Making a lasagna is semi time consuming. Which is understandable when most traditional Italian meals took all day for the woman of the house to create. Turns out they had little else to do... I came to find, though, that it's actually pretty simple. There are quite a few ways to approach it and this time we decided to make it a combination of a few things.
When I was still attending the Art Institute of Houston, I took the advice from several professors and made friends with as many of the culinary students as I could. Among other things, I learned that a fresh red sauce (with or without meat) is not as hard as people make it out to be. Yes, the stuff in a jar is way easier, but give homemade a chance. This time there was enough room in this town for both.
We used both green and purple cabbage, which I think made a really pretty color contrast (no, Mamma. It didn't look like a bruise). Some of the cabbage-noodles were big leaves, some were in chopped chunks as the recipe suggested.
::Word to the Wise:: for anything acting as the noodles of a casserole, be it actual noodles or a substitute, make sure they have drained thoroughly, rested and dried before layering them into the pan. We didn't take the time to care for this step and it made for a pretty wet lasagna. That's not to say it wasn't absolutely delicious. It was just... y'know... wet.
As for the cheese, we figured we'd go all out with the traditional lasagna idea and made a ricotta mix with egg and nutmeg (the nutmeg makes a world of flavor difference), but because the whole casserole came out at wet as it did, the ricotta didn't really stay creamy like it should have. Next time, we'll try leaving it out and upping our mozzarella percentage. Way up.
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
Let's face it; Houston, Texas has 2 basic seasons. Hot and Hotter. Yeah, we're allotted a couple of days out of the year that require a couple of extra pieces of clothing to keep the draft out, but one time I saw Satan sitting at a Houston bus stop sweating, waiting for the next ride out of town. So with our warm climate, seeing salad on the menu is pretty typical. With our southern
Like I've said, re-purposing food has become a huge interest of mine. That's why instead of the usual dressing to my slaw, I chose to go Asian. You'd be amazed at how easy it is to create an Asian flavor profile, which could easily be used for either a hot or cold meal.
Once more, the recipe Mamma provided included using a package of chicken flavored Ramen.
Honestly, who do you know who does not have
at least one package of Ramen in their pantry?
Report them. They're not human. Only humans would be at least
mildly prepared for the Apocalypse with a small stash of Ramen.
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
Asian 'Slaw
- 1 head of cabbage or 1 bag of coleslaw mix
- 1 grated carrot
- 1 package of Ramen (pulverized in the bag first)
- 4-5 stalks chopped scallions
- Optional:
- Toasted seeds (pumpkin, sunflower, etc)
- Sliced almonds
- 3/4 C olive oil
- 1/4 C sugar
- 3 Tbsp soy sauce
- 2 Tbsp vinegar
- Season packet from the Ramen package
- Black pepper
Check out her blog.
-k
No comments:
Post a Comment