Boat Baked Ziti

June 30, 2015June 30, 2015Leave a comment

Ello Bloggies!

This next recipe is really special to me. The first thing the hubby ever made me was baked ziti. We were on his boat and he started off the meal with wheat thins, cheddar and brie cheese and a homemade Mai-Tai. Let me tell you it was definitely a great way to start a relationship! Fast forward 5 1/2 years and although I’ve added some magic to the recipe it still remains one of our weeknight boat or land favorites. Make it for someone special on your first date and see if it still has the same charming effects. Then again, it may have been the mai-tais. But hey, it all worked together perfectly right?!?! Alright, enough with the match-making. Go grab a mai-tai and let’s make some baked ziti!

The Goods

1 lb lean ground beef
1/2 large onion, diced
1 box rigatoni or ziti pasta
1 large jar Vodka pasta sauce (this is me not making my own sauce. Ironically, I did recently make sauce and freeze it but then we ate it. Because that’s what you do with food. You eat it. So store bought it is. Remind yourself, it’s a weeknight, and you worked <fill in the blank> hours today and just the fact that you are making dinner makes you awesome. Pats self on back.)
8 oz sour cream
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (a little more if you want to top it with some at the end)
1/2 c Italian breadcrumbs
1 c parmesan (1/2c for sauce, 1/2c for breadcrumb topping)
2 Tbls butter, melted
Seasonings: Garlic Powder, dried Oregano, S&P

Ziiiiiiiiiiiti Time

Preheat your oven to 425 degrees F

In a pot, boil heavily salted water (it should taste like the ocean). Add your pasta and boil for about 10 min. When done drain and add back to the pot.

I know, I know. This is rigatoni. Which is not ziti. Which is totally fine because rigatoni works just as well for baked pasta dishes. I don’t know why we just always all it baked ziti but we are all special so go with it.

In a pan, swirl olive oil over Med/Hi heat and cook your onions. You only need a minute or two as they’ll continue to cook with the meat.

Add in your ground beef, 1/2 tsp garlic powder, 1/2 tsp oregano and S&P. Cook until the ground beef is no longer pink in the middle.

Add in your jar of tomato sauce and 1/2 c parmesan. Simmer for about 10 min until all the flavors come together. Note: I did not drain the meat before adding the sauce. The meat I had really didn’t have much fat. If yours has a lot, drain the meat, then add the tomato sauce. You may need to adjust seasonings again once you do that to ensure salt level is still legit.

Now, add the meat/tomato sauce mixture to the pasta and stir to combine.

Add in the sour cream and 1 cup mozzarella cheese and stir one more time.

Spray a baking dish with cooking spray and put your delicious looking pasta mixture into the baking dish.

Next, let’s make the amazing topping. In a small bowl combine the melted butter, rest of the parmesan cheese and breadcrumbs. Mix with a fork for best results.

You may be tempted to try this to see how it tastes. Don’t do it. It’s like unicorns wrapped up in hugs topped with ice cream and sprinkles. It’s amazing. Don’t eat it or you may not have any left for the pasta.

Top your pasta dish with the breadcrumb topping and bake for 25 min or until bubbly and the topping just starts to get brown. Then eat it. Yum!

This is a super easy dish that is full of flavor. We make this sometimes with sausage pieces or turkey ground sausage or even cut leftover meatballs! Just make it, eat it and then go nap. Because, who doesn’t love a good nap.

xoxo Shawna

Slow Cooker Carnitas

June 29, 2015Leave a comment

Hello all!

Following fellow Gal Lani’s amazing lead with her Honey pork sliders (Honey Vinegar Pork Sliders) I decided to go a Mexican route and whip up some slow cooker carnitas for some friends coming over tonight. This recipe is so versatile that once the meat is made you can turn it into tacos, enchiladas, quesadillas, fajitas, nachos….there are just too many options here. And all of them are making me hungry. So let’s get cooking!

The Goods

6 lb pork shoulder (We prefer to buy ours at local butcher Siesel’s or their sister store Iowa Meat Farms (Siesel’s & Iowa Meat Farms) although in a pinch Costco has a great selection also)
1 large onion, sliced
2 limes
1/4 cup light beer (We used the Rocky’s finest…Coors’ Light)
Dry rub: 2 Tbsp each garlic powder, cumin, and chili powder. 1 Tbsp each salt and pepper.

