Seafood Ravioli

I am really into making the soaked whole wheat macaroni lately.  It does take a little time (more than opening a box, that’s for sure!) but it isn’t hard.  I have to get better at the texture, though.  Sometimes it is too doughy, sometimes it is too soft.  I am having trouble getting it al dente, which is how we like it.  The texture was the biggest stumbling block with this ravioli.  I am open to suggestions!!!  

Anyway, the flavor of everything else was great.  I wanted to make the filling with clams, but we didn’t have any.  So, I sauteed some shrimp in butter and olive oil.

When they were done, I toasted up some bread and crumbled it in the pan with more butter, a can of anchovies, and some garlic.

I put the shrimp and the breadcrumb mix in the food processor with an egg and some parsley.  

Once this was done, I rolled out the dough.

Then, I spooned the mixture on.

I covered the raviolis, pressed the air out, and sealed them.

 To go with it, I sauteed some spinach in lemon and LOTS of butter.

 I forgot to take a picture of the raviolis topped with the lemon-butter spinach, but I did snap a picture of the raviolis John fried in coconut oil!

We enjoyed the Macaroni Monday meal with an arugula tomato salad with balsamic vinaigrette and shaved Parmesan cheese!

The whole thing wouldn’t have taken too long, but, as always, I get easily distracted!

This post was shared on Fat Tuesday, Traditional Tuesday, and Scratch Cookin’ Tuesday!

Cheesey-Creamy Shrimp and Veggie Dish

I didn’t put the names of the veggies used in this dish into the title on purpose.  It is a yummy meal or side dish and could be made with a variety of vegetables and I didn’t want anyone to write it off because I chose to make it with turnips.  For many people (including my father… sorry Dad!), turnips constitute an automatic no-go.  I beg you to try the recipe anyway, changing the veggies if need be.  If you can, though, try the turnips.  You can’t even really tell they are turnips!

On to the recipe…

First, I chopped up carrots and turnips and simmered them in a little chicken broth to make them nice and soft.

I took them out of the pan and set them aside while I did the next step.  I sauteed onion and celery in butter until tender.  

I set THAT aside and sauteed shrimp in butter.

When they were ready, I added in the celery and onion mix along with a little flour, salt, and pepper.

When it was mixed together, I added in about a cup and a half of milk and the broth the root veggies cooked in to the pan.

I cooked it down until it was nice and thick.

When it was thick enough to coat the spoon, I shredded in lots and lots of cheddar cheese.

Topped with a little fresh parsley, this was so tasty and filling.  I would DEFINITELY make it again.

This post was shared on Fat Tuesday!

Fish Cake Salad

We try to eat seafood at least once each week.  It is usually a simple baked fish.  Sometimes it is a shrimp stir-fry or clams with macaroni.  I have been wanting to try something different, so this time I was aiming for fish burgers.  But I didn’t have burger buns… so…. I put it on a salad!

To make the burgers, I baked up a white, somewhat flaky fish.

When it was cooked, I broke it up and mixed it with bread crumbs, egg, celery, onions, and whatever herbs I had on hand. 

I shaped them into patties and fried them in coconut oil.

In the meantime, I boiled up some beets for the salad.  When they were cool, I sliced them up.

I stumbled upon some walnuts when I cleaned out the freezer, so I toasted them up.

The rest of the salad was arugula, cranberry-cinnamon goat cheese with balsamic vinegar and olive oil.  

When the fish cakes were crispy, I put them on the salad.  It was one of my best ideas yet!

This post was shared on Fight Back Friday!

Macaroni Monday: Spinach, Shrimp, and Beans

Happy Monday!  This Macaroni Monday recipe is quick and easy.  

1.  Melt butter in pan

2.  Cook shrimp in butter and garlic

3.  Add more butter and garlic (roasted if you have any lying around)

4.  Add spinach

5.  Add beans

6.  Put shrimp back in and season as desired (I just used some sea salt and butter)

7.  Serve over macaroni (or rice… or quinoa… or anything, really) and enjoy!

This post was shared with the Hearth and Soul Hop!

Taste of Yum (John Style)

I always show you what I cook, but I rarely share John’s recipes… mostly because he doesn’t like me to take pictures while he is cooking.  Regardless, I snap away at the finished meals.  

By snap away, I mean quickly grab a photo before he notices.  

Some of John’s recent creations:

Pizza with vodka sauce and raw milk cheddar (with cookies on the side)

Hake and balsamic roasted asparagus

Sardine, tomato, cheese, and other stuff salad

Lacto-Fermented Daikon Radishes

I need to get better at snapping pictures of things that he cooks.  I mean, he is in charge of dinner on Thursdays, and all meals on the weekends.  I help out, but he is the boss.  Everything he makes is really tasty, and I want to share it with you!

Super Easy, Fast and Yummy Veggie Side

Here at Crest Cottage we tend to food shop once every 2 weeks.  This is fine for most things because we cook so much from scratch.  The only thing we haven’t been able to master is getting our produce to last 2 full weeks.  Trying to balance the items on sale with the items that will last that long, all while staying under budget, is challenging.  We tend to supplement our fresh produce with frozen toward the end of that second week.  This week, I came up with this CRAZY easy veggie side to have with our salmon.  Check it out!

First, I toasted some slivered almonds in a pan.  

When they were brown, I added in a box of frozen succotash and a box of frozen peas to defrost.  

When they were warm, I added in some brown rice I had made before (I always make extra to have on hand for the week), the juice of 3 small lemons, and sea salt.

When it was all warmed through, it was served with salmon.

It was that easy!  Minimal effort, maximum taste.  John even went back for seconds of the side dish!  He never does that!!!  He couldn’t believe that it was just lemon juice and salt.  WIN!

