Pregnancy and Bolognese

I have been a terrible, rotten blogger lately.  The truth is, that for 15 of the last 16 weeks, I've had no desire for food.  Every time I've tried to eat it, my body rejects it.  I've been taken down with a case of pregalimia.  Brutal.

If you haven't heard of pregalimia, then you have either a. never known a pregnant person with "all the time sickness" (morning sickness is seriously the most annoying phrase EVER.  It has nothing to do with the morning.  It has to do with things being smelly, the very cute little alien that has taken over your body and turned you into a vomatious demon, and a very disturbing relationship with your head in the toilet- or the sink- or the trash can...), or a. you are one of those people that have only seen the bright side of pregnancy (i.e. your wife/significant other/friend never got sick, or she kicked it old school, and hid from you until she woke up and saw the sunlight with a rumble in her stomach that said: FEED ME NOW!)

Now that I've hit week 16, I finally have a (mostly)steady, ravenous desire for food.  This is one of those lovely times when living in Italy is first world problems.  What?  You're pregnant!  'No cured meats little lady, but here ya go, have some bolognese!'  It's wonderful.  Good grief.  Writing this blog is making me hungry. (Yay!)

Speaking of bolognese, or ragu, as it is known to some, this is one of the recipes that I have come to love since moving to Firenze.  A good girlfriend gave me the recipe, and it's one of the few things that I've ever made that if it was in our house everyday, my husband wouldn't be able to resist it.  Ever.

You'll need:

• 2 tbsp olive oil (I prefer extra virgin)
• 6 rashers of streaky 'pancetta' bacon, chopped
• 2 large onions, chopped
• 3 garlic cloves, crushed
• 2 carrots, chopped
• Stick of celery, chopped 
• 1kg/2¼lb lean minced beef (I usually use what is sold as "ragu meat" in Firenze.  Pork is just as tasty as meat if you prefer it.)
• 2 large glasses of red wine (I prefer Chianti)
• 2x400g cans chopped tomatoes (or 1 jar of passata- a type of tomato puree for those that don't like a chunky sauce)
• 2 fresh or dried bay leaves
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 800g-1kg/1¾-2¼lb dried tagliatelle or a good artigianale pasta that will hold up to the ragu.
• freshly grated parmesan cheese (optional for serving)

Instructions:

1. Heat the oil in a large, heavy-based saucepan and fry the bacon until golden over a medium heat.

2.  Add the onions, garlic, carrots, and celery, cook until softened, and the onions are clear.

3.  Increase the heat and add the minced beef. Fry it until it has browned. Make sure to "chop" at it with your spatula so that the meat gets nice and small (and the veggies too as they break down and cook).

4.  Pour in the wine and boil until it has reduced in volume by about a third. Reduce the temperature.  Stir in the tomatoes and bay leaves.

5. Cover with a lid and simmer over a gentle heat for 1-1½ hours until it's rich and thickened, stirring occasionally.

6.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

7.  Serve over tagliatelle, or stir in with a hearty pasta that sticks to the ribs on a cold day!

8.  Top with freshly grated parmesan cheese.

This is also one of those delicious sauces that tastes better with each passing day, so don't be afraid to make it ahead of time and use it later.  (Although, once you taste it, I guarantee that it won't last long!  I've caught Kyle eating it by the spoonful!)

Caprese Salad

 

I love caprese salad.  It's one of my oddball comfort foods.  It reminds me of when I was younger, and would try to wow my grandparents with my cooking ability (little did I know how little I didn't know!)  I remember serving it up with some homemade Italian bread, with the caprese salad placed neatly in a bowl and my family devouring it.  It's one of the first things I ever made where I had hope that I could really be good at this cooking thing, so it'll always be a bit special to me, regardless of the fact that it's incredibly easy to make.  I think it goes to show that sometimes the best things in life are the simplest.  

Since we've been living in a hotel for the last few weeks, I've had to find different ways to make healthy, fresh food.  I don't want to live on take-out or go out to dinner all the time.  I have a preschooler.  She needs her sleep, and we all need some time to relax! 

Caprese Salad is literally the most simple, yet fancy seeming dish that you can make.  And all it takes is a tomato, a ball of fresh mozzarella, a few basil leaves, 2 tablespoons of some balsamic vinegar and 2-3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, with a dash of salt and pepper.  It doesn't matter if you cube, slice, or chop your cheese and tomatoes.  It will be perfectly delicious regardless of how you present it.  Does it get more simply, or more lovely than that? 

