Chicken Marinara Sandwiches

This is my husband's favorite food. Out of everything I cook, out of every restaurant he's ever eaten at, this is his favorite thing. The only reason we ever eat anything else is because I won't eat these every day. We go to restaurants for me, he'd rather be at home eating a Chicken Marinara Sandwich. He doesn't even like any other one, he thinks mine is best.

Now, this isn't some majorly organic dish or anything. In fact, I don't even have a decent bread for it. I usually use french sandwich rolls. So I apologize that this is such a bachelor food, but I had to share it with you all.

Turn on the oven at 350. Then start with your chicken breasts. Put them on a grill if you have one, or fry them in a pan. I always loved doing it on the Foreman before it died.

While they're grilling/frying, get a dish/bowl/ramekin and some tomato sauce and regular dried spices. I'm all about making your own from scratch, but this recipe is perfect the way it is, with the "canned" guilt not being worth the taste.

Add in Italian Seasoning, garlic powder, a pinch of cumin and one of coriander, some kind of meat seasoning, oregano, and sprinkle a little white sugar on top. Taste it. It should taste like quintessential marinara, and if it's not, add a little more garlic and maybe a splash of a dark thin sauce like Worcestershire or Maggi Seasoning. If you want to cheat, you could buy the plain cheap canned basic spaghetti sauce, but I've never found one that tasted quite "normal". Non-descript. It needs to be a really simple sauce.

Add a bit to the chicken that's still cooking. Don't drown it, just add a little to cook in. Once your chicken is cooked (and you can keep it a tiny underdone, since it's going in the oven as well, and that way it doesn't dry out).....

Lay out the bread on your cookie sheet. Spoon a thin layer of sauce on the "bottom" half of your bread. Place the chicken breast on top, pour marinara on top. Again, you don't want to drown it, but you do want to cover the majority of the top and let a little run over the sides. Sprinkle some shredded cheese on top (a colby jack kind of mix of your choosing, buy a block and shred it or buy shredded, it doesn't make a difference). With the top slice, spread a little butter on top and sprinkle some Italian Seasoning and garlic salt on top, but don't put it on the rest of the sandwich.

Put it in the oven, and cook it for about 10 minutes, just long enough for the cheese to melt.

Pull them out, and as quickly as possible, put the top slice on the sandwich and serve!

Calories: 742

Fat: 32.0

Carbs: 47.9

Protein: 62.2

 Weight Watchers Plus points: 19

Thanksgiving Dinner!

I'm not very "traditional" about Thanksgiving. Since I focus so much on old-world style cooking, I'm not a big fan of most foods served on Thanksgiving. Jellied cranberry sauce seems strange, and green bean casserole is not exactly my favorite thing to eat. I've always thought ham on Thanksgiving was weird, too. Additionally, my husband doesn't like turkey, cranberry sauce, potato salad, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie, or most any of the other traditional Thanksgiving dishes.

So even though it was a little unusual to most, I made a Thanksgiving dinner that was much more suited to what we like.

Of course, we started out with a walk around the neighborhood. We know more than a few people around, so it was only a matter of time before we bumped into someone. We got invited by one of my husband's fighting buddies that was driving by to the orphan dinner that one of the old pirates does every year. I loved the walk, and greatly recommend that even if you don't live in a neighborhood with friendly parks, you find one to go to on Thanksgiving. It seems the early part of the day draws people out even just to walk their dogs or walk around the park. We passed many happy spirits to wish a happy Thanksgiving to, and we think it will be a tradition for us from now on. There were also many beautiful photo opportunities.

So on to the menu.

Chicken with Orange Sauce
Apple Orange Cranberry Sauce
Cinnamon Pumpkin Bites
Roasted Cheesy Potatoes
Chicken Gravy
Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Pie


Chicken with Orange Sauce


This was a slow cooker recipe. I'm not a major fan of the skin of the chicken, and was happy to sacrifice it for the tenderness of making the chicken in the slow cooker.

