From the Saute Pan: Spinach Ravioli with Sausage and Roasted Tomato Sauce
As Valentine's Day was on a Monday and A never knows what time he'll be home from the hospital, we decided to have our holiday meal the Sunday prior. We took on quite a challenge - homemade ravioli along with homemade roasted tomato sauce.
I won't lie to you - the ravioli was difficult, and we didn't get it perfect. (The only thing wrong with it was it was too thick for our tastes.) But the roasted tomato sauce turned out to be very easy, and is extremely versatile, so you can be sure we'll make it again in the future.
A warning: This is incredibly messy! Flour everywhere, sticky dough, egg wash... but it's fun!
Dish: Spinach Ravioli with Sausage and Roasted Tomato Sauce
Eaten With: Salad, Pinot Noir
Ingredients: Ravioli - Eggs, flour, spinach, ricotta cheese, grated Parmesan cheese; Sauce - Tomatoes, white onion, garlic, olive oil; Italian sausage
How to Make It:
Roasted Tomato Sauce
1. Cut 1/2 pound of tomatoes in half lengthwise.
2. Slice 1 white onion.
3. Put the tomatoes halved side up in a baking pan (we lined ours with tinfoil). Add onions on top of the tomatoes.
4. Drizzle with olive oil and add pepper.
5. Cook at 400F for about 45 minutes.
6. Pour the contents of the pan into a cooking pot.
7. Blend with an immersion blender.
8. Simmer over medium heat until it has reached your desired thickness. Add more spices as you'd like.
Sausage (You could dress this up too, but we kept it simple.)
1. Dice up Italian sausage links.
2. Saute on the stove top in garlic until done.
Ravioli
1. Steam 8 oz of spinach until it shrinks.
2. Use a food processor to chop spinach into a paste.
3. Beat 2 eggs (we did it in our stand mixer - dough hook attached).
4. Add in 1.5 cups of flour and 1/4 cup of water, along with spinach paste, mixing until it forms a ball.
5. Remove dough from mixer and knead (on floured surface) until elastic.
6. Let dough sit in a glass bowl about 30 minutes to let gluten relax.
7. Roll the dough out as thin as you can (I believe the instructions I saw said a nickel's width.) - Here's where we failed... definitely need a pasta roller to get the dough thin enough!
8. Using a glass, cut circles in the dough.
Ricotta Filling
1. Beat one egg in a bowl.
2. Add 1/2 cup of ricotta cheese, 1/4 cup of grated Parmesan, and basil/oregano/whatever your fancy.
3. Mix until thoroughly combined.
4. Chill in the fridge for a few minutes (or while you're preparing the ravioli dough).
Putting It Together
1. Make an egg wash (beat 1 egg with a small amount of water).
2. Put a tablespoon of ricotta filling on 1 dough circle.
3. Brush egg wash around the edges.
4. Top with another ravioli circle.
5. Push down on the edges to seal the ravioli. You can use a fork to crimp the edges if you'd like.
6. Cook the ravioli in boiling water for 10-15 minutes. It will float to the top when done.
7. Lift the ravioli out with a slotted spoon and put on a plate. Cover with sauce and sausage.
I won't lie to you - the ravioli was difficult, and we didn't get it perfect. (The only thing wrong with it was it was too thick for our tastes.) But the roasted tomato sauce turned out to be very easy, and is extremely versatile, so you can be sure we'll make it again in the future.
A warning: This is incredibly messy! Flour everywhere, sticky dough, egg wash... but it's fun!
Dish: Spinach Ravioli with Sausage and Roasted Tomato Sauce
Eaten With: Salad, Pinot Noir
Ingredients: Ravioli - Eggs, flour, spinach, ricotta cheese, grated Parmesan cheese; Sauce - Tomatoes, white onion, garlic, olive oil; Italian sausage
How to Make It:
Roasted Tomato Sauce
1. Cut 1/2 pound of tomatoes in half lengthwise.
3. Put the tomatoes halved side up in a baking pan (we lined ours with tinfoil). Add onions on top of the tomatoes.
4. Drizzle with olive oil and add pepper.
5. Cook at 400F for about 45 minutes.
7. Blend with an immersion blender.
8. Simmer over medium heat until it has reached your desired thickness. Add more spices as you'd like.
Sausage (You could dress this up too, but we kept it simple.)
1. Dice up Italian sausage links.
2. Saute on the stove top in garlic until done.
Ravioli
1. Steam 8 oz of spinach until it shrinks.
2. Use a food processor to chop spinach into a paste.
3. Beat 2 eggs (we did it in our stand mixer - dough hook attached).
4. Add in 1.5 cups of flour and 1/4 cup of water, along with spinach paste, mixing until it forms a ball.
5. Remove dough from mixer and knead (on floured surface) until elastic.
Note: Add more flour if you need to - I did!
