I’m in love with the lasagna roll-up. It’s simple, it’s customizable and it’s delicious. I also love pesto. So it only makes sense to combine my two loves to create something super amazing tasty.
Chicken pesto roll-ups!
They were indeed super amazing tasty, but they were more like stuffed shells than lasagna. They weren’t as gooey and cheesy. I would consider using cottage cheese next time or adding some milk to the filling.
Ingredients (I eyeballed everything):
Lasagna noodles
1 chicken breast, cooked and shredded
1/2 cup pesto sauce (Costco has the best store-bought kind, but nothing beats homemade)
1 egg
1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese plus 1/4 cup for topping
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella
1/2 cup cream cheese, softened
salt and pepper
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350. Grease a casserole dish. Boil a large pot of salted water and cook noodles according to box directions.
Meanwhile, mix together all the rest of the ingredients. Lay the cooked noodles out on your counter and spread some of the filling on each noodle. Roll up the noodle and place it seam side down in the casserole dish. When all the filling is used up, top the roll-ups with cheese and bake for 30 minutes.
In an attempt to make less messy breakfasts for my 13-month-old son, I came up with a tasty pancake recipe that’s healthy and delicious. I’ll never understand why my mom always had pancake mix in the cupboard because homemade pancakes still only take minutes to make. And if you have leftover pancakes, bag them and freeze them for another day when you don’t have as much time. Just pop them in the microwave to reheat.
Ingredients:
2/3 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1.5 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. allspice
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 Tbs. sugar or agave nectar
1 egg
1 Tbs. cooking oil or melted butter
1.5 cups milk
1/4 cup canned pumpin purée
Directions:
Mix together the dry ingredients. Measure the milk in a large liquid measuring cup and add the rest of the wet ingredients. Whisk gently to combine. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir till just combined. It’s ok if there are lumps.
Heat a large skillet over medium flame. Coat with cooking spray. Ladle batter into pan, forming three flapjacks at a time. Turn when edges are cooked and bubbles form in middle. Cook on other other side till brown. Repeat with rest of batter. Serve with butter and syrup or honey.
In my ongoing quest for quick and somewhat healthy dinner ideas, I came across a tasty recipe for chicken flautas today. Usually my decision to try a recipe is based 90 per cent on whether I have all of the ingredients already. This one passed the screening and sounded tasty as can be. Since I never know what type of vegetable to serve alongside Mexican food, I tweaked the recipe slightly and added chopped frozen spinach. I also healthified it more by adding a wild rice/quinoa blend that I’d made earlier in the day and saved in the fridge.
Both boys (husband and son) gobbled this up. I think I’ll have to make these a staple dinner in our house.
Ingredients (I eyeball everything, so measurements are approximations):
8-10 taco-sized flour tortillas
1 chicken breast
olive oil
1/4 cup salsa
1/4 cup cooked brown rice or quinoa
1/2 cup frozen spinach
1/2 brick Neufchatel cheese or cream cheese
nearly one cup Monterey jack cheese
1/4 tsp. cumin
1/8 tsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp. smoked paprika
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. onion powder
salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spray a casserole dish with cooking spray and set aside.
Place frozen spinach in a microwave-safe bowl and cover with water. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and microwave for two minutes. Drain thoroughly, squeezing with your hands to remove as much water as possible. Place in a medium mixing bowl.
Butterfly the chicken breast and coat both sides with salt and pepper. Coat a frying pan with olive oil and heat over medium-high flame. Add chicken and brown on both sides, about 5 minutes per side. Once chicken is thoroughly cooked, shred with two forks and add to mixing bowl.
Add all the other ingredients but the tortillas and combine thoroughly. Spoon about 1/4 cup of the filling onto a tortilla and shape it into a narrow log. Roll up the tortilla tightly and place seam-side down in a casserole dish. Do the same with the rest of the tortillas and coat the tops of the taquitos with cooking spray. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes or until they are golden and crisp on the edges.