Pork Time…

The night before you want to make the carnitas mix up the seasoning, slather the pork, wrap it back up and marinate it overnight.

Dry rub: mix the seasoning listed above in a small bowl.

Rub the dry rub all over the pork (save a tiny bit in a ziplock bag to put on the onions tomorrow). Wrap up in parchment or butcher paper and place into fridge overnight. We also put the wrapped up pork into a big bowl to catch any drippings.

Once you’re ready to cook first set your slow cooker to “Low” and lay the sliced onions at the bottom of the cooker. Sprinkle the rest of your dry rub over the onions.

Next, remove any butcher string from the pork and cut off any excess patches of fat. Cut up the pork into large pieces and place into slow cooker.

Next, slice your limes and squeeze over the meat.

Lastly, crack open a cold beer and pour about 1/4 cup over meat. Feel free to drink the rest. We are all friends here, it’s fine.

Put the lid on the slow cooker and cook for 10 hours.

When done remove the pork and using two forks shred into amazing carnitas awesomeness.

We served our pork pieces of heaven on fresh tortillas, with sour cream, salsa and lime. These make even better leftovers so make sure to buy a big pork shoulder.

Happy cooking and Cheers!

xoxo Shawna

Baked Frank’s Red Hot Drumsticks

June 28, 2015June 28, 2015Leave a comment

Hello blog-land,

Oh man is it getting toasty in Southern California and like most natives I do enjoy not only the hot summer day but also the occasional hot & spicy dish – some of our favs are spicy crunchy sushi, the amazing kimchi based spicy cream that goes with buttery Hawaiian style ahi poke, and of course spicy Mexican food! But today, we are going to do a twist on a traditionally fried dish. We’re making Hot Wings…but baked…and technically drumsticks…..and they are so good! This appetizer (or main) is so easy and really a crowd pleaser. You could always dunk these bad boys in some oil and fry them up but I generally don’t fry during summer…I mean come on…it’s hot enough already. But the world is your Hot Wing oyster….so to speak…so feel free to do what you like.

The Goods

6 drumsticks (bone in, skin on)
4 tablespoons Olive Oil
Seasonings: 2 tsp Garlic Powder, 2 tsp Tumeric, 2 tsp Seasoned Salt (we used Goya Adobo but anything will do), and ground pepper
1 tsp Lemon (juice and rind to make sure your lemon is well scrubbed and rinsed)
Frank’s Red Hot Sauce (or your fav hot sauce)
2 tablespoons Butter

Note: I forgot the tumeric in the picture. Don’t be like me, don’t forget your tumeric.

Let’s get baking!

Pre heat oven to 400 degrees F.

Time for the marinade. Mix olive oil, garlic powder, tumeric, seasoned salt, a couple of twists of ground pepper, lemon and a touch of rind. Let the chicken sit (20 min to about 2 hours makes the best combo).

When the chicken is done marinating lay them on a baking sheet and bake for 30 min. Turn over and bake another 20-30 min until internal temp gets to 165 degrees. If you want to get a bit more color feel free to put them under the “High” broiler – but watch them! They can burn very quickly.

Hello Pollo. Feel free to drizzle with a tab of olive oil here to help it get brown and delicious.

Next melt 2 tablespoons of butter (I did this in a tiny glass bowl in the microwave for 20 seconds) and put into a larger bowl. Add in a couple of shakes of garlic powder and S&P as well as 20-30 shakes of Frank’s Red Hot Sauce (The bottle had the shaker top. You can’t really overdue the sauce so get at it).

Let the chicken go for a hot sauce swim.

Serve up with blue cheese and lemonade spiked with tequila and fresh lime.

Enjoy!

xoxo Shawna

Chili Beef Zucchini Boats & Fiesta Muffins

June 22, 2015June 22, 2015Leave a comment

Hello friends!

