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Posts Tagged ‘pasta’

Spaghetti Bake

Posted by terrepruitt on May 29, 2023

I had an open jar of spaghetti sauce in the fridge I wanted to use, but I didn’t have any Parmesan or ricotta so I couldn’t make my regular spaghetti pie so I thought I would make a spaghetti bake. I went back and forth with just mixing the chicken and pasta, but the thought of melted cheese on top was too strong to resist.

Even though I wanted to use the spaghetti sauce I am not a big fan. I went back and forth on mixing it in or pouring it on top. Then I decided I will serve the casserole on a puddle of it. That way I can give my husband more than me. I can have a taste of it, but not have it overpower the other flavors.

As usual I was making this up as I went a long and using what we had so I forgot two things I wanted to put it in. I wanted to add shallots and nutritional yeast. Oh well. Next time.

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Spaghetti Bake

1 can of garbanzo beans
Olive oil
Season All

Tomato sauce (2 cups? or as much as you want)

salt (for boiling pasta)
1 box / 1 lb. of spaghetti

1 C crumbled feta

3 eggs
3/4 C milk
2 cans of chicken
1 cup of shredded cheese
oregano (to taste)
garlic powder (to taste)

olive oil
2 cups of mozzarella

Drain the garbanzo beans. You can use them as is or roast them. I roasted them using Season All (my Roasted Chickpeas post uses garlic powder).

If you are not roasting the chickpeas you may want to turn on your oven to 400°F to preheat it.

Spoon a thin layer of spaghetti sauce on the bottom of a 9X13 baking dish. Cook and drain the spaghetti. (I boil pasta with salted water.) Put half of the cooked pasta on the sauce in the baking dish.

Sprinkle some crumbled feta on top. Then put the beans on top and spread them out.

Scramble/mix the eggs in a bowl add the milk. Drain the chicken, add to bowl. Add the 1 cup of shredded cheese. (I used a triple cheddar blend.) Add the oregano and garlic powder. I also added some salt. Mix it all together than spread over the pasta in the dish.

Put the rest of the cooked spaghetti on top. Sprinkle with olive oil then top with cheese. Put the dish in the preheated (to 400°F) oven and bake for 30 minutes.

Then slice . . . and as I said I served it on a puddle of sauce.

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It is just another way of eating pasta. I love cheese melted in the oven until it is golden brown. This was gorgeous and delicious. There are so many ways you can do it. What would you add?

Posted in Food, "Recipes" | Tagged: baked cheese, chicken, chickpeas, golden brown cheese, mozzarella, not spaghetti pie, pasta, spaghetti, spaghetti sauce | Leave a Comment »

Complicated Spaghetti Pie

Posted by terrepruitt on May 8, 2023

In May of 2021 I made Spaghetti Pie. I loved it. I love pasta, but I don’t necessarily like tomato sauce, so I loved that this allowed for a hint of it, but it didn’t saturate all of the pasta. But I also am interested in getting more protein so of course I had to complicate it with meat. But it is good.

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Spaghetti Pie

Olive oil
1/2 cup chopped onions
1 lb of ground beef
salt
pepper

16 ounces of dried spaghetti
Salt
4 eggs
1 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese – divided
2 tablespoon Italian seasoning
1 tablespoon chopped garlic

1 cup ricotta
1 1/2 cup mozzarella – divided
1 1/2 cup sauce

aluminum foil
parchment paper
springform pan

Heat some olive oil then add the onion. Cook onion for a bit, then add the ground beef. Cook the ground beef – chopping it up as necessary. Season with salt and pepper if you’d like. Remember the meat is going to be in the oven for at least 45 minutes.

Cook the spaghetti (with salt if that is how you regularly cook your pasta).

While the pasta is cooking, beat the eggs.

Drain the spaghetti. Mix the cooked, drained spaghetti with the beaten eggs, 1/2 cup of the Parmesan cheese, the Italian seasoning, and the chopped garlic.

Line the springform pan (bottom and sides) with aluminum foil then with parchment paper. (I use both because the pie tends to leak out of my pan.) Brush the parchment paper with oil. Put about half of the spaghetti mixture in a baking dish/pan. Layer the cooked meat over the spaghetti, leaving a blank circle in the middle. Then add the rest of the spaghetti and make a well in the middle. Put the ricotta cheese in the middle. Sprinkle the ricotta with 3/4 cup of the mozzarella. Put the sauce on top of the ricotta. Sprinkle the sauce with the rest of the mozzarella and Parmesan.

Bake at 375° F for 45 minutes or until done. Then broil for 2 minutes.

Slice like a pie and serve.