For the most part, this is a common sense recipe. Get a whole chicken that will fit in your slow cooker. Surround it in 2 cups of water (or chicken broth if you need the extra flavor), and add some rosemary and basil to the water. Cover it and turn on to high, and cook for about an hour. Take the lid off and add in a couple of garlic cloves, and turn it to low. In my kitchen, this is when the rest of cooking starts. Once it's time to start setting the table and the chicken has been carved, take half of an orange and squeeze out the juice into a cup, mix with about a teaspoon of sugar, and drizzle it over the chicken right before serving. Surprisingly, the gravy didn't clash!

Apple Orange Cranberry Sauce


I have always battled with cranberry sauce. I want to like it. But jellied is, well, unnatural canned stuff, and the  stuff with cranberries has hard skins and is always too bitter. So I didn't plan on making a cranberry sauce. I really didn't know what I was doing. I just started boiling about 2 cups of water and 3/4 cup of sugar, stirred it together, and then added cranberries. I was considering a cobbler or a tart.

Once the cranberries started popping and the water started turning red, I considered just draining the cranberries out and having my husband pick up some rum while he was out for a festive drink to go with dinner. This was a pretty appealing and wonderfully smelling situation already.

However, I wasn't sure how much food I was going to have, so I poked around in the fridge. I found an apple that hadn't been eaten yet, so I chopped that up to about the size of the cranberries and added it.

Then. I found the orange I had to go with the chicken, and realized I only needed half - so I cut half off, and peeled it, then took apart the pulp to put in with the cranberries.

Out of curiosity, I mashed a couple cranberries to see how soft they were, and they mashed perfectly. After more mashing, I had a sauce. So I added about 1/4 cup brown sugar, about a teaspoon of cinnamon, and half a teaspoon of nutmeg, pulled it off of heat, and put it into the fridge to chill.

It went wonderfully. Though my husband wasn't about to get seconds of it, he ate a couple of spoonfuls. I loved it. The skins weren't a problem at all, and the autumn flavor it had was so fresh. I wish I had someone to credit with a recipe, as I'm sure due to its simplicity I'm not the first to ever do this. Also, it was so good and entirely by accident that I feel strange taking credit for it.




Cinnamon Pumpkin Bites


I decided I'd do this at Halloween, when I made cinnamon apples. For fall, I'd bought a few tiny pumpkins to decorate windowsills and the fireplace mantle. I figured they'd at some point turn into this if they started getting soft, but they survived until now, so I went ahead and made them for Thanksgiving.

I used two of the tiny pumpkins, and it was enough for 4 adults and a toddler, so you could make more if you need to. The process and amounts wouldn't change much.

Cut each pumpkin in half and clean it. Chop the pumpkin into bite size pieces. It's okay to leave the skin on for now. Put the bites into a frying pan with about a tablespoon of butter, 1/4 cup of brown sugar, a teaspoon of cinnamon, and a dash of nutmeg.

Put the heat on higher at first to get the butter melted, then turn it down to medium low and slowly toss them. After a while, the sauce will start to caramelize.

When it does this, remove the bites from heat and remove the skins if you're going to. You can leave the skins on and eat them, as well. You'll need to keep cooking them awhile, until the bites start to brown and go softer in the middle.

This came out so tender and flavorful. It might not necessarily be the healthiest item on any menu, but it was fantastic to have just a few bites of, and went quickly.


Roasted Cheesy Potatoes


Again, not the healthiest menu item, but another easy sensible recipe.

Wash and chop potatoes into bite sized pieces. However many you want, this one's not an exact science by any means. Sprinkle with whatever herbs you'd like. Since I was doing rosemary in the chicken, I just went for oregano and pepper on the potatoes. Bake them for about 15-20 minutes at 350. Pull them out and sprinkle whatever shredded cheese you like on top.