Meatloaf 4 Ways!

I have a confession...when my husband is on business trips, I eat way more popcorn than a normal person would ever consider consuming...and I tend to live on leftovers.

During Kyle's last business trip, I made Laela and I some delicious turkey meatloaf. You might be thinking, "meatloaf? How boring! How on Earth can anyone live on meatloaf for a week?!" Well, let me tell you this- meatloaf is awesome. You can eat it cold on a sandwich (some people like it with mayo, others with ketchup, or some top it with tons of lettuce, tomato, onion, cheese and/or pesto). You can eat it hot and steaming with mashed potatoes, veggies, and brown gravy. You can chop it up, mix in some bbq sauce in a medium hot pan until it's well heated, put it on a bun and yum! You've got a tasty sandwich!

My latest discovery for leftover meatloaf may very well be my favorite. I cooked some hericots verts (french green beans) in a medium-hot pan with 2 cloves of finely sliced garlic, 1/2 a roughly chopped tomato, about a tablespoon of olive oil, and some salt and pepper. Once the beans were good and crispy, the tomatoes were oozing flavor, and the garlic was clear and aromatic, I transferred the green beans to a plate.  In the same pan (without turning off the heat) I drizzled a small bit of olive oil (about a 1/2 tsp), chopped the meatloaf to bits (2 servings), threw in 3 chopped up basil leaves, 1/4 cup of chicken broth, and added the other half of the roughly chopped tomato to the mix. I cooked it on medium heat for about 2 minutes, then let it reduce for about 30 seconds on high heat, stirring to make sure nothing stuck to the pan. Man oh man, was it ridiculously delicious. It was like a gourmet meal for the lazy...or the very tired mama.

This meal is proof that no matter how tired you are, you don't have to grab the phone and order that take-out that's just going to make you feel awful.  Sure, it's fine for once in a while, but if you have a life like most people, you're busy, and it's easy to get in a take-out rut.  Do yourself a favor, Drop the phone, and try cooking. This dinner took less than ten minutes to throw together.  The meatloaf itself is only 5 minutes or less of prep.  Plus, the more often you try new techniques and recipes, the more quickly you will be able to get things done in the kitchen.  Be a fearless home cook!

For a really great meatloaf recipe, click here. Just replace the 1lb beef for 1lb ground turkey (I prefer 1/2 dark and 1/2 white for meatloaf).

Once you've tackled that meatloaf, give this one a go! There are more ingredients/steps involved, but it's really delicious! (and it's great for sneaking some vegetables into your anti-vegetable family members!)

Crock Pot Chicken

I've been craving some chicken with salsa, so I decided to "food-speriment"  I put two large, boneless, skinless chicken breasts in the crock pot on low, with some black beans(as much as you like), chunky tomato salsa (about a half a jar-4-5 oz or so), kidney beans (as much as you like), and a half cup of chicken broth.  I served it with some basmati rice with a bit of shredded cheese, and wala!  Dinner was ready!

Super delicious!  Try it!

**Optional:  You can "pull the the chicken" and put the chicken with salsa and beans in taco shells/tortillas.  It's also great served with tortilla chips.

Fajitas!!

We are big time Mexican food lovers in our house, so when I got the email from the Food Revolution to try this recipe, I went for it.  I paired it with some golden Spanish rice.

This took about ten minutes to make, and froze/reheated really well.  Give it a go!

Fajitas

Ingredients for the fajitas:

• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 medium red onion
• 8 ounces skinless, boneless chicken breast fillets
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• A small pinch of ground cumin
• 2 limes
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/16 teaspoon sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 2 x 8-inch flour tortillas
• ½ cup plain yogurt
• 2 ounces Cheddar cheese

For the salsa:

• ½–1 fresh red chile, to your taste
• 15 ripe grape or cherry tomatoes
• about ½ cup a small bunch of fresh cilantro
• 1/16 teaspoon sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1 lime

For the guacamole:

• a small handful of cherry tomatoes- about ¼ cup
• ½-1 fresh red chile
• a few sprigs of fresh cilantro
• ½ ripe avocado
• 1 lime

Jamie's Tips:
•This is a great meal to prepare ahead, like a stir-fry – the trick is to prepare all your ingredients before you start cooking because once you start things go pretty fast!
•Make sure your grill pan is nice and hot before you start cooking so that the chicken starts sizzling and grilling as soon as it hits the pan.

