cheese ravioli filling

okay, i made these several weeks ago with the intention of boiling them, dipping them in egg wash and drenching them in breadcrumbs, then toasting them on a lightly greased baking sheet sprayed with olive oil (on top). instead i just bagged them to be eaten when we felt like raviolis.

i'm a little lazy, so for the actual pasta recipe, go to my turkey florentine ravioli recipe. i'll wait.

so, for a regular cheese filling, you kinda just bullshit around a little bit.

ingredients:

• ricotta cheese (the not-huge size)
• 1 egg
• chopped fresh basil
• a dash of garlic powder
• about 1/4 cup scratch cheese

then i mixed them together and filled my raviolis. ta-da! delicious. and easy. i'm pretty sure this made about 25 large triangles (they were supposed to be appetizers, remember) and 15 or so small (1.5") squares. i also got a little tricky with the filling-- i used a pastry bag. next time i probably won't bother with a tip, because who cares if it looks pretty? no one will see it.

regularly scheduled baking: christmas cookies

when i was growing up, my mother made christmas cookies. thousands of them. hundreds of thousands. million, maybe. a whole damn lot. candies, too! fried walnuts and almond brittle. but, umm, that's crazy hard. CRAZY. now, with two teenaged boys in the house and one only half out, she can't set a batch of cookies aside, anyway, so why bother?

but christmas cookies are so NICE. two years ago, i guess i made some pretty regular cookies: chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal, and some gluten-free meringues. there might have been shortbread and spritzes. i don't remember. it just seemed like the thing to do, newly married in our own little apartment.

always trying to outdo myself, last year i made chocolate chip, peanut butter, oatmeal, shortbread, springerle, spritzes, other spritzes, pinwheels, these insane chocolate pillows with maraschino cherries on top that are made with cake mix and never made it onto the trays because they looked a little obscene, gingerbread SNOWMEN-- each frosted and decorated because i bought cookie-cutters too late to find gingerbread people, sugar cookies, chocolate-orange biscotti, vanilla meringues, white chocolate cranberry-walnut fudge and candy cane fudge. i think that's it.

this year's plan includes choco-chip, pb, oatmeal raisin, shortbread thumbprints, springerles (which all go to my daddy), spritzes, pinwheels, gingerbread snowmen, sugar cookies, chocolate-orange biscotti, snickerdoodles, white chocolate macadamia nut cookies, meringues, chocolate-pb oatmeal squares, white choc cra-lnut fudge, candy cane fudge and almond brittle. plus, some gluten-free gingerbread ladies (yadies), but that's just for fun.

ingredient shopping is scheduled for black friday (when everyone else is in a gift-shopping frenzy the supermarket will be all mine!), with springerles that weekend and everything else commencing december 1st.

this is the big one, people. the great christmas cookie flood of ought-eight.

gluten-free/egg-free chocolate birthday cake (licensed character merchandise optional)

this recipe is incomplete, but i'm hoping not to have to make it again until next year, so i'll try some variations then, okay?

there's a pair of littles in my life who have some special dietary needs: no gluten for either of them, and no eggs for one. loving them as i do-- and loving kitchen experimentation as i do-- i spend lots of time thinking about how to accommodate their allergies without making them feel left out. their fourth and second birthday party was saturday and i made them this delicious, mostly-hypoallergenic cake. i've also included adjustments for dairy allergies and no allergies, just for the hell of it.

i bought some of my ingredients from amazon.com, so...

special ingredients:

• gluten-free flour blend-- i totally forget what brand i got, but next time, i'm going to try for one that doesn't smell like ass. i'm a super-smeller, though, and no one else had a problem with it. i think the ingredients are potato starch, corn starch, garbanzo beans and fava beans. the cake was originally going to be half chocolate and half vanilla, but the vanilla smelled so unappetizing that i had to make the whole thing chocolate. really, really chocolate. if dealing with a chocolate allergy, too, i'd make this cake with another STRONG flavor. like gingerbread.
• egg replacer-- i forget what the vendor for this was, too, but i suspect you can pretty easily find it in supermarkets or fancy food stores.
• gluten-free/egg-free frosting mix-- total. ripoff. you know what was in it? confectioner's sugar and vanilla flavoring. i had to add butter and milk (or margarine/butter flavored crisco & soy/rice/almond milk). just make a butter cream. it's cheaper.

ingredients:

• 3 1/4 cups flour OR flour blend
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs OR 6 tbs egg replacer & 8 tbs warm water
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbs baking powder
• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter OR margarine, softened to the consistency of mayo (butter flavored crisco might work, too, and it doesn't have any major allergens in it)
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• (1 tbs instant coffee powder, optional, but makes it taste chocolatyer)
• 3 ounces chocolate, chopped very fine (semisweet, unsweetened, whatever you have, just watch ingredients if you're going hypo-allergenic)
• 1 1/2 cups milk OR soy/rice/almond milk
• 1 tbs vanilla

prep:

• preheat to 375
• chop/grind chocolate
• soften butter or margarine

actual cooking:

