Calling all Bachelors - Eggplant Parmesan - An easy meal to impress with

You go to an italian restaurant. You order the eggplant parmesana. It comes to you all soft and covered in cheese and sauce with a side of noodles. Melt in your mouth yummy right?

You go home thinking, "I wish I could make something that yummy". But alas, you think your meager cooking skills are too lacking to make something so complex and delicious. 

Or maybe you're having your new girl over and want to impress her with your suave cooking skills but are truly clueless. This would definitely impress her but too hard right?

Nope. You're wrong. Eggplant Parmesean is the easiest thing in the world to make. No really. It is. It involves slicing, a few herbs, some cheese and an oven. You can do that right?

Sure you can.

See easy. And fast too. And you can continue playing on Facebook and Pinterest while it cooks. Triple bonus!

So first you need an eggplant. There are multiple types and any will do. The long skinny ones I reserve for thai cooking, but would be fun for an appetizer or kid sized pieces. I used a regular old purple eggplant. 

I lied. First, get your oven rarin' to go by setting it to about 350. If your oven is retarded like mine, 375ish.

Now, chop off the ends of your purple orb. Oooh. Orb. Giggle. I like that word. Sounds dirty and silly all at the same time. Giggle.

Ehem. Sorry. Slice into 1/2 inch sized pieces. 

Lay them on a baking sheet in a single layer. One eggplant was enough for 2 adults and 2 kids here. 

Next, spray with olive oil and sprinkle with some herbage.

Herbage used this day was:

Basil

Oregano

Lemon Pepper

Salt

Garlic

Just shake it on, being messy is ok!

No really. It is!

Ok. If you want clean up to be easy 'cause your lazy like me then use a piece of tin foil over the pan before you lay your slices down. Makes clean up a snap.

Just recycle the foil k? K.

Wax paper is a good option too. Recycle that too when your done.

Look at you being all green and stuff!

*Sniff* I'm so proud.

*Clears throat* 

Ok. So. Your eggplant is almost really happy. Its crying for cheese. 

Mozzarella to be exact.

Be prepared, I am going to go Alton Brown on you...

Ready?

Are you sure?

There are a few types of Mozzarella out there. I usually use either the kind you get in a block that is half plastic or the kind you get in a roll that is 100% mozzarella, no plastic involved. 

They both get yummy and melty. The fresh mozz is creamier, meltier and well, better for you. (No plastic). It is also about the same price as the blocks.

Ok. I'm done doing Alton Brown. He'd probably go into a lot more scientific detail. I won't subject you to that. :-)

Where do you get them you ask? Oh.Well. Any decent grocer has them, usually located by the ricotta cheese. I get it from Costco. Double pack for $6. Lasts through 3 pizzas and this plus a little for snacking.

Spread on your mozz. If you are using shredded, it is doubly important, for ease of cleaning up, that you use foil or wax paper to line your pan. Burnt melted cheese is a bitch to get off.

Trust me.

Ooooh. See. Can you here the eggplant rejoice at the yumminess layered on? 

You can't? 

Well, put your darn ear closer to the picture...

See? Amazing right?

So then you slide those puppies into the oven. It should be hot by now.

Let them cook for 15 mins or so.

In the meantime, you can dump in your noodles into that pot of boiling water you started. 

You can get out your jar of sauce too and get it nuked. If you were feeling adventurous and made it from scratch, then use that. Make it before you start the other stuff. It would be step 1 in this meal.

Scratch Marinara Sauce Recipe Here

Go play on your computer or watch T.V. while waiting.

Or you could chop some lettuce and tomato and onion and cucumber and make a salad to go with dinner. Then you would be really impressing the girl.

Oooh. Or make some garlic bread. Slices of bread, add butter, sprinkle with garlic and stick  in the oven.

When your eggplant is done is should look like this...

Put a couple on a plate, douse with sauce, add some noodles on the side and douse with sauce. If you got REALLY fancy for that special girl you are impressing, put the salad in a small bowl, and a put the bread in the middle of the table on a nice plate. No, not the poker one. A NICE one. 

Crack open some red wine, light a couple of candles and you are set to impress. 

