Feeling like some Creative Fish!

So I’m at the store and they have beautiful big tilapia filets on sale… So… I got some… but for some reason thinking of all the normal ways I usually fix it were not making me happy… I just got the notion of wanting to make it “stuffed”.  So I decided I was going to make stuffed fish and set about to see what I had here in the house to stuff it with!  It was fun!  AND it turned out great!

I started with some thick Tilapia filets that were thick enough that from the center I was able to slice a flap on either side so when I stuffed it, it was open on top not the side…  the size and thickness of your filets will determine how you slice it to later stuff….any way you do it is fine…

Next I sauteed some

pancetta ( you can get it in little blister packs at Trader Joes already diced up)

some diced up zucchini

chopped sweet vidalia onion

chopped sun dried tomatoes

(all these things were chopped to be rather small and uniform in size)

Then while that was all sauteeing together,

I took about a pint of heavy cream and half a package of cream cheese and beat it together until lightly fluffy (not necessarily to full whipped cream stage) and then I added a hefty dollop of some leftover zinfandel I had but you can use any white or pink wine…and whipped some more.

I then added cream mixture to sauteed mixture and stirred all together and sauteed a bit more.   I added a little white pepper and I am telling you that I added JUST A PINCH of salt…the pancetta added enough saltiness and everything else had plenty of flavor..

Then you just scoop out the filling and stuff inside of fish halves and then pour remaining sauce on top.

Bake in 350 degree oven 20-30 minutes

Serve with some roasted potatoes and another green vegetable and you have a healthy meal with just a little “cream” fat and the pancetta is so little for flavor that it isn’t that bad either… but if you make sure you have some greens it helps the health factor a LOT. 

If you eat a lot of good things like this… with fish, veggies, etc, then a little cream or bacon isn’t horrible as long as you keep EVERYTHING IN MODERATION (and LOTs OF greens!!)

I really hope you enjoy this dish because according to my husband it was REALLY good…

Peace, Love and Happiness!

♥Dorina

Pasta con Lenticchie!!! (pasta with lentils!!!)

Ok let me start by telling you that “lentils” is a word I did not know growing up. It was Lenticchie (pronounced len-teek-yeh)…I only knew the Italian word.
Mom would make some kind of smaller pasta with the lentils and lots of garlic. Yummmy!

This is such a simple dish it is almost embarrassing to call this a recipe but you have to make this sometime. It is a simple, stick to your guts, garlicky and yes HEALTHY southern Italian peasant dish!!!
First…rinse your lentils and then put them in a pot and cover with water….OK now this is hard…I usually use my 3 quart sauce pot and fill it about 1/2 way with water and I use a one pound bag of lentils!
OMG!!! I feel like my old Italian Grandmother trying to pass on recipes that have no measurements!!!
Of course you may not use that much since I do have a family of 8 to feed and that one pound bag and 2 pounds of pasta JUST covers us! So for a family of 4– 1/2 a bag is good with 1 pound of pasta!

***Anyway, bring the lentils to a boil and then just let them simmer slowly til they soak up all or most of the water (which you have lightly salted). If they dry out and aren’t soft then just add more water and take note for next time! In the end, you want the lentils soft and for the whole pot of them to still be kind of moist. Even a smidge watery is fine.
***Now in your other pot, boil your water for your pasta (with a good pinch of salt) and then cook the pasta. I like to use either a smaller pastina like ditalini or elbows, or acini di pepe or the mini bows…but I have also used the big bows, or rotelle, or even taken spaghetti and broken it into 1 to 2 inch pieces and used that. Use what you like or whatever you have on hand!
***Once the lentils and the pasta are both cooked drain the pasta then mix the two together. Now here is where I do it a bit different than my mother used to do…and of course you can do it either way.
My mother used to take a bunch of cloves of garlic and throw them in with a bunch of olive oil and mix it all up. Let it sit for a bit and then serve. She likes hers a little more “watery” than my grandmother used to make it.
I like it this way but I also like to take a small pan ( I have the coolest little miniature cast iron frying pan ) that I heat up olive oil and lightly saute my garlic before throwing it in. I usually do this step while the pasta is cooking.
I saute in a bit of regular olive oil but then I mix in with the pasta and lentils and add extra virgin olive oil.
Then all you need now is a pinch of salt to taste (don’t forget you salted your pasta water and the lentils a bit so taste it first)
***I like to serve this with grated parmigiano or romano cheese or even take a slice of provolone and lay it on top and it melts and gets gooey and is just another amazing variation!