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I really like this. I don’t like spaghetti with sauce the regular way, but I like it in pie form. And it really isn’t difficult or complicated, but I just laugh because I always seem to take a really quick easy recipe and add a step or two to make it “complicated”.

What about you – how do you like your spaghetti?

Posted in "Recipes", Food | Tagged: beef, pasta, protein, spaghetti, spaghetti pie, spaghetti pie with meat | Leave a Comment »

A Pasta Idea

Posted by terrepruitt on October 10, 2022

This is not a recipe at all . . . it is more of an idea. The other night I was trying to decide on a side to eat with our ground turkey (with mushrooms) and I decided to go with pasta since I didn’t want to turn on the stove AND the oven. Then I saw that I needed to use some Roma tomatoes that were going to start to go bad so I thought I would just add them to my husband’s ground turkey . . . I am not a fan of cooked tomatoes, but I thought he would enjoy it. But when I looked at the tomatoes I decided I need to use all three and not just one so then I thought, well, I will just throw them in the pasta after it has cooked and mix it up with a bit of cheese. Then I thought, I could just slice them and put them on top. Then I thought I could layer the mozzarella. Then I thought . . . dang, I could just turn it into a “bruschetta type” pasta and add basil and balsamic.

I have a recipe for Bruschetta Pasta and I love it, but it is more involved. This was just me putting some sliced tomatoes on the pasta . . . it was really good.

I cooked the pasta and put it on the plate, sprinkled with garlic powder and shredded mozzarella, then put the sliced tomatoes on top of the pasta, a little more cheese, a sprinkle of dried basil (fresh would have been awesome), and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar. Just an idea. It was really good. I loved it!

Posted in Food | Tagged: Bruschetta Pasta, great flavors, mozzarella, pasta, pasta idea, sliced tomatoes | 2 Comments »

Things I Put Ricotta On

Posted by terrepruitt on May 10, 2021

You may be familiar with the story from last year: My husband has been doing the shopping since we have been sheltering-in-place. One time I asked him to get ricotta . . . the only kind I know comes in a specific container and is in a specific spot in the store . . . I described both to him. He came back with different kind. He said that the one I wanted wasn’t there and I have experienced that myself so I am not saying he didn’t see it. He said he got some other kind from the deli case (THE DELI CASE? $$$) It doesn’t matter, what he brought home is heaven in a tub and I love. (It turns out is doesn’t cost more than the other brand.) Since I think this new-to-me-brand is so yummy I have been putting it on many things. While I used to put the other kind on things when I remembered I am going out of my way to put this stuff in and on things.

Things I put ricotta on:

My Quesadillas as you may have seen.
My breakfast sandwich
Our salads
Our pastas one was just the cheese and the other one I added to the sauce
And, our pizza, of course, that is what started this whole thing

I wish I would have taken a picture of what I used it on today for lunch. I toasted some sliced sour dough bread, spread on some ricotta, then piled on some chicken, sprinkled on a little shredded mix of cheese and toasted it more – to warm up the chicken and melt the cheese. It was so good. I was eating so late and was so very hungry I didn’t think of it being a great addition to “Things I Put Ricotta On”.

It is yummy.

Do you put ricotta on anything?

Posted in Food | Tagged: breakfast sandwiches, creamy goodness, pasta, pizza, quesadillas, ricotta cheese, salad | 9 Comments »

One Pan Easy Beef And Pasta

Posted by terrepruitt on November 11, 2020

Recently my friend sent me a recipe and it had such an exquisitely simple list of ingredients and sounded so easy to make that I put what I didn’t have on hubby’s grocery list and I made it the next day. I only altered it slightly* and that was more out of necessity/ease than anything else. The pasta came in a larger sized package than was called for and we had more sour cream (but not enough to save) than was called for. Also, I used more onion and garlic because . . . well, it’s onion and garlic! I made it and it was DELICIOUS! It was good on the night I made it. The “sauce” was VERY watery so I decide that the next time I made it I was going to use less water. When I use “broth” I use Better Than Bouillon so I would be able get the same amount of flavor but use less water. But, as is often the case with pasta dishes it was even BETTER the next night. And the liquid had been soaked up and so I figured the next time I made it I wouldn’t use less water. AND . . . it was even BETTER on the next night.** Here is a super easy recipe my I-would-be-crazy-if-it-weren’t-for-her-during-this-shelter-in-place friend sent me.

