Guilt me into blogging...

So, I am talking with my mother last night and she starts teasing me about how I have not posted since January 6th. Sheesh. One problem with following a budget is, it's most economical to make one or two large dishes for the week. So that's what I've been doing. This week was Dry Curry, because it sounded good, and Swedish Meatballs, because I needed some comfort food. Dry Curry isn't a very appetizing name, but it's a very delicious meal. Swedish Meatballs have a very bad reputation, but when made properly are delicious, not grease ridden blobs. Let's hope the family does not attempt to remove my heart for sharing the recipe for one of our family favorites.

Dry Curry

1 tbsp oil
2 to 3 medium onions, finely chopped
5 to 6 carrots, peeled and finely diced
5 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 tofu blocks (soft)
3 cans tuna, drained
5 to 7 curry roux blocks
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 c cilantro, chopped

Heat a large skillet over medium high heat, then add oil.
Once oil is hot, add the onions, carrots, and garlic.
Cook until onions start to get soft.
Add tofu, breaking it up with the back of a spoon, and tuna.
Make sure that the tofu and tuna are chopped up and evenly distributed in the pan.
Add curry blocks and cook, stirring often, until curry blocks melt and blend into the dish.
Taste. If more curry is needed, add them and allow them to melt.
Add salt and pepper and stir in the cilantro.
Serve over hot rice.


Swedish Meatballs
1 lb ground turkey or beef (I use turkey because I like lighter meatballs)
1 stack of saltine crackers, crushed
1 egg
dash of milk
1 small onion, finely chopped
salt and pepper
about 1/2 a nutmeg, ground

Place all ingredients in a bowl and mix together well with your hands.
If using turkey, add 1 tbsp of oil to a large skillet. Do not turn on the heat.
Shape meat mixture into balls smaller than a golf ball, but larger than a ping pong ball.
As each ball is shaped, place in the center of the oil, then slide to the edge of the pan.
Once the pan is full (which may be before all the balls are shaped), turn heat to medium-high.
As soon as the meatballs start to brown, turn the heat down to medium and start turning. The goal is to brown all sides.
As the meatballs shrink, add more to the pan and brown.
Once all meatballs are browned, spread evenly in the pan.
Add about 1/2 c of water to the pan and cover. Turn heat down to low and let meatballs steam until centers are no longer pink.

Mushroom Pizza

Sunset from my back window

My friend came over yesterday for an evening of cooking and knitting. The food was good (a Thai curry), but would have been better if I had remember correctly and told her to buy the fish sauce. I guess I didn't have any in the house after all... but the dish didn't suffer too much from the absence of the fish sauce, so all was well. The recipe called for shitake mushrooms, stems removed. Instead of letting those stems go to waste, we saved them and tonight I made a mushroom pizza. I heated my pan and then added my oil and let it heat up as well. That way, the shitake mushroom stems didn't absorb too much oil, but did give the oil a strong mushroom flavor. I added to that garlic and rosemary. Once the garlic was starting to brown, I removed the mushroom stems, garlic and rosemary. I then turned down the heat and once the oil had cooled a bit, I added about one cup of chopped portabella mushroom. This I cooked slowly, allowing the mushrooms to wilt and absorb the flavored oil. Once it had cooked a while, I added some flour and then some milk. I combined the sauce with sharp cheddar cheese to top the pizza. I was very pleased with the results. I hope you enjoy it too.

Mushroom Pizza

pizza crust (see Rockin' Homemade Pizza)
1/4 c olive oil
stems from 5 oz of fresh shitake mushrooms, trimmed and sliced lengthwise
3 large cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
1/2 tsp dried rosemary
1 large portabella mushroom, chopped fine (yields approximately one cup)
1 tbsp flour
salt and pepper to taste
3 oz milk
1 c shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 500 degrees.
Heat a 2 quart sauce pan over medium high heat.
Once the pan is hot, add the olive oil.
Once oil is bubbling, add the shitake mushrooms and cook, stirring, until slightly browned.
Add garlic and rosemary and cook until the garlic just turns golden brown.
With a slotted spoon, remove the mushroom stems, garlic and rosemary.
Turn down heat to medium low and add the portabella mushrooms.
Allow the mushrooms to cook slowly for 5 to 10 minutes, until wilted and only a little oil is still visible in the pan.
Add the flour, salt and pepper and cook for one minute.
Slowly stir in the milk.
Once the mixture is smooth (except for the mushroom pieces), remove from heat.
Prepare your pizza crust and prebake for 4 to 5 minutes.
Remove the pizza crust from the oven and spread evenly with the mushroom sauce and cheese.
Bake another 8 to 10 minutes, or until bubbly and golden.
Remove from oven, slide from the pan onto a cutting board; cut and serve.


Someone got a haircut...

Alternate Doctored Up Tomato Soup

Still feeling ill and still needing to go grocery shopping, I had tomato soup again tonight. I remembered a good recipe for homemade tomato soup in my Cooking From Quilt Country cookbook, so I found it again and used it to make my canned tomato soup a little more tasty. While the garlic powder was good, this version makes a more complexly flavored soup. I simply added 1/4 tsp black pepper, 1 whole clove, a couple dashes of cinnamon, a pinch of allspice, and a couple dashes of Tabasco sauce. It's amazing how well the spices blend with the tomato. Of course, I also make this with milk. No watery tomato soup for me. I'll settle on something like that when I'm a starving and struggling actress in New York City; at which point I will enter my local, shabby diner and order a mug of hot water into which I will pour a healthy amount of ketchup. But until that day, milk in my condensed tomato soup from a can.

Feeling Sick Doctored Up Tomato Soup

I don't get colds easily, so when I started feeling a cold coming on yesterday surprised me, since I just got rid of some lingering nasal congestion over the weekend. Tonight I'm totally wiped out and have very little in the house (must grocery shop tomorrow...). For a quick dinner, I made Tomato Soup, which I just recently discovered other people don't necessarily make with milk. Who knew?! We (as in my family) have always made it with milk. It's creamy, warm, and delicious. Tonight, besides my typical healthy dose of ground black pepper, I added a small dash of garlic powder. Yummy and soothing. I'll have to do that one again.