Lasagna on the Fly!

"On the fly," is a term used in restaurant kitchens, when something needs to be cooked and delivered to a customer ASAP! That's exactly what happened last night! We got home a bit later than usual, and my husband needed to get to a softball game. He also needed to eat before he went, so I flew into the kitchen and whipped up a little something! This was the planned meal of the evening, but I thought I would have more time to prepare it, so I definitely pulled this out of somewhere!

Three things needed to happen before I could assemble the Sausage, Chard, and Lemon Lasagna. I had to simmer some lemon slices to soften them, cook the sausage until it was no longer pink, and create a delicious Bechamel sauce. I whizzed around the kitchen (well, as fast as my limping foot could take me) gathering my ingredients in my arms. I was able to do it one or two trips! I got three pots set on the stove and started preheating the oven too!

The first pot held a thinly sliced lemon, along with some water that I brought to a boil, and simmered for 7 minutes. This softened the lemons, bringing out the flavor and also making the entire thing (including the rind) edible and flavorful. Once the 7 minutes had passed, I took them out of the water and left them to dry on a paper towel. We'll be using those later!

Meanwhile, I also placed some sweet Italian sausages into a non-stick skillet, peeled of their casings. I used a wooden spoon to break up the sausages, letting them crumble and brown in the pan. I was able to let that sit and cook, while I worked on the Bechamel sauce, which required a lot of stirring and attention.

Now, for the Bechamel sauce, which I have to say, came out really well! I melted three tablespoons of butter in a pan, and added a quarter of a cup of flour. This combination creates a roux, which thickens liquids over heat. After cooking the butter and flour mixture for a minute or two, I added the three cups of whole milk and brought it all to a boil. As it began to boil, it began to thicken, which meant it was time to remove it from the heat, and add the Parmensan cheese. As the cheese melted into the roux and milk, the sauce became silky and thick, and delicious! I seasoned it with some salt and pepper, and stirred in my chopped Swiss Chard that I got at a local farmer's market this past weekend.

Now, it was time to assemble the lasagna and put it in the oven. Where are the noodles, you ask? Well, this recipe called for Barilla's No-Bake Lasagna Noodles, so I decided to go with that direction, rather than making my own this time around. I spread some sauce on the bottom of the pan, added two noodles, half of the sausage and a cup of sauce. I repeated the procedure and then finished it off with two noodles, the rest of the sauce and the lemon slices. I have to say that this is the first lasagna recipe that has made the perfect amount of sauce. I usually double the sauce portion of any recipe because I never seem to have enough, but this was perfect!

After 27 minutes in the oven, at 350 degrees, the lasagna was ready! And I was just under the gun, too! We finished eating and then, Matt was off to his softball game! Clean-up wasn't too bad either! Since there were so few ingredients, the majority of the clean-up were the three pots I used to prep everything. The lasagna pan went straight into the fridge - I'm looking forward to those leftovers!



Healthy and Fresh

I finally got my act together and planned a menu for the upcoming week. It was a necessary evil, as I just found out we'll be having my in-laws in house for Christmas Eve, as well as Christmas Day, so I had to have a plan! While I was at it, I planned out the rest of the week as well. Be sure to click over to the Current Menu tab to check it out. With all the holiday plans and get-togethers, it's been hard to find time to eat a meal at home. I'm looking forward to a whole week's worth of them!

I really wanted something healthy, and full of fresh ingredients for tonight's dinner, but I had some chicken breasts in the fridge that I needed to use, so I built my meal around that. I opened Tender by Nigel Slater, knowing I'd find exactly what I was looking for, and in fact, I did.

This simple recipe of warm chicken, served over a bed of swiss chard, green beans and tomatoes is as fresh as fresh can be! I didn't open a single jar, or bottle, aside from the olive oil...everything came from the produce department! My first order of business was to get a few pots of water boiling on the stove, and then I set to prepping my ingredients. I purchased rainbow chard, because it's just so pretty, and I separated the leaves from the stems, chopping both in anticipation of cooking. I also trimmed the green beans while the water was beginning to boil.

I finely minced a small shallot, and mixed that with some lemon juice, chopped mint, a pinch of salt and olive oil in a container with a top. I shook it all together until it was emulsified, and set it aside to dress the salad.

As the water in my two pots began to boil, I heated my grill pan and seasoned my chicken breasts. A little salt, a little pepper, and a little chopped rosemary goes a long way! I cooked the chicken quickly, until both sides were golden with wonderful-looking grill marks, but I left it a bit undercooked. Instead, I placed the meat on a plate, and covered it with a bowl to keep the heat in, allowing it to continue cooking as it rested. 