We recently spent two and a half weeks in Mexico where I spent a good deal of time watching the housekeeper cook. She used to run a restaurant from her home and one of her specialties is a dish called chilaquiles. It’s fried corn tortilla strips steeped in a red chile sauce. I thought the sauce would transfer well to an enchilada dish. I made a few twists and it turned out almost as well as Moña’s in Mexico. I wasn’t able to find the exact same dried chiles she used, but I used the kind from the Hispanic food section of the grocery store and it worked just great. Add in a little bit of slow-cooked beef, some rice, black beans and cheese and you’ve got yourself some amazing enchiladas.
Oh, and if you’re totally lazy, you could buy the sauce and just follow the enchilada recipe below. That’s what I did to obtain this pathetic photo. Trust me, it’s waaaaay tastier than it looks.
Homemade Red Enchilada Sauce with Slow-Cooked Shredded Beef
Ingredients:
3 plum tomatoes
4 medium-sized dried red chiles
3 cups water
2 cloves garlic
2 Tbs. olive oil
1/2 onion, chopped fine
3 Tbs. flour
2 cups chicken stock
1 Tbs. chile powder
salt to taste
1 Tbs. chiles in adobo sauce, chopped finely
Directions:
Break the tops off the dried chiles and toss as many of the seeds as you can. Bring the water, tomatoes and chiles to a boil in a saucepan. Boil for 10 minutes. Turn off the heat, cover and let sit for 20 minutes.
Place one clove of garlic in a blender. With a slotted spoon, add the tomatoes and chiles, cover the blender and start blending. Slowly add the water from the saucepan and blend on high for a minute or so.
Mince the remaining clove of garlic. Heat olive oil in a large saute pan. Add the onion and garlic and cook till onions are tender, about 5 minutes. Add the flour and mix into a paste. Cook over medium heat for a couple of minutes.
Turn down the heat and add the blended mixture, chicken stock, chile powder, chiles in adobo sauce and salt. Bring to a simmer, turn to low and let bubble for 10 minutes or so. The sauce will be thinner than gravy.
If you prefer it thick, make a slurry with 1/2 cup chicken stock and 1-2 Tbs. flour and pour it in. Stir and let simmer for five minutes or so till it thickens.
Store in a jar in the fridge for up to a week.
Recipe for beef enchiladas
Ingredients:
1 thin, cheap cut of beef; about 1/2 lb.
olive oil
salt & pepper
dried oregano
smoked paprika
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
1 can black beans, partially drained
2 chiles in adobo sauce, seeded and chopped fine
leftover brown rice (optional)
1 cup cheddar cheese, grated
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese, grated (for the top, optional)
tortillas (flour or corn)
Directions:
Coat the beef in olive oil and sprinkle both sides with salt, pepper, paprika and oregano. Place in a slow cooker and add the onions. Cook on low for 5 hours or so. It’ll be so tasty you might have a hard time getting it into the enchiladas. Shred the beef and set aside.
When it’s near dinner time, preheat the oven to 375′. Add the beans to a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Mash with a potato masher and add the chopped chiles and some salt. Cook for five minutes or so. Heat up your leftover rice, if using. Coat the bottom of a square or rectangular baking pan with enchilada sauce.
Pour about a cup of sauce in a pie pan. Set up a little assembly line with the tortillas, sauce, work surface, beans, beef, rice, cheese and baking pan. Soak a tortilla in the sauce and place it on your work surface. Add small amounts of all your ingredients, roll up the tortilla and place it seam-side down in the pan. Repeat till the pan is full. Pour a cup or so of the sauce all over the enchiladas. I never put enough and they end up drying out on the edges, so really saturate the baking dish. The tortillas suck up a lot. Top with remaining cheeses. Place, uncovered, in the oven for 30 minutes, or until it’s all bubbly.
Remove from oven and let sit for 10 minutes before serving, or, if starving, risk lava-hot amazingness.