This post was featured on Midnight Maniac’s Meatless Monday!

New England Clam Chowder

John loves soup and I don’t make it all that much.  As winter starts to wind down, I figured I better start soupin’ it up!  The first?  New England Clam Chowder.

I love this soup.  It is probably my favorite kind of soup, but I have always been too scared to try and make it myself.  You know what?  That is silly!  It was really easy to make.  I combined a whole bunch of recipes to create this. 

First, I sauteed some onions and garlic in bacon grease.  Our house smelled amazing.  

I added in carrots, celery, and potatoes and let it all saute.  

When it was all bacon-ey, I added 2 cans of clams with the liquid. 

When THAT was warm, I covered it with raw milk and some grass-fed butter.  

It warmed up pretty quickly, and I watched it to make sure it didn’t boil.  It was so good!  I could have used some cream, but I only had a little on the top of the milk on hand.  This is definitely going in our meal rotation!

This post was featured on the Hearth and Soul Bloghop and Real Food Wednesday with Kelly the Kitchen Kop!

Clams Orega-NOT

This quick and easy dinner is my lazy version of clams oreganata and macaroni in clam sauce mixed together.  

John helped out and made it WAY faster.  He smashed up 8 cloves of garlic.  I threw them into a pan with a ton of butter.  

Once the garlic was fragrant, I scooped out half of it to make the orega-not.  What’s in that, you ask?  Well, remember the hot dog bun fail?  I turned them into bread crumbs. 

Said breadcrumbs were thrown into the food processor with the garlic, 2 cans of clams (1 with the liquid, 1 without), parsley, oregano, salt, and some olive oil.  

When it was all mushed up, I put it into a Pyrex bowl and baked broiled it a bit.  

In the meantime, a ton of spinach went into the pan with the other half of the garlic. 

When it was all wilted and yummy, I took it out.

To serve, I put the orega-not on top of spaghetti with the spinach on the side.

With a little Parmesan cheese shaved on top?  Yum!

Black Beans and Rice…and shrimp… and spinach…

I was going to make shrimp quesadillas with black beans and rice on the side.  I have been really tired lately, though, so I didn’t have the energy to make the tortillas.  Our milk/meat/cheese delivery service wasn’t going to be delivering for a little while, so I had to make do with the cheese we have until then.  AND THEN John tells me that, well, he doesn’t really like the dried beans cooked.  He likes the canned ones better.  I had cooked up a boat-load of back beans and frozen them and was planning on using them.  I was at a total loss.  No idea what to make.  

I grabbed the black beans out of the freezer to defrost and set up the rice cooker with 2.5 cups of brown rice/5 cups turkey stock.  As I was setting it up, I realized that it has a steamer basket.  Hmmm… Maybe steaming the beans to defrost them would make them softer, the way John likes them?  I tried it. 

While that all cooked, I chopped up 1/2 an onion and 3 big cloves of garlic and put them in the pan with a chunk of butter.  

When they were soft and smelled like heaven, I added some cumin, parsley, and salt.

Then, the spinach jumped into the pan.  I’m not sure how it got there, but it did.

When it wilted into the delicious flavors, with some help from extra butter, the now-defrosted and somewhat mushy (YES!) beans were added, along with defrosted raw shrimp.

At this point, I poured in a little bit of turkey stock to help it all along.  When the shrimp looked nice and pink, I added the rice and some more cumin.

For all my exhaustion and doubts, it turned out to be way better than I could have imagined.  It was warm and filling and yummy!

With a salad on the side!

This post was also featured at Real Food Wednesday with Kelly the Kitchen Kop!

Linguine with Calamari and Garlic

One tradition here at Crest Cottage is Monday Macs.  We have macaroni on many Mondays here.  It makes meal planning so much easier for us to know what type of food we will have on a certain day.  Don’t get me wrong, we deviate from that, but our fall-back is always Monday Macs.  

We keep it interesting by always changing up the way we have it.  This week?  Linguini with Calamari and Garlic!  Check out the ingredients:

Linguini (duh)

Kale

Butter

Bread Crumbs

Anchovies (don’t let that scare you, please!!)

Frozen Calamari

Garlic

Sea Salt

To start, set aside a pot of water that is salty like the ocean to boil.  Then, add some sea salt to a pan, and add the sliced up garlic.

Smash the daylights out of the garlic. 

Add some butter and saute the garlic until you can smell the deliciousness.  Then add defrosted frozen calamari or fresh cut into rings.  We had the remnants of a bag of frozen in the freezer.  That is actually what prompted this meal.  I was trying to make room in the freezer and that bag was annoying me.  Whoever said necessity was the mother of invention was wrong.  Annoyance is. 

While the calamari is bathing in the garlic (wish I could bathe in garlic butter… or at least swim in it….), mash up a can of anchovies.  I know, I know, it sounds scary… ANNNN-CHOOOO-VIEEES.  They aren’t.  Especially in this dish.  The calamari already makes it vaguely fishy, so you don’t notice any from the anchovies.  They just add a dimension of saltiness and depth of flavor.  Try it.

Add the anchovies to the garlicky goodness.  and yes, I am aware of how weird the mashed anchovies look. 

When everything seems good and garlicky, add in the washed kale.  You might need to add a bit more butter at this point. 

The kale will quickly wilt down and absorb the flavors.  Add some more butter (I love butter!) and the some bread crumbs, parsley, and any other seasonings you would like. 

Since you hopefully added the linguine to the pot when it boiled, you now have cooked macaroni to serve this amazing meal with.  Enjoy it!

This post was featured on Tuesday Twister at GNOWFGLINS and Presto Pasta Nights hosted at Chez Cayenne!