While the chicken rested, I cooked the green beans in one pot, and the chard stems in the other, for about 3 minutes. With 30 seconds left, I added the chard leaves to the pot while I drained the green beans. The beans and the chard (stems and leaves) got tossed in a bowl with the tomatoes, and the dressing I made earlier. At this point, I sliced the chicken breasts into about 4 slices each, and placed them atop the salads, with a bit more dressing. It made for a beautiful plate of healthy, fresh food. Sometimes, it's wonderful to sit down to a summery meal on a cold winter's day, and while I used more wintery vegetables, the resulting dish was bright, light and made me wish for spring!

Now that dinner is done, I can tuck into Chapter 3 of The Professional Chef, and write about that a bit later tonight. 

I also want to remind everyone that there's still time to win a case of Popchips! I've only got one entry so far, and you can't win if you don't enter! Be sure to scroll down to the prior post, entitled Share the Health! and comment in order have a chance at winning! The contest ends on Wednesday night, so be sure to comment ASAP!!

It's a Scorcher!

Phew, is it hot out there today! On days like this, the last thing anyone can think about is standing over a hot stove, slaving away at a complicated dinner. You want to eat simply, lightly, and with the least effort expelled, right?

I have all this produce to use, from the CSA Share, and I was sitting at my desk today, thinking about what I could make for dinner. I haven't gone grocery shopping in awhile, but I have some things, and thought about what I could buy at the farmer's market to fill in the gaps. On my way back from the gym at lunch time, I stopped in at the Foxboro Cheese booth at the Dewey Square Farmers Market. The gentleman there also sells some beef and veal products and that's what I had my eye on. The prices were better than I remember them being last year, so I was psyched about that...but more importantly, he had two gorgeous veal loin chops with my name on 'em!

This was going to be easy! Now, all their meat comes frozen, so I left it out for the afternoon to defrost, and when I got home from work, I mixed up some olive oil, rosemary (from my dear friend, Heidi's, garden), salt and pepper. I let that infuse for a little bit before coating the veal in the mixture. I let it sit for a little bit while the grill was heating up.

I sliced the swiss chard I received in the CSA share into 1-inch ribbons and also minced up a couple of garlic cloves. While the veal was on the grill, I sauteed the garlic in a little butter and olive oil until fragrant and then threw in the chard.

Chard is a very hearty green but it will wilt down just like any other, given the time. I tossed it every minute or so until every leaf was wilted equally. At the very end, I turned down the heat and threw in a bit of Champagne Shallot Mustard from Stonewall Kitchen. The mustard gave a nice creamy texture to the chard, as well as a nice bite...and I only used a tablespoon or so.

This meal came together in about 15 minutes, 10 of which I spent outside, enjoying the weather near the grill. Now that's my kinda summer-time meal!

Fun fact of the day: Did you know that Swiss Chard is high in A, K and C? The World's Healthiest Foods says that Swiss Chard ranks only second to spinach in a total-nutrient analysis!

Farm Fresh Produce in the House!

The CSA share from Harvest Delivery arrived this evening! I thoroughly enjoyed unpacking the box full of goodies, since I had no idea what would be arriving in the delivery! The gentleman who delivered this wonderful package was named Ed, and he was very friendly and sunny! He told me a bit more about the CSA shares and how their deliveries work. They have a very cool (no pun intended - ha!) system that involves an insulated cool box that stores your deliveries until you arrive home from work and unlock the box to retrieve your fresh produce.

Look at all that beautiful fresh produce that I was lucky enough to receive! So, let's take a short inventory, shall we? We have two bunches of crispy, bright radishes and a giant bunch of fresh beets, with the greens attached! Radish greens and beet greens can be used in recipes separate from their root counterparts too, so I'm going to try and make the most of these bunches! We've also got some summer squashes, and some cute little cucumbers. The bunch of scallions are enormous - I've never seen scallions that big! We have a carton of deliciously sweet blueberries, and a half-dozen farm fresh eggs as well!

There are two huge heads of different lettuces that will make us salads for a week and a half! We've got a gorgeous bouquet of swiss chard, as well as a giant bunch of basil!  Since basil goes bad fairly quickly, I think I might use that first and make some pesto sauce for a pasta dish for tomorrow night's dinner. There's also a bag of delicious, peppery arugula which I can't wait to eat! I had to try a leaf, just to TASTE it ... and OH...so good! Lastly, I got two little heads of a strongly flavored green, but I'm not completely sure what it is - I think it's baby bok choy.

So, let's see, so far, I'm thinkin' pesto sauce...which isn't exactly the most creative use of basil, but when you have a lot of it, and want to use it all before it goes bad, it's the best way to go! I'm also thinking of some sort of curry, using those summer squash, since I also took a little trip to Penzey's Spices today. I picked up quite a few Indian spices, even though they weren't on my list of refills. Sometimes you see things, and you just think..."yes, I will be able to use that for something in the very near future." We'll be having lots of salads to use those two giant heads of lettuce, and I love the crunch of crispy radishes sliced in salads as well! I think I'll stop by the farmer's market booth that sells locally-made goat cheese, for a nice big salad full of greens, feta and some roasted beets as well! And I think...maybe a pasta carbonara with the addition of some wilted swiss chard. Sound good!?