Have you ever envisioned a meal and had it turn out better than you expected? This was one of those dishes. I had some leftover ground pork and a can of black beans in the cupboard, so I did a Google search for those two ingredients and found this recipe for mexican pot pie. I had everything the recipe called for, but I didn’t need to feed an army, so I halved it for just me and my husband and tweaked a couple of ingredients.
This casserole had deep flavors and just the right amount of spice and cheese. The cornbread topping was crusty on top and creamy underneath. A dollop of sour cream and this became an instant dinnertime favorite in our household.
Since the full recipe called for one egg, I just beat an egg and eyeballed half of it.
Feeds 4-6
Ingredients:
1/2 onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
1/3 cup diced bell pepper, color of your choice
2 Tbs. jarred jalapeños, chopped
3/4 lb. ground pork (or beef)
olive oil
1, 8-oz. can of tomato sauce
1 Tbs. tomato paste
5 oz. frozen corn, thawed
1/2 can of black beans
1.5 tsp. cumin
1/4 tsp. allspice
1 Tbs. chili powder
1 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp. Tabasco sauce
2 tsp. yellow cornmeal
salt and pepper to taste
Cornbread crust:
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
1.5 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/8 tsp. salt
2 Tbs. melted butter
3/8 cup milk
1/2 egg
1/2 cup grated cheddar
1/2 can green chili peppers (4 oz. can)
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Grease a small baking dish (mine was 1.5 quarts). In a large skillet, heat up a couple of tablespoons of oil. Add the onion, garlic, bell pepper and jalapeño and cook for about five minutes.
Add the pork and cook till the pork is no longer pink, chopping with a wooden spoon as you go.
Stir in the tomato sauce, paste, corn, beans, cumin, allspice, chili powder, Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco, cornmeal, salt and pepper. Bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally.
For the cornbread batter, combine the flour, cornmeal, baking powder, sugar, and salt. Add the butter, milk and egg. Stir until just combined. Add the cheese and chili peppers.
Place the filling in the baking dish and dollop the cornbread on top of the filling, spreading it out as you go. If you can’t cover the whole top of the pie, then fill in the holes with grated cheese.
Bake for 35 minutes or until the crust is baked and the filling is bubbling.
Serve with a dollop of sour cream and a cold beer.
“If you saw two guys named Hambone and Flippy, which one would you think liked dolphins most? I’d say Flippy, wouldn’t you? You’d be wrong though. It’s Hambone.”
-Jack Handey
– November 2024 Update –
I made this recipe back in 2013 and realized I don’t really eat ham that much, so when I insisted my husband bring home a hambone from his work’s Thanksgiving lunch I decided to give this recipe another go. I made a few adjustments.
I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with my leftover Christmas ham. The bone seemed too good to just throw away. I did a few recipe searches and I found this one, and it sounded really good.
I didn’t follow it exactly, so I thought I should write out my version here. If you have the foresight to soak the beans while you’re at work, this soup could be made as a weeknight dinner. You could use canned beans in a pinch, but then the beans might not be as flavorful since the dried beans simmer in the ham-steeped stock till tender. This was the best soup I have made in a long time.
Leftover Hambone Soup
Serves 6-ish Cook time: 2 hours
Ingredients:
1/2 pound dried beans (navy or pinto work great)
6-8 cups chicken stock
1 onion, finely chopped
2 medium carrots, chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 meaty hambone plus extra ham
1 piece of Parmesan rind (optional)
freshly ground pepper
1 bay leaf
1-2 teaspoons smoked paprika
3 sprigs fresh thyme
4 small Yukon gold potatoes, cubed
Salt, to taste
2 tablespoons butter (optional, read recipe)
2 tablespoons flour (optional, read recipe)
Fresh parsley, to serve
Sour cream, to serve
Directions:
Pour the dried beans into a saucepan and cover with plenty of cold water. Cover and soak beans for six hours.