Please let me know what you think of this one!!!

Peace!

♥Dorina

 

New Year’s Dinner!!!

Well, we had the best guests for New Year’s this year and that was my friend Randi and her family up from Baltimore.  Her husband Louis I just love and the kids…Luke and Sami …well they are like two more of my own. (and Sami is my godchild anyway!!)

So Randi calls and tells me she is bringing up two beautiful Sirloin roasts up with her (we need that much to feed the size of my family and hers combined of course!)

So on New Years Day I made wonderful pot roast.  If there were bones in it the meat would have fallen off of it!!!  It was so tender and moist you could cut it with a fork.

So I have to admit though, that as tasty as it all was, it was so easy my 9 year old daughter Angelina could have made it with 2 minutes worth of instruction!

Pot Roast

Ingredients

Roast

Onions

Potatoes

Carrots

Red Wine

Balsamic Vinegar

Broth

Salt

Fresh cracked black pepper

Directions

Rinse the meat, pat dry and lightly salt and pepper the whole thing.

In a nice hot pan pour just a slight covering of olive oil.  Sear the meat by dropping it in the pot letting is sizzle for a couple of minutes then turn it until you have quickly browned all the sides. 

Add the onions all around the sides of the meat and let them begin to soften. 

As soon as the onions are mostly clear, and your meat is seared, begin adding everything else.

Add the red wine (at least a good cup or two or three…and no i’m not kidding.)

Add about 1/4 cup of balsamic vinegar

Add at least as much no salt added broth (I used chicken this last time but you can use that or beef or even vegetable broth)  as you did red wine so you now have double the liquid covering at least 1/2 the meat.

Sprinkle some cracked black pepper (of course you can use regular black pepper if you don’t use or have a pepper mill!  Silly!)

then sprinkle a pinch of salt now and then test taste for salt at the end.

Once all the liquid is in the pot, throw in the potatoes and carrots cut in large chunks or they will get too mushy to quick!

Let it come to a boil then drop the heat and just let it simmer and make your house smell amazing for at least an hour.

When you go to cut the meat, as you slice it put the slices back in the pot to soak up more of the broth which is soooo tasty!  ( I usually take the potatoes out and put on the serving platter first then there is room to soak the meat in the pot in the juice) then you can take the meat and lay in the center of the platter with the potatoes and meat surrounding and it looks beautiful!

Then just serve with a nice salad or other green vegetable and you have a very nice dinner!

Enjoy!!!

Peace! 

 

Dorina  ❤

 

“Chicken” Fish!

When the kids were little, I didn’t cook as much fish as I do now because honestly I didn’t like it that much either.
My own mother, fantastic cook that she is…never really cooked fish much either and when she did, it was some plain “white fish” that she broiled with lemon juice and that was it. I hated it.
(Sorry Mom!!! 🙂 )
So as I have matured as a Chef (in my own imagination), I started to experiment and try new recipes and experiment some more. Then as the kids came to those ages where they didn’t want to try new things…especially FISH!!! ugh!! I really had to get creative.
SO…I started treating fish like chicken!
Guess what? I found a bunch of ways the kids would eat fish and they didn’t always know what they were eating but they liked it and I was happy and now the older ones know when its fish but its OK….!!! They LIKE it even knowing what it is!!! Woohoo!!!

So…
Here is one of my tricks!