Bet you even get a kiss for your troubles!

Penne with Marinara and Meatballs, Orange-feta salad.

A simple italian-esque meal for a weeknight. Mildly healthy, very yummy, and kid approved. I like kid approved and easy. 

Start with noodles. I picked penne this round. Get your pot of water boiling with a little salt and oil added to it.

Because it keeps noodles from sticking, makes the water boil faster and adds an little something extra.

Geez! So many questions!

Ok. So while the water is getting all bubblyish, chop one onion, 2-3 mushrooms, 1/2 bell pepper and 1/2 a summer squash into chunks. You can add whatever veggies you have in bits and pieces. 

You know the ones. There is not enough to make a side, but too much to just pitch.

This is one of those later in the week meals to get rid of the bits and pieces of other stuff you made.

Throw the veggies into a skillet with a little olive oil and a sprinkle of salt and pepper.

The water should be close to ready now, so add in your noodles.

Un-bag some meatballs too and get those in a pot or in the nuker. Add a little sauce to them to keep them form getting dry on the edges.

Meatballs you ask?

Costco carries in giant bags. You can also get them from a normal grocer. I like the big bags because we use them for all sorts of meals.

Next add a red sauce of choice. This one was the 3 cheese by Ragu.

Remember that blue cheese and garlic butter you made waaaaaaay back when?

Probably shoved in the back of a drawer in the fridge completely forgotten. 

Ya. I do it too. 

Fish it out and throw in the sauce mix. May as well use it for a good purpose right?

By now it smells yummy and you need a snack.

Have a snack.

If you haven't had this before, you must. It's crack in popcorn form. Don't get out the whole bag. Trust e. You won't eat dinner.

Now you cut up the veggies and stuff for the salad.

I generally use, for the 5 of us, 1/2 head of romaine, 1/4 onion, 1/2 bell pepper, some sort of fruit  (in this case and orange) and a sprinkle of a salty cheese like gorgonzola, bleu cheese or feta. In this case, it's feta.

Oranges

Oh. Tomato and cucumber too. 1/2 of each. If you have them. 

Assemble to make this gorgeous salad.

Have another bite of popcorn.

The noodles should be done by now, so drain them.

Put a few in a dish, top with meatballs and sauce. Get your salad on there too. A vinaigrette works the best IMO. But if you are a hard-core ranch person, I won't tell.

Now go sit down and watch some Big Bang Theory. Try not to snort sauce out your nose. Trust me, it hurts.

Homemade Marinara Sauce

This is a long task. Be forewarned. Long task.

Its worth it though. This is one of those things you start on a Saturday morning and let cook all day as you do your weekly housecleaning.

It makes the house smell yummy too.

I suppose you could do this as a slow cooker thing. No reason why not.

First and foremost, pour yourself a nice tall glass of Wild Cherry Pepsi. Or wine. Wine is good too.

Ready?

Ok.

The ingredient list is long.

Tomatoes-Roma 6-10.

1 onion

1 bell pepper

5-6 cloves garlic

Some sort of squash, zuchinni or yellow squash. 1 should be fine

Carrots, 2-3.

Celery, 1 or 2 stalks

Mushrooms. 5 or 6 pounds. Just kidding! Geez! 5 or 6 should be fine. Baby Bella's if you can find them for a reasonable price or wild mushrooms work well too.

On occasion I will throw in broccoli, artichokes, sun dried tomatoes, or eggplant. This can totally be one of those whatever is left of my veggie drawer kind of thing.

Wine. A little for you, a little for the sauce.

So let's start with that.

Chop onion, pepper, and celery (trinity) into bits. Chop garlic coarsely.

Saute in olive oil until translucent and smelling yummy. Sprinkle some salt and pepper in there.

While getting all happy, chop everything else into bits or chunk. However you like your veggies. I like mine chunky.

These are examples of chunks. 

Asparagus. I totally forgot to mention asparagus. This works too, or you can use it as a side for the noodles later.

Toss everything else but tomatoes in and saute for a few minutes. 