Sorry for a lack of picture, I make these so frequently I didn't even think of it, and I'm sure you can get the idea from the picture of the whole dinner that includes them.


Chicken Gravy


While the chicken is cooking at some point, get in with a baster and snag about two tablespoons worth of broth and meat drippings and put them in a saucepan. Sift in about 1/4 cup of flour slowly and stir in while the pot is on medium low, until it turns into a gravy. Add salt and pepper to taste. In my case, I added more meat drippings as well, because the flavor was closer to flour than meat gravy. This was a wonderful gravy for pouring over the chicken and potatoes, and was incredibly easy. Of course, if you're doing mashed potatoes or having more people, you'd probably want to double your proportions.

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Pie

For the most part, I just followed the Libby's recipe. I had never made a pumpkin pie, so I wanted to play it safe and go with easier canned recipes. Next year, I'll try it from puree. 

Here's the original:


3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 large eggs
1 can (15 oz.) LIBBY'S® 100% Pure Pumpkin
1 can (12 fl. oz.) NESTLÉ® CARNATION® Evaporated Milk
1 unbaked 9-inch (4-cup volume) deep-dish pie shell

MIX sugar, cinnamon, salt, ginger and cloves in small bowl. Beat eggs in large bowl. Stir in pumpkin and sugar-spice mixture. Gradually stir in evaporated milk.

POUR into pie shell.

BAKE in preheated 425° F oven for 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350° F; bake for 40 to 50 minutes or until knife inserted near center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack for 2 hours. Serve immediately or refrigerate. Top with whipped cream before serving. 

(Source: http://www.verybestbaking.com/recipes/18470/LIBBYS-Famous-Pumpkin-Pie/detail.aspx)

For mine, I left out the clove because I don't like clove. Also, on suggestion from a comment, I split the sugar between white and brown. Also, part of baking in my kitchen is messing up, so I put all of the dry ingredients in, cracked one egg into the side of the bowl, then read that I'm supposed to beat the eggs first. So I cracked the second egg on top of the first and lightly beat them while trying to not mixing the dry ingredients in. 

Then I mixed the rest altogether, and gradually added the evaporated milk. 

I poured it into a graham cracker crust I'd bought. I would have made my own, and will in the future, but I found myself a little short on time and available cash to buy food supplies with. I'm glad I did it the way I did, because it came out wonderful. 

I put it in the oven at 425 for a while. When it was time to turn it down to 350, I dropped some chocolate chips in.

 At 40 minutes at 350, I dropped more chocolate chips on top to melt. I let it bake another 10 minutes, then took it out to cool.  

This pie came out so light that it wasn't offensive if you're already full of Thanksgiving food. It was also incredibly tasty! My husband ate two slices and kept telling me how delicious it was. I'm happy to find a pumpkin pie that pleases the critics!

So there it is, a different take on Thanksgiving. I was thankful to have my husband and my son to eat with me, and I was very thankful to be able to feed a friend of ours that wouldn't have otherwise had a Thanksgiving to go to. We were blessed to have Thanksgiving dinners offered to us that we had to turn down. It was definitely a day for remembering the things that are really worth appreciating - the things that we may daily forget because we're busy appreciating the jobs, the money, and the tangible things we have. Thanksgiving this year was for remembering that even without those things, we'd still find a reason to smile every day.

I hope your families had a wonderful and fulfilling holiday meal together!

Impromptu Dinner!

Tonight, I got off of work and tagged out my husband as he left to go out with a friend. As soon as my husband left, the kiddo started telling me he was hungry. I myself had been anxious to get home for something to eat. However, we do our shopping on the weekends and don't have many meal options left. I dug around the fridge for last bits of things and came up with this wonderful concoction I just had to share!

