30 September 2009

Three Cheese Baked Penne

Quick, easy, really delicious, and again, pretty good for you! Courtesy of Cooking Light. When I made it I went heavier on the crushed red pepper and used one spicy and one sweet Italian sausage because both Ben and I love a little more zip! Great comfort food as the weather starts to get cold.

2 1/2 cups uncooked whole wheat penne (about 8 ounces tube-shaped pasta)
Cooking spray
2 (4-ounce) links sweet turkey Italian sausage
1 cup finely chopped green bell pepper
1 1/2 teaspoons dried Italian seasoning
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
10 grape or cherry tomatoes, halved
1 garlic clove, minced
Dash of salt
1 (8-ounce) can garlic-and-herb tomato sauce
3/4 cup (3 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup (2 ounces) crumbled goat cheese
1/4 cup (1 ounce) grated fresh Parmesan cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350°.

2. Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt and fat. Drain and keep warm.

3. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Remove casings from sausage. Add sausage to pan; cook 2 minutes, stirring to crumble. Add bell pepper and next 6 ingredients (through salt) to pan; sauté 6 minutes or until bell pepper is tender. Stir in tomato sauce. Reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes. Add pasta to pan, tossing gently to coat. Spoon pasta mixture into an 8-inch square baking dish coated with cooking spray. Stir in mozzarella and goat cheese; sprinkle with Parmesan. Bake at 350° for 7 minutes or until bubbly and top is browned.

Yield: 6 servings (serving size: 1 1/4 cups)

CALORIES 326 (30% from fat); FAT 10.9g (sat 5.8g,mono 2.9g,poly 1g); IRON 3mg; CHOLESTEROL 47mg; CALCIUM 211mg; CARBOHYDRATE 38.9g; SODIUM 641mg; PROTEIN 20.8g; FIBER 4.9g

28 September 2009

Spice-Rubbed Braised Beef

I haven't forgotten about the blog, I just been traveling, which doesn't lend itself to great cooking. But I'm home this week and cooking. Here's a great recipe courtesy of Cooking Light that I made last night. Totally delicious and good for you. Since the sauce is so yummy I wanted something to soak it up, so I boiled and smashed one Yukon Gold potato per serving with a couple tablespoons of fat free milk and a couple teaspooons of butter, nothing rich, just enough to get the potatoes to hold together. When I served it I plated the potatoes underneath the meat and then covered it all with the tasty sauce.


Roast:
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon dark brown sugar
2 teaspoons garlic powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon dry mustard
1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper
1 (3-pound) boneless chuck roast, trimmed

Sauce:
Cooking spray
1 cup chopped onion
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 (28-ounce) can whole tomatoes, undrained
1/2 cup water
6 tablespoons dark brown sugar
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

(You can make the sauce up to three days ahead of time, just reheat before you put the roast in it.)

1. To prepare roast, combine paprika, 1 tablespoon brown sugar, garlic powder, 1 teaspoon salt, dry mustard, and ground red pepper; rub over roast. Place roast in a large zip-top plastic bag. Seal and refrigerate 1 hour or overnight.

2. To prepare sauce, heat a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add onion, crushed red pepper, and minced garlic; cook for 3 minutes, stirring frequently. Place tomatoes in blender, and process until smooth. Add pureed tomatoes, 1/2 cup water, and the next 3 ingredients (through tomato paste), and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon black pepper.

3. Preheat oven to 325°.

4. Remove roast from bag. Add roast to sauce in pan. Cover and bake at 325° for 2 1/2 hours or until tender. Serve with sauce.



Yield: 10 servings (serving size: 3 ounces beef and about 1/3 cup sauce)

CALORIES 262 ; FAT 10.8g (sat 3.6g,mono 4.8g,poly 0.5g); CHOLESTEROL 76mg; CALCIUM 48mg; CARBOHYDRATE 15.7g; SODIUM 508mg; PROTEIN 25.1g; FIBER 1.4g; IRON 4.3mg

09 September 2009

Herbed Cheese Pizza


Ben and I tried this from one of my Cooking Light magazines and wow, it was amazing! And a quick tip - if you need to make this a quicker dinner and don't have time to make dough, Whole Foods sells a great, fresh pizza dough that will save you some time and still result in a delicious, pretty healthy pizza.