Let me start by telling you that we have a rule in our house since we first started having kids…
You always have to TRY whatever is for dinner. It may be something NEW. It may be something you already have tried and don’t like, but you have to try it no matter what.
I always taught my kids, that just as your muscles grow, (they always got that since I started out with the 5 boys and they all wanted muscles like Daddy!!! –but of course my daughter gets it too!) so do your tastebuds. And you never know one day to the next if one has grown to like something new. I also told them that if I fix something differently they may like it a different way. SO….that being said…that is how I got them to try my “FISH” that I wouldn’t say was fish….they would just assume it was chicken because that is how it looked and the house doesn’t smell like fish because Tilapia is not strong smelling at all and the wine covers everything and makes the kitchen smell GOOOOOOOD!! Of course if you make this dish with chicken first and they like it, then the next time with fish is easy because they already like the sauce!

Tilapia Piccata

• First…..
  (don’t tell them it’s fish…let them assume it’s chicken. Of course you can outright tell them it’s chicken but that is up to you!…and if you fix it this way you may get one over on them!)
  I started this “trick” with Tilapia. It is firmer than your “white flaky fishes” yet not quite a tuna or swordfish steak and most of the filets are about the same size and shape as a chicken breast! It is also not very “fishy” smelling or tasting so that helps.–ONE THE OTHER HAND…if people in your family like fish….TELL THEM IT’S FISH!   🙂
• Take your fish, rinse it off (I always rinse my fish)
  then lightly flour it in some flour with a bit of salt and pepper mixed in.
• Then saute in some olive oil. Let it brown lightly and then turn over.
• Once the Fish is almost done on the second side, add one pat of butter,
• a lot of white wine and
• some lemon juice. (some recipes call for chicken stock instead of wine. I like it better with wine! but you can use either or half and half if you want)
• Let it cook down a bit until it thickens. (the flour on the fish helps thicken the sauce and helps the sauce stick to the fish at the same time!)
• And add a pinch of salt and pepper if needed and to your taste.

Now traditional Piccata recipes all have capers in them…my kids don’t like the capers so I either leave them out or just don’t put them in their dishes.
And of course If you want to make this fancy you can sprinkle some chopped fresh parsley on top. But of course that is up to whether you and your kids would like that!

**Serve this over some pastina or angel hair pasta or rice that you will spoon some of the extra sauce over, and then add some string beans or broccoli and you’ve got a nice well rounded meal!

***I don’t really put measurements on this recipe because you just put in enough to make a nice sauce. If there isn’t enough, then just add some more wine and another pat of butter. I personally don’t use too much lemon juice but it all depends on what kind of mood I am in. Sometimes I make it more lemony and other times I JUST use the wine and butter!
No matter which way I make it is tasty and we all love it.

Please always remember that recipes are easy to follow as long as you don’t completely follow them!
I’ll tell you more how to “read” a recipe later!!!

Anyway, this is also exactly how I make my Chicken Piccata so try it either way!!!

Ciao for now!

♥Dorina

 

Soccer Practices and Dinner!!

Tuesdays are kind of my “hell day” this Fall because I am coaching 2 different teams and both of them have one of their practices on Tuesdays. So as soon as Angelina walks in the door after school she has to change and we have to get out quick so I can coach her 8 year old girls team which is from 4-5-30pm. Then we run home and eat dinner, and then Carlo has to be ready to go for my next practice from 7:30-9pm with his under-12 boys team.
It makes for a really long day!
Of course yesterday was worse than normal because I was working on 4 and a half hours sleep from the nite before!
Well on these days the only way we can get home and eat dinner before Carlo and I have to go to his practice is for dinner to be done or almost done by the time I get home from the first session!
So…it takes planning and time during my day to make sure I have it all set.
Often times on these nites dinner is something simple and easy to dish out otherwise it just takes too long! Last nite, I made a pot of “Chili”.
My “chili” is not always the same because as with a lot of my other “peasant” dish foods, I make them the way they originated…as a way to use up food or to make do with what you had.
THAT’S how I often cook.
These are also the types of dishes that I can hide a ton of stuff in and the kids and hubby will eat without knowing it! I have to say that last nites chili was pretty good.

Last nites

Soccer Practice Chili

(remember I have a family of 8!)

