Greek/Irish gone Italian...What!

So I did it, I made my first Lasagna! It was soooo good! I made it Sunday night to cut up for lunches for the week, but it smelled so good we plunged into it Sunday night for dinner. Nearly half a pan later the remainder was cut up for lunches.  I finished the last piece today for lunch, it was so yummy!  Pictures, lots of pictures to follow! 

1 lb. ground turkey
1 lg. onion
1 (14 oz.) can fire roasted tomatoes
1 (6 oz.) can tomato paste
1 c. water
1 tbsp. parsley flakes
1 tsp. basil
15 oz Ricotta

4 oz. Parmesan cheese
1 tbsp. parsley flakes
1 tsp. oregano
8 oz. uncooked lasagna noodles
8 oz. Mozzarella cheese

2 Eggs

Cook turkey and onion together and drain. Mix tomatoes, tomato paste, water, 1 tablespoon of parsley flakes and basil together and add to turkey and onion.  Simmer to reduce mixture.  Mix together ricotta cheese, 2 eggs, mozzarella cheese, 1 tablespoon parsley flakes and oregano; set aside.

Spray 9x13 inch pan with extra virgin olive oil. Place about a ½ cup of sauce on the bottom of the pan and your first layer of noodles.  Next begin to layer sauce, meat mixture, cheese mixture and noodles; alternating as you fill the dish. Top with Parmesan cheese. Bake covered 45 minuets and uncovered 15 minutes at 350 degrees. Let stand a 10 minutes before serving. Perfection!

So its been awhile...

Right, sorry I neglected my blog over the last 2 weeks. You were in my thoughts.

I made gyros last week! They were stupendous!!!  I also made lots of other things... On Sunday night we had friends over and I made Parmesan crusted tilapia. I know I made lots of stir-fry too...throughout the week.

     

        Parmesan Crusted Tilapia

• 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 3 tablespoons mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/8 teaspoon celery salt
• 2 pounds tilapia fillets 

Gyro how to, to come!

Work is out for the weekend...or rather it was.

First off, I have my first follower!!! Now down to business.  Over the weekend I made chicken quesadillas, salsa, and guacamole for Sunday lunch. All of it was yummy! Later, I made Katie Kuizine's for us to take to work for the week. Then for dinner I made stir-fry. I will add pictures once I am home tonight so you can see how scrumptious looking all of it was.

The chicken quesadilla filling was a mixture of red and yellow peppers, red onion, and chicken. I sauteed the onion and peppers in olive oil and spices until tender-crisp. First off I started the grill and seasoned the chicken with the same spices as the other filling mixture. Then I grilled the chicken to just done, not pink, but juicy to the poke since I knew it would be cooked a bit more once in the quesadilla maker.  While the chicken grilled I made the guacamole and salsa.

Guacamole

6 Avocados

2 Limes (enough juice to cover the avocados, but not soupy)

2 Roma tomatoes

1 Red Onion

3 Jalapenos

2-3 Shakes of Garlic Powder

1 1/2 teas.of Kosher Salt

In a large bowl chop all things chop-able and add to bowl after you mash the avocados and coat them with lime juice. Add the garlic powder and salt. Taste adjust the garlic powder and salt to taste...Enjoy!

Mild Salsa

1/2 lb. Green Tomatoes

1/2 lb Roma Tomatoes

1/2 c. Basile

1/2 Red Onion

1/2 tea Kosher Salt

For the salsa chop and mix the everything together add the salt sir/toss and place in the fridge for at least an hour so the salt has time to draw out the liquid in the tomatoes and onion.

Chicken Quesadillas

I heated my quesadilla maker with some olive oil on the plates and added the bottom shell, filling, salsa, cheese, and the top shell. You can add whatever you want, of course. Then I closed the lid and snapped it down for about 3 minutes. The olive oil helps it brown and crisps the outside. Repeat until shells or filling or both are G.O.N.E....gone!

More to come!