Dough:

9.5 ounces bread flour, divided (about 2 cups)
2 cups warm water (100° to 110°), divided
1 teaspoon sugar
2 packages dry yeast (about 4 1/2 teaspoons)
14.6 ounces all-purpose flour, divided (about 3 1/4 cups)
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons olive oil
Cooking spray

Topping:
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon hot paprika
3/4 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper, divided
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 garlic cloves, minced
1 bay leaf
1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes
10 ounce sliced kasseri cheese
3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley

To prepare dough, weigh or lightly spoon bread flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine 4.75 ounces (about 1 cup) bread flour, 1 cup warm water, sugar, and yeast in a bowl; let stand for 15 minutes.

Weigh or lightly spoon all-purpose flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine 13.5 ounces (about 3 cups) all-purpose flour, remaining 4.75 ounces (about 1 cup) bread flour, and 1 teaspoon salt in a large bowl; make a well in center. Add yeast mixture, remaining 1 cup warm water, and 2 teaspoons oil to flour mixture; stir well. Turn dough out onto a floured surface. Knead until smooth and elastic (about 10 minutes); add enough of remaining flour, 1 tablespoon at a time, to prevent dough from sticking to hands.

Place dough in a large bowl coated with cooking spray, turning to coat top. Cover and let rise in a warm place (85°), free from drafts, for 45 minutes or until doubled in size. (Press two fingers into dough. If indentation remains, the dough has risen enough.) Punch dough down; divide dough into 8 equal portions. Cover and let rest 20 minutes.

To prepare topping, combine oregano, cumin, paprika, and 1/2 teaspoon black pepper. Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1 teaspoon olive oil to pan. Add onion; sauté 3 minutes. Add 1/2 teaspoon salt, remaining 1/4 teaspoon black pepper, garlic, bay leaf, and tomatoes; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer for 15 minutes or until thick. Remove from heat; discard bay leaf.

Preheat oven to 450°.

Working with 1 dough portion at a time (cover remaining dough to keep from drying), roll each portion into a 6-inch circle on a lightly floured surface; place circle on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Repeat procedure with remaining dough portions. Top each crust with 1/4 cup tomato mixture, 1 1/4 ounces cheese, and 1/2 teaspoon oregano mixture. Bake at 450° for 12 minutes or until crusts are lightly browned. Sprinkle evenly with parsley.

Yield: 8 servings (serving size: 1 pizza)
Recipe credit goes to Cooking Light magazine

05 September 2009

Where in the world is Ntina?

My life is starting to feel a little like a geography game for your average kid. Except rather than deciphering the clues to find the VILE villian, it's just me, cavorting around the country.

Recent travel has included plenty of trips to Michigan, happily embarked upon to share in special moments in the lives of people I love including Sarah's shower, Missy and Lonnie's wedding, Sarah's bachelorette party, Sarah and Nick's wedding, Jen's shower, and soon, Jen and Japan's wedding. We'll also soon be packing out to St. Louis to share in Dan and Erin's special day!

However, my work life is throwing in some less expected travels including a recent trips to Indianapolis and Laguna Niguel, CA. Not that I'm complaining about work travel that allows me to take off in the evening and dip my toes in the Pacific. But don't be surprised to see a blog entry from some far flung Texas destination, Dallas and Rio Grande Valley here I come.

All the CI girls with Dino at Sarah's Shower

My favorite college ladies at Missy and Bower's Wedding
(Jules, G, me, Missy, Al, Jomo, Box, F)

Boxy's Bach night at Coyote Joe's

The bridal party jump in the Law Quad for Boxy and Nick's nuptuals





In Vino Veritas

Since the intent of this blog is to share all the pleasures of life, including food and drink, I thought I'd post something on the wine we've been enjoying lately.

Paired with crab cakes, roasted golden potatoes and asparagus, we enjoyed an Adami Prosecco Garbel 13.

Those of you who know me best recall how much I love the bubbly. This was a great addition to our meal.

An Australian wine, perfect with pizza, pasta, and other middle of the road Italian dishes is the 2005 Craneford John Zilm Merlot. This bottle is best if you decant it. In doing so, the astringent qualities that present themselves when you first open the bottle dissipate leaving behind a solid, fruity merlot.

Last but not least is New Zealand's 2008 Sole Beech Sauvignon Blanc. This wine, as with the Craneford, we had the luxury of tasting before buying. As a sipping wine it's crisp and delicious with a really clean finish. We took it home to enjoy with Paella, a little unsure as to whether it would hold up to the bold flavors of the dish. We had nothing to worry about, the food brought out the richness of the wine, developing the more exotic flavors that result from the region in which its grown including gauva. Evidently there is also a strong gooseberry flavor, but since I don't know what they taste like I'll have to take the label's word.

Last Day of Vacation!