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One Pan Easy Beef And Pasta

• 3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
• 8 oz. mushrooms, sliced
• salt and pepper***
• 1 cup diced onion
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 lb. ground beef
• 2 teaspoons paprika
• 4 cups water
• 4 teaspoons Better Than Bouillon/Roasted Beef****
• 12 oz. dry rotini
• 3/4 cup sour cream

Heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil over medium heat in a large skillet (large enough to hold all the ingredients). Add the mushrooms to the pan and let them cook a bit, then sprinkle with salt and pepper. Keep cooking until they are done to your liking. Then remove from the pan and set dish aside.

Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil in the same pan. Add the onion, season with salt and pepper, cook until translucent. Stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant, 30-60 seconds. Add the ground beef and continue to cook, breaking up the beef as it cooks, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle the paprika over the top and stir to combine.

Pour the water in and add the Better Than Bouillon/Roasted Beef, stirring until it is incorporated, then add the dry uncooked pasta. Bring to a light boil then turn the heat down and cover. Continue to cook, stirring often, cook until the pasta is al dente, about 12-18 minutes. Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the mushrooms and sour cream.

Serve.

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There are a lot of asterisks in this post!

*Ok, shoot, as I was typing up the recipe I realized I changed a few more things than I thought. The recipe called for cremini mushrooms, low sodium broth, and fresh parsley. I didn’t use those ingredients.

**The leftovers were very good, especially since the pasta had soaked up the sauce, but I also added a few teaspoons of ricotta cheese. I heated the leftovers in a pan and stirred in the ricotta.

***I do not use pepper. I just left it in the recipe for those that do.

****I never MAKE the broth. No matter what I am making I just add the water then add the Better Than Bouillon and figure it all can get mixed up that way. I don’t add the Better Than Bouillon to the water and MAKE it broth before adding it to the ingredients.

Again, this was sooooo good, I had decided to make it again this week. I did more adjusting and now my mouth is watering thinking about it. I love this recipe because it is super simple and the return is a super yummy dinner, but I will probably make it the way I did last night from now on. I will post that recipe later. And you can share with me how you made it. So easy, so many things you can do with it.

Don’t you LOVE easy and tasty recipes?

Posted in "Recipes", Food | Tagged: beef, easy dinner, one pain dinne, pasta, sour cream, stroganoff | Leave a Comment »

Shells And Cheese With Beef And Corn

Posted by terrepruitt on September 23, 2019

Shells And Cheese With Beef And Corn

2 tablespoons coconut oil
1/2 of a medium size onion
1 lb hamburger
garlic salt
can of corn

3 tablespoon butter
3 tablespoons flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 C milk

4 cups shredded/grated cheese

1 Cup Panko bread crumbs

bag of pasta shells*

While chopping the onion let the coconut oil heat up in a large pan. Cook the chopped onion in the oil. After the onion is cooked, break the hamburger up into the pan. Sprinkle with garlic salt. (continued below)

While the meat is cooking, you can make the sauce. Melt the butter in a saucepan. Stir in the flour a little at a time. Keeping all the lumps out and incorporating the flour into the melted butter. – (Don’t forget about the meat cooking!) – Pour in the milk a little at a time stirring constantly and working out the lumps. Add the salt. Add some cheese, stirring and letting it melt as you go. Continue to add about two cups of shredded cheese.

Cook the hamburger until almost done. (If needed drain the grease from the meat.) Drain the corn and stir it into the meat. Sprinkle with garlic salt. Since the corn is already cooked it doesn’t necessarily need to cook with the meat because it will cook in the oven.

Somewhere in the middle of all of that boil the water for the pasta. *I didn’t use an entire bag because it had been opened. I think there was about 3/4th of a bag of small shells. Cook the pasta. Drain the pasta.

Butter a 9X13 baking dish. Preheat the oven to 450° F.

Spread a very thin layer of sauce on the bottom of the buttered dish. Then mix the pasta, a little over half of the cheese sauce, and the meat and corn mixture together. Spread half of the new mixture (cheese sauce and meat-corn) into the dish. Sprinkle with cheese. Then spread the remaining mixture on top of the cheese layer. Then top with the rest of the cheese sauce, spreading out evenly.* Then top with the rest of the shredded cheese and the bread crumbs.

Bake about 25 to 30 minutes. If you want the bread crumbs brown broil it for about 5 minutes (or until they are browned).

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*I am sure mixing all the shells, meat-corn, and cheese sauce together and then putting it in the baking dish would work. I was just trying to make is a little more like sauce ON the shells. It all seeped down and was yummy.

This is very rich and very filling. And pretty good. My husband loved it. I always seem to like pasta dishes better the next day. It is as if the flavors all meld and seep into the pasta. So I really enjoyed our leftovers that we ate for a few days.