Put in tomatoes. I usually end up using more than I think I need. I said 10 above. Sometimes its more. Depends on how many other veggies I put in.

Beautiful makings this is. In the above picture, I cheated. I used some tomatoes and a can as well. I didn't have a ton of fresh left and didn't feel like getting out for just mater's.

No worries. You can do the same. I won't hunt you down, I promise. (Fingers crossed behind back)

Add a dash of red wine. Take a sip. Ok another. Maybe one more.

Add a tablespoon of sugar.

Now on to the herbage.

Important stuff, herbage is.

Here we have...

Oregano

Basil

Garlic powder (cause you can never have too much garlic)

Lemon Pepper

Here's how much to use of each.

About that much. Can you tell I don't like measuring herbage?

Measuring is overrated. 

Ok. Baking is the ONLY exception.

Err on the side of too little and you'll be fine.

If you are anal about measuring...this is about 1.5 tsp, give or take.

So for the oregano, 1 of those is fine. For the garlic 2-3, basil 2-3, lemon pepper 1 or 2. If you have rosemary, 1 is good. 

Fresh is always better, but its not quite time yet to be able to have fresh unless you want to pay out the nose at the store or have and indoor herb garden.

Sigh.

One of these days.

Cook the sauce slowly, on lowish for awhile. The longer it cooks, the better it is.

When you are ready to use it, cook your noodles in salted boiling water (I used ravioli this night)

Fix a veggie (Asparagus this time)

And maybe some bread - Freddies had foccacia in the used bread section so I used that. Have I mentioned my love of used bread? Seriously. Why pay full price?

This is what the whole she-bang looks like. So worth the wait. 

I generally make a huge recipe and freeze it for later. The measurement above feed a fam of 5. 

Hawaiian Chicken Sandwich

It's an amazingly beautiful perfect day today in Washington. I am hobbling along with bare feet and a tank top today. Let me tell you, the air on my skin is like a lover's caress. Mother nature needs to create a climate where it doesn't get above like 70 ever. Or below for that matter. I'd be down with that.

I'm in a summery mood today, and again am in a creative mood for food.

So lunch today was a chicken sandwich, hawaiian style.

Well probably not technically hawaiian, but it has tropically things on it so we are calling it that, k? K.

See the yumminess...

So there is no step by step with this, because its basically assembly only. And cutting stuff.

Start with chicken. I used a frozen chicken patty and cooked it in the microwave then put it in a saute pan for a little bit to get it crispy. Lots less time than using the oven. 

I was hungry. I like shortcuts.

You can use a chicken breast as well and just cook it in oven or saute pan. I keep several cooked on hand because I have a high protein diet and its a quick snack.

Cut up an onion and mushrooms while waiting for chicken. Saute them in a little olive oil to until brownish in color. Sprinkle with a little salt and pepper while cooking.

Slice a piece of pineapple or use a ring or 2 out of the can and put in pan. Let them get a golden brown color on both sides. 

Slice an avocado.

For the mayo/sauce I used 1 T olive oil mayo, dash of garlic powder, pinch of dill, pinch of ginger.

Get out your buns. 

EWWWW! NO! Not those buns! Geez! Put THOSE buns away!

The edible kind...get one out. I like onion rolls, but a hoagie bun or whatever you have on hand os fine. 

Take pineapple out of pan and after buttering the un-crusty side of the bun, put them in the pan to warm up. You know. Kind of like grilled cheese.

When nice and toasty, spread each half with mayo mix and a wedge of laughing cow cheese or melt your cheese of preference over the chicken. Swiss, provolone, monty jack works well or cream cheese if you don't have the Laughing Cow stuff.

Assemble. Chicken. Lettuce. Pineapple. Onion/Mushroom mix. Avocado. 

Yum.

Voila! You have a very yummy summery sandwich, perfect for a sunny day and eating on the porch.

Peaches and Cream Pancakes

I know its been awhile. I deeply apologize. Life takes its twists and turns and well, I have had little time or gumption to write anything.

To kick off the weekend, I ended up in the E.R. for back issues. My daughter of course, was up by the time I returned home and as such announced she wanted pancakes. Here's the sucky part...I can't stand up straight and I am in the mood to cook. These 2 things do not go together well.

