Category Archives: Cooking

Chicken Stuffed with Feta and Red Pepper with Lemon Thyme Veggies

October 17, 2012 alaskaknitnat 1 Comment

My husband is back on his South Beach Diet kick, which is always fun for me because I get to try to cook yummy carb-free food. Months ago I found a recipe for chicken roll-ups with roasted red peppers, feta and pistachios with some sort of a lemon yogurt sauce. I was originally going to make this recipe, but I had to wing it when the lemon zest made the yogurt curdle. The sauce went down the drain and what I came up with instead was deeeelightful. My husband is always positive about my cooking, but tonight he said the veggies were the best he’d ever tasted.

Ingredients

Two boneless, skinless chicken breasts

2-4 roasted red peppers (jarred or make them yourself)

1/2 cup shelled pistachios, coarsely ground

1 tsp. smoked paprika

salt and pepper

1/2 cup crumbled feta

2 Tbs. olive oil

For the veggie side:

1 zucchini

1 golden zucchini (or whatever that yellow kind is that’s always next to the zucchini)

6 mushrooms

3 mini yellow and orange bell peppers

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 tsp. fresh thyme

1 tsp. lemon zest

1/4 cup chicken stock

smoked paprika

salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Mix together the pistachio crumbs, feta, olive oil, paprika, salt and pepper till you have a tasty paste. Pat dry the red peppers. Rinse and pat dry the chicken breasts. Cut a deep slit in each breast as though you were going to butterfly them, but don’t cut all the way through. Stuff each breast with red pepper and the feta mixture. Close the slit with two toothpicks. Heat some olive oil in a frying pan over medium high heat and brown the chicken on each side. Place into a baking pan and bake for 30 minutes. Remove toothpicks and let sit five minutes before serving.

Meanwhile, chop the zucchini into 1-inch pieces. Slice the mushrooms and mini peppers. In the same pan you browned the chicken, add the veggies, thyme and lemon zest. Cook the veggies for a few minutes then add the stock. Add the paprika, salt and pepper to taste and cook till the stock disappears and the veggies are soft. Top with crumbled feta.

Cooking

Lasagna Roll-ups with Spicy Sauce

October 10, 2012 alaskaknitnat 1 Comment

Oh Pinterest, how I love thee. Let me count the ways….nah, I’ll just tell you about lasagna roll-ups. Do a Pinterest search for this dish and you’ll find lots of versions. I would like to add my version to the list.

Lasagna roll-ups — what a splendid idea. It’s easier to serve and you don’t have to make one gigantic batch and hope that you’ll eat the leftovers before they become fuzzy with mold. That’s always the problem when I make it for just me and my husband. Each roll up is like one slice of lasagna, which to me is about one third of a serving since I’m always starving.

Here’s my down-home lasagna recipe TRANSFORMED!

Serves 4 hungry people, or 6 regular people

Ingredients for the sauce:

1 large can of crushed tomatoes

1 Tbs. tomato paste

2 Tbs. olive oil

3 cloves of garlic

1/2 onion, chopped (optional)

3 Tbs. or so dried basil

1 Tbs. or so dried oregano

1 tsp. sugar

salt and pepper

1 lb. spicy pork sausage

The rest:

One package of lasagna noodles (the kind you have to boil)

1 regular-sized tub of cottage cheese (trust me)

1.5 cups shredded mozzarella

1.5 cups shredded parmesan

2 eggs

1/2 package of frozen chopped spinach

3 Tbs. fresh parsley, chopped

salt and pepper

For the sauce, heat the olive oil in a medium saucepan. Add the onion and garlic and cook till onions are translucent. Add the tomatoes, paste, sugar, basil, oregano, salt and pepper. Bring to a simmer and turn down the heat so sauce doesn’t burn. In the meantime, brown the meat and break up into small pieces. Add to the sauce.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Heat the spinach in boiling water till it’s heated through. Drain, cool, and squeeze out as much water as possible.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.