6. Let dough sit in a glass bowl about 30 minutes to let gluten relax.
7. Roll the dough out as thin as you can (I believe the instructions I saw said a nickel's width.) - Here's where we failed... definitely need a pasta roller to get the dough thin enough!
8. Using a glass, cut circles in the dough.
Ricotta Filling
1. Beat one egg in a bowl.
2. Add 1/2 cup of ricotta cheese, 1/4 cup of grated Parmesan, and basil/oregano/whatever your fancy.
3. Mix until thoroughly combined.
4. Chill in the fridge for a few minutes (or while you're preparing the ravioli dough).
Putting It Together
1. Make an egg wash (beat 1 egg with a small amount of water).
2. Put a tablespoon of ricotta filling on 1 dough circle.
3. Brush egg wash around the edges.
4. Top with another ravioli circle.
5. Push down on the edges to seal the ravioli. You can use a fork to crimp the edges if you'd like.
6. Cook the ravioli in boiling water for 10-15 minutes. It will float to the top when done.
7. Lift the ravioli out with a slotted spoon and put on a plate. Cover with sauce and sausage.
Craft Corner: Shoe Rack Fix
When A and I moved into our current apartment, we knew we needed a solution to a common problem: How to best organize our shoes? I have a hanging shoe organizer in the closet, but we have more shoes than it can hold.
After looking around Bed Bath & Beyond and online with the requirement that it fit behind our bedroom door and not cost a ridiculous amount of money for a shoe rack, we settled on this one from BB&B. It's expandable, so could maneuver into place and looked good. However, we quickly ran into an issue.
The bars are too far apart to hold the shoes! Our shoes were constantly falling down and just generally making it a pain to find the ones you wanted. (Besides the fact that looking at that mess every day was driving me crazy!) Heeled shoes were the worst - the heels wouldn't stand on the bars, and they'd just slip off every time.
I was just about to throw in the towel and buy a new shoe rack (one with solid boards!) when I thought to myself... can I do something to fix the shoe rack we already have? I took a close look at the bars and came up with an idea.
I would cut fabric strips, then Velcro them across each set of bars - our shoes would sit on the fabric! A was excited about the idea of spending less money to fix up the shoe rack instead of buying a new one, so he happily unwillingly politely sat through a trip to JoAnn to pick up the supplies.
I used:
- 1 yard of cheap fabric (didn't actually use all of it)
- Iron-on Velcro strips
- Scissors
- Measuring tape
How to fix your shoe rack (if yours is as annoying as ours was!):
1. Measure the distance between two opposing bars. (Ours is 8 inches wide.)
2. Cut the fabric into strips about 5 inches longer than the width of the bars. (8+5=13 inch wide fabric). We have three sets of bars, so I cut three strips.
3. Cut pieces of the iron-on Velcro for each strip. I used 3-inch pieces and spaced them out.
4. Iron on one row of Velcro (one of the two sides - scratchy or soft) on the end of the fabric.
5. Here's the only tricky part: Put the fabric on your shoe rack to find where to put the complementary Velcro strips (the soft side if you just ironed on the scratchy side). I wasn't very precise - you could measure. I just didn't.
6. Once you've done one side (one bar), repeat the process on the other side of the fabric strip. Then repeat the entire process on the other two strips.
7. Hook the fabric up to your shoe rack and you're done!
Look! My heels aren't falling! They just sit nicely in the fabric.
The fixed-up shoe rack is now much more visually appealing.
From the Saute Pan: Black Bean & Sweet Potato Soup
This soup doesn't look particularly appetizing, but it's delicious! Very warming and filling for a winter day.
Dish: Black Bean & Sweet Potato Soup
Eaten With: Salad
Ingredients: Onion, garlic, coriander, cumin, vegetable broth, black beans (canned), sweet potatoes
How to Make It:
1. Heat vegetable/olive oil over medium heat in a large pot. Add 1 chopped yellow onion and two tablespoons of minced garlic and cook until it starts to soften.
Dish: Black Bean & Sweet Potato Soup
Eaten With: Salad
Ingredients: Onion, garlic, coriander, cumin, vegetable broth, black beans (canned), sweet potatoes
How to Make It:
1. Heat vegetable/olive oil over medium heat in a large pot. Add 1 chopped yellow onion and two tablespoons of minced garlic and cook until it starts to soften.
2. Chop 2 sweet potatoes into small cubes.
3. Add about 1 tablespoon each of coriander and cumin, and 1 teaspoon of black pepper and stir until fragrant.
4. Add about 1 quart of vegetable broth, 2 cans of black beans and the sweet potatoes. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the sweet potatoes are tender.
