Braised Beef with Tortellini and Garlic Breadsticks

Can I just say again that I LOVE my bread machine? It supplies us with wonderful baked goods and does the leg work (hand work?) for most of my shaped-dough recipes. Today we had some FABULOUS breadsticks:

1 1/8 cups water (70 to 80 degrees F)
2 tablespoons olive or canola oil
3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons sugar
3 teaspoons garlic powder
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
3/4 teaspoon minced fresh basil
2 cups bread flour
1 cup rolled oats
2 teaspoons active dry yeast

Add to bread machine in order listed. Select dough cycle (it's just that easy!).

I put my dough in the fridge overnight last night, and then shaped and baked the breadsticks for lunch. Took about 20 minutes at 350 Allen said they were the best I've ever made--huzzah!

And what did these bread sticks accompany? Only one of the tastiest meals to ever come out of my crock pot. Not kidding! This recipe was supposed to be an approximation of one of our favorite Olive Garden dishes, Braised Beef with Tortelloni (no, that's not a misspelling). The result was amazing, and a fair representation of the original, although not spot-on.




1 lb beef shortribs
1 onion, diced
1 cup red wine
1 can diced tomatoes (14.5 oz)
1 bay leaf
salt and pepper to taste
1 cup water

Combined everything in the crock pot and cooked on low 8-10 hours. Boiled some tortellini and served the meat over the pasta. My taste buds thanked me over and over for this one!

Note: Next time I'll make a pan gravy with the drippings to get a closer version of the sauce that OG serves with theirs. Might add a bigger can of tomatoes.

Bread Pudding

I must confess, I never had bread pudding until December. That's right, a life without bread pudding. Sad, I know. I actually tried it at Golden Corral. We were visiting hubby's grandparents down in Florida, and they took us there for dinner one night. I thought it was yummy--sort of like a gooey cinnamon roll.

Last night I had a bummer of a night. Spent all day working, then all night doing homework in preparation for spending all day today (Saturday) in class. And to top it all off, I accidentally deleted one of my homework assignments. Perfect! I ended up recovering the file, thanks to www.getdropbox.com--can't say enough good things about this free online storage site! Anyway, I was feeling low and decided to bake myself a treat as a study break.

2 old hoagie rolls (original recipe said 6 slices of bread, but this is how much it took to fill the pan I was using)
2 tbls butter, melted
4 eggs, beaten
2 cups milk
3/4 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Tore rolls into chunks and arranged in 9x9 baking dish. (Forgot to spray first, which meant it stuck. Oops.) Drizzled bread with melted butter. Combined eggs, milk, sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla. Poured mixture over bread, pressing the bread down into the pan lightly. Baked at 350 for about 45 min, until the bread sprang back lightly when touched.

This was a perfect pick-me-up! It also turned out to be great reheated for breakfast this morning.

Notes for next time: More cinnamon, and use brown sugar to make it taste more like a cinnamon roll.

Crock pot Chicken Chow Mein

So once again, silly me forgot to take a picture. That's ok. Crock pot meals aren't that gorgeous anyway. But let me just tell you, it was mmm mmm good! Definitely satisfied my craving.

2 chicken breasts (it was one of those I've-got-chicken-in-the-freezer-and-need-to-use-it-up days)
1 onion, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
2 cups water

Put chicken in crock with onion, celery, and water. Cooked on high for 4 hours. Then, more ingredients!

2 cups frozen veggies, Asian blend
1 cup broccoli (cause I REALLY like broccoli)

Added to crock with the following sauce:

1/4 cup cornstarch
1/4 cup soy sauce
3 tbls molasses
(Mix well)

Stirred the veggies in with the sauce and cooked on low for another hour. Served with whole wheat spaghetti noodles, cooked and fried in a pan with olive oil (just so the noodles got a little crispy).

We will definitely be repeating this yummy and quick dinner! I'm super excited that there was enough left over to have either lunch or dinner tomorrow. Yay!

Moorish-Style Chickpea and Spinach Stew

I heard this recipe a while back on NPR when they were having a "cheap eats" kind of series. It sounded incredible, but I just never got around to making it till today. This recipe would be a lot more involved if you didn't already have chickpeas cooked and ready to go in the freezer (like I almost always do). Wouldn't really sub canned--they're just not as good.