BYOS -Bring Your Own Steak

I think this event, dare I call it that, went well!  I made the stuffing, but the steaks were too thin to slice and stuff.  That is what I get for being cheap! Anthony and my dad ate the stuffing mixture of onion and mushrooms on the top of the steak and I passed on it given my aversion to mushrooms.  I made squash and couscous to accompany the steak. The summer squash was good, but the zucchini was bitter. The couscous smelled like play dough, yuck!  This was our first couscous experience, easy to made, so easy you'll wonder if you are doing it correctly. 
Pictures and recipe to follow.

Indian (like from India) Chicken & Peppers with rice.

This is a great recipe that looks like a lot of time went into it, but really it is just some prep that needs to be done. Wednesday night when I arrived home I raced into the kitchen and checked the chicken in hopes that it was mostly thawed. It is good to work with partially frozen meat when you plan to cut it so it will slice easier. I heated the grill pan with a bit of olive oil and prepared the spices with yogurt in a large bowl.  Note to self, mark spice bottle with a note to say that the shaker top is missing.  As you can imagine, of all the spices in my cabinet, I grabbed the cayenne pepper!  With one hard flip of the wrist I dumped in 1/4 of the bottle on top of the yogurt in the large mixing bowl. "Oh no," I thought as I began to pinch out small amounts and put it back in the jar.  I realized that my efforts, although good, would not combat the heat wave that was going to ensue 30 minutes later. If I recall correctly the dish calls for 1/4 of a tea. Not that I ever measure, but I took it a bit to far last night!

I will follow up with pictures of the recipe later.

3/4 cup plain yogurt

1 1/2 tea coriander

2 garlic cloves

1/2 tea paprika

1/4 tea cayenne pepper

3 tbls fresh cilantro or 1 tbl dried

1 lb chicken

1 of each red, green, yellow, orange bell pepper

1 red onion

1/2 tea salt

Chop or grate  the garlic and chop the cilantro if needed, then combine the spices with the yogurt in a large zipper bag.  Chop the chicken into 1 inch cubes and add it to your bag of spices, squeeze out the air and zipper closed. Marinate in the fridge for 1-24 hours (I almost never do this because I forget to, but it will intensify the flavors).  

When you are ready to cook the chicken prepare a pan with olive oil or the outdoor grill (as you can skewer the meat and veggies separately).  Chop the peppers and red onion  to desired bite-size. Next either prepare to skewer the meat (on bamboo skewers soaked over night in water or metal skewers) and veggies or place the chicken in the heated pan. Then place the veggies in separate olive oil heated pan about 5 minutes later. Cook the chicken until done and no longer pink inside.  Cook the veggies until reached desired tenderness about 10 minutes.  Meanwhile, begin the rice. Follow package instructions and adjust time to have completed when the rest of the meal is done. Once cooked combine the chicken and peppers in a large bowl toss and serve over rice.

When you see the pictures you will notice that I added extra "cilantro" a.k.a spinach to the dish. This is an option to seek in the good stuff...

Made by someone else...

I arrived home late, starving, and tired last night so we went out to dinner. I am convinced that it was not as good as what I could have made, but beggars and all that... I invited my dad to come over on Saturday for BYOS (Bring your own steak). I will actually make mushroom stuffed steak, zucchini, and couscous for dinner then!  I also have some lobster meat that I want to incorporate.  I am not sure what we are having tonight maybe chicken and peppers. I have the whole day to decide! -Katie

First Post!

So, this is my first post...ever! My intention in creating this blog is to journal the food I make and give suggestions for making dinner easy, fun, and simple. I want to take the guess work out of making dinner. For example, you are making chicken, but you are not sure what kind of chicken or don't know what to pair it with. As my blog grows I hope to have easy, quick meals that show what flavors pair well together.

This is my new creative outlet...let's see how long it lasts. I am also open for suggestions.

-Katie

P.S. We are having mushroom stuffed steak, zucchini, and couscous for dinner!