5. Add in the black beans and simmer for about 2 minutes.
6. Reserve about 1 cup of the beans and potatoes and puree the rest of the soup. (We used our immersion blender.)
7. Return the reserved beans and potatoes to the soup. Serve with a dollop of sour cream and some chopped green onions.
It's Official...
I'm excited to announce that I've officially launched my photography venture!
It's daunting and I'm nervous, but I'm really hoping to work hard and make a name for myself in the photography world.
Visit my new website here: http://kerricohenphotography.com
You can also find me on Facebook - just search for "Kerri Cohen Photography".
It's daunting and I'm nervous, but I'm really hoping to work hard and make a name for myself in the photography world.
Visit my new website here: http://kerricohenphotography.com
You can also find me on Facebook - just search for "Kerri Cohen Photography".
Growing Plants in Water - Day 3
A's sister bought us an AeroGarden a while back. We grew a batch of flowers in it at one point (in the old apartment), but haven't used it since. (Mostly because the flowers didn't do well... A was very disappointed his green thumb didn't save them.)
Since it's winter and we don't have much sunlight, most of our plants haven't been doing well. I thought we'd give the AeroGarden another go. I planted some flower pods one night. The domes stay on until the seeds germinate.
Since it's winter and we don't have much sunlight, most of our plants haven't been doing well. I thought we'd give the AeroGarden another go. I planted some flower pods one night. The domes stay on until the seeds germinate.
The seeds germinated a lot faster than we thought - just two days later!
It's hard to see, but there's at least one bud in each pod! Very exciting.
Blizzard 2011
About two weeks ago we were caught in what the news stations called "Blizzard 2011". At 2:00PM, my client's office kicked us out because the weather was getting bad quickly. Then both A and I had Wednesday off - you couldn't see any of the buildings for all the snow coming down.
That afternoon it finally cleared up and we braved the outdoors. It was still pretty windy, but it was fun to see the piles of snow everywhere!
From the Saute Pan: Butternut Squash Soup
A and I love butternut squash. We first experimented with it in a risotto - delicious. We put it in stew, tagine, as pasta sauce, you name it, we can find a use for it. However, it's not the easiest vegetable to prepare. Peeling it is not fun. And even using the biggest knife we have, it's difficult to cut into manageable pieces.
This was our first attempt at using it in soup. I had an idea to chop up toasted nuts to make it "fancy". Don't let the tough squash skin deter you from trying it out!
Dish: Butternut Squash Soup
Eaten With: Salad
Main Ingredients: Butternut squash, chicken stock, almonds, walnuts
How to Make It:
1. Peel a butternut squash and cut it into cubes.
This was our first attempt at using it in soup. I had an idea to chop up toasted nuts to make it "fancy". Don't let the tough squash skin deter you from trying it out!
Dish: Butternut Squash Soup
Eaten With: Salad
Main Ingredients: Butternut squash, chicken stock, almonds, walnuts
How to Make It:
1. Peel a butternut squash and cut it into cubes.
Icicles The Size of People!
Last weekend A and I took a weekend away to the huge populous snowy city of South Bend, IN. I had a Hilton rewards certificate which was expiring soon (thank you, traveling project!), and we could not let it go to waste. We chose South Bend because it was close (about a two hours' drive), they had received multiple feet of snow and they have a park with outdoor winter activities.
One of A's med school friends graciously volunteered to watch Orion for us, so we dropped her off Saturday morning then headed out of town. About $10 in tolls, four chapters of neurology and two iPod playlists later, we arrived in South Bend. We were very impressed with the amount of snow on the ground (this was pre-2011 Blizzard!).
Our first mission: Find a local place for lunch. After seven minutes of driving around town, we decided we must have missed the city. Where were the restaurants? College kids? Hangouts? After consulting Yelp via cell phone, we settled on Nick's Patio, a 24-hour diner-type eatery. The small-town atmosphere was prevalent. A had the chili taco salad (very good), and I had a chicken wrap (pretty good).
Mission #1 completed, we made our way to St. Patrick's County Park. They advertised $10 cross-country ski rentals (including boots), and we were eager to try out a new activity. We weren't sure how difficult cross-country skiing was, so the night before this trip we looked up video tutorials on YouTube. It didn't look life-threatening, so we decided we'd give it a whirl. (Well, hopefully no whirling while on skis!)
The park was beautiful. We got fitted with skis and boots, then ran into our first hurdle. How do you get the boots into the skis? While we were struggling to figure it out, a park employee was kind enough to help us out. (He might have laughed a little, too.)
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