•The trick to sizzling hot, golden brown chicken and veggies is to not overcrowd the pan. If you’re making this for 4, just double the ingredients but cook them in two pans or in batches.

•You can make the guacamole a little bit ahead of time – to keep it nice and fresh, press a piece of plastic wrap right onto the surface of the guacamole – this will keep it from turning brown.

Method:

•Put your grill pan on a high heat. Halve and seed your bell pepper and cut it into thin strips. Peel, halve, and finely slice your onion. Slice your chicken lengthways into long strips roughly the same size as your bell pepper strips.
•Put the bell peppers, onion, and chicken into a bowl with the paprika and cumin. Squeeze over the juice of half a lime, drizzle over a lug of olive oil, season with the salt and pepper and mix well. Put to one side to marinate for 5 minutes or so while you make your salsa.

•Finely chop your chile. Roughly chop your tomatoes and the cilantro, stalks and all.

•Put the chile and tomatoes into a second bowl with the salt and pepper and the juice of 1 lime. Then stir in your chopped cilantro.

•Use a pair of tongs to put all the pieces of bell pepper, onion, and chicken into your preheated pan to cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until the chicken is golden and cooked through. As the pan will be really hot, keep turning the pieces of chicken and vegetables over so they don’t burn – you just want them to lightly chargrill to give you a lovely flavor. Give the pan a little love and attention and you'll be laughing.

•To make the guacamole squeeze a handful of cherry tomatoes on to a board. Finely chop up the flesh with ½ -1 red chile and a handful of cilantro leaves, including the top part of the stalks.

•Halve the avocado, leaving the side with the pit for another use. Then squeeze the one side of the avocado over a board so the flesh comes out of the skin. Discard the skin. Squeeze over the juice of 1 lime and chop everything together until fine. Taste and adjust the flavors if needed.

•Warm your tortillas up in a microwave or a warm dry frying pan. Divide your warmed tortillas between your serving plates.

•At the table, carefully help yourselves to the chicken and vegetables straight from the hot grill pan. Just be sure to put it down on top of something that won’t burn, like a chopping board.

•Halve your remaining lime and squeeze the juices over the sizzling pan. Serve with bowls of plain yogurt and guacamole alongside your Cheddar, a grater, and your lovely fresh salsa.


Spanish Rice:
This is one of my favorite dishes.  Follow the instructions on the box/bag.  Add 2 packets of Goya Sazon seasoning, 2 cloves of crushed garlic, a small pinch of paprika, and salt and pepper to taste.  You can add kidney beans, black beans and/or olives if you'd like.  I chose not to this time because I felt that a nice simple rice was the perfect addition to the fajitas!

I hope you enjoy this as much as we did!

Flatbread Pizza!

Over the last two and a half weeks, we've done a lot.  I've signed up for two mommy groups (something I was always too nervous to do in Philadelphia), made some new friends in the area, and have discovered some really great places to eat.

The only thing that I haven't been able to find is really great pizza.  For some reason, the pizza here tastes really bland.  The dough doesn't have that amazing texture that pizzza had back home.  The pepperoni and sauce are missing that really kickin' spice that you can find in PA.  Here, people eat pizza from chains.  At home, we ate pizza from the Italian neighborhood we lived in.

Last Sunday, we went to a Greenville Drive game with a mommy group that I joined.  The game was really fun and the moms' seemed really nice!  After the game, Kyle and Laela were cheering "pizza! pizza! pizza!", so we ran to the store, picked up some ingredients, and I came up with this totally tasty flatbread pizza.

This pizza is practically effortless!

Flatbread Pizza with Tomatoes, Basil, Ricotta Cheese, Pepperoni and Mozzarella
You'll need:

• 1 tomato
• 6 basil leaves
• Pasta sauce (as much or as little as you'd like)
• Fresh mozzarella (I used mini balls, about 5 will do.)
• 1 piece flatbread
• Olive Oil
• Ricotta cheese (about 4 tsp, depending on how cheesy you want it.)
• Pepperoni (optional)

Instructions:

• Heat your oven to 400 degrees.
• Brush your flatbread on both sides with olive oil.
• Toast the flatbread for ten minutes in the oven.
• Take the flatbread out of the oven.
• Using a cookie scoop or a spoon, scoop about four tsp of ricotta cheese onto the flatbread.
• Spread some sauce over the ricotta.
• Slice the tomato into thin slices.  Add the slices to the pizza.
• Add the basil.
• Add the pepperoni slices.
• Slice your mozzarella balls into halves.
• Place them on the pizza.