I sliced up some leftover carrots and mushrooms, chopped up the rest of an orange bell pepper I had, and threw in the last serving of shrimp. I added in some minced garlic, but it seemed still a little bland and colorless. I told the kiddo, "we need something green", and we found some basil together. He "helped" me tear up the basil (as in, he held the basil leaves for me and managed to not lick them), and that was just what it needed.

We really enjoyed it, and though it's not a proper recipe by any means, it just goes to show what you can do when you think there's nothing left to eat in the house!

I'm Still Cooking!

Life has been very busy the last week! I decided to change careers, and, well, I don't like doing anything with half energy, so I busted my butt for a couple days looking for interesting jobs and discerning which I would like, and found one I wanted. Then, I've been enjoying some time with my family "between jobs" while I had the time off. Now, I have training tomorrow and Friday and officially start on Monday. Naturally, I've been cooking lots of interesting things, not getting pictures or posting them. I promise, that'll resume as things level out!

I got a brand new shiny slow cooker, so I'll be looking up some recipes and sharing those here. We tried it out last night with some leftover chicken my mom brought over. She has a neighbor that brings her yummy homemade food that she wouldn't have the energy to make herself. The other day, she brought her a whole chicken! So my mom brought it here. I put it in the new slow cooker to try it out, and threw in some veggies and chicken broth, and let it sit a couple of hours on low. It came out so tasty, and the meat was falling off of the bone. I'm very excited to get used to this! Especially as I continue to try new foods from the co-op and farmer's market, like these kiwi berries we picked up when we went on a celebration trip.

As for today, I've no idea what's for dinner yet, but for breakfast, we're having breakfast sandwiches - bacon and eggs on a gluten-free green chile cheese bread. Yum!

I hope you all are having wonderful adventures in cooking.

Happy Halloween!

I know I'm a day late here, but we had, and are having, quite the celebration. Like last time, I wish I had some pictures, but I was just so busy I didn't have time. However, I want to share the experience and some of what I made.

When we woke up, I made a simple breakfast of green eggs and ham. My husband and I weren't hungry, so we made something funny for the little one. Once we'd gotten picked up and set up decorations, I got the appetizers going:

Rotten Eggs - deviled eggs with dye
Place a dozen eggs in a pot with cool water, enough to cover the tops.
Boil the eggs until the bottom end floats to the top, and then a couple minutes longer.
Remove the pan from heat, and after a minute or two, begin cooling the eggs. Drain the water and fill the pot with cool water. Repeat, again and again, until they're cool. You can speed this up by rolling the eggs in the water every time you drain them and replace with new cool water.
Drain most of the water, leaving just a small coating on the bottom of the pan.
Crack the eggs, not entirely like you're scrambling them, but enough to put cracks in the shell. "Crunch" them up in your hand a bit, so that there are cracks all around the egg.
Add 4-5 drops of blue/green dye to the water. Let the eggs sit for 10-15 minutes, rolling them around occasionally.
The eggs will dye along the cracks, making them look gruesome!

Peel the eggs. By the way, this is easier if you use eggs that aren't brand new.
Slice the eggs in half longways and pop the yolks into a dish.
Mash the yolks with a fork.
Add 3 tbsp mayonnaise, 1 tbsp mustard, 2-3 tbsp relish (to taste), and about a teaspoon of sugar, plus 2-3 drops of green and 1 drop of red dye, and mix. You can add more of anything if you don't like the taste of it.
Scoop the mixture into the eggs and serve, topped with a little paprika, or a spider...

Puking Pumpkin - Carved pumpkin with avocado salsa
Carve a pumpkin, but put the mouth low and large. Name him or her affectionately and set your new poor friend on one end of a platter.
Chop up an avocado, a yellow onion, 2-3 green onions, a Roma tomato, 2-4 jalapenos (depending on size), and mince a clove of garlic. Squeeze in some citrus fruit if you have any. Mix it all together, and pour the salsa into the pumpkin, letting the salsa come out of the pumpkin's mouth.


