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!  

Caeser Salad

Ok. Another week has passed and people are still isolated inside keeping their distance from others. I made dinner yesterday. We had mini pizzas (they are super easy to make just grab some pitas, pizza sauce, your favorite toppings, and cheese and bake at 375 degrees for 12-15 minutes) and Caesar salad which was made with homemade fish free dressing. Today I will share with you that recipe so you can give it a try while you’re at home.

Fish Free Caesar Salad Dressing (for those with allergies)

You will need...

3-5 cloves of garlic

1 cup of mayonnaise

½ cup of shredded parmesan cheese

4 tbsp. of olive oil

1 tsp. of salt and 1 tsp. of pepper

2 tbsp. of lemon juice

Put all of the ingredients into the food processor and process for 1-2 minutes.

Put into an air tight container and refrigerate for at least an hour.

Toss it with Romaine lettuce, more parmesan cheese, and if you’d like, top with croutons. Add grilled chicken breast slices if you want more of a meal salad. 

Use the leftover dressing to dip fresh veggies in for a snack.

Chicken Cacciatore

Yay it’s Thursday! It’s been a long week so far. Anyways, we are taking a break from the baby shower planning for now and we’re going to share with you a simple recipe that you can make on the weekend ahead.

Chicken Cacciatore is a family favourite dish. I don’t always have the time to make it, but this past weekend we had a stormy indoor Sunday so I thought why not. It’s the perfect comfort food dish to have after a long week and on a cloudy hibernating day.

To make Chicken Cacciatore (to serve five people roughly) you will need the following…

16-20 chicken thighs, with bones and skin.

1 can (796ml) of diced tomatoes

Your favorite tomato sauce, we used Classico’s Tomato Basil (or you can make your own)

12-20 sliced white mushrooms

2 tsp. of dried oregano

½ tsp. of dried basil

1 red chopped pepper

1 green chopped pepper

Salt (to taste)

½-1 tsp. of black pepper

3 cloves of garlic

Rice or pasta to serve with the chicken

Start by salting and peppering your chicken. Let it sit for about an hour.

While that’s happening, chop up your peppers and garlic and sauté them in a big pot until a little bit softer but leave some crunch. 

While the peppers are softening, you can slightly cook your chopped up mushrooms in a separate pan and set aside. You want the mushrooms to get a bit darker and softer and to cook some of the liquid out of them.

Add in the seasonings and the diced tomatoes. Stir around and then add in your tomato sauce. Allow your chunky looking sauce to boil and then simmer while you cook your chicken. 

Now it’s time to cook the chicken in batches making sure they get nice and crispy. I cooked them until they were almost fully cooked but you can leave them less cooked and let them finish cooking in the oven. I’m always super worried about under cooked chicken though. I started by cooking them on both sides for 5 minutes and then going back to the original side and cooking for at least 3 more minutes (make sure you don’t burn).

Place the prepared chicken into a couple of Pyrex dishes and cover with the tomato sauce. It’s not meant to be a runny type of sauce; you want it to be thicker over top of the chicken.

Cook further for an hour at 350 degrees.

When it comes out it should be steaming and bubbling.

Serve over rice or pasta. I also made some of my cheese biscuits to go along with it. They are always a hit

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Heart Healthy Food

Valentine’s Day is a day away. Such a happy week and day! We’re doing our last Valentine’s post and we’re taking a little different approach. We’re looking at heart healthy foods. Oh, and we haven’t forgotten or left out our Oscar Dress card, we’re gonna do up a card and our top 10 list of dresses next week so hold tight!

We usually do the typical Valentine post, heart crafts and sweet treats but today we’re going to delve into some foods that support heart health. Literal hearts!

Top Heart Heathy Foods:

1.      Leafy Greens – They a great source of vitamin k which helps with promoting proper blood clotting and to help with good artery function. Some include, spinach, kale, and collard greens which are full of minerals and vitamins and antioxidants.

2.      Whole Grains – They are high in fiber which can help reduce bad cholesterol. Common whole grains are quinoa, oats, rye, brown rice, and barley.