Today San Diego was gorgeous and hot. Perfect day for hitting the beach or playing in the yard but not necessarily for cooking in the kitchen! So tonight’s dinner needed to be light and super flavorful. If the hubs had his choice he’d have steak, rice or buttered pasta all day long. Well, lucky for him I have his health (and my sanity) in mind. So I did what I do best – compromised. I took lean ground beef and made it sassy. I’ve made a version of this recipe so many ways I’ve lost count. You can stuff zucchini, bell peppers, spaghetti squash, tomatoes…basically anything. Today the delish zucchini won the vegetable rock-paper-scissors test. The seasoning is similar to when you make ground beef tacos and we kick up the muffins with mild green chilis and corn to really drive home the fiesta. Well I’m starving so let’s get cooking.

Ingredients

3 med to large zucchini
1 lb lean ground beef
1 can tomato sauce (I originally had a 15 oz can and ended up using about half)
1/2 small yellow onion
Seasonings: S&P, garlic powder, chili powder, & cumin
1 box Jiffy corn muffin mix
1/3 c milk
1 egg
1 small can mild green chilis
1 small can kernel corn
Shredded cheddar cheese

Fiesta Directions

Since we are taking this delish dinner a “Fiesta” route it’s only appropriate to pour yourself a margarita or some tequila for sipping. Now now, no tequila shots just yet. We have to play with fire so keep it safe until the dinner is done and then go nuts.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.

Wash your zucchini and slice in half. Slice a thin layer off the backside so you can lay it down flat on a baking sheet (if your baking sheet isn’t super new, either spray with cooking spray or lay down alum foil). Using a spoon gently scoop out most of the filling and set aside. Add some S&P to each “boat” and place on a baking sheet. Lightly chop up the filling you set aside.

Next dice your onion. Heat a sauce pan over Med-Hi heat and hit it with a couple of swirls of olive oil.

Add your onion and stir a bit. Add S&P, 1 t Garlic Powder, 1 t Chili Powder and 1 t of Cumin. When the onions just start to get translucent add in your ground beef and reserved zucchini insides.

Cook until all the pink is gone (internal temp needs to hit 165 degrees F) and add in 1 cup tomato sauce and stir.

Let it cook for a few minutes to just come together. Give her a taste and increase any of the seasonings that you’d like. We tend to have a heavy hand with seasonings and really at this point I usually add a ton of hot sauce but I dialed it down for our blog friends. Feel free to add what you like.

Lastly, turn off the heat and stir in about 1/4 cup of bread crumbs just to keep the beef together. Usually that’s all you need just to keep the beefy deliciousness together to stay in the boats.

Now fill each zucchini boat with the ground beef. Bake in oven for 15 min. Remove, sprinkle with shredded cheddar and bake for about 3 min more. Internal temp needs to stay at 165 and the zucchini will be just tender enough to eat but still firm to hold the filling.

While those are baking let’s make the muffins!

In a bowl add in the muffin mix, 1/3 c milk, 1 egg, 3 heaping tablespoons of corn, 2 heaping tablespoons of mild green chilis and 2 tablespoons of shredded cheese (we had mozzarella and cheddar and used both). Whisk until combined – it will be lumpy and that’s totally good.

Fill cupcake paper lined cupcake pan 2/3 full and bake 15 min. Watch these closely as they’ll go from not done to “browning on top” very quickly. Ours took exactly 15 min.

We served our Fiesta zucchini boats and muffins with a bit of tomatillo salsa and sour cream. Oh man. I need to quit writing and get to eating. Enjoy our Fiesta twist on a healthy and fun meal.

xoxo
Shawna

Hawaiian Pork Katsu

June 16, 2015June 17, 2015Leave a comment

Aloha friends!

The hubster and I just got back from a whirlwind 3 1/2 days on the East Coast attending and being in the wedding of his sister Carrie and her new husband Anthony. They had their ceremony at their family’s church and a dream-come-true reception at The Wadsworth Mansion in CT. They then followed it up with an aloha honeymoon in Hawaii. Needless to say it was a struggle to quickly recover from a red-eye into wedding shenanigans into long flight back home. Caffeine was a must. As I got some super RARE and much needed coffee I passed an L&L Hawaiian BBQ restaurant that not only made me think about the newlywed’s awesome honeymoon but also made me realize that it had been waaaaay too long since I’ve had Katsu. Well, I have a blog now so Katsu it is!