May 29, 2009

We awoke knowing it was our last day of vacation but determined to make the best of it. We walked over to the Piazza San Marco which is the historic center of Venice and within seconds realized it wasn't where we wanted to be. Boatloads of tourists were disembarking and lining the streets awaiting entrance to the Cathedrals and museums. Knowing how difficult it would be to take in any more of Venice while standing in line we opted to skip the tourist attractions to walk the streets instead. Fast forward three hours and we'd found ourselves a lovely park, meandered through the winding streets and over nearly a hundred footbridges. Leaving that afternoon we really felt that even in such a short visit we'd feasted on much of what the city had to offer, its people and its spirit and charm. We spent the rest of the day fighting immense traffic on our nearly 7 hour (should have been 4) drive back to Rome. Exhausted at nearly 11PM, we checked into the airport Marriott for what felt like a quick cat nap before our 4AM departure for home.

The amazing jasmine blooming all over Venice

A Venetian streetscape - this is one of my favorite pics from the whole trip. The hanging laundry just screamed, "real people live here!" to me and I loved that!

The fountain in one of the parks we stumbled into during our walk around the city

The Grand Canal

A blooming waterlily

A floating paradise

May 28, 2009

We woke early, grabbed a quick pastry breakfast in Florence, said goodbye to the lovely city and headed north through tunnels and over elevated highways toward Venice, stopping in Bologna for lunch at my friend Amy's suggestion. We dined in an old wine cellar enjoying delicious local fare. We arrived in Venice in the late afternoon and parked our car in one of the many structures that line the outside of the city. And then we crossed the bridge into wonderment!

Venice is a dream world. Really, I've never seen anything like it, and regardless of how I'd imagined it in the past, I'd imagined it wrong. This city is the most incredible combination of tourist attraction and real life. After getting lost, finding our way, and getting lost again we made our way to Hotel Alex to meet our host. We actually stayed at a small B&B only peripherally related to the hotel, the B&B is just too hard to find in the winding streets and canals without assistance.

After settling in we ventured out for a twilight gondola ride and a dinner of fresh fish and homemade gnocchi. The gondola ride lasted about 45 minutes and gave us a great tour of many of the internal canals as well as the grand canal. I was in love with this city! After our ride and our dinner (at a cute restaurant recommended by our host) we just walked around the city, soaking in all the Venice we could in the one night we had.

A friend we made during our stop in Bologna

The fountain in Bologna's Centro


On our way beneath one of the more than a hundred footbridges scattered all over Venice

More incredible scenery

Our gondola buddy. I normally hate birds, especially seagulls,
but he was very docile and just chattered to us

Tipsy People and Tippy Towers

May 26, 2009

This was our wine tasting tour is the Tuscan country side - AMAZING! Castello di Verrazzano is nestled on top of a hill surrounded by incredible valleys of vineyards, olive trees and persimmons. The country is gorgeous and the wine was delicious. About 45 minutes of actual touring through the winery including lessons on what makes a REAL chianti, etc. were followed by a "light lunch" and wine tasting. There was nothing light about it but we couldn't have been happier. Seated with three other couples we enjoyed their table Red, Chianti, Chianti Reserva, Super Tuscan and Vino Santo. Unlike most wine tastings you find in the States, they poured us each our tasting portion and then left the bottles on the table for us to finish. Just look at the plate, too! After our tasting and more than an hour of trolling around the grounds making absolutely certain Ben was sober enough to drive the mountain roads, we headed for Pisa to check out the Leaning Tower. What we learned was that, unfortunately, while the tower is in an old, fortified town, there isn't much to see apart from the main attraction. So after a long day of drinking and touristing, we headed back to Florence for the best dinner of our lives at Cibreo.

This dinner deserves its own paragraph. Actually, it deserves its own Oscar. Our evening began as we were seated in a lovely dining room complete with high backed leather chair and an eclectic collection of tables. Rather than handing over menu and standing before us to rattle off a list of specials, our waiter joined us at the table by pulling up a chair. As the menu varies based on a combination of fresh ingredients and the Chef's whim, there are no menus. After chatting with the waiter on the evening's menu we settled in to await the three course meal we'd just ordered. And then the house antipasti arrived. This is served to every table, unbeknownst to us, regardless of whether or not you order another appetizer. Brined peppers, perfect pecorino cheese and fava bean salad, tomato/garlic aspic, homemade potato bread, chicken pâté, i've lost track there was so much deliciousness. We followed this with traditional parmesan polenta for me and ricotta and potato flan for Ben. Then perfect chicken ricotta meatballs with bone bread for me and a spicy fish dish (that I can't remember the name of because it's September as I write this) for Ben. Our dessert included a delicious flourless chocolate tart that has been a house specialty for 25 years and a bitter Sicilian marmelade ricotta and mascarpone cheesecake.