I did it anyway. I'm a stubborn bitch. End of story.

So this mornings breakfast, since I had 2 lovely white peaches with absolutely no flavor, is Peaches and Cream Pancakes.

The pancake recipe is mom's. I alter it with add-ins to make it fun. The basic recipe makes fat, fluffy, dense pancakes.

Now I am not a huge fan of pancakes.

I know. Blasphemy.

But my kiddos are, so I indulge them.

So first off, warm up you griddle or skillet. I use my cast iron. Ok, I use my cast iron for darn near everything.

Looks yummy right?

From scratch pancakes are super easy, I promise. Even you bachelors can get this.

You need:

2c Flour

1Tbs Baking POWDER

1tsp salt

1Tbs Sugar

and these...

...plus a little milk. I usually end up using about a cup, but it depends. 

So first off dump the dry ingredients into a bowl.

Add Egg.

My daughter loves to help me with this part. She is an egg-o-holic like me and her specialty now is breaking and adding eggs.

Add milk. Start with a little and keep adding until blended and a thick batter forms. You wan it to be gloppy, not runny.

Like this. 

I would like to apologize for the not well lit pics. I hurt. I am not feeling camera mode today :-(

Add into your batter a splash of vanilla and if you have it a tiny amount of maple extract. Almond works well too if you have it.

Next, chop a peach into bits.

No! Don't put them in yet! I didn't tell you to do that and I am the boss right now! Got it? 

Ok good. Geez. Thinking your a pro and all. ;-)

Dust the peaches with a little flour. A tablespoon works pretty well.

What? Why?

Because the flour helps fruit or any watery, chunky additions to suspend in the batter instead of floating to the bottom. 

Wait. Can you float to the bottom? Uh...fall, coagulate, have a meeting in the depths of the batter. 

This way you have even peachiness in every cake. 

Now that your batter is all happy and peachy, coat your skillet with an oily substance (I use butter)

and pour batter in small circles. about 1/4 c per cake.

Whilst they are cooking slice up another peach.

Why? Again you ask why? 

'Cause you can't have enough tasteless white winter peaches, that's why.

And your gonna coat them in sugar too. 

Turn the cakes over when they get bubbly on top and start to look dryish on the edges. Depending on your skillet, heat level and stove, 1-2 minutes per side. I cook on medium when using cast iron.

See pretty peach slices.

Coated in sugar.

Flip over your cakes.

Put them on a plate.

Top them with your peach slices and a dollop of your favorite yogurt flavor (I used banana 'cause that's what I had). I also added this peach-mango compote stuff I get at Costco. It's yummy on vanilla ice cream too.

Voila! Peaches and Cream Pancakes.

See that was easy!

Fry an egg, cook up some sausage and bacon, pour a cup of the nectar of the gods and enjoy on the front porch. Make sure you wave at the neighbors!

Traditional Egyptian Breakfast - Foule, hard-boiled eggs, pita and veggies.

One of the few good things that came out of my mom's marriage to my step-father was the introduction to a whole new realm of food. He is native to Cairo and as such, she learned to make some of the more traditional meals.

Let me tell you, what they serve in Mediterranean restaurants is not what they eat everyday!

This is my daughter's favorite breakfast. I think a lot of that has to do with the hard-boiled eggs. She has her mommies obsession with hard-boiled eggs. 

Obsession. We can eat a dozen by ourselves in a sitting kind of obsession.

Yes. We go through a lot of eggs.

"When I was a lad I hat 4 dozen eggs every morning to help me get large, now that I'm grown I eat 5 dozen eggs and I'm roughly the size of a baaaarrrgggge!"

Channeling my inner Gaston.

A traditional breakfast on Sundays for us was his favorite meal. Foule (a type of bean), warm hard-boiled eggs with butter, crispy pita, tomato, onion and cucumber, feta cheese and kalmata olives. 

Generally you'd put it all together to make a sandwich more or less.

I don't get that technical. I bit of this a bite of that. It tastes the same going down.

And savoring the eggs with butter. MMMMMM.