3 lbs of ground turkey, which i started cooking in the pot while I chopped up everything else
***then I drained off all the fat and grease before adding anything else.
1 whole large onion chopped
1 small head of bok choy (see I told you I hid stuff!)
8 pretty large carrots
1/2 bag of frozen corn
1 large can of crushed tomatoes(or sauce or puree)
1 large can of red kidney beans
1 large can of white cannelini beans
1 large red pepper chopped (makes for pretty red bits in the dish!)
1 overflowing “cup” of red wine ( you can use any leftover wine or white wine or even beer or chicken stock or plain water…I like wine!)
A cup or two of water
about a cup of brown rice
—————–
salt and pepper
coriander
cumin
red pepper
garlic powder
onion powder
fresh dried basil
oregano
———–
We often use these optional toppings
a small blob of sour cream and/or some shredded cheddar or mozzarella cheese.

This is before I mixed in the carrots and bok choy --Secret Ingredients!!

In general I start with the meat and get it mostly cooked because I like to drain it or soak up the grease with some paper towls. I have at times, when I am being overly “fat content” conscious, put it in a colander and rinsed it off!(no soap tho!!! haha…you need the little bit of fat that sticks to the meat for flavor!!) but usually I just put the lid on the pot to hold the meat in and just pour out whatever grease that will pour….
and then just start chopping and as I am done I throw it in the pot.
Last nite since I was trying to get some “green vitamins” in the pot, I took the bok choy and threw it in the food processor and just pulsed it til it was chopped but not mush. With the green stuff this small it just blends into the chili mix!

…and I get tons of extra vitamins with less than $1 worth of bok choy! (it was a small bundle of maybe 6 or 7 leaves/stalks) You can also use chopped spinach or any other green leafy vegetable. It is well worth its weight especially when the weather is starting to change and people are getting sick!
Last nite I also chopped the carrots in the food processor to small chunks and that worked out great! I usually chop by hand but since the machine was out and I was in a bit of a hurry, I used it!
**Please note…I enjoy chopping things by hand…it is just part of the process that I enjoy. Plus if you have good knives it is easy and at times fulfilling when you get good at using your knives….and I have to say that SOMETIMES it is a good feeling to get your frustrations out on the cutting board!
I believe that there is a purpose to doing everything the “way it is supposed to be done”…and part of the simplicity that we all crave in life. Enjoy the process!
As for the chili, I do have to say I like my onions sauteed, so I put them in a small frying pan with a little olive oil and got them a nice clear with a hint of golden color …you don’t really have to do this I just think it brings out the sweetness of the onions better. Most of the time I don’t bother and just throw them in.

About the spices…One time years ago when I still bothered to buy the “taco seasoning” packets in the grocery store, I took one and started to read the ingredients…WOW, there was a lot of CRAP in those packets….anti caking agents and other stuff I didn’t understand…but if I don’t know what it is then it probably isn’t that good for you. Along with all the crap tho, was listed a bunch of spices…
SO, I began adding more spices to my collection of Italian spices.
Next to my Italian food which is my absolute favorite cuisine, I think Spanish, Mexican and South American food is my next favorite. A lot of Mexican foods have similar spices to the Italian….
like garlic, onion and oregano, but I have since added cumin, coriander and cayenne pepper among others to my cupboard.
I love coriander…it is sort of lemony and I use it in a lot of chicken dishes also.
I don’t list amounts for my spices because I tend to be a little heavy handed with my spices.
This is where you make the dish your own. Start light and then add more after tasting it a few times. Tasting while you are cooking is the best part of cooking! My own personal beliefs are that you can never have too much garlic…:-)
So, just adding these spices to meat or just to this chili pot really bumps us the flavor.
That’s pretty much it.

Rice Note…
You don’t have to add the rice to the pot and if you don’t, just modify the amount of water you add to the dish depending on how wet or dry you want your chili. I added the rice last nite to add a little weight to the dish and to stretch it a bit so that I would have enough for lunches today. (which went with Pat and kids to work/school in a thermos)

Lunches!!!

Let it all cook down and make sure you let it go long enough to cook the rice.
Sometimes, I will cook rice or pastina separately and then put that in the dish with the chili poured over it….if not you can mix it in after it is cooked separately. It doesn’t matter.