For today we’ll be making pork katsu, sauce and jasmine rice. We did pair it with macaroni salad but I have to tell you a secret: I didn’t make it. Agh! Gasp! I know, I know. I just didn’t have time today. But if you have a killer recipe go for it. If not, stop at a deli counter and scoop up some macaroni salad.

And now for my other secret. I haven’t the slightest clue how to make Katsu sauce. I mean I had some general ideas of the basics but had to search for a recipe. I’ve had several diff kinds of Katsu in my time with one of my favs being from a tiny restaurant on the island of Lana’i that offers up pork katsu drowned under a fried egg served Loco Moco style with straight up mushroom and carmelized onion gravy. Sorry if I’m drooling on this post.

For this one I adapted a recipe I found on William Sonoma’s website. The issue is that I didn’t have two of the ingredients (Mirin or Hot mustard) so I winged it. The result was a less sweet and more vinegary sauce that I totally fell in love with. So, there you have it. It may not be uber authentic but it’s delish. Let’s head to the kitchen…

Pork Katsu & Sauce Shopping List

8 thinly sliced pork chops (boneless)
Breadcrumbs (I had Italian style on hand)
Panko
Soy Sauce
2 eggs
Flour (all purpose or any other flour would work)
Garlic Powder, S&P
Olive Oil
Jasmine Rice
Butter
1 tablespoon Ketchup
2 tablespoons Soy Sauce
1 tablespoon Worcestershire
1 tablespoon Hot Mustard (I used 1/2 tablespoon yellow mustard and 1/2 tablespoon Tapatio or Cholula hot sauce)
1 tablespoon Mirin (I used apple cider vinegar. I really need to restock my pantry soon.)

Let’s make us some Katsu.

Pre-heat your oven to 400 degrees F.

First prepare the dredging station for your pork chops. You’ll need 3 shallow dishes. In the first put 2 eggs, a dash of water and several dashes of soy sauce, several dashes of hot sauce and mix thoroughly (yolks should be totally broken and mixed in).

In the second dish put several heapings of flour, sprinkle with garlic powder and S&P.

In the third dish put 1 cup panko, 1 cup breadcrumbs and S&P. Start with this, you may need to add more later which is totally fine.

Take each pork chop, pat with a paper towel to remove any excess moisture. Now dip it in the flour, then the egg, then the crumbs on both sides. Place onto a plate or cutting board for safe keeping.

When all the chops have been dressed heat up a nonstick skillet on Med-Hi heat and hit it with olive oil. Wait until it’s pretty hot and brown each side of the pork chop. Make sure the pan has plenty of oil as you do this or else you’ll get blackened bits and not awesome tasty brown bits.

Place the browned chops on a baking sheet and bake until cooked through to a safe internal temperature of 165. This took about 15 min. May take more or less depending on the thickness of the chop.

While that’s cooking let’s whip up some rice and sauce.

In a sauce pan mix 2 cups water with 1 cup jasmine rice. Boil and stir until the rice is tender and water is mostly absorbed (took me about 17 min). HIt this with a tablespoon of butter, salt and mix well.

In a bowl combine the Ketchup, soy sauce, Worcestershire, mustard and vinegar and taste. Adjust seasonings accordingly.

Plate up your pork, rice, and macaroni salad and drizzle with the sauce. And there you have it. Homemade Katsu.

Aloha!

xoxo Shawna

Dudes in the Galley Meatballs

June 10, 2015Leave a comment

Alright, let’s be honest. (First, let’s get some wine). This next recipe is technically my own BUT it was strongly influenced by a knight in shining armor moment my favorite dude in the galley husband arranged a month or so ago. I worked way too many hours last week and it looked like not only would I be getting home way after dark but the tasty dinner I had waiting to cook would stay cold and lonely in the fridge. Out of nowhere the hubby volunteers to cook what I had planned for din din so long as I provided a very thorough set of instructions. He’s very good with lists. I accepted this challenge and texted…yes texted…the recipe below albeit in “Shawna shorthand.” Not only did the meatballs come out AMAZING but it inspired me to take it back to basics…and…basically…try to make it better than he did. I know, I know. If you’re not first, you’re last.

