Toss Up a Pasta and Shrimp Salad

This evening I was tired by dinner time and hunger was creeping in.  I knew my son had been snacking all afternoon so I wasn't worried about what he was going to like and I took a risk.  I threw together this Pasta and Shrimp Salad.

Yes, I am off track with my menu plan.  I have been distracted with the card business and laundry... I don't even know what I was supposed to cook for today.  So glad I had my basic GO TO's on hand.  Elbow Macaroni, frozen shrimp, garden veggies. 

I boiled 1/2 a pound of elbow macaroni for 5 minutes in salted water.  I added ground turmeric, garlic and @ 10 shrimp (which I cut in thirds or half to stretch the portion) to the boiling water and cooked the shrimp.

After I drained the pasta, I cooled it off a bit and then added

Finely chopped:

• 4 green onions (wish I had red onions)
• fresh parsley (cilantro would have also worked)
• 3 celery stalks
• 1/2 seedless cucumber
• 1/2 c (well drained) crushed pineapple (wish I had chunks)
• a shredded carrot 
• (grapes might have gone well in this dish too)

I poured 1/2 c of Asian salad dressing and tossed, as in mixed- not threw away.  It needed more salt so I included a dash of soy sauce.  

 

 

 

 

It was pretty good, if I have to say so myself.  Actually, I do since I was the only one who ate it.  If you try this recipe, you'll have to let me know how you like it. 

Small Shells in Clam Sauce

 

 

Just a quick dish I whipped up since I didn't make it to the grocery store today and I didn't have what I need to stay on my Meal Plan. I reached for my Lenten Staples and came out with this delicious dish.

 

 

• I boiled small shell macaroni in one pot. (Remember I like to have a variety of macaroni in my pantry so I don't get bored with spaghetti.  Any macaroni will do.)  I cooked the whole pound since I knew my son wasn't going to eat what I was making and he'd want some with spaghetti sauce. 
• Yes, I serve him sauce from the jar once in a while.  He'd pour ketchup over any wonderful dish I served him so I don't mind.  I'm just beating him to the punch.
• In a small saute pan, I heated up some olive oil, threw in 5 chopped green onions and 2 garlic cloves, crushed and chopped.  
• Waited a bit and then added chopped parsley and chopped fresh spinach. 
• Added a can of chopped clams, with the juice.  Having cracked a tooth last month (on koliva) I am chewing everything on my left side till I can see the dentist next week, so I went ahead and chopped the clams a bit more before I added them to the pan.
• When the macaroni still had 2 minutes to cook, I scooped 3 ladles full of macaroni with the some water it was boiled in and added it to the pan. 
• I added another ladle of water from the pot to help the macaroni finish cooking.
• I dissolved 1 T Corn Starch in 1/4 c warm water (I actually used the can with the clams so I wouldn't get another thing dirty)  I wanted to thicken the sauce.
• Squeezed a lemon into the mix, careful not to add the seeds, and  gave a few shakes of dried dill. 
• I let it sit on the stove a bit longer to do it's magic and voila! 
• The whole dish took 15 minutes. 

It's so yummy!!! 

 

You Can't Win Them All - Whole Wheat Flour in Pastitsio

Today I was making a meatless pastitsio and the creme wasn't working. It kept getting brown way too fast. After my second try I realized I had whole wheat unbleached flour. Ugh!!!

I poured it down the drain and switched flour. It actually worked this time. :).

What?! Leftovers?!

As I mentioned before I don't care for leftovers. I would rather make them into another meal than eat the same thing. Unfortunately I don't know how to do this without adding a bazillion calories. If you have any ideas please let me know. I usually just add cheese.

Tonight we are planning on eating such a concoction.

Elbow macaroni, leftover turkey/beef meat sauce, broccoli, provolone, ricotta, Parmesan, and asiago.

Chicken, Asiago, Pastitsio Leftovers

It’s dinner time and I have a fridge full of leftovers.  I hate (dislike) leftovers.  They are okay for lunch, but not for dinner.  In my head, dinner requires its own meal.  So what do I do?  I make something.  What do I have?  I have boiled chicken breast, milk, eggs, cheeses, noodles, onions and flour.  Now my dad would have made Chicken a la King with these ingredients.  That’s what we would eat when I was a kid.  And I was thinking of doing the same.  But I don’t know how to make Chicken a la King.  I know how to make Pastitsio.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastitsio  So this is what I do:

 

·         I start boiling the water for the elbow macaroni and set the oven to preheat at 350 degrees.

·         I chop and sauté Vidalia onions.

·         I chop the chicken breast and put it in a bowl.

·         I find another pot and melt a stick of butter.

·         I put the elbow macaroni in the pot with the (salted) boiling water- I salt the water after it starts to boil.

·         I pull out a medium sized bowl and add 1 maybe 1/2 cup crumbled feta, 1 maybe 1/2 cup shredded asiago, and 1 maybe 1/2 cup parmesan cheese. 

·         I pause to find my recipe for Pastitsio so I don’t ruin the crème sauce. (And this is when I should have just stopped for a moment till the macaroni was finished and drained.  But I didn’t and my crème sauce, professionally known as béchamel, cooked too much and was too thick.  But anyway…)

·         With cookbook open to correct page… I add 8T flour (one tablespoon at a time) and whisk into the butter.

·         When the butter/flour is smooth and turns brown, I slowly add 4 cups of warmed (from the microwave) milk.  We had fat free in the fridge.  You have to stir it over a med heat till it thickens.

·         I then add 4 eggs.  The recipe calls for 4 eggs or 6 egg yolks.  To be honest I didn’t want to mess with leftover egg whites (maybe because I don’t like leftovers) so I used the whole egg.  Keep stirring over a LOW heat till thick.  Now you can add salt and pepper.   

·         At this point, add the chicken to the translucent onion and season.  This time I chose to use a shake or two of ground turmeric, ground garlic and salt.

·         Now assemble.  In a large buttered casserole dish, add:               

o   ½ the macaroni

o   1/3 of the crème sauce

o   spread out the chicken mixture

o   then the cheese mixture

o   the rest of the macaroni

o   and the rest of the crème sauce.

·         Put in the middle of the oven for 50 minutes.  This is a good time to clean the pots and bowls, then with a clean kitchen you can enjoy your dinner. 

This dish is great because after it’s done cooking  it retains the heat for a while after you take it out of the oven… so if your salad isn’t ready or the table isn’t set yet, you still have time before you serve.