So this is what we had last nite that I made yesterday during the day before I left for my first practice. I was able to turn it off, put the lid on it and turn it back on when I got home to warm a bit more (it was still warm when I got back!) This is also good in a crock pot but yesterday I was home all day so I was able to watch it on the stovetop.

So, start throwing things in the pot…meat, beans, veggies, hidden veggies and whatever else you have…just make sure there is some tomato sauce and some sort of other liquid and plenty of spices and you are good to go!!! Have fun creating your chili tonite!

♥Dorina

 

MY Stuffed Zucchini

One of our favorite dishes in my house is my stuffed Zucchini.
Some years ago, I overdid it with the zucchini in my garden, and had so many zucchini that I didn’t know what to do with them all. I make this “Italian vegetable stew” that I grew up eating, fried zucchini, zucchini bread, but I soon became obsessed with coming up with new and better ways to use up ALL THAT ZUCCHINI!!!
OK…so stuffed zucchini isn’t that original, but my recipe is very simple, very tasty and the KIDS LOVE IT! Which for a green vegetable when they were still very young was an accomplishment!  On top of all that it is a meatless/vegetarian dish that I always know will be a hit with my few vegetarian friends when they come over!

Well last nite, I used 12 zucchini, which made 24 pieces and they were all gone by the end of the nite even tho they weren’t all finished at dinner! The boys walk thru the kitchen and just grab one off the pan sitting on the stove til they are gone! And I was thinking I’d send some to work with Pas today!!! Oh well, he got a wrap like the kids did instead!

But…when I do have some left over zucchini , they are great hot or cold the next day and they freeze well also to be heated up in a toaster oven or in a small pan on the stove with a smidge of water and a lid and it steams up real quick.

SO…
All I do is…

• First I chop an onion and saute in some olive oil on the stove til soft and clear…(I get this started while I am then getting the zucchini ready)
• Wash the zucchini, cut the ends off, and cut in half lengthwise.
• I then take a big spoon and scrape out the flesh in the middle and put it all in a big bowl.
  *now you can experiment with how thick or thin you want your “boats” , but I leave some flesh on the inside …so they will hold together, but not so thick that the kids are getting “too much” zucchini in a bite. Make sense?
• Once the flesh is all in the bowl, I cut it up into smaller pieces or “squoosh” in my hands…but don’t go crazy with it… they don’t have to be perfect…some big some small makes it easier and more “rustic”!  You never know what you are getting in any bite!
• I throw in a good amount of bread crumbs–up to almost half of the amount of the zucchini, (which I made in my food processor—not the powdery fine, way too dry ones that you buy! )
• a couple handfuls of grated Romano or Parmigiano cheese and then
• a handful or two of shredded Mozzarella —but when I have it I will shred a little sharp Italian cheese like some romano, sharp provolone or the like so there are a few little extra “bites” of flavor!
• by this time the onions are ready and I add them plus the oil they cooked in into the bowl also.
• add a pinch of salt and two pinches of pepper
• So now I have all this stuff in the bowl, –zucchini flesh, breadcrumbs, grated cheese, shredded cheese, sauteed onions, S & P and I mix it all together, (you can use a big spoon or your hands…might as well use your hands because you are going to be getting dirty momentarily when you begin stuffing!!)
• Add just enough olive oil to the mix so that it binds and sticks together …but not mushy.
• Then by hand fill each zucchini shell…I usually start making them just barely full and then once they are all filled I take the remainder of the filling and top them all off.  Make sure you use all your filling!!!
• Now bake on a cookie sheet or baking dish in a hot oven, for about 1/2 an hour.  Again, this you can experiment with because some people like their zucchini a bit “al dente” or a little firmer and others like it softer.  So test one out with a fork to see.  The tops will be lightly browned (the olive oil helps in that area!!) and then you just take them out,  let cool a bit and serve.

Last nite I served this with a fun new potato dish we made up on the spur of the moment.  It was a fully  vegetarian meal but had plenty of vitamins, fiber, protein  and “good for you stuff” in it!

Watch for the “Twisty Potato” dish next! 