I present to you now homemade browned-in-a-pan-then-finished-in-homemade-tomato-sauce meatballs served over buttered creamy thin spaghetti. (Fun trick: once you assemble the dish the crazy good sauce falls over the noodles and the cream combines with the tomato and you end up with unintentional but oh so good pink sauce. Culinary magic trick. You’re welcome.)

The Goods

1 lb ground lean turkey meat
1 egg
1 cup (or so) breadcrumbs (last time I made this I had literally no bread left…which is so weird in our house but it happened. So I took my fav crackers Melba crisps and slapped them into the food processor and bam….bread crumbs. Today, I used the pre-made kind but only because I was trying to kick out two blogs before we head back to CT this week for the hubster’s sister Carrie’s wedding! So excited! Sorry, I digress…)
Worcestershire sauce (that’s how you know you get REALLY into cooking when you can spell Worcestershire sauce and not need spell check to correct it for you.)
Grated Parmesan (get the block, grate it yourself…it’s SO much better)
1 large can crushed tomatoes (wanna go crazy? Get San Marzan tomatoes. Chefs use them. It’s worth it.)
1 smaller can of tomato sauce
Veggie Oil (for browning meatballs) & Olive Oil (for the tomato sauce)
Seasonings: Garlic Powder, S&P, dried chili flakes (like what you put on pizza), dried Oregano, fresh basil (dried is fine if you have it)
1/2 large onion, diced
1/2 carton of portabella or other mushrooms, rinsed, patted dried and diced
1/2 package thin spaghetti
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup sour cream

Today’s music selection: 90’s hits on cable TV music channel. First up, my dream boyfriend from Junior High…Justin Timberlake. Perfect.

Let’s get saucy….

In a medium-large sauce pan heat pan up to med high and give it a couple of swirls of olive oil (Note: you’ll see in the pic below there is a can of diced tomatoes. I ended up not using it. Feel free to add some for texture but drain them first so you just have the tomatoes. The seasonings and such are measured to not include it so you may need to kick up the S&P and oregano if you do).

Add in onions, mushrooms, 1/2 tsp garlic powder, 1 tsp Oregano and 1/2 tsp pepper flakes

When onions are translucent add in the crushed tomatoes and tomato sauce

Let simmer over med or med-hi heat while you make the meatballs. Adjust seasoning if you’d like but once you add the partially cooked meatballs a LOT of flavor will transfer to the sauce so maybe hold off for a bit.

Mini balls of meaty deliciousness..

In a large mixing bowl add in the turkey meat, 1 egg, 4 dashes of Worcestershire sauce, 1/2 cup bread crumbs and S&P. Combine with your hands. I’m telling you, it’s really the only way to go. I ended up washing my hands in varying levels of intensity about 15 times during this recipe but you want to be safe! At this point you probably need some more breadcrumbs.

Add in 1/2 cup more breadcrumbs and 1/2 cup grated parm and mix one more time.

Form large meatballs (we got 10 total from 1 lb of meat) and heat up a large non stick skillet over med-hi heat. When heated swirl around some veggie oil.

Brown the meatballs on both sides. Look at those glorious brown bits of deliciousness. Man, that’s good.

Add partially cooked meatballs and some torn up basil into the sauce and kick up the heat a bit. Put on a lid and let cook until internal meat temp hits 165 (this should take about 12-15 min). If you have more time, set the temp to medium and let it simmer for 30 min. The sauce will be ridiculously good this way.

While the mighty meatballs are simmering away let’s make the pasta.

Boil pasta in heavily salted water. (1. I use Morton’s salt and 2. One of my favorite chefs, Anne Burrell, says the water should taste like the sea before the pasta hits it. Do as the pros do. Ocean the crap out of your water. It makes even store bought dry pasta taste great and not like cardboard.)

Cook about 8 min until al dente (nobody likes mushy pasta), drain and return to pan.

Add in 3 tablespoons salted butter and 1/2 cup (or 1 cup if it’s not creamy enough) sour cream. Mix religiously until well combined.

Serve meatball over pasta with sauce drizzled over both.

