What's cooking at Jerk Castle . . .

Roasted Veggie Calzones

If you don't mind, I will indulge myself for a minute to tell you that we have totally gotten calzones down. . and they are delicious made at home. I was never really a huge calzone fan to be honest but these are scrumptious. We added roasted red peppers and onions, roasted garlic, spinach, ricotta and mozzarella to ours but really any vegetables would work. 

It is a little bit trial and error but here are the steps we took:

1)  pre-heat the oven at 500 degrees- put your pizza stone in the oven so it pre-heats.

2) thinly slice a few red and/or orange bell peppers as well as an onion- add to a bowl- drizzle with olive oil

3) take a garlic bulb, place in tin foil and drizzle olive oil (remove the outer most layer of the bulb)-close the tin foil so it is enclosed

4) roast the peppers and the garlic in the oven at 500 degrees for around 15-20 minutes

5) meanwhile, cut the pizza dough in half (we buy dough from our local pizzeria for 3 bucks- each half makes two calzones and you can freeze whatever you are not using) form the half into a ball and roll out the pizza dough (using plenty of flour) into a circle (or as close as you can make it). Cut the circle in half and each half circle makes one calzone.

6) Place the dough on some type of wood board lightly coated with flour and cornmeal (we use the paddle that came with our pizza stone) and add your fillings to one side (the roasted peppers, onions and garlic as well as ricotta and mozzarella cheese, we also threw in some raw baby spinach which was fully steamed once the calzone was taken out of the oven)- add a bit of salt and pepper to the filling. 

 

7) Fold over with the other half of the dough and pinch all along the outside so the calzone stays together.

 

8) Brush the outside with olive oil and make a few one inch slits to the top.

9) Place the calzone on the stone and bake at 500 degrees for around 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.

 

Dreamy isn't it? 

Linguine with asparagus and pine nuts

http://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/browse-all-recipes/linguine-asparagus-pine-nuts-00000000031206/index.html

i love a quick pasta dish every now and then for during the week . . .especially one which includes pine nuts and a vegetable. This recipe, which was featured in last months real simple magazine as a quick weeknight meal, did fit that bill. . . besides cutting the asparagus and shaving the parmesan there was very little prep work involved and it was very satisfying after a long day at work- fresh and salty and cheesy. . .

 

April is a peak month for asparagus, artichokes and peas so we are right in season . . lots of artichoke and pea recipes to come. . . .and matzo meal of course since Passover begins Monday night. . . 

Enjoy your Saturday. 

Pasta with Pumpkin (Butternut Squash) and Sausage Sauce straight from Bologna

Steven and I had a wonderful time in Italy.. . .of course we ate a ton of perfectly cooked pasta, drank fabulous wine almost everywhere we went and enjoyed more espresso and croissants than i care to admit. . . a dream trip really . . . except for the snow and ice. 

A big highlight of our trip was a cooking class that we took in Bologna courtesy of Maribel who runs the cooking school- Taste of Italy. We loved Bologna and within just a few hours of us having gotten off the train from Florence,  I was already trying to get Steven to agree we could move there (so far he's not leaving Brooklyn, but I will continue my efforts).  

Below are some pictures of us taking the class, trying our hand at rolling out pasta dough (which is not as easy as Italian mothers make it look that's for sure), and a recipe for the pumpkin and sausage sauce that we added to bow tie pasta. The sauce was flavorful and hearty yet also light leaving you feeling full and satisfied but not like you need to lay on the couch for a week. . .I loved it and think its a perfect sauce to help us all get through these cold snowy days. 

First, a peek at us making pasta dough by hand:

 
the basic ingredients are down- eggs and flour

working in the eggs

Steven working his dough and doing a fine job

   
my dough looking good after some serious assistance from Maribel

  

Tortellini with a ricotta filling- how cute are these? We made a butter and sage sauce for them that was also delicious.