Drain and rinse the beans and add them to a large dutch oven. Add enough chicken stock to cover the beans by two inches. Add the onions, carrots, garlic, hambone, parmesan rind, pepper, and bay leaf. The hambone will probably stick out a bit. Cover and bring to a simmer. Turn the heat to low and let simmer for 1.5 hours or until the beans are tender. Add more stock if needed.
Remove the hambone and take off most of the meat. Let the meat cool and break it up into bite-sized pieces or cube up any leftover ham you might have saved so you have about 1.5 cups of ham bits. Place the bone and meat back into the pot along with the paprika, thyme and potatoes. Add more stock if it’s looking like it isn’t soupy enough. Let it simmer partially covered until the potatoes are tender, about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove and discard the bone, bay leaf and the parmesan rind (if you can find it – if someone finds it in their soup bowl it’s good luck maybe!) Add salt to taste.
If you’d like your soup to be thicker, create a roux as follows: about 10 minutes before serving, heat the butter in a small sauté pan. Add the flour and stir into a paste. Cook for one minute on medium. Add about 1/2 cup of hot soup to the pan and whisk till thick and smooth. Add this roux to the soup. Cook soup another 5 minutes to thicken. If it’s too thick, add a little water.
Serve in large soup bowls with a dollop of sour cream, fresh parsley and a piece of rustic bread.
On my way into work yesterday morning I stopped by the local fancy grocery store for a microwave burrito. I didn’t have time to make lunch and with our tight budget I really can’t afford to buy scrumptious lunches. At the checkout lane was a special on heirloom tomatoes — you know the ones, mutant and delicious looking that Martha Stewart and Food Network chefs go ga-ga for? I’ve never been able to afford them since they are usually about $6 a pound up here in Alaska, but for some reason they were only $1.99 a pound yesterday. I went ga-ga!
I’m not used to cooking with fresh tomatoes. Good fresh tomatoes are pretty much non existent up here unless you’re willing to pay the big bucks in the summer for home grown. So when I brought home these funny tomatoes I wasn’t sure what to do with them.
I had to sleep on it, and this morning it was clear: bean salad. It’s a great lunch food because it requires no reheating and can sit at room temp for a while and still be good. In fact, it’ll probably be better since it’ll soak in the flavors of the seasonings.
Ingredients:
1 can canellini beans, drained but not rinsed
1 medium ripe tomato, cubed
1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped
1/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled
1 tsp. dried parsley
1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbs. olive oil
2 tsp. baslamic vinegar
Directions:
Combine all the ingredients, wait till lunchtime to eat. Easy!
After a long week of single mom-dom, my husband returned from his work trip with some sort of bad flu. So now I essentially have two babies to care for. In addition to his wearing a mask around the baby and sanitizing his hands non-stop, I’m making him drink all types of fluids.
Here’s where matzoh ball soup comes into play. Traditionally a soup eaten at Passover in the spring, this chicken broth-based dumpling soup brings me back to my childhood. I never had chicken and dumplings, but I don’t think I could love them more than matzoh balls. Light, moist and flavorful — homemade matzoh balls can’t be beat. But store bought is actually pretty damn good, but I like to dress it up a bit more so that it looks and tastes like mom’s. This soup can be enjoyed year round, since most grocery stores have a kosher section where this soup mix can be found.
Ingredients:
1 box of matzoh ball soup and mix (not just the matzoh meal)
2 eggs
1/4 cup cooking oil
2 Tbs olive oil
1 celery rib, chopped, keeping the leaves
half an onion, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
1 chicken breast, cooked and shredded
salt and pepper
Directions:
Whisk together the cooking oil and two eggs. Add the matzoh packet and mix well. Place in the fridge while you prepare everything else.
In a large soup pot, heat up the olive oil and add the chicken, onion, celery, carrot and salt and pepper. Cook till onions are soft, about five minutes. Add 2.5 quarts water and bring to a boil. Add the soup mix and turn down the heat.
Wet your hands and form the matzoh into walnut-sized balls and drop into the soup. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Serve to sick husband.
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.
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!
Alaska Knit Nat 