FoodNuts!

Archive for the ‘Dishes’ Category

Hey, its almost August. Time for a cool meal. I invented this salad years ago by looking at a pasta salad in a deli. I figured I could do it better and cheaper. It is a killer salad and I have lots of compliments over the years to prove it too. It is really delicious and is a full meal. Let me know how it works for you.

Perfect Pasta Salad

Corkscrew pasta, 1 ½ lg pkg, cooked and drained, (about 12 oz)
Sweet, spicy uncooked Italian sausage, 1 pkg or 5 sausages, casings removed,  fried and crumbled  into small pieces(may need oil in the pan first)
Ham strips (optional, amount to taste)
Cherry tomatoes, 1-2 cups
Marinated artichoke hearts, drained (2 lg jars)
Red Onion ½, chopped
Broccoli heads, 2-3 cups- bite sized pieces,  steamed only til crisp
Fresh basil coarsely chopped, amount to taste (try 1/2 cup)
Olives, drained, 1 can
Feta cheese, original or traditional, buy chunk but crumble, 1 pkg
Salt and Pepper to taste

Good Seasons packaged salad seasoning, Zesty or regular Italian,  2 packages

All these ingredient amounts can be adjusted to your own taste. Prepare the ingredients as directed, and mix all but the dressing in large salad bowl. Make both packages of dressing separately according to directions on package (I use white wine vinegar and corn or canola oil. Olive oil is too strong).
Toss salad with one made package of the dressing.  You might need to use a little of the second batch of the dressing if it seems too dry, though it should be lightly dressed.
Chill several hours to develop flavors,  tossing a couple times.

Serve salad in the bowl for guests to help themselves, and have the rest of the dressing on the side to drizzle over the top.

Serves 10-12 hearty eaters, and maybe more.

We have an old family favorite that we shared with The Foodnuts tonight, as we watched a couple of pent-up episodes of Top Chef : Masters.

One of the great things about this recipe is that it’s easy to create to take “on the road”, as our get-together was not at our place  tonight.

Crab Bruschetta:

1 large French bread
2 cups of chopped fresh spinach
2 teaspoons of chopped garlic
4 Romas, drawn and quartered (ok, diced is probably best, but I love the phrase)
2 cans of crab (we’re workin’ folks so it’s the canned for us)
Two to three cups of shredded low-fat mozzarella, depending on how “cheesy” you want this to be.

Combine the spinach, garlic, tomatoes, crab, and cheese in a bowl. Mix.

Quarter the French bread. Remove perhaps half of the “guts” of the bread. Dip this in olive oil and balsalmic vinegar whilst the baking goes on.

Spoon in the crab/tomato/etc. mixture into the bread until it’s gone; place the four quarters on a cookie sheet and place in a pre-heated 375 degree oven. Bake until the cheese is melted, but not beyond.

We served this with a nice salad and a couple of varieties of dry red wines; followed by chocolate.

It’s a nice light supper and goes well with a pairing of yelling at the Top Chef folks on the television.

Saturday night, we had a group of 17 folks heading for the Capitol Steps show at CalTech. This has become an annual ritual for the original FoodNuts. We decided to eat first, since the show was at 8:00 pm, and Terry made reservations for us at Cafe Santorini in Pasadena.

A few of us were a tad early to the restaurant, so we enjoyed a really good sangria. Not as good as my own, of course, but very good nonetheless.

The restaurant was lovely. The food was even lovelier.  The service was perfect; and the attention of the manager for our party was amazing. None of us, of course, brought cameras, so we had to make do with cell-phones.

For a starter, my wife and I shared their shrimp saltada, which was a plate of Black tiger shrimp baked with roasted potatoes and garlic Parmesan sauce over grilled French bread. I have to admit that the bread was a very pleasant surprise; this would have made a lovely entree rather than a starter.

Roz decided that she was more inclined to comfort for the show (and I agreed) if we ordered salads. She decided to try the lamb and spinach salad, which was amazing, and I had the Caesar with a perfectly cooked portion of salmon.

This left us with enough room for a dessert — chocolate mouse cake with a raspberry sauce that went perfect with espresso and Grand Marnier.

We’ll be back.

2-3 cups of cooked egg noodles

2-3 cups cut up cabbage

2-4 tbls butter

salt/pepper

Melt the butter in a skillet and add the cut up cabbage.  Sautee the cabbage on medium heat until it’s almost cooked and add the cooked egg noodles and mix together, adding salt and pepper to taste.  Cook until cabbage is done and egg noodles are heated through if using cold noodles.  A great side dish to go with any meat in a pinch.

I love Brussels sprouts, and I thought I would share one of my favorite recipes with the Food Nuts community. This easy and flavorful recipe is a great side or even as a quick meal in itself. Starting out with farm fresh Brussels sprouts is key. It could probably also be done with frozen, thawed Brussels, but I have never tried it.

In addition to the Brussels sprouts, I use the following ingredients.

Mezzetta roasted red peppers (about 4 large pieces, chopped)

1/2 red onion, chopped

1 cup Spanish red wine, I used a Monastrell

3 tsp agave nectar

1/2 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp sea salt

1 tsp fresh ground black pepper

2 tsp habanero oil

I combined all of the ingredients except for the Brussels sprouts and brought them up to a boil, then lowered to a simmer until the onions had softened substantially. Then I placed each sprout face down into the bubbling wine mixture, which smelled amazing, by the way!

Isn’t this festive looking?! I let everything simmer together, uncovered, until the sprouts were soft enough for me. Leaving it uncovered also helped the wine mixture to reduce to an almost syrupy, sweet and spicy glaze.

If you enjoy this recipe, please visit my blog, http://traveleatlove.com for more food and wine goodness!