Let me know if you like this zucchini dish!!!

Enjoy!

❤  D

Ways to use all that damn Pesto!

Well, I said I would share my ideas on some of the many uses for all the PESTO I made!!!
So here we begin…
Pesto makes a great 

pizza sauce

(I know I surprised you by not starting with the Pasta!!!–just wait!)
Spread it on a pizza shell ( I will give you all my pizza/bread dough recipe later so watch for it so you can make your own!) and then just throw on a little cheese…I have used FRESH mozzarella slices, shredded “regular” mozzarella, and the other nite I used some fontina cheese. They were all really good but I think my fave was the Fresh Mozzarella!
I made some mini pizza shells last week and put them in the freezer so all I did was spread the pesto, put on some cheese and warm in the toaster oven! Perfect lunch, after school snack or before dinner antipasto/appertizer! You can also try this on a Pita or even a slice of Italian bread!
Last nite I made a cucumber salad to go with our dinner and I made a

vinaigrette

with some extra virgin olive oil, some red wine vinegar and a half teaspoon of pesto–whisked it up and poured over the cucs. Very simple flavor addition to a regular oil and vinegar dressing. Added just enough to make it a “dressing” as opposed to just O and V.

Of course using pesto as a

Pasta sauce

is a no brainer. Use as much as you want but make sure to add the grated cheese! and depending on how dry you make your pesto, you may need a bit more extra virgin olive oil. For the cheese, you can use grated Parmigiano or Romano. I personally prefer Romano because that is what my grandmother always used and it has a bit more of a “bite”, but the Parmigiano is excellent also, so try them both out and see what you like best. In a pound of pasta I use about a handful of cheese (at least) and a good couple spoonfuls of pesto. All this should be according to your own personal taste. Don’t be afraid to start light and then add more until you are happy with the flavor. Tasting and perfecting is part of the joy of cooking!

OK that’s it for now!

❤ D

Nervous breakdown…or dinner?

I am feeling SOOOOOO lazy today!!!  Tuesdays (yesterday) I have two soccer practices to coach and between house stuff , work and writing…and planning coaching sessions and cooking to make sure there is dinner ready between my two sessions…and being on my feet all day with my knee killing me…blah, blah, blah…

Well….I guess I can feel a little tired on Wednesdays!

But still there is the guilt!  How is it that I can make a nice pot roast/potatoes and carrots dinner in the crockpot on my busy day and today on my “lazy” day, I can’t get moving!!!

Well…no choice…I have to get up and MOVE!!!

You know….this reminds me of my desire to have a nervous breakdown years ago…or maybe still???

Well, quite a few years ago when all my kids were little…I was having “one of those days”.  I finally got myself to the point where all the kids were sitting down in front of the tv or napping for a few minutes and I ran tomy room and threw myself on my bed crying and I swore I would never be able to get up from there…I was emotionally and physically spent.

So finally after I had calmed down a bit I called my dear old high school pal Carol Ann who is a psychologist (as was her very cool, now retired mother!)  Well I needed to know so I asked her…”What’s the definition of a nervous breakdown?”  —of course I was sure whe was going to describe my feelings and I was going to say…that’s me …and I was going to get to go to the hospital for a 3 day vacation! 

BUT NO!!!  She told me that there is no real definition of a nervous breakdown.  It is basically just when an individual person “can’t take it anymore”…So of course I told her that I couldn’t take it anymore and asked if it was possible that I had had numerous nervous breakdowns over the years but everytime I think I can’t take it anymore, I realize I have been on my bed long enough and I have to get up to make dinner!!!

So she tells me “of course”…but that I am just too strong to give in!   AAAGGGHHHH!!!  I didn’t want to be strong I told her….I wanted a vacation!!!  I was sure the hospital with it’s nice crisp sheets and people waiting on me would be just what I needed!!!  But alas…my family needed me more than I needed that bed that someone else would make for me! 

I never have gotten that 3 day vacation!!!

Oh well, enough of today’s “moment”…I have to get up and scrounge the fridge to see what I can throw together for dinner tonite!

Ciao for now!  🙂   D