In a medium bowl, combine the cottage cheese, eggs, 1 cup of mozzarella, 1 cup of parmesan, spinach, parsley, salt and pepper.

In a square baking dish, add about a cup of the sauce.

When water is boiling add six noodles at a time and boil for 10 minutes, or whatever the packaging says. Spread the noodles out on a sheet of aluminum foil. Spread a couple of tablespoons of the cheese mix to each noodle. Roll up the noodles and place seam-side down into the baking dish. Top with the remaining sauce and sprinkle the rest of the cheeses on top. Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes. Remove the foil and cook another 5-10 minutes.

Enjoy!

Cooking

Creamy Tortellini, Sausage and Mushroom Soup

September 22, 2012 alaskaknitnat 1 Comment

Winter’s a-coming and that means it’s soup and stew season. Gotta stay warm, especially when we’ve been having these unusually early El Niño-like windstorms lately. Here’s a great recipe to hunker down with. I found it on Pinterest and as usual, added my own little flair (i.e., meat).

I wasn’t sure what the blogger meant by “white sauce mix.” Normally, I’m averse to using prepackaged stuff in my cooking, but I thought I’d try it out and I used one dry packet of alfredo sauce mix. It turned out to be a delightful soup base and boosted the other flavors quite well.

Creamy Tortellini Sausage and Mushroom Soup

Serves a whole bunch of people — like 12?

Ingredients:

1 packet of dry alfredo sauce mix

4 cups water

2 cups chicken broth

1.5 cups crimini or baby portobello mushrooms, sliced

1/2 an onion, chopped

3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 tsp. or so dried basil

1/2 teaspoon or so dried oregano

some sprinkles of cayenne powder

salt and pepper

one 8-oz package of dried tortellini

1/2 package of frozen spinach

4 Italian sausages

1 12-oz. can evaporated milk

Directions:

Combine the sauce mix, water and chicken stock in a large Crock Pot. Add the mushrooms, onion, garlic, basil, oregano, cayenne, salt and pepper and set Crock Pot to low for 4-5 hours.

Stir in the dried tortellini. Cook on low for another hour. Meanwhile, heat the frozen spinach in a small pan with water till it’s thawed. Strain and squeeze out the water. Set aside. Cook the sausage thoroughly and slice up.

Add the spinach and sausage and continue cooking till tortellini is al dente. Add the evaporated milk and cook till soup is hot again. Serve with freshly grated Parmesan and crusty bread.

Cooking

Benihana-style Fried Rice

September 22, 2012 alaskaknitnat 1 Comment

I sometimes have to remind myself why I started this blog in the first place. I can never remember how I made something and I need a catalog of all my creations. That is my excuse for the poor photography for this post.

I grew up in a gourmet kitchen. We ate pesto, caviar and porcini mushrooms. You’d nary find a casserole on our dining table. But for some reason, my father could never master fried rice. It was always too much oyster sauce or something didn’t seem right.

I just assumed it was impossible to make tasty fried rice at home unless you have some sort of Asian granny teaching you her family secrets.

I was wrong. I CAN make yummy fried rice, and although the secret ingredient is not traditional, I have to say that Benihana knows what’s up — butter. Mmm…besides bacon, butter makes everything amazing.

I guess it’s not much of a secret since the chefs make it right in front of you, but I found a great copycat recipe and decided to try it out. You, too, ought to try it.

My recipe is a little different from the one I found, but I ate about six servings worth. It’s carbalicious!