Once the appetizers were out, all I had to do once people arrived was set out sandwiches and 2 liter bottles of soda. I got a pumpkin-shaped cookie cutter and cut the bread, meat, and cheese slices into pumpkin shapes and set on a plate.

Then, it was time to make dinner and the desserts. You see, I didn't want to miss the whole party for slaving in the kitchen. So, here's the basics, and I'll tell you how I did it.

Monster Heads - Stuffed bell peppers
Boil rice, fry sausage, mix together with chopped tomato, oregano, and basil. Cut the tops off of bell peppers and remove the seeds. Put the mixture in, top with cheese for "hair", and bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

Witch's Brew
Scoop lime sherbet into a bowl in small scoops. Pour in 7 Up slowly. It froths up cool-lookin'. Just be careful, you will get a brain freeze!

Chocolate Graves 
Chocolate pudding in little cups, topped with Oreo "grave dirt" and cookie "tombstones"


In order to get all of this done as efficiently as possible and put it all on the table at once, I'll share the order I did it in. This is something I really care about, having nothing cold while the rest of dinner is still cooking, and having dessert chilling while dinner is being eaten.

Cut Milano cookies in half so you have little "gravestones" and write on them with decorator's icing, "RIP" or initials. Set in the fridge so they'll keep. Start the water boiling for rice. 2-3 cups of rice works for about 6 large bell peppers. Cut the tops off of the bell peppers, remove the seeds, and set in a baking dish. If your dish is too large for the peppers, instead of trying to squeeze them in, use the large pan. Just make an artificial "pan" of tin foil that's the size of your peppers. It'll hold them up. Once you're done removing the seeds, your water should be boiling. Add your rice and turn the heat down to medium and cover.

Get chocolate pudding mix, mix with milk, and beat for about 2 minutes. Set in the fridge to cool for a minute. Remove filling from cookies and crumble them into a dish. Fry up 1 lb of sausage and chop a tomato while it's frying, and preheat the oven to 350. The rice should be done about now. Add rice, sausage, and tomato together and fill the bell peppers. Top with shredded cheese "hair" and put them in the oven.

Get out little cups and scoop the pudding into them, put cookie crumbles on top and any cute candies you have (I had little fall leaf sprinkles), and stick a Milano cookie grave in each. Put them in the fridge. Scoop your sherbet into the bowl you're going to serve Witch's Brew in and pour the soda on top. Take the Monster Heads out of the oven, and carve little eyes and mouths. You can just push them into the peppers to not waste food. Put them on a serving platter, and move the Monster Heads and Witch's Brew to the table. When everyone's done eating, the pudding graves will be chilled and ready for dessert.

Today, since our celebration's still going, I "fried" apples in butter, cinnamon, a pinch of nutmeg, and when they were soft melted caramel on top. I'm also on my way to make a cottage pie. Tomorrow I'm going to roast some red potatoes and onions in balsamic and olive oil with some rosemary, and I'm baking a pumpkin pie.

I hope you all had a fantastic Halloween.

Chicken Roast!

I apologize that there are no pictures for this, but it came out so fantastic, I just had to share the recipe with you! We had a friend visiting, and I was in the middle of a long work day. I'd stopped to call my mom, and she mentioned making a stew, which gave me an idea.

Preheat the oven to 350. Ah, the magic 350 that cooks many things just perfectly.

Put a few pieces of chicken in a baking dish (according to how many people you're feeding, and you can decide if it's breasts, thighs, drumsticks). This is going to be like a pot roast, so make sure the dish will leave you plenty of room for veggies. In my case, I did 4 thighs in a 4-qt Pyrex baking dish.

Chop up as many potatoes as there are pieces of chicken (preferably red) into quarters (or rather, however you can best get big bites like a stew or pot roast). Toss them around the chicken. Do the same with some white onion, though you don't need much (about 1/2 a cup will make enough for the whole pan), and about half of a green bell pepper. Slice a large clove of garlic and decorate the chicken with the "chips".

