In Answer to Meredith

Since Meredith answered my question on her blog, I decided it was only fair to answer her question on mine. Her question was "how was your turkey?" Nothing earth shattering, but I figured fair is fair. So, stop being sick of reading about turkey and pretend to enjoy this post (unless you're my dad and then I have no expectations of you liking anything about meat. Ever.).

As I said before, I made Gourmet's Roast Turkey with Black Truffle Butter and White Wine Gravy. And let me tell you, it was good. A nice twist on a classic turkey recipe - nothing too extreme, but nothing too boring either. Here's my sister with our free range organic turkey.


No, Alli! Don't lick the turkey! You're a vegetarian!


The great thing about this recipe is that you get to rub truffle butter under the skin of the turkey. Who doesn't like that?


Make sure your hands are clean. That would be kinda gross otherwise. See all the nice butter/truffle flecks? So earthy and creamy. Yum.


You put some salt and pepper on there too and then set it on a rack above a few cups of water (to keep things moist). Gourmet favors the high heat/quicker cooking time that I'm a big fan of - you only cook the turkey for two hours at 450 degrees. It comes out all nice and golden brown.


I couldn't get the wing tips tucked, which is why they're kinda black on the ends. Oh well. It still tasted great. Here's all the turkey drippings.


There's a lot of them because of the water that you pour in the pan. But that's okay! More gravy base. I really liked this gravy. You pour off the juices/fat into a glass/bowl/fat separator. You add about 1/4 cup fat back in the pan (straddled over two burners) and add some chopped shallots. When they soften a bit, you add two cups white wine and bring it to a boil. You cook it down some, scrape up the brown bits and add the turkey juices and some turkey stock (up to 4 cups combined juices/stock). Bring that to a boil and add a paste of butter and flour. This is the first gravy recipe that I ever used that didn't start with a roux - I never understood what lumpy gravy was all about, but I sure get it now.


It had a nice tangy taste! I liked it a lot (oh yeah, I don't strain my gravy - I like the little turkey bits). I poured lots of it over my turkey.


Mmmm, turkey. Here's our mangled, half carved carcass.


Can it be Thanksgiving again soon?

More pasta.....it's good for you

This is my 100th post! Be excited. I sure am.

Tonight, I continued my game of "how many CSA vegetables can I get into one dish?" It's a really fun game. I eat healthy, I cook with new things, Zack doesn't bother me about how I never use vegetables......everybody wins.

Tonight, my dish is very similar to last nights.....whoops. It's different though and it's still good.

CSA Grab Bag Pasta

1 box whole wheat rotini
1 bulb fennel, chopped, fronds reserved
1/2 can whole peeled tomatoes
1/2 package ground turkey
1 bunch swiss chard
fresh basil
salt
pepper
olive oil

1. Boil your water, salt it good, and cook your pasta al dente.

2. Heat some olive oil in a saucepan (not too much), and saute your fennel.

3. Add your turkey and season it well. Brown it up good! Remember, raw turkey = death.

4. Remove the stems from your swiss chard. I don't usually do that, but I thought that the stems would be weird in pasta. Chop up the leaves and throw it in the pan with the fennel and the turkey. Wilt it down.

5. Squish up your tomatoes and throw them in the pan. Add more salt and pepper and let it all break down. It looks pretty right?


6. Now add your pasta! Let it all heat together and let the flavors mix.

7. Eat it! Add some cheese if you want. I love cheese.


I feel like I have to make more varied things.....any suggestions?

Ground Turkey, take two

Ground turkey was great in the Pumpkin Pasta I made the other night, but I decided to return to a classic and finish up the leftovers in some classic red meat sauce. It's quick, yummy and easy to make. Here's my version:

Quick and Easy Meat Sauce!

1 28 oz can of whole peeled tomatoes
ground turkey (about half a pack)
1 large or 2 small onions
5 cloves garlic (or less if you don't like garlic)
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Basil (fresh or dried)
Oregano (fresh or dried)
Lawry's Seasoning Salt
Cooked pasta - whatever kind you like

1. Heat a saucepan over medium heat. Add some olive oil (not too much). Let it heat up a minute until it's hot but not smoking.

2. Chop up your onion and garlic and add to the pan. Let soften until opaque (about five minutes). Then turn up the heat a little.

3. Add the ground turkey. Break it up with a wooden spoon or your hands as you drop it in the pan. Hit it with some Lawry's Seasoning Salt. It looks like this:


Some people have very strong feelings about this. I'm not sure why.

4. Take your can of tomatoes. I use this kind:


For a more "classic" (ie store bought) taste, puree the tomatoes (juice and all) in your blender or food processor. For a chunkier taste, just squish the tomatoes with a spoon (or your hands! That's what I do when I'm too lazy to wash the food processor. Plus, it's fun).

5. Season your sauce with these seasonings:


If you can't see, it's salt, pepper, dried oregano and basil. I like fresh basil, but Zack doesn't and since I didn't have any on hand, I decided to humor him for tonight. He appreciated it very much.

6. Simmer your sauce until it's warm and bubbly.

7. Add the cooked pasta. I used quinoa pasta.


It's healthier and tastes more like regular pasta than whole wheat does. Mine looked like this:


8. Add cheese and eat it! Yay!

What can you make with a fully stocked pantry?

I suppose you could make anything you set your mind to - I decided to pull out some random ingredients and see what came to me. Here are my ingredients:


Hmm.....I probably can't make fudge with these......Pumpkin pasta it is!

Pumpkin Pasta:
1 box whole wheat penne
1/2 can cooked pumpkin (not pie filling - ick)
1/2 can evaporated milk (or 3/4 cup regular milk)
1 cup chicken stock
1 yellow onion
3/4 pound ground turkey
fresh sage
salt
pepper
nutmeg
Parmesan cheese (for the table)

First cook a box of pasta according to the directions on the box. I used whole wheat penne, but feel free to use your favorite kind. While it cooked, I put my skillet over medium heat, added a little olive oil and when it got hot, added my chopped onion. Here it is now:


Once the onion softened, I turned up the heat a big and threw in half a pack of ground turkey.


I stirred it up and waited for the turkey to turn brown (pink = raw meat = death. brown = cooked meat = yum).

Then I threw in half a can of pumpkin.....


And mixed it up.


Then in went about a cup of chicken broth:


And half a can of evaporated milk (cream would be better - but I didn't have any. Regular milk would be good too).


Then I ripped up some sage and threw it in (this made Zack complain. He hates big pieces of herbs. But I'm the cook and I'm too lazy to chop them, so he can just pick them out if he wants. And he does).


(I also threw in some nutmeg. You can kind of tell in the picture above. If I was Rachael Ray, this is where I would say, nutmeg is the thing that makes people go, "ooh, what IS that?" But I'm not Rachael Ray. She's a millionaire with four television shows. I'm just a poor scrub with wireless internet and an iBook). The pasta was done now, so I threw it in the pan.


Then I mixed it all up and tasted it. It needed more salt, so I added some and put it in my pretty pasta bowl from Target.


All ready to eat! All it needs is Parmesan cheese. Lots of it. Enjoy!