And, sadly, I didn’t make this with plans to post about it, so I only have the one picture of the finished product. But I will be making it again. I had a friend that says she uses cream corn . . . that might be interesting.

I don’t even know why I put corn in it. I was thinking of two separate things to make at points during the day and when I went to cook, they got combined someohow.

How do you make macaroni and cheese? Do you put meat in yours? Vegetables?

Posted in "Recipes", Food | Tagged: beef, bread crumbs, casserole, cheese sauce, Corn, macaroni and cheese, meat-corn, pasta, roux, shells | Leave a Comment »

Thirteen Ingredients To Be Aware Of

Posted by terrepruitt on January 19, 2013

According to an article on Shape.com there are 13 ingredients that are banned in “many other developed countries” but are still allowed to be used in food in the United States of America (U.S.). A lot of the ingredients are in foods that are considered highly processed and for many of us these foods can be easily avoided. But some of the things that are allowed in the food in the U.S., but are not allowed in other countries are things that are not listed on the ingredient list when you purchase the product.

Two of the ingredients that are banned according to the list are Synthetic hormones (rBGH and rBST) and Arsenic. I am pretty confident that if you looked at a food product that listed arsenic as one of its ingredients you would not purchase it. But when it is not listed, but still could be present in the product that becomes very confusing and a health concern. The Synthetic hormones (rBGH and rBST) is not listed on the ingredient list of dairy products. The hormone is something that is injected into the cows to ensure they produce more milk than they naturally could and should. This hormone is something that was created in a lab making it genetically engineered. Because this hormone causes the cow to produce more than is natural the cows often end up with infections of their udders. When they end up with infections in the udders they have to be given antibiotics. You might have heard the theory about the more we use antibiotics, the more the things we use them against grow to be resistant. So we keep having to have stronger antibiotics. Also you might be interested to know that some milk has been documented as having pus from the infected udders in it. Just a few things to think about when purchasing milk.

Again, this is because of the hormone that is put into cows and is BANNED in some other countries, but allowed here in the United States.

And the arsenic I mentioned, according to the Shape article, is allowed in the chicken feed. It sounds as if it is just for coloring of their flesh. Which goes back to the first ingredient on the list in the article. The artificial coloring. Seems we want our food to be a certain color when we eat it.

I remember hearing about an experiment where people were fed a nice turkey dinner in a dimly lit room. They were enjoying the food. Then once the lights were turned on and they saw that all of the food was green some people actually got ill. The food was not green because it was bad, it was just green because it had been dyed green, but because it did not have “normal” coloring some people got ill. So it seems as if consumers prefer food that is pretty, even though some research is showing that dyes are not healthy. Some studies even report that dyes cause health issues.

Here is the list (copied from the article):

Ingredients: Coloring agents (blue 1, blue 2, yellow 5, and yellow 6)
Found In: Cake, candy, macaroni and cheese, medicines, sport drinks, soda, pet food, and cheese

Ingredient: Olestra (aka Olean)
Found In: Fat-free potato chips

Ingredient: Brominated vegetable oil (aka BVO)
Found In: Sports drinks and citrus-flavored sodas

Ingredient: Potassium bromate (aka brominated flour)
Found In: Rolls, wraps, flatbread, bread crumbs, and bagel chips

Ingredient: Azodicarbonamide
Found In: Breads, frozen dinners, boxed pasta mixes, and packaged baked goods

Ingredients: BHA and BHT
Found In: Cereal, nut mixes, gum, butter, meat, dehydrated potatoes, and beer

Ingredients: Synthetic hormones (rBGH and rBST)
Found In: Milk and dairy products

Ingredient: Arsenic
Found In: Poultry

Please keep in mind this is not a complete list of foods that these ingredients are found in. So if you are interesting in avoiding the ingredients check the labels of the food you purchase.

And check out the article, it states reasons as to WHY the food manufacturers use the ingredient.

Right now my avoid list consists of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), partially hydrogenated oils/trans fat, and Canola oil. In actuality Olestra too, but I haven’t seen that on an ingredient list in so long I don’t think of it as being on my avoid list. But I am going to be on the look out for the items on this list. I have recently been avoiding the dairy hormones, but I will have to work on the rest.

So, what do you think? Do you think you could eliminate some of these ingredients from your diet? Do you want to?

Posted in Food | Tagged: antibiotics, Arsenic, artificial coloring, banned ingredients, Canola Oil, cereal, dairy products, Fat-free potato chips, flatbread, frozen dinners, HFCS, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Olean, Olestra, Partially Hydrogenated Oils, pasta, rBGH, rBST, Shape.com, sports drinks, Synthetic hormones, Trans fat | 6 Comments »

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