Man, the smells in this kitchen are crazy. Hubster just walked in and guessed right away what I was making. He then immediately got slapped with a kitchen glove when he tried to dip his finger into the bowl of meatballs pictured below BEFORE I took the picture. Unless his hand wants to be famous on a blog I suggest he not get in the way of his awesome wanna be pro chef wife and her food blog iPhone photo shoot. 🙂

Cheers to all the men and women in our lives that support us, love us, and inspire us to try to cook better than they can. 😉

Cheers!

Shawna

Galley Gals Sassy Stroganoff

June 9, 2015June 9, 2015Leave a comment

I’m pretty excited for this post. College classmates of my hubster (and now friends of mine) Shawn, Marissa and their Boston Terrier rescue pup Rocky (follow him on Instagram @lordrockefeller), just moved back to California from Maryland! We were so excited that they are back on the West Coast that we had to have them over for dinner. That also meant that they got to be front and center in taste test group for today’s recipe. Lucky people! I also learned that Marissa makes her own jams/marinades so she will most definitely be guest blogging in the VERY near future. Alright, so now about the food…

I love beef stroganoff and I have to admit I’ve made it a slightly different way each time. Each batch sort of revolves around my mom’s original recipe which was awesome, but because I’m me, I have to do it differently. Since I made this on a Sunday I had a wee bit more time for prep so I made it the “low and slow” way. It’s really good. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

The Goods

2 lbs beef (ok, so if you go “low and slow” really any cut will do. Get the cheap stuff that says “for stews” if you want or get boneless chuck. Remove any super massive chunks of fat and slice into medium thick strips)

3 tablespoons flour (all-purpose is fine)

2 cups beef stock (1 cup of this can be replaced with red wine and I’ll note below where that will be. I didn’t have any….I may have drank it all with the last couple of recipes….but remember this is a safe place No judging.)

Worcestershire sauce

Veggie Oil, S&P & Garlic Powder

1 can cream of mushroom soup (I used low-fat)

Equipment: Dutch oven or other pot/lid combo that is oven safe. This FINE piece of equipment was given to me by my good friend and bridesmaid Elaine for my 30th birthday….”some” number of years ago….

Put on some music, pour a cocktail and let’s get cooking…

Pre-heat your oven to 300 degrees F

Get a dutch oven on the stove over high heat and let her warm up (she needs a minute so pour some more wine…check facebook…snap-a-chat….tweet….tind…what ever makes you happy just be patient).

Slice your meat into thick strips

Put about 2 tablespoons of veggie oil into the dutch oven and after about 30 seconds add your meat (You want this hot, so Olive Oil is not a super great choice. It smokes at a lower temp than Veggie oil so unless you want an olive oil facial and bitter sauce skip the EVOO)

Immediately add S&P and a couple of shakes of garlic powder. Add seasoning to each batch if you need to do them in separate batches.

Remove the meat to a platter.

Make sure there is liquid in the dutch oven. It should still have some oil mixed with liquid released from the meat. If there is not enough, add some butter (you need fat for the next fancy part that the pros call a “roux” (pronounced Roooo…like Moooo but with an R (this is why they don’t let me teach elementary school).

We are using 3 tablespoons flour so you want about the same amount of fat in the pan.

Add in the 3 tablespoons of flour and start whisking. You don’t want to burn it but you want the mixture to fully incorporate and start getting brown. You want to cook out the flour taste a bit. Once it becomes sort of a light brown “roux”y mixture add in 1 cup of beef stock (or wine!) and whisk whisk whisk! Let it come to a light bubble and get happy until it reduces by about half (mine went really fast, like 3 min but can take up to 10 if you pot isn’t terribly hot)

Add in the other 1 cup of stock and send the meat into this delicious stroganoff sauna (aka = meat goes back into the pot)

Mix to incorporate, put the lid on the dutch oven and put it into the oven.

Let it cook for 2 1/2 hours and it comes out soooo tender and flavorful.

When it’s done remove most of the liquid so you have about 2 cups remaining and the meat. Or you can remove the meat + 2 cups liquid to a new pot but I was just trying to help you reduce the number of dishes you’ve got coming after this one.