3.      Berries – Are also high in antioxidants and help with controlling the bad cholesterol. Blueberries in particular help improve cells that promote blood clotting. Berries that are good to have are strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries.

4.      Avocados – Are high in monounsaturated fats which help lower cholesterol levels and lower the risk of heart disease. They are considered a healthy fat and are also high in potassium.

5.      Beans- Beans can reduce the levels of blood triglycerides and bad LDL cholesterol. They can also help reduce blood pressure and inflammation which are linked to heart disease.

6.      Dark Chocolate – Yum! It is rich in antioxidants and flavonoids and can help lower the risk of heart disease. Make sure to have a high quality of dark chocolate though with at least 70% of cocoa.

7.      Tomatoes – They have lots and lots of lycopene that has powerful antioxidant properties which can neutralize harmful free radicals that can lead to inflammation and heart disease.

8.      Garlic – It contains allicin which has therapeutic effects. It can help reduce platelet buildup that can lead to strokes and blood clots.

9.      Olive Oil – Again it is loaded with antioxidants that can relieve inflammation and decrease the risk of chronic disease. The monounsaturated fats in it helps with heart health.

10.  Green Tea – It has a lot of polyphenols catechins which can prevent cell damage and improve heart health. It can also decrease blood pressure and lower cholesterol.

Wonton Wrapper Raviolis

As we ease into a New Year, we like to throw in a few miscellaneous blog posts of things that we find interesting and want to try out but they may not fit into our themes throughout the year.

First up...easy wonton ravioli. This is something that we wanted to try out for a long time. We actually wanted to make some ravioli at home that was quick and easy so we first tried out fresh store bought lasagna sheets but they were too thick and stiff and didn’t work out at all. Our next plan/idea was to get some wonton wrappers and fill them and make ravioli. These worked out much better. Take a look below to see how made a yummy batch of ravioli.

First of all you’ll want to make a filling. We chose a ricotta cheese and spinach filling. For this you will need ricotta cheese, spinach, olive oil, garlic, eggs, parmesan cheese, and salt and pepper. I cooked up about 10 cups of fresh spinach (yes that seems like a lot but it cooks down so so much) along with 3 cloves of chopped garlic and a drizzle of olive oil. Cook until dark green and until the spinach goes down. 

In a bowl, add in 2 cups of ricotta cheese, 1/3 cup of parmesan cheese, 1 egg, salt and pepper and the spinach. Mix well and refrigerate until ready to use.  

After the filling is made, you can whip out your wonton wrappers and start filling. Either the square or rounds ones will work. We are making slightly larger raviolis so that we can use the entire wrapper without cutting off scrap bits. They are also much thinner than your average ravioli so it’s fine that they are a bit bigger.

Grab a bowl of warm water and put it nearby as you will need to use this to close the ravioli. You’ll also want some baking sheets to place the raviolis on as you wrap them.

Place a dollop of filling in the centre of the wrapper. You don’t want too much as it may split open so a little goes a long way.

Use your finger to put a light boarder of water around the edges of the wrapper.

Fold in half and pinch the sides together.

Place it on a baking sheet and then continue to make more. We were feeding a lot so we made a lot! You can make as many as you want. I did try making some and put them in the fridge overnight. That wasn’t the best idea as they stuck together and stuck to the container and turned really soft. It was a disaster! It’s just best to make them as you need them.

Get a large pot of water boiling. Once it’s boiling, drop about 6 of the raviolis in and let them cook for about 3 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon and place on a parchment lined baking sheet in the oven. I put the oven on the warm and hold setting. Continue cooking the rest of the raviolis.

Next, make your sauce. We kept it real simple and just melted some butter in a pan along with some fresh sage and then tossed in the raviolis. I would say just eye how much of each you use. I needed a lot of sauce so I used extra butter and sage. We were so excited to make this and hungry that we forgot to take some pictures along the way! Sorry.

Serve and enjoy...so delicious.