Bake for 10-15 minutes.  Serve!!

*Since Kyle does not like tomatoes on their own, I  made him the same thing without the tomato slices.

Happy Buhday Dada!

Birthdays are sacred in our house.  They're a week long celebration of well, your life.  It's not just about presents, but appreciating the person for their general wonderfulness.

Since Kyle started his first day of his new position at work on his birthday, we didn't really get to celebrate like we normally would.  Instead, we had to run all over town trying to find him proper footware for working in a plant.  When we finally got home, Laela was so tired, when she handed her Daddy his birthday pictures that she'd drawn and covered in Mickey Mouse stickers, her mumbling "Happy Buhday Dada" was quickly followed by her passing out.

So what does a wife do in such a situation?  Improvise baby.

The next day, we made Dada brownies and double baked chicken with homemade mac-n-cheese.  Veggies?  Just corn- which personally, I like to call a grain- very much NOT a veggie.  Oh, and yes, I definitely topped it off with a gigantic bottle of scotch.  Dada was a very happy guy.

For day three of the Dada celebration, I made some homemade guacamole, some homemade salsa, and some tasty tacos.

For the tacos:

I used 4 TB Penzey's Spices bold taco blend and 4TB water with a pound of ground turkey meat.

For the guacamole:
Use a fork to blend 1 avocado with the juice of 1/2 a lime.  Salt and pepper to taste.

For the salsa:

You'll need:

• 5 tomatoes
• 4 green onions
• 1/4 vidalia onion
• 1 jalapeno pepper
• The juice of 1/2 a lemon
• 1/2 bunch of cilantro
• Salt and pepper to taste

To make the salsa:

• Chop the tomatoes, onion, green onions, jalapeno, and cilantro (including stems).
• Toss together in a bowl.
• Add the juice of the lemon.
• Mix in the salt and pepper.  Taste.  Add more as needed.

Serve!

This was a delicious, simple, relatively healthy meal.  We enjoyed our salsa with some Whole Foods Sunflower and Flax Seed Torilla Chips.

Do birthdays always turn out the way that we want them to?  No.  But sometimes, life is a lot like food.  You've got to work with what you've got, put as much love and effort into it as you can, and hope for the best.

A Ridiculously Fast, Ridiculously Good Ragu!

It's cold.  It's gloomy.  It's time to make a rapid ragu!

I got this recipe from the fabulous Nigella Lawson's cookbook, Nigella Express.  It's nothing short of amazing.  Beef?  Check.  Bacon?  Check.  Cheese?  Oh just give me my heart attack and be done with it!

Ingredients:

• 2 tablespoons garlic oil
• 1 cup cubed pancetta (or bacon if you don't have pancetta handy)
• 1 pound ground lamb (I used a meatloaf mix)
• 1/4 cup caramelized onions *available at gourmet and specialty stores as Onion Confit, or recipe follows
• 1/3 cup Marsala
• 1 (14-ounce) can diced tomatoes
• 1/3 cup green lentils
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/2 cup grated red Leicester or Cheddar, optional

Directions:

• Heat the oil in a wide, medium-sized saucepan, and fry the pancetta until beginning to crisp.
• Add the lamb breaking it up with a fork in the bacony pan as it browns.
• Tip in the caramelized onions, Marsala, tomatoes, lentils and water and bring the pan to the boil.
• Simmer the ragu for 20 minutes stirring occasionally. Sprinkle over the cheese before serving, if using.

Caramelized Onions:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 cups sliced onions (about 2 medium size onions)

Heat a large saute pan over medium heat. Add the olive oil and heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring, until the onions are a deep golden brown and soft, about 25 to 30 minutes. Make sure to use a gentle heat and cook the onions slowly so they don't burn. Onions will keep in the fridge for up to 1 week

 

I served this over angel hair, and Kyle ate the leftovers sans pasta for lunch the following day.  I hope you enjoy this as much as we did!