 

The bow ties and some other shapes we made for the pumpkin and sausage sauce 

And now the recipe for the sauce. . . Published here with special permission from Taste of Italy-

Pumpkin and Sausage Sauce:

Serves 4 as a first course

**Note- although called pumpkin, the pumpkin is actually a winter squash such as butternut squash

Ingredients:

1 onion

150 g- 5 ounces pumpkin (butternut squash), peeled and cubed 

150g- 5 ounces sausage (mild)

White wine

Salt to taste

1-Cut pumpkin (squash) into small cubes and julienne the onion

2-Heat some extra virgin olive oil in a pan and add onion and pumpkin over medium heat cooking for app. 10 minutes

3-Squeeze the sausage out of its casing and add to the pan, cook for app. 15 minutes

4-Add half of a glass of white wine and allow to slightly evaporate

5-Cover and finish cooking over low heat for another 10-15 minutes

6- Add salt to taste

 the sauce as it is being prepared

And the finished meal- add grated Parmesan after serving and you are set. . . Enjoy!

  

Artichoke Pasta Salad

My computer has been out of my life for a few weeks as my brother worked on it getting it back shape. . (basically by taking everything off that i had put on which messed it all up and starting over from scratch). . . he even added a new keyboard. i am therefore seriously behind on letting you all know what we have been eating here at jerk castle- never even posting about all of our thanksgiving sides. . .

oh well, i must move on as the new holiday season has arrived. . .coming soon i will post about our potato pancake fest that we had last weekend during the snow storm, but that is jumping ahead just a bit. First I need to tell you about Steven's birthday meal we had here at home. . . a grilled porterhouse with sauteed swiss chard and this tasty and easy to make artichoke pasta salad.  

Although the steak was the star of the meal, the artichoke salad was a lovely and different side . . .salty and hearty, i would definitely make it again. . . and i don't even really like olives very much.

here is the recipe thanks to sunny anderson and her show cooking for real (from the "speed dating" episode which, besides the salad, didn't seem like the food was all that quick to prepare but thats just me)-i do enjoy her show from time to time however she talks too much for my liking . . .(please just stop telling me personal stories for a few minutes and talk about the food). anyway, props to her salad- here is the recipe and a peek at ours:

 http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/sunny-anderson/quick-artichoke-salad-recipe/index.html

 

Tip-the recipe makes a ton (not sure who she was feeding on date night) so if you are only cooking for two or three people and making this as one of a few sides, halve the measurements and you will still have plenty of leftovers. . . 

Now here come the latkes! wooohoo. 

Spinach and Roasted Red Pepper Calzones

I was in the mood for pizza the other night and then steven had the great idea of making calzones. these were really good- crunchy and cheesy and very satisfying.

we used a recipe i had pulled out a while ago from gourmet magazine. . .

http://www.gourmet.com/recipes/2000s/2009/04/spinach-and-red-peppers-calzones

tip: add ricotta cheese- we made two calzones using both ricotta and mozzarella and two with just mozzarella and there was no comparison- the ricotta added a creamy cheesy texture that was wonderful.

p.s. i finally found a restaurant that is the new york equivalent of the slanted door, my favorite restaurant in san francisco. we ate at indochine last night and it was just amazing. . . the lemongrass chicken (my favorite dish) was perfect and the beef salad was also delicious.  if i could afford to eat every meal there i would. .  hoping that we can go back for my birthday (not so subtle hint).

Roasted Garlic and Veggie Pizza

This pizza, if i do say so myself, was franny's worthy (for those of you who don't know franny's, it is time to get to brooklyn- http://www.frannysbrooklyn.com/), the crust was perfectly crispy and salty (maybe just a tad bit too salty if we needed to find a complaint), the mozarella was a perfect cheesy layer and the roasted garlic and veggies were thin and lovely.

After attempting to make pizza a number of times without success, let me share some tips with you:

1) DO get a pizza stone- it doesn't have to be fancy- steven bought this one during an amazon.com procrastinating spree and it worked like charm- http://www.amazon.com/Bialetti-4-Piece-Pizza-Stone-Set/dp/B0001SJGAQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1244989215&sr=8-1 

2) DO NOT use mozarella made fresh that day- according to the cheesemaker at a cheese shop in rockland, fresh mozarella made that day sounds great but is too watery and mushy for baking- (and the last pizza we made was very watery)- for this pizza, we picked up a mozarella that they made at the cheese shop specifically for baking but if you can't find that, no need to get polly-o, we just bought mozarella yesterday at the fairway that was made two days ago and froze it for our next pizza- (ill let you know later on this week how it went with this cheese).

3) If you buy pizza dough from your local pizzeria, DO cut it in half and then roll out to a ball as best as you can-do not use the whole amount or you will have a thick raw nightmare that looks good but is gross (see prior pizza post!).

