the grocery store. I used to be leery of the fact that they sat out for so long, but then I talked to someone who worked at a grocery store and he said they sold so fast they were always making new ones. And they’re such a time-saver!

Anyway, take that sucker and pick it apart, shredding the meat with your fingers. You’re going to need 2 cups shredded chicken, so I just did the whole bird and got a little more than that.

Juice 3 limes and set that aside for a minute.

Gather together as well a giant bunch of baby spinach leaves, and chop them coarsely. It’s harder than it looks.

Chop up as well a giant handful of cilantro. I had a brainfart in the grocery store and bought Italian parsley by mistake and had to go back. But they are very similar in appearance. So I chucked in some Italian parsley too.

While you’re gathering your stuff together, grab some fish sauce and sriracha, and some sea salt.

Use a slotted spoon to remove the ginger, lemongrass, and lime leaves from the broth. You can chuck those bits in the compost now.

Add in the mushrooms, tomatoes, and noodles. Bring those puppies back to a boil and cook for about 10 minutes, until the noodles are tender.

Stir in the chicken, 4-6 tablespoons sriracha (I used 2 tablespoons because of the nursing mum, and it was spicy enough), the lime juice, and a few teaspoons fish sauce. Add some salt to taste.

Add in your spinach and cilantro and cook that for a minute or so until everything is bright green. Serve hot, with additional cilantro on top, if desired. Fantastic the next day.

Spinach and Mushroom Stuffing

We made this for our Canadian Thanksgiving celebrations, but maybe the next time you cook up a turkey (say, for American Thanksgiving, or Christmas, or various other turkey-related feast days), you could try this stuff(ing) out.  You can make it all the day before and chuck it together at the last minute, which is awesome for big dinners.  It’s also the kind of stuffing that doesn’t actually go into the bird, so you can feed it to vegetarians, too!

Start with your bread.  You can buy bags of pre-cut, pre-toasted bread chunks specifically for making stuffing, but I kind of like to make them myself, because I can decide what kind of bread I’m going to use in my stuffing.  Here I used a loaf of Italian sourdough.

I ripped each slice up into bite-sized chunks and spread them out across two baking sheets.  Shove them in your oven and bake them at 350°F until they’re dried out and lightly toasted, about 12 minutes.  Make sure to stir them occasionally.

Dice up about a pound of fresh mushrooms.  The wilder the better.  Unfortunately all we had around were some oyster and regular white mushrooms, but feel free to experiment.  You should have about 9 cups diced mushrooms when you’re done.

Chop up as well 2 large onions, so you’re left with about 3 cups chopped onions in total.

And while you’re at it, go to town on 4-5 stalks celery, ending up with about 2 cups chopped celery in total.

Find yourself some herbs.  These were all growing in our fall garden: sage, parsley, and thyme.  I thought about adding some rosemary to add to the “Scarborough Fair”-ness of the whole thing but managed to restrain myself.

Chop up a couple bunches of each.  You can never have too many fresh herbs in your stuffing, so just go with what feels right.

Dump 1/4 cup of butter and a tablespoon or so of olive oil in a large skillet and melt over medium heat.

Plop in your mushrooms and sprinkle them lightly with salt and pepper.  Sauté those suckers until they’re all squishy and starting to brown, about 8 minutes.  Dump them in a large bowl for now.

Slide another 1/2 cup butter into that skillet and let that melt.

Add in your onions and celery and cook, stirring, until the veggies are tender, probably 12 minutes or so.

Sprinkle in your herbs and cook for another minute.

Then plop in a whole package (5oz) fresh baby spinach.  Toss in the skillet (maybe use a lid) until the leaves are just wilted.

Chuck all that stuff into the bowl with the mushrooms.  If you’re making this ahead of time, this is where you stop.  Let the stuff cool, cover it, and bung it in the fridge overnight.

When you’re ready to get this on the go, preheat your oven to 350ºF and butter a large casserole dish or 9″ x 13″ baking pan.  Whisk 2 eggs and some salt and pepper in a bowl.

Pour in 1 cup low sodium chicken broth (you may need more if you find it dry) and stir that around.

Toss your bread bits with your vegetable mix and pour your broth/egg stuff over top, stirring to make sure it makes it all the way through.

Jam that into your baking dish and bake without covering until it’s brown and crusty on top, about an hour.  Let it stand a few minutes before serving (like, take it out when you start to carve up your bird and you’re set).