• combine dry ingredients
• add wet ingredients
• mix it all up
• pour into greased baking pans (2 8" squares, i guess, it doesn't rise as much as you think it will)
• bake at 375 degrees until a cake tester (or toothpick, or sharp, unserrated knife) comes out clean
• cool completely before frosting

so, the issue i'm left with is HOLY CRAP was that cake dry. HOLY CRAP. next time i'm going to try adding either a can of tomato paste (no, really, this is a good idea!) or some vegetable oil/more butter. it could probably also use a bit more sugar.

i frosted mine to look like the magic carpet from disney's aladdin and decorated it with figures of the characters. it's not my favorite way to decorate, but it works.

the kids loved it and even a couple adults said it tasted like food. so i'll call it a success. next up in my allergy test-kitchen: gluten-free/egg-free gingerbread people.

bill's awesome procuitto & asparagus pizza

i'm not going to lie, my husband is a pizza-and-beer guy. just, you know, a GOURMET pizza and beer guy. on a recent trip to visit family, he invented this insanely easy pizza. i wanted him to guest blog, but, alas, he thinks you'll miss my dumb jokes. or something.

ingredients:

• pizza shell (pre-made crust)
• tomato sauce
• one of those mozzarella/prosciutto/basil roll-ups
• about a half-pound of asparagus

optional ingredients:

• scratch cheese (which, btw, means your choice of those grated aged cheese combinations, like peccorino-romano and shit)
• crushed garlic/garlic powder
• olive oil spray
• oregano (et cetera)

prep:

• chop asparagus into about one inch chunks, steam or blanch
• slice cheese roll thinly

actual cooking:

• (spray crust with olive oil, sprinkle with herbs, spices and scratch cheese)
• spread tomato sauce VERY THINLY over the shell, almost to the edge
• spread out your sliced cheese roll to cover sauce (a little space between is fine, it will melt)
• add asparagus on top
• bake (about 350?) until ooey-gooey and delicious-looking

ohmygod, so good. i'm starting to think i should make him cook more often.

potatoflower soup

this delicious soup makes a great lunch, and all it takes to convert the recipe to a healthy alternative to mashed potatoes is omitting the water. sweet. and? it's SO EASY. i always thought soups would be hard to make and then last fall: click. i get it. you need one of the following to make this soup: an immersion blender, a huge blender, a potato masher, a big food processor, a hand mixer or a fork and infinite patience.

ingredients:

• 4 large potatoes
• 1 quart chicken (or veggie) broth
• 1 head of cauliflower
• 1 onion
• water
• sea salt & fresh ground pepper (should we just assume that every savory recipe needs these?)
• a drop (or spritz) of oil

prep:

• cube potatoes (and skin them if you or your eaters are wusses)
• trim cauliflower into florets
• chop onion

actual cooking:

• put a big pot over high heat, spritz with oil
• add onions, stir
• add cauliflower, stir
• add potatoes, stir
• add broth and about 1/2 quart of water
• cover, cook for, oh, you know, a while... until both potatoes and cauliflower are a bit soft
• remove from heat and mash it all together with whatever implement you're working with (i used a potato masher & hand mixer. i bet an immersion blender is freaking AWESOME, but i don't have one.)
• salt & pepper to taste

tada! easiest. recipe. ever.

so, like i said, all you have to do to make this seem just like mashed potatoes is omit the water and maybe add a bit of butter at the end. mmmmmmm.

(by the way-- cauliflower is a cabbage. so it kinda smells. which apparently makes people think it tastes gross. it DOES NOT. it is delicious. and versatile. and potato-like.)

falafel & israeli cous cous

tonight we had falafel & israeli cous cous for dinner. SO yummy. and EASY. possibly because i cheated.

ingredients:

• falafel mix (this is the cheating part... available in your grocer's "ethnic" section)
• olive oil
• water
• israeli cous cous (different from regular cous cous)

prep:

• combine falafel mix with water as directed (manichevitz brand wants 1/2 cup water to one packet mix)
• let stand ten minutes

actual cooking:

• in a small sauce pan lightly brown 2/3 cups cous cous in a tablespoon of olive oil, stirring frequently for about five minutes
• add about 1 cup (a smidge less) water, bring to boil, turn way down and cover (check occasionally so you don't burn it!)
• set about 1/2 inch of oil in a pan to heat
• roll falafel mix into one inch balls
• fry falafel in oil until browned (you'll have to turn them once and maybe roll them around a bit if you went light on the oil like i did which is kinda pointless since you're DEEP FRYING for christsakes!)
• remove falafel and drain on paper towels

SO GOOD. seriously. but israeli cous cous has NO TASTE. a tiny sprinkle of sea salt made it perfect, since the falafel was kinda spicy. if you thought ahead about this meal, you might want it to have, oh, i dunno, a vegetable? or something? i think wilted baby spinach would be perfect. you could dump your falafel oil, not clean the pan, and toss in the spinach while the falafel drains. yum!

(spell check HATES this recipe.)

serves 2 or 3, depending on your eaters.

i got behind again...

this weekend i'll be making rosemary-olive oil bread, lasagna and maybe a gluten-free, egg-free cake. also expect an apple pie (THE ONE?) and a quick write-up on last weekend's raviolis and pumpkin pie.