Eating Dinner With My Family

I have improvised a white pizza before, but I thought I would follow an actual recipe this time for Meatless Monday.  It was pretty good!.  I think I would have liked some greens in there somewhere.  Adding cooked spinach to the white sauce, or finely shredding some for on top to just wilt with the heat of the pizza would make it more to my liking, but the boys liked it as is, and so to did the baby girl.  I didn't bother with making the dough, and I didn't go to the local NY style pizza place to get their dough, I went to the Publix bakery because it is the easiest for me.  If you are feeling like making the effort, please do make your dough from scratch! New York-Style White Pizza   1 New York-Style Pizza Dough ball 12 ounces (recipe follows, or buy one) Unbleached high-gluten or bread flour cornmeal, or semolina flour for dusting 1 1/2 Cup ricotta cheese 1/4 Tsp salt 1/4 Tsp dried or chopped fresh thyme 1/8 Tsp coarsely ground black pepper 1...

Ok so it is the kids first day back to school and its meatless Monday. I did not have the mimosa in the driveway moment after they were off to school that I was dreaming about so I was feeling less than motivated when it came to dinner. I also want to toss everything in the fridge and start over as back to school is like New Year's Day to me.  In the end, I focused on the ricotta I needed to use. I'm sure this dish has been done a thousand times over, but I don't think I have ever made anything similar. (Other than lasagna). I decided today was the perfect day to bust out the pricy, all natural, marinara I buy bogo for just such an occasion. So, that + ricotta was the start of the dish. I had angel hair on hand do I called it a dish and skipped the grocery. The ricotta would need at least salt. I decided to add that in the form if Parmesan. So, any tired moms, bad day having, or slackers, this is a dish for you! Fast, easy and zero work!  Oh and I called it pasta alla Bambi...

I forgot to put the basil in the filling, so we put it on top. Meh!  I didn't read the reviews of this dish because it was from Giada De Laurentiis  and her recipes almost never disappoint, this one wasn't so great for me.  I did add some garlic to the Béchamel and I think the sauce was ok, but there was a ton of it for the amount of pasta and the cannelloni was just alright.  I didn't pop for the really expensive crab that I would have had to shell myself because we are covering it with at ton of sauce and that would have been a waste, but I didn't by the cheapest crab either.  It was an expensive plate of blah.  I wouldn't mind playing around with the dish,  so I deem it fixable.  I think loosing the seafood and replacing with veggies would make me like it more.  So we will see if I ever get around to playing with the fixable recipes;). I did forget to put the basil inside the filling, so we put it on top.  The basil was needed!...

My darling, aunt in law I guess, gave me this huge beautiful eggplant. When I went  on my meatless board on Pinterest, the first one that popped up was this one. I figured it was fate and decided I had to make it. It was a bit of work but not to terribly much. I made the tomato sauce the day before which cut out a lot of time and some work off the dish. I think the tomato sauce was pretty good, and it was most definitely better the next day.   I would think the whole dish is about a 3. Things that prevented it from ranking higher!  I would reduce the lemon juice or zest. Not that they weren't nice in it, but it was a lot of lemon flavor in the end. I also think it needs more tomato sauce to eggplant roll. So next time, instead of just a little in the bottom, I would put a good thick layer. Also, I only used 1/2 tablespoon of cream per roll. I am putting this in the fixable file. For the eggplant involtini recipe click here . For the tomato sauce r...

I was making a slew of different pizzas for the family tonight.  And while most of them were made before, I did have one new one, this Alsatian Pizza.  I liked it much more than I thought I would.  I didn't make it exactly like the original recipe.  If you are interested in seeing that, follow the link, but I made it the way I typed it out here.  Alsatian Pizza   1 Lb pizza dough 1 Tbl plus 2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil 1/2 Cup fromage blanc or fresh ricotta 1 Tbl all-purpose flour 1/2 Cup crème fraîche or sour cream Salt and freshly ground pepper 1/4 Lb thickly sliced smoky bacon cut crosswise into 1/4-inch strips 1 medium onion thinly sliced 1. Put a pizza stone in the oven and preheat it to 500 2. Roll out dough in to a large thin circle 3. In a food processor, pulse the fromage blanc until smooth. Add the flour, crme frache and the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and process until smooth.~ 4. In...

Not too long ago, I made a lasagna.  I know what you are thinking, but there isn't a lasagna on the blog.  It is true, I didn't put it on the blog.  Why?  Well I think every one and their mother knows how to make a lasagna, and this particular one was nothing special.  Also, I just wanted to go in and clean up some ingredients and relax and cook with out having to write it all down.   However, this applies to this dinner because I made way too much of the ricotta layer.  I put what was left in a gallon zip top bag and pressed it in to a thin layer and froze it.  I have been starring at it wondering what to do with it and since the hamburger calzone came out so good, I thought I would make a lasagna one.  My husband wanted some meat in it, so I let him saute up some bacon (and while he was at, I let him do the onions and garlic as well:).  This is recipe is, unfortunately, very vague.  I know generally w...

Ok, tonight's pizza was an improv and not resounding success I had hoped.  It tasted good, but while the picture at the top of the post is showing the pizza in its best possible light, the entire pizza was a bit of a monstrosity. (the pizza in all it's grotesque glory can be seen at the end of the post)  Why?  Well, let me start at the beginning.  My son has a friend over tonight as we have an early date with a ropes & zip line course.  I always try to not suffer the little children to eat what is not friendly to most kids palates, and this particular friend likes things plain to boot, so I was making the boys a plain cheese pizza.  For the second, adult, pie, I decided to try and clean up some of the stuff I had floating around the fridge.  I decided to use up the rest of the ricotta from a lasagna I made recently.  Also because it was the grown up version, I decided to try making it flat bread thin.  That began my jo...

I have no idea where this came from and I'm sorry about that because the recipe leads me to believe it was from a blog.  If I ever find out, I will link to there, however I did change it a bit.  The idea was solid, but the amounts were somewhat vague, I had to wing it a bit.  The recipe below is what I copied from somewhere, and the stuff in parentheses is what I actually did.  I really liked it.  It was smoky, tasty and a bit different.  It is certainly economical and fast. Smoky Pizza 1  Pizza Dough,Unbaked    (1 LB) 1/4 c  Ricotta,Fluffy           (3/4 cup mixed with 3-4 dashed of liquid smoke) 3/4 c  Mozzarella,Smoked  (couldn't find smoked so used regular and added smoke to the ricotta) Ham                             ...