Baked Manicotti

Once again another week at home. I think I say that every week! I thought I’d make some comforting pasta and since I had more time on my hands, I thought I’d make one that takes a little more time. I decided on a stuffed pasta, manicotti to be exact. Now, the filling that I made can be used for any of your favourite stuffed pastas. Manicotti was what I could find at the store. It’s a little bigger in size than the cannelloni that I usually use and a lot bigger than the jumbo shells that I sometimes stuff as well. So enjoy the pasta!

Stuffing

For this stuffing you will need...

About 2 lbs. of ground beef

¼ cup of parsley

2 cups of mozzarella cheese, shredded

½ cup of parmesan cheese

3-5 cloves of garlic

1 small onion chopped, optional

1-1  ½ cup of tomato sauce

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. pepper

Brown the garlic and onions in a pan with some olive oil.

Once browned, add in your ground beef and cook well. Drain.

Once cooked and drained, add in the cheeses, tomato sauce, salt and pepper, and parsley.

Mix it all up and cook until all incorporated and gooey ooey.

Place in a glass dish. Once cooled, cover and put in the fridge overnight.

Usually the next day, I prep a tomato sauce. I add peppers, zucchini, diced tomatoes, etc.  whatever you like in your red sauce, add in. Let that simmer.

While your sauce is simmering, stuff your pasta. Some stuffable pastas you can fill when uncooked and they will cook in the oven when you bake your pasta, but the one that I got requires you to boil them first, so that’s what I did.

I just followed the package instructions and then let them cool slightly so that they were easy to handle.

When they were cool enough, I stuffed each of them with the ground beef filling that I made the day before. Be sure not to over fill as they will explode in the oven.

You can freeze any of the leftover filling or use it in another pasta or sauce.

Once the pastas were all filled and ready, I placed them in a casserole dish (put some sauce on the bottom first) and then cover with more of your sauce and then with a layer of mozzarella cheese.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes or until boiling. Since the pasta is already cooked, you want to make sure you don’t overcook and make the pasta mushy. The pasta is ready when the cheese is all melted. You can put it on a broil at the end to brown the cheese a bit.

Serve warm and enjoy!  

Bread Maker Bread

Another week at home so as I was cleaning up I rediscovered my bread maker. I haven’t used it in some time as I have been so busy and it was easier to just buy bread. Since I have been left with so much free time on my hands, I thought I’d make some fresh bread (I’ve actually made a few loafs and will be making even more). Fresh bread is always so yummy. I made some to have for breakfast and I made some to go along with some pasta the other night.

I will admit that in the past it took some figuring out which recipe worked the best. I have made some bread that didn’t rise and some that were super dense, but take a look at the recipe below to see one that worked out perfectly!

White Bread Maker Bread

You will need...

4 cups of sifted flour (must must must be sifted)

1 ½ cups of warm water (must must must be warm)

2 tsp. of sugar

2 ½ tsp. of dry yeast (I use break maker yeast)

2 tsp. of salt

2 tsp. of oil

How to...

Sift flour.

Warm up your water. You don’t want it to boil but you want it slightly warmer than room temperature. I put it in the microwave for about a minute. Pour the water into the bread maker pan.

Now sprinkle the yeast and then the sugar on top. Allow to sit and foam/bubble for 5 minutes.

After the 5 minutes are up, add the salt and then the oil. I used Mazola oil but you can use olive oil instead.

Finally add the flour.

Place the pan into the machine and put it on the basic bread setting. Choose your crust colour and then press start. This setting usually takes about 3 hours.

Once the final “bread is ready” beep occurs, remove the pan and allow the bread to cool in the pan. The pan should be cool to the touch before you try to remove the bread.

You can slice and serve the bread warm or you can let it cool completely and either leave it or slice* it all and store in an airtight container.

Enjoy the fresh delicious bread!

*a regular bread knife will do the job but my dad gave me an electric knife and it sliced my next loaf so perfectly.

Makeup Brush Cleaning

Ok, so we’re gonna take a different turn today and do a little something out of the ordinary. Instead of baking and crafting, we’re going to do a little makeup/beauty post. We haven’t done one of these for a little while. As I have been sitting at home I have been taking pictures of things that are apart of my daily/weekly routine and one thing that I do every week is wash my makeup brushes. It might be an obvious thing to do but for some, they might need a little walk through so take a look at the step by step guide below showing how to wash your makeup brushes.

You need to wash your brushes and makeup tools every week if not every day. This will keep harmful bacteria away. You should also be changing your makeup after three months and if you are using sponges, definitely be changing them after three months time.

First things first, grab all your dirty brushes, tools, and sponges. Have a fresh towel ready to dry everything on.

Find some soap. I use baby shampoo for the brushes, alcohol wipes for tools, and Dove bar soap for the sponges.

Now lather up those brushes. You want to see the makeup come out of those brushes. Rub the bristles just like you were washing your hair.

Next I take an alcohol wipe and I wipe down my eyelash curler and rose quartz roller.

Finally I wash the sponge that I use to apply foundation. I rub the sponge on a Dove beauty bar and squeeze out all of the foundation. You want to make sure that all of the foundation colour comes out of the sponge so that when you squeeze it, you no longer see the foundation colour and just the water and soap instead.

When you are all done, you can lay everything out to dry on the fresh towel and let them all air dry overnight.

Granola

So today for our indoor activity we are making granola. It’s a very simple and quick recipe that is perfect for putting onto yogurt or for snacking on with some dried fruit and chocolate. Take a look...

Granola

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.

While that is preheating, mix 3 cups of quick oats with 3 tbsp. of brown sugar, ¼ tsp. of salt, and ½ tsp. of cinnamon. Stir it all up.

Now add in ¼ cup of  vegetable oil, 1/3 cup of  honey, and 1 tsp. of vanilla.

Stir again and spread on a lined cookie sheet.

Bake for 15 minutes and then mix it around. Now bake for 12 minutes more.

Store in an air tight container after cooling on the sheet.

Easy peasy!