Douse the lot in about a up of chicken broth. Tear up fresh rosemary and sprinkle all over the place. You'll use about 3 tablespoons of it for 4 pieces of chicken. If you only have dried rosemary that's okay too, but the fresh rosemary is so aromatic. Sprinkle about 1 tbsp pepper and a tiny pinch of coriander on top of everything.

Cover it with foil, put it in the oven, and I dare you to try and focus on anything else for the next 40 minutes because it smells amazing as soon as it starts warming! Pull the foil off at 40 minutes, and to the frustration of hungry people that can smell it, give the chicken about another 10-15, until it starts browning on top. You probably won't need that step if you're using thin breasts.

Pull out and serve piping hot. Don't be afraid of the garlic slices, they're incredibly tasty!

...I wanted to get a picture at least of the finished product, but our tummies would wait no longer! I'll make it again soon and add pictures to this.

371 calories
11.7g fat
44.9g carbs
21.5g protein

Weight Watchers value: 8 (either system, and assuming a chicken thigh. It'll change based on what chicken you use)

Shrimp Alfredo

I've been so scared to make my own alfredo. I was inspired by my fantastic mother in law, because I've never had an alfredo like hers. It's amazing.

Anyway, I can't put it off any longer. I'm only cooking for me, so I'm making some shrimp alfredo! You don't have to do shrimp. Chicken or steak would surely work just fine.

Now, recipe is a funny word. There's not really one for me to work off of. My mother in law doesn't have her recipe, but gave me some concepts to work with. We'll see how this goes!

First, boil the noodles and get that part out of the way. Of course, since these are fettucine noodles, they stick together. You can eliminate most, if not all, with olive oil and diligence.

While those are going, go ahead and cook your shrimp in advance. I'm sprinkling them with pepper and garlic.

Drain the noodles when they're al dente, and give them a toss to separate any still stuck.

Now for the fun part! You need about a cup of butter (which is 2 sticks-ish),

and a pint of heavy cream. I was incredibly delighted to find that my local co-op has organic heavy cream! Put them together in the pan you did the shrimp/chicken/steak in to keep those flavors, and put the pan on low until the butter's melted.

You'll also want to toss the noodles once in a while. I'm finding that they try to re-stick together.

Once it's all melted, sprinkle in a bit of spices. The basic salt, pepper, and some garlic powder. This is to taste, I did a teaspoon of salt, about a tablespoon of pepper, and about a tablespoon of garlic powder.

Then the cheese begins! I got this wonderful jar of romano-parmesan blend while I was at the store for some basics. You can get romano and parmesan however you want, but it comes out to about 6 oz. combined. Sprinkle the cheese in slowly as you stir, and turn the stove up to medium.

As soon as all of the cheese has melted in, it's time to pour it into the noodles! I also added in a bit more pepper and some Italian Seasoning here at the last minute.

After stirring it up a bit, add some additional parmesan. I got this from the co-op, but any parmesan would do, even the dried stuff if you want. It's about 2 average handfuls that you add in at this point, and then stir it in. This gives it a different texture than just slimy creamy noodles. Some people like that, but I was sold on the different texture when my mother in law made it for us.

Then it's time to serve up!

For the dreaded health facts....
If you're eating alfredo, I'd hope you understand that it's not "low" anything. It's an indulgence, and we all deserve a guiltless indulgence from time to time.
But if you must, we'll assume a cup of noodles and 1/4 cup of sauce, and assuming shrimp.
750 calories, 69g fat, 21.9 carbs, 12.2g protein.
WW Points Plus: 21

So alfredo's not a diet food. Who knew?! At least you can keep track, and that's best.
It's worth it. So yummy. Of course, I ate my one bowl (that I shared with my husband) and the rest got put away. It's going to take me days to go through all of that! I hope you have more people to share it with than I do!