What can you possibly do after a meal like that except meander through the streets of Florence and marvel at its wonders which seem to be as well represented in the kitchen as they are in history!

One of the many olive trees of the Vineyard's property

Persimmon Tree

Wine barrels on our tour

The bottle room at Castello di Verrazzano

Our fantastic "light lunch"

The Vineyard

The leaning tower




I can count to 462, can you?

May 26, 2009

We spent our day enjoying the sites and sounds Florence had to offer. Stepping into the Duomo we marveled at its simple decoration as compared to the many cathedrals we'd already seen. But the trip to the Duomo wasn't complete until we climbed the 462 narrow steps to the top of the dome, to look out over the whole valley. An incredible sight! Before the Duomo we stood in another museum line to see the David. The hilarity ensued when Ben picked up his camera to snap a photo and this giant woman came screaming at him in heavily accented english, "NO PHOTO!" Now, we're good tourists and we heed signs that prohibit photography and we hadn't seen one. After five minutes of searching, we finally found one sign printed on a normal piece of paper hanging high on the wall. Perhaps you wouldn't have to employ that absurd woman if you invested in a decent sign people.

Our illicitly obtained photo of the statue of David

The outside of the Duomo

The dome

The view from the top of the Duomo, worth every step

No "kid"ding around...

May 25, 2009

This was the most frustrating day our trip by far. Knowing we couldn't leave Rome without seeing the Sistine Chapel we waited the hour required to enter the Vatican museums. And we saw the Sistine Chapel. And that was about it. So packed in with tourists, with barely enough room to move our elbows, the museums were so crowded that we found our tour difficult to enjoy and after a short time we decided our best bet was to make our way to the Sistine Chapel and resolve to come back in the off season to see the rest of the museum. After our Vatican jaunt and a delicious neopolitan pizza lunch, we picked up our car and headed for Florence. Three hours of beautiful Italian countryside, followed by a quick, late dinner and off to bed, exhausted from our travels.

Because it was so crowded, it was difficult to get any high quality pics,
but I couldn't leave without a pic of the goat, I heart him

Our Roman Holiday Continues

May 24, 2009

Sightseeing galore. St. Peter's, both the tomb of the Popes and the Basilica, the Colosseum by day, the Spanish Steps, the Pantheon and a walking tour that took us along the beautifully tree lined river and through some Roman neighborhoods that made me wonder what it would be like to just pick up and move. We ended our day with some of the best food of our trip (not THE best, hold for Firenza on that but certainly close). Eating on an open rooftop patio, we enjoyed carpaccio, authentic carbonara, perfect, flaky sea bass and delicious Italian wine with each course.

The length of St. Peter's Basilica

St. Peter's assembled for a Papal Mass

This inset was called "Conversion of the Pagans" - last I checked the best way to get someone to do what you want is to stand on them, literally or figuratively. okay, off my soapbox, this one just one of those things that irks me.

Ben was getting photo happy and snapping lots of me. Ignore the crazy hair, but notice the cardigan, worn especially for the modesty police.

The Spanish Steps - clearly quite full of tourists, but we made our way to the top anyway

The exterior of the Pantheon

The dome of the Pantheon

The interior of the Colosseum


02 September 2009

An Italian Whirlwind

Yes, I realize it has been, I hate to say it, nearly three months since I last posted. And I'm still catching flack about not having said anything about our Italy trip. So starting here is a whirlwind tour of our Italian vacation.

May 23rd, 2009

We arrived in Rome on Saturday after a few hours spent waiting in the airport. We caught a terrifying* cab ride into the Centro Storico to our hotel (*Italian cabbies are like Greek ones, they believe death and/or maiming do not apply to them while behind the wheel). Checked into our lovely, air conditioned hotel without incident then set out on foot in search of dinner. We stumbled into a place just up the street that had a touristy vibe but the food possibilities seemed worth the risk. Three delicious courses later we found ourselves back on the street meandering our way through the tourists at the Trevi Fountain. After the fountain we wound our way through the quieter streets toward the Colosseum, which all lit up at night, is a sight to behold. After we'd looked our fill, we headed back to the hotel for some much needed rest.


The Trevi Fountain at twilight (thanks to Ben you can't see the throngs of tourists scattered in front of the fountain, pays to be tall)

The Colosseum at night