Add in 1 can of cream of mushroom soup and mix. Heat over Med heat until warmed through. Taste for seasoning and adjust with more S&P if needed.

We served this amazingly tender meat in stroganoff sauce over buttered egg noodles and green beans (my trick: put butter in a small sauce pan, add diced dried onions (from seasoning aisle) at the store, rehydrate them for a minute, add green beans, S&P and boom! You never had better tasting GB’s.)

Other versions use no soup and instead sour cream, some use flour dipped meat pan seared then cooked in the sauce. I’m telling you, “strogy”, like my dad likes to call it, can go many different ways but this one is amazeballs.

Well I hope you enjoyed today’s recipe. Now it’s off to bed to get ready for another fun week in Paradise…and I mean work. Until next time friends…

Cheers!

Shawna

Sour Cream & Verde Chicken Enchiladas

June 3, 2015June 3, 20151 Comment

Ok guys. Seriously. These have got to be one of my favorite meals I make at home, period. Let me remind you I live in San Diego…the gateway to Mexican food. I’ve had a whole lotta years to experiment and taste amazing Mexican food and this recipe is the prodigy child of all those years. One of my fav restaurants growing up had these KILLER sour cream and chicken enchiladas and these are a nod to that memory.

But these enchiladas are made with flour tortillas?!?! Gasp! You make it all from scratch on a week night, gasp?!?! Yup! But you know what, you can bet your sombrero not only will you love these you’ll be willing to come to the dark side of “making food that tastes good and doesn’t necessarily fit the norm.” Exciting right?!?! You’re welcome. Let’s get cooking….

The Goods

3 Chicken Breasts
2 Anaheim chili peppers (dark green, medium to large is fine)
1 lb tomatillo peppers (round, looks like a green tomato with paper skin)
1 small tub sour cream
Taco size tortillas (we used flour…I know, I know…OMG they didn’t use corn. Nope, we didn’t. And we loved it.)
Pepper jack cheese (We like a bit of a kick and the sauce we are making is not spicy at all. This cheese is a nice addition. If you want you can replace with regular jack cheese, shredded)
1 cup jarred salsa (you can use homemade if you have it…I actually ran out of tomatoes and it was coming up on 6pm and my household had not eaten so needless to say I went with jarred. You get it, I know you do. That’s why we are friends.)

The Fiesta (Ironically, Enrique Iglesias just came up on our cable music channel…ha! It’s like the world knew I was blogging about enchiladas. Perfect.)

Preheat your good ol’ trusty oven to 350 degrees F. (Note: I’ve made these on the boat before and they were amazing. Make sure to pick a smaller lasagna dish to make them in beforehand so you don’t end up with a large pan and a tiny oven.)

Start by filling up a stock pot with water and set the heat to medium. Add your chicken breasts and poach until they hit 165 degrees F.

Next, using tongs you want to char your Anaheim peppers over an open flame (gas stove) or under the broiler. You want them super charred on all sides. When done add them to a small bowl and cover TIGHTLY with plastic wrap. Add something on top so it stays shut and don’t touch it for about 15 min.

After 15 min take them out and using a paper towel simply slide the charred skin off and you have this amazing dark green flesh left that is AMAZING to taste. Slice the peppers in half and remove the seeds. Chop it up and set it aside.

While that’s happening peel the tomatillos (the paper comes off super easily), rinse under water, cut into quarters and add to a smaller sauce pot.

Cover with water and boil until the dark green turns to pale green and they just get soft. (This only takes a few minutes. Just enough time to grab another margarita. Go ahead, we don’t judge here.)

Once complete place the tomatillos into a blender, add in about 1/2 c of the cooking water and lots of S&P. Give it a whirl until it looks like enchilada sauce. Pour out the remaining water in the pot and add the sauce back in. Hit it with some heat and let her reduce a bit and come together.

Once your chicken is done shred her up and return her to the pot.

Add in 1/2 c sour cream, the salsa, your chopped Anaheim peppers and mix it up. Taste. It should be amazing. Add S&P if needed. Now stop eating it or else you won’t have enough to make the enchiladas.