Join me as I work my way through this CSA share...I love a new adventure and this one is exciting! Next up: I'll teach you how to make pesto sauce!

This One Took Awhile!

Today, I decided to conquer the challenge of Jamie's Lasagne alla Cacciatora, or "hunter's lasagne." This was quite an endeavor, I found, but nonetheless probably the BEST lasagna I've ever had, so it was totally worth it. Trust me, during the process, I was cursing all the ingredients and thinking, "This better be the best lasagna ever." It was totally worth every second I spent making it, and even though the recipe mentions that it serves 6...this is going to feed us for awhile!

I took pictures a bit differently this time since there were so many moving parts of this recipe. I have a couple of mise en place pictures, for each of the different steps. So, let's get the show on the road!

This afternoon, I roasted a whole chicken to be used in the sauce for the lasagna. There are a bunch of roasted meat recipes in Jamie's Italy, and the hunter's lasagna calls for one to five of them. I opted for just one my first time, but I could have done rabbit, duck, chicken, squab or quail. You can get a whole chicken relatively cheaply at the grocery store, while the others can be a bit pricier. All I needed to roast the chicken was well, the chicken, as well as some bay leaves, some garlic cloves, olive oil, salt, pepper and some lemon halves.



I rubbed the chicken with the olive oil, salt and pepper. Then, I stuffed the lemon halves, bay leaves and garlic cloves (whole) inside the bird.



I know that's not a very pretty picture, but I wanted to show you how it's done! :) I put the chicken into a 375 degree oven for an hour and a half, basting half way through!



Once the chicken was done, and cooled, I shredded it with my fingers. This became part of the mise en place for the red sauce. Along with more olive oil, more garlic, some rosemary, more bay leaves, and 3 14-oz cans of plum tomatoes, I was ready to start the next step in the process.



I heated a large saucepan with some olive oil and slowly fried the garlic until it was lightly colored and very fragrant. Once the garlic was ready, I threw in the rosemary sprig, bay leaves, and the three cans of tomatoes. I left this to cook gently for 45 minutes, covered.



While the red sauce was cooking, I made my fresh pasta dough and left it to rest for the requisite 30 minutes.



Once the red sauce was close to the 45 minute mark, I started in on the white sauce for the lasagna. This step called for milk, a sprig of parsley, nutmeg, some sliced onion, black peppercorns, butter, flour, parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.



I needed two different pots for this step. The milk, parsley, nutmeg, onion, and peppercorns went into one pot, and I then brought it to a gentle boil.



Meanwhile, in the other pot, I was melting down some butter. Once the butter had liquified, I stirred in the flour to make a roux.



While the milk mixture was heating, the timer went off on the 45 minutes for my red sauce. I added the chicken to the sauce and set the timer for another 20 minutes. I also pulled out the bay leaves and rosemary sprig.



And now back to the white sauce! Once it was gently boiling, I strained all the stuff out of it (because all we really wanted was the flavoring for the milk) and slowly poured the milk into the roux, stirring to blend as I poured. This is a slow process so be patient with it - pour a little and then blend it, pour a little and then blend it - it's a bit like risotto!



At some point during all this commotion, I found time to roll out some lasagna noodles. I quickly blanched them by putting them in boiling water for a minute, and then directly into an ice water bath. Once the noodles were done, my red sauce had simmered, and my white sauce was blended, it was time to build the lasagna!

I want to pause here, and say that lasagna does not need to be this much work. You could very well buy dried lasagna noodles, some jarred marinara sauce, and an already cooked rotisserie chicken to make this same meal, but...have you ever known me to take the simple route!?

Okay - back to the task at hand! I layered two of my lasagna noodles in a greased 13x9" pan.



They aren't exactly square but hey, it's more rustic that way. On top of the noodles, I ladled on my red sauce with the chicken in it.



On top of the red sauce, I poured on some of the white sauce, and then sprinkled it with some of the shredded parmesan.



Then, you start all over again, until you've used all the sauce. I ended up with 2 layers of sauce and three layers of noodles (one layer for the top). The pan was full to the brim, nothing else would fit in there if I had tried! Once the last layer of noodle had been placed on top, I poured the remaining white sauce over it, sprinkled with parmesan and some fresh shredded mozzarella. I sprinkled some sage leaves on top and a few drizzles of olive oil, and it was ready to go into a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes, until it turns golden on top.



I made some Italian-Style Swiss Chard while the lasagna was cooking, and when the time went off, this is what I pulled out of the oven!



This was the best lasagna I've ever had. I'm not sure whether it was the different layers of sauce, or the fresh lasagna noodles, or the touch of fried sage on top, but this ... was ... de-lish-ous! I can't wait to eat it for lunch tomorrow!



I'll be making my next menu this week, so if you have any requests, don't forget to comment on a post to let me know. You can also contact me here, if you would prefer to email your request directly to me.