For this pizza, we rolled out the dough, brushed it with olive oil and added sea salt, we then layered sliced mozarella and the veggies and garlic- thinly slice zuccini and eggplant which we had brushed with olive oil and grilled on the grill pan and roasted garlic from a jar we had bought at the supermarket. Place on the stone and bake at 500 degrees for just around 8 minutes.

This pic does not do the cheesy, salty, roasted goodness justice. . . but here is a peek.

It was really really good- we had to slow ourselves down from eating the whole pizza in like 5 minutes.  

Cheese Ravioli with Spinach Almond Pesto

We are replacing our kitchen cabinets and bathroom vanities, updates long overdue in our apartment. . . although i understand that this may not excite you as much as it does me, i tell you this so that you understand why on sunday we spent around 7 hours at IKEA and by the time we left we were in no mood to do anything but sit on our couch. . needless to say, the trip to the grocery store planned for after IKEA did not happen.

we were therefore left last night with our own resourcefulness as far as dinner was concerned. . luckily, we had Durso's cheese ravioli in the freezer. Durso's is a fabulous italian specialty shop that makes their own ravioli- steven grew up near Durso's and his mother used to bring home manicotti to heat up for dinner when he was younger. . .  if you are ever nearby, i recommend you pick up some ravioli for days like last night.

http://dursos.com/

The sauce is where the resourcefulness came in- we were thinking pesto but had no pine nuts or basil. . we did have spinach, almonds and parmesan cheese- this combination made for a wonderful nutty and rich spinach pesto sauce which took around 5 minutes to make using a mini-chopper (food processor would work of course).

Here is an attempt at explaining the recipe, but i really just eye-balled the measurements, so you will have to taste as you go:

-Add app 1- 2 cups baby spinach, 2 cloves of garlic, and around 1 cup of grated parmesan cheese to food processor or chopper

-toast app 1/2 cup almonds and then throw those in as well

-pour in app 1/4 cup olive oil (keep an eye out to not make it too oily) as you pulse the processor

-add salt to taste

-once you have the ratio as you like (taste as you go), heat in small sauce pan

- if it seems too dry, add extra olive oil to pan as you heat the sauce

here is a peek-

 

Enjoy!

Roasted Veggie Pizza

We made this pizza last tuesday night- perhaps as an ode to passover about to start the following evening- we ate unleavened bread and not in the matzo variety- this pizza looked picture perfect, the only problem was the dough barely cooked . . . .  we used dough from the neighborhood pizza place (no more trader joes for us). seemed liked a good plan yet we fit the whole amount of dough onto a small pan which resulted in it being very thick and not cooking thru at all except for the crust (the crust was super tasty). . .a failed pizza attempt overall but we will not give up (we may wait for pizza on the grill which steven is a wiz at). . .for now it is onto matzo ball soup.

Pasta in Garlic-Almond Sauce

http://www.gourmet.com/reipes/2000s/2009/04/pasta-in-garlic-almond-sauce

Like many fellow jews, with the passover holiday just around the corner and lots of  matzo in my future, we've been increasing our carb intake . . . (and our butter and cheese intake as well since pasta is just so damn good with butter and cheese.)  Since I usually force us to eat whole wheat pasta and some veggie type sauce, eating old school regular pasta with butter and cheese was really a dream.

This recipe was pretty easy although has quite a few little steps listed in quick sequence. Reading a recipe as you are trying to follow small steps is never that easy and led to a few mishaps- also, making it a humorous start, the food processor lid gave us some  difficulty causing almond pulp/water to cover the counter. . . we then forgot to add the garlic into the food processor until it was too late so we just had to add it to the sautee pan. Regardless, i definitely recommend this recipe if you like salt, butter and parmesan. . and if you don't, this blog is probably not for you.

We made the beet salad again to accompany the pasta in an attempt to healthy up the meal- Rachel Ray, (who thinks that salami is healthy if you add it to broccoli raab), would say that this made the whole dinner "figure friendly" . . . .

Tonight we are making a spinach, pepper and onion pizza (i think this one will come out even more delicious than the arugula pizza as we are using dough from our neighborhood pizza place and we borrowed a pizza pan from friends). . .i am very excited and will let you know how it turns out tomorrow.