Benihana Fried Rice

Serves about 6

2 cups uncooked rice
2 carrots, cut into small cubes
1 onion, cut up small
7 tablespoons butter
4 green onions, chopped
2-3 eggs
2 chicken breasts, sliced into thin strips
Soy sauce
Fish sauce
salt and pepper
vegetable oil
toasted sesame seeds (if you’re up to it, but I didn’t bother)

Directions:

Cook the rice according to the package’s instructions. While it’s cooking, heat a wok or large skillet over high heat. Once hot, add about a teaspoon of vegetable oil. Crack the eggs into the pan and swirl around with a spatula thus scrambling them while they cook. Once fully cooked and slightly brown (I like when it’s like that), remove from pan and set aside. Let pan reheat and add a couple of more teaspoons of oil. Add the chicken and cook thoroughly till browned a little. Remove from pan and set aside. Reheat the pan and add the butter. Once melted, add the onions, carrots and green onions and cook till carrots are tender to your liking. Add the rice, eggs and chicken to the wok. Sprinkle the soy sauce all over the rice till everything is thoroughly coated. I’m assuming it’s about 1/4 cup, but I eyeballed it. Next, lightly sprinkle the rice with fish sauce (maybe about 1 teaspoon). Toss everything thoroughly and season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve with steak and lobster à la Benihana.

Cooking

Potato, Beet and Chèvre au Gratin

September 1, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

Yesterday my best friend Jess, Jack and I went to a farm in Palmer where you can pick your own produce. They had all kinds of yummy stuff, but we decided to pull up some orangey beets. Jess had previously found some purple potatoes at the state fair and we reconvened at dinner time for a lovely spread of salmon fillet, brown rice, homegrown green salad and a beet and potato au gratin with chèvre. It was positively amazing.

Potato, Beet and Chèvre au Gratin

Serves 4

Ingredients:

6 small to medium beets

6 small purple potatoes

Olive oil

Blackberry balsamic vinegar (or just regular)

salt and pepper

Chèvre cheese

Directions:

Clean and peel beets and potatoes. Boil them till they are fork tender. When they’ve cooled enough to touch slice them 1/4-inch thick. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a small rectangular baking dish, layer beets and potatoes in an alternating fashion. Drizzle with oil and vinegar and add salt and pepper to taste. Sprinkle chèvre on top of the slices and bake until the cheese is melted to your liking.

Cooking

Cooking From the Past

August 26, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

Cooking, Pasta, recipes, seafood

Pasta Alfredo with Peas and Salmon on a Bed of Arugula

July 24, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

In case you don’t live in Southcentral Alaska, it’s sockeye salmon season. If you do live in Southcentral Alaska then you, your brother, your coworker and your landlord’s cousin have a freezer full of salmon. My husband came home with 36 gorgeous fish and after 4 hours of processing we now have to come up with ways of eating this healthy, delicious animal.

Last night we grilled up simple salmon steaks with just butter and lemon pepper, but tonight I wanted something fancy. No, I just wanted pasta.

This turned out amazingly. Here’s how to make it. Please keep in mind that I eyeball everything so these measurements are approximate.

Serves 2-3

Ingredients:
1 small salmon fillet
butter
1 clove of garlic, minced
2 oz. cream cheese
1/4 cup cream
1/4 cup milk
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan or pecorino romano
1/2 cup frozen peas
1/2 lb. pasta of your choice
fresh baby arugula
salt and pepper

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Place salmon fillet, skin side down, in a baking dish. Spread butter all over your fillet. Salt and pepper to taste.

In the meantime, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.

Bake your salmon for about 20 minutes. Keep an eye on it. When you see white “sweat” coming out of the edges of the filet, it’s done. Remove from oven and set aside.

Cook your pasta al dente.

Meanwhile, heat a tablespoon of butter in a medium saute pan over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook till fragrant, about one minute. Add the cream, cream cheese, and milk. Stir until cream cheese is melted. Add the nutmeg and cheese and pepper to taste. Turn down heat as soon as sauce thickens.

When pasta is almost done, add the peas to the sauce. Drain the pasta and add it to the saute pan. Mix till pasta is thoroughly coated in the sauce.

With a fork, flake the salmon into bite-sized pieces.