Ok. So ingredients here are hard to find. My mom sends the beans to me because I have had a hard time finding a good Mediterranean grocer in Portland. 

You need a can of Foule Medames beans, or fava beans

Drain and rinse.

Start with the spices. This is the reason I have cumin and coriander seeds. For this specific recipe. 

Use Mortar and Pestle to squish seeds.

If you don't know how, look here.

Pour seeds in a saucepan with a little olive oil. 

Why? So many questions!

The heat and oil release the natural oils of the spice and make it yummy.

Chop some garlic too...maybe 4 to 5 cloves. If you don't have fresh, then powdered is fine. 

Meanwhile, start the eggs. 

When the whole house smells like cumin and garlic, add 1 whole onion, chopped into bits and half a bell pepper, chopped into bits.

Saute until happy.

Add beans and a can of diced tomatoes or chop 3-4 romas into bits. 

Cook until tomatoes are cooked through. 

Get out your potato squisher. 

You know the one. Yes the one that is rusty and deformed and probably belonged to your great great aunt betty. 

Squish the beans with the fancy squisher.

They will be chunky, no worries, just do what you can.

While the beans finish cooking, slice a tomato, onion and cucumber.

Drag out the feta cheese and olives. These 2 things can be purchased at your local grocery store. I get the olives at Costco because the are really yummy as a snack and are great for adding to other dishes. Pizza and pasta especially. I could go on and on about the fabulous kalmata olives.

Throw the pita bread into the oven. If you can find fresh versus a bug name, its amazingly better. If not, regular ones are fine.

Drain and peel the eggs. Cool them off with cold water but you'll want them warm.

Trust me on this ok? 

Just try it my way.

Warm hard-boiled eggs with butter are...very very very yummy.

Open mind and all that.

Ok good. See? Yummy right?

Everything is done. Assemble on plate and eat. 

Apple Crisp

We went on a trip to Olympia to the only reasonably close orchard that was supposed to be a U-pick place. It wasn't. But the trip was fun anyway and we got a snot-load of apples for super cheap. AND the BEST apple cider I have ever tasted. Holy bananas was it good.

Hang on. Something is bouncing at the bottom of my screen and driving me nuts.

Ok. Back. Why the email needs my password every time it sends something, I don't know.

Olympia is gorgeous in the fall. But then the PNW is in general.

Anyway, we had a snot load of apples to deal with. What to do, what to do.

Apple pie, baked apples, apple bread, apple muffins, applesauce, applebutter, apple...crisp. Oooooh apple crisp. 

We ended up making applesauce too, but apple crisp was a start.

I decided to entice you first. *enter evil laugh here* Mwahahahahaha. 

Slice a bunch of apples. 

I dunno. A few. I think I did 3 of those monsters at the top. 

Put them in a deep dish GLASS pie pan or a 9x9 baking dish.

Cut up 2 tbs of butter into cubes, more or less. Or just pinch it into bits. That works too. Put on top of apples here and there.

Cover in 1/4c brown sugar, 2 Tbs cinnamon, 2 Tbs white sugar

The picture is actually from the applesauce but it shows what it needs to.

Cover with buttered foil...

Yes, butter the foil. Or spray with cooking spray. It keeps the foil from sticking to the sugars.

Trust me on this. This is one of the best tricks in the book.

Cook at 250 for 20-30 mins.

Meanwhile, get out your oats. 

Pour 1 c of oats in a bowl. Cut up another 2 Tbs of butter. Throw in 1 Tbs cinnamon and 1/4 c of brown sugar. 

Use a fork to squish together. 

Stop eating it. 

I said stop.

There won't be enough for the top!

Ok fine. Make some more if you must.

When apples are all happy...

Happy=tender but not squishy

When they are happy, pull out and cover with oat mixture, if there is any left.

Pop back in oven for a few minutes and let the oats get brownish. 

Don't let it cool! Dish it out now and eat while warm. I like mine with a touch of cream or vanilla ice cream... oooh then the ice cream gets all melty with the heat of the apples and it becomes one creamy, caramelly, cinnamony, gooey yummy mess. MMMMMM