Spray the bottom of a lasagna pan with cooking spray. Grab a tortilla, add some of the delish chicken mixture, some shredded cheese, roll up tight, and add to the pan. Repeat until you fill up the pan. We made GIANT enchiladas (I had some help from the Dudes in the Galley tonight and well…they are men…and they like to eat…so big enchiladas is what happened.) We ended up fitting about 7 in the pan but you can probably get 8.

Now slather the whole thing with your amazing tomatillo sauce you made and top with some shredded cheese.

Bake for about 20 min at 350 degrees F and enjoy. Serve with beans and rice and your favorite Margarita. Ole!

xoxo Shawna

Working Lady’s Lasagna

June 2, 2015June 3, 2015Leave a comment

Let me give it to you straight. I work way over 40 hours a week number crunching, typing and engaging in general office shenanigans. I love my friends and hubster a TON but there are not enough hours in the day for homemade lasagna – by scratch – on a weeknight – while there is still light outside. So, I’ve come up with the “working lady’s lasagna.” There are some homemade parts, some store bought parts and a whole lot of wine. I mean a whole lot of love. But mostly wine.

If you really want to get down and dirty we’ll post a full blown made-from-scratch lasagna that would be the talk of the town in any trendy hipster alcove. That post will come soon enough. For now. Working Lady Lasagna.

The Goods

Lasagna noodles (alright, just buy a box of the kind you boil in water. Trust me, it’s fine. Breathe in, then out and then realize there are worse things in life. You’re making dinner for crying out loud! *patting self on back*)
1 large jar (24 oz or so) pasta sauce
1 bag mozzarella cheese (shredded)
1 container ricotta (17 oz, I used low fat but who are we kidding, this is lasagna. Get the regular kind if you’d like)
1 bunch basil leaves
1 1/2 lbs ground beef, ground pork, or a mixture of both (get crazy if you want just stay away from the heavily seasoned meat like chorizo. There is a time and place for that delicious Spanish & Latin morsel and this is not one of them)
1 large onion
1/2 cup sour cream or greek yogurt plain flavor
S&P
Garlic

Let’s do this…

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Boil the noodles until al dente. The lasagna will continue to cook in the oven. Ideally, you want the noodles to be done as soon as you are ready to start layering. If they get done early, drain the noodles and lay out on some parchment or wax paper and it’ll prevent it from sticking. Rad, right?!?

Get your lasagna pan ready (I have both glass and ceramic and both work fine) by putting a bit of the sauce at the bottom of the pan.

Heat a large sautee pan (I’m talking as large as you can get. If you don’t have one feel free to use a pot, either works just fine) and give it a couple o’ swirls of olive oil.

Dice up the onion and throw it in the pan. Immediately hit it with S&P (seasoning is your best friend).

Once translucent add a healthy tablespoon full of chopped garlic and stir around a bit for a few seconds.

Add in the meat. You’ll want to break it up so it ends up looking like ground beef when done. Cook until all the pink is gone.

Add in the rest of our sauce to the pan and stir to combine. Let this hang out a bit until the meat is cooked through then turn down the heat to low to keep warm.

Next you want to make the delicious cheesy layer. You see the Mister does not like ricotta. So I basically hide it. You know, like you hide vegetables in kid’s meals? I hide Ricotta in adult meals. Same-same.

In a bowl combine: the jar of ricotta, 1/2 c sour cream, 1/2 c mozzarella cheese, and a handful of basil either chopped up or ripped by hand. Be rustic, I dare you. Add S&P and taste. It should taste lovely.

Now it’s time to layer.

Lay down 4 pieces of lasagna noodle, lengthwise, overlapping, to create a bottom in your lasagna dish.

Add half the meat/sauce mixture.

Add half the cheese mixture and spread evenly. It’s ok if the two layers mix, it will be all that more delicious.

Add 4 more pieces of lasagna noodle, the rest of the meat and the rest of the cheese.

Top with 4 more noodles and some shredded mozzarella.

Bake in oven for about 30-40 min until bubbly and hot. Invite some friends or family over and dig in. Or eat the whole thing yourself. This is a no judging blog, eat your heart out. We dig it.

Enjoy friends!

xoxo Shawna

galsinthegalley

San Diego-based food & lifestyle blog with a coastal flair

Tag: dinner

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Working Lady’s Lasagna