Semi-Homemade Marinara

I love making any kind of pasta with marinara. I'd make it every day if my husband wouldn't gag. He only wants spaghetti once every few weeks, at best. However, if I wait and only do it once a month or so, he gets excited. He has a fold-out chair in the kitchen watching me make this. Of course, if you're watching your waistline, you should wait until a day where you've otherwise consumed fewer calories/points, 'cause it's not the lightest meal you'll ever eat.

First, get a couple of tomatoes. I like the beefsteak tomatoes you can get at the store in a 3-pack, like this. They're really sweet, and big enough to be used for large quantities of food.

Chop them up and throw them in a pan. Tear up some dill and rosemary to cook in with the tomatoes. You'll want to start it out on low and work it up to medium. This takes a while, so be prepared. To blow some time, you could do what I do and chop up the third tomato, put it in a bowl with a little sugar, and get a spoon! It's one of my favorite breakfasts.

Eventually, the tomatoes start falling apart a bit and giving you a glossy mush.

Looks less than tasty, right?! We all know that's going to be a yummy sauce though, so we'll deal with it. Go ahead and brown some ground beef and chop and add any other veggies you'd like in with the beef. We've been very veggie-heavy, so I'm giving the boys a day off from it. Just the 'maters.

Once they've simmered a bit and are this pile of mush, it's time to throw in a can of tomato sauce. The cheap stuff works just fine, just make sure it's not salted.

Throw in some spices. I'd usually be chopping garlic right now, but I forgot that I'd used my entire bulb on the garlic beef. *Sigh* So I have to use garlic powder. Here's the rest of my spice army.

You want about a tablespoon of garlic (or one minced clove), a tsp of each tarragon and cilantro, and about 1/2 a tsp of cumin and coriander seed. For pepper, use what you like. We like pepper here, and we use about a tablespoon.

Add the meat. Now, you're off the hook for a while while this turns into a wonderful spaghetti sauce. Keep it between low and medium.

Once it's smelling and looking attractive to you, turn it way low and cover it, and start a pot of water boiling.

Add noodles of your choosing. We're doing penne tonight, because I love the Barilla penne for this dish.

 Add about a tablespoon of a good extra virgin olive oil. The Star Special Reserve is my favorite, because I like the Omega 3 DHA. It's not too expensive, and the flavor is fantastic. Stir it in gently so that the noodles get a little coating and don't stick together.

Give your sauce a stir and make sure it's not scalding. You can also do like my husband does with the noodles and add some various spices to them, but I don't like over-spiced food, so I keep it more natural.

Once the noodles are boiled however you like, drain them and serve up!

...And if you have kids, get good pictures of spaghetti faces. :)

I love pasta face - even though if it weren't for feeding him, there'd be cabernet in that sauce.

Now, the health facts. 

Assuming a 1/2 cup serving of pasta and 1/4th of the sauce, so we're probably over-shooting, just to be safe...

472 calories, 23.9 grams of fat, 28.8 carbs, and 33.6 grams of protein. 

WW PP: 12

I hope you like it, and let me know how it goes!

Italian Garlic Beef

Oh goodness, how exciting to finally be starting this blog!

One of my hobbies is medieval reenactment. I love the food from the era. It's so fresh and simple. There are so many flavors, and they come without loads of spices.

The epitome of this simple, natural flavor is in the recipe I'm making tonight, and I can't wait for you to enjoy it. My husband is fighting in a big tournament tomorrow, one where the best of the best goes up against everyone hoping to take his title, and he isn't allowed to win. The thing is, the one who currently holds the title gets a huge advantage, so he basically gets to choose who wins. Rumors have been going around and he's been hinting that it'll be my husband. Though this is merely a game to most, I'm extremely excited.

So, on to the food!

I offered to cook for the group and wanted to choose something that would be easy to make a LOT of, since it needs to feed 8-10 big fighters. I'm splitting it into two batches, so you'll only see the first.