4 cups chickpeas
6 garlic cloves, peeled and whole
1/4 cup Spanish extra-virgin olive oil
2 slices white bread, with the crusts removed
1 tablespoon cayenne pepper (originally called for 2 tbls paprika, but didn't have any)
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/2 pound spinach, washed and cleaned
1 teaspoon ground cumin
Salt and pepper to taste

Brought the chickpeas to a boil while heating a pan with olive oil.

Browned garlic cloves for 3 min, set aside. Browned bread in the oil. Used a pestle to mash them up into a paste.

Added spinach, seasonings, and bread crumb mixture to boiling chickpeas. Cooked 5 min. Done! I think I started cooking at 11:30 or so, and we were eating before noon. Now that's what I call a quick meal!

Result: Wow! Spicy! That cayenne has quite a kick. Glad I didn't use 2 tbls of the stuff! But it was really tasty. Definitely would do again for a quick, cheap meal.

Overnight Oatmeal

It's not that I haven't been cooking lately...I really have! In fact, I've tried a number of awesome new recipes! Tonight's dinner, for example, was an AMAZING lentils taco recipe. You'd have to try them to believe how good they are! It is definitely going to be part of the Shull standard Mexican fare. I've also made a fabulous roasted garlic and white bean soup (twice--it was a big hit with the hub), tortilla soup, and tortellini soup. All very tasty. I just haven't been taking pics and have been too busy (ok fine, not busy, just not motivated) to post.

But tonight I decided to make another batch of overnight oatmeal, since it was such a hit last week. This recipe made enough for 3 breakfasts! Not wanting to forget which recipe I used (since I looked at several), I decided I'd better post about this one so that I don't have to scour the internet next time I want to make this dish.

2 cups oats
6 cups water
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla (a generous tsp!)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup cherry berry blend dried fruit (or whatever you like, rasins, etc.)
pinch of salt

Combine all ingredients in a slow cooker and cook on low 8-10 hours (or from whenever you go to bed till whenever you wake up).

Buttermilk Alfredo

Remember that buttermilk that revolutionized my pesto? Well, today was the "best by" date. I am a stickler when it comes to expiration dates, and I also hate throwing things out. Result--kitchen experiments! Today's was a great success!

1 package frozen spinach, thawed and drained
2 cloves garlic
1 can diced tomatoes
3 cups buttermilk
3 tbs cornstarch
pinch italian seasoning
salt & pepper
1 cup parmesean cheese
pasta

Like many of my fave recipes are, this was really quick and easy! I mixed the buttermilk, cornstarch, and italian seasoning and simmered it.

Meanwhile, minced garlic and the spinach went into a separate pan. (A third pot was boiling water for noodles--I hate getting so many pots dirty, but that's life). After a few minutes, added the tomatoes (drained) to the spinach.

The buttermilk was bubbling away, so I added the cheese. Stir, stir, stir!

Then I dumped the buttermilk mixture in with the spinach and tomatoes. Gorgeous! Love those colors! By this time, the noodles were done. Mixed those in as well. Done! From start to finish, this took about half an hour, maybe less. Perfect for a Wednesday night meal!

Allen and I both really loved the creaminess of the pasta. And since the buttermilk was low-fat, none of the guilt of eating alfredo! We will definitely be having this again, although next time, I think some garbanzo beans would be a fantastic addition.

The leftover sauce is going to become a white pizza in a few days. Yay leftovers!

Mexican Pizza

I made a HUGE pot of black beans yesterday. By huge, I mean, it completely filled my 6-quart crock pot! Most of the beans were portioned into bags and frozen for later, but I kept some out for this week. Then I went searching for something to make with said beans.

I've never had a Mexican pizza, but they sound cute! There seem to be two basic types--those made on regular dough and those made on tortillas. Since we've had pizza and calzones recently, I thought we'd try them out with tortillas.

Since I had both corn and flour tortillas on hand, I made one of each to see which we like better! (It was a tie--the corn tasted more "authentic" but the flour were good too!)

So here's the recipe:

Put 1 tortilla in a pie pan (or baking sheet)
Spread with half a can (each pizza) of refried beans
Top with another tortilla and bake for 10 minutes at 350.

Then, add seasoned black beans to the tortillas. Cover with a third tortilla and bake for 5 min.

Top with salsa and cheese, bake till cheese is melty (about 5 min).

Easy, cheap, and fairly nutritious! My triple-layer pizza was a result of not reading the directions carefully, haha. But since I was pretty much improvising anyway, I figured it was ok! And it turned out just fine. Now we have a new Mexican dish to add to our rotation!