Line each serving plate with baby arugula leaves. Add the pasta and top with a serving of salmon.

Deeeeeelish!

appetizers, Cooking, recipes

White Bean Pesto Hummus

May 31, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

My husband is back on the South Beach Diet, which means I have to get creative in the kitchen. This evening he was planning on herbed chicken bits with asparagus. He was just going to pile some canned black beans on top of his chicken, so I decided to get a little more creative.

I had a can of cannellini beans in the cupboard and some leftover homemade pesto so I decided to bust out the blender. What I came up with was a smooth and flavorful dip perfect for topping his chicken bits with. I cleaned up the rest of the dip with pretzel chips. Divine!

Ingredients:

One can of white beans

1 clove of garlic

juice of 1/4 lemon

3 or so tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons pesto

Directions:

Drain the beans and toss them into a blender. Add a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, the lemon juice, garlic and pesto. Turn on the blender. If your mixture is struggling to mix, add a little more oil while the machine is running. Once it loosens up, let it run for a few more seconds.

Serve with pita chips or spread on a chicken sandwich. Be creative!

Cooking

I tried it — homemade almond milk

April 15, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

I’ve never been a huge fan of almond milk, or rather, you wouldn’t ever see it in my shopping cart, but that’s not to say it isn’t tasty. When I saw a super easy recipe on Pinterest for homemade almond milk, I figured I might as well give it a go.

It was pretty simple: soak 1 cup of raw almonds in water for 8 hours. Drain the water, fill a blender with four cups water, add the almonds and blend for a few minutes. Then strain the liquid through a cotton kitchen towel, being sure to save the almond meal for later.

It turned out really tasty. I added a little honey to sweeten the flavor. It made about a quart of milk.

But then I realized it was totally not cost efficient. I mean, up here in Alaska, raw almonds are $10 a pound I used about 1/2 pound. Five dollars for a quart of almond milk — I’m pretty sure it’s cheaper to buy it already made.

I guess if I wanted to make it in the future, I’d have to check out if Costco has raw almonds or if I can buy them online for cheaper. I read in one recipe that Trader Joe’s sells 4 cups of almonds for $10. Blasted Trader Joe’s — when will you come up to AK?!

*Update! I just discovered my local Safeway is a total rip off! Fred Meyer had raw almonds for $5 a pound! I’m trying this project again since $2.50 is much more affordable for a quart.

On the plus side, I kept the ground up almonds and roasted them for a while in a 250-degree oven till they were dried out. I used them in my oatmeal the next morning and in my mini meatloaves instead of breadcrumbs. Totally useful stuff.

Cooking

I tried it — homemade yogurt

April 15, 2012 alaskaknitnat Leave a comment

It’s been a busy couple of weeks. I installed a kitchen sprayer on the toilet for our future cloth diaper cleaning, made some prefolds out of old t-shirts, made some grocery bags out of t-shirts, made meatloaf cupcakes with mashed potato frosting, did a couple of more sewing and cooking projects and for this post I decided to try out making my own greek yogurt.

I found a reasonably easy recipe on the interwebs here and decided it was totally worth doing, especially since my husband bought two gallons of 1% milk at Costco for no reason other than he was craving cereal and thought we could consume all of it between the two of us in a week.

I love that I made this in my crock pot. Everything was super easy, including clean up! Since all crock pots aren’t alike, I had to heat the milk for quite a bit longer to get it to 180 degrees. I got it up to 177 and called it good.

After cooling the milk to 105 degrees, adding the 1/2 cup of store bought yogurt I just wrapped the whole crock pot in a towel and stuck it in the oven for eight hours (with the oven OFF!)

My yogurt, after straining, was silky and flavorful. I liked it better than store bought because it wasn’t sour or bitter tasting, but that could be that I added honey as the recipe called for (although I didn’t measure).

Anyway, I will totally make this again in the future especially if I need to use up 1/2 gallon of milk.