For this dish, you need a lot of beef. The original 15th century Italian recipe calls for tenderloin, which does work out pretty good, but I usually use Eye of Round steaks. You can get a lot of it pretty inexpensively at just about any grocer. They come in big packages with 2 lbs, like this:

If they don't come in that large of packages, just get 2 lbs worth of eye of round steaks or any other simple and inexpensive steak you want. We've also tried this with pork and chicken, and while they were good, it wasn't quite the same. Now, you can trim the fat off if you like. I usually remove at least the bigger chunks.

You'll also need some sherry. You can get cooking sherry at the grocery store for about $2-3. While I usually prefer to keep a proper bottle for each type of wine I use, I use so much sherry that it would be ridiculous. This stuff works out fine.

You'll also need about a tablespoon of butter, a bulb of garlic, and a pinch of salt.

First, you need to peel the cloves of garlic. Leave them whole. You do want to do this before you get your meat cut so that the garlic has time to release its flavor.

Chop the beef into bite-size pieces, about an inch wide and across. It will take a little longer to cook, which is good, and I'll get to why later... You don't have to worry about the shape. This meat can be weird to cut and there's no need to waste - unless you're showing off :)

What a pile of meat!

Now, you may want to take this opportunity to tie your hair back if you have enough to, go to the bathroom, and prepare a glass of wine or a fresh juice for your cooking, because you won't get any more downtime until it's done.

When you're ready, melt butter in the pan with the garlic.

Once the butter's melted, turn the pan down to medium, and throw in the meat!

While this is cooking, if you want something to eat it with, our favorite thing to do is to slice up bell peppers and fry them with a little olive oil while this is going. I'd also like to suggest a french bread or biscuits - something to sop up all the juices you'll have! This is a medieval dish, after all. Since I'm preparing this for a lunch tomorrow, I'm not doing that now, but they're fantastic complements.

Now to why you want the meat to take a while to cook... The garlic cloves. If you give these time to absorb all the juices and flavors of the meat, they're wonderful to eat by themselves, whole. I never would have considered it before this recipe, but they turn out so soft and all of the intensity that makes them unpalatable is cooked right out. It's one of my favorite things to eat now!

You want to cook the meat until it's actually frying and starting to get brown markings, when most of the liquid has boiled down. You may see a lot of liquid when it looks like the meat is done, but don't panic! All that liquid just has to boil out more, so it condenses into the meat and garlic.

That steam looks delicious! But do you see how much liquid is still there? That's okay.

Once you've got the liquid condensed, it'll look almost thick and syrupy, like this horribly blurry representation.

That's when it's finally done!

Pull the meat off, sprinkle it with salt right away, and deglaze the pan with some sherry. If you don't know, deglaze just means to pull up all of the drippings and bits of meat still remaining. You can use any liquid to deglaze, but this recipe calls for sherry!

See that box in the corner of the shot? That's because we're still unpacking. It's hard to do when we don't have our garage key! I'll stop yelling at my new landlord in my head now... ooh, and see that splatter on the stove? Every time I make this dish, a piece of meat inevitably escapes. It's terrible. That's why the cat hangs out and "helps me cook".

Here's your deglaze...

Once that's stirred up well, pour it over the meat in almost gluttonous joy.

Then get your fork and enjoy!

Now, for the nutritional facts for those maintaining lovely figures (and don't try to say it's not, you're beautiful!)

Assuming you eat a quarter lb of the beef with a clove of garlic to yourself, it's 258 calories total. 12.8 grams of fat, 1g carbs, 32.1 grams of protein.

If you add about half a cup of bell peppers, that changes to 351 calories, 21.7 grams of fat, 5.6 grams of carbs, and 32.8 grams of protein. 

For those on Weight Watchers, the Points Plus value is 6.

Well, I sure hope you like it, and I hope you come back for more! Feel free to leave me a 'morsel' to let me know how it went for you!