Cooking with Dee

It just occurred to me that I never gave you the recipe, just told you a story. I made two yesterday. It only took a few moments more to complete two as I did them together as an assembly line, using aluminum pans so I could freeze ours and give the other, as promised, to my guitar teacher.

This is a 10-15 minute lasagne for an 8×8 pan, which will very generously serve a family of four, or more with a green salad and crusty bread, even garlic bread. Yum.

For one lasagne:

8 sheets NO-BOIL lasagne noodles (Barilla makes one)
16 oz. Ricotta
8 oz Mozzarella, shredded
1 egg, beaten
handful parmesan or romano, freshly grated, more for the top
salt and pepper to taste
fresh or dried basil, marjoram and/or oregano to taste
1 25.5 oz. jar of your favorite pasta sauce (yesterday I used Muir Glen organic with tomato and basil)

I made a vegetarian version. I like to alternate the direction of the noodles just because I think it makes it stick together better (it’s just my way). Place enough sauce on the bottom of the pan to coat it lightly.

Add two sheets of pasta. Cover with 1/3 of cheese mixture and then tomato sauce to coat. Repeat twice. On the top layer place the pasta down, cover with remaining sauce and top with parmesan cheese. Bake at 350 degrees (place on a cookie sheet in case it boils over) for 45 minutes, uncovered, to an hour until it’s bubbly and gooey and gorgeous. Remove from the oven and let stand five minutes. Cut and serve.

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Single people who are terrified to cook for a date should learn this recipe (try it once before the date). I recently ran into a new dad, with baby, at the store in the pasta section and asked him what he was trying to make. I pointed out the no-boil noodles and he was very thankful, perhaps somewhat as thankful as his wife was for having 1/2 hour to herself and getting hubby to make dinner!

Enjoy! Dee

Coming to a location near me. A location I can walk to. Starting next month approximately 12 vendors will set up in an interior space right here in our back yard. We went to a market today, mainly hippie clothing, jewelry and other items. They also had prepared food and about eight farmers market stalls, one which had the most beautiful mushrooms I’ve ever seen since Mendocino – chanterelles. But by then I’d run out of cash. I bought yellow and red cherry tomatoes, some organic summer wheat berries to grow wheatgrass, 1# of frozen sea scallops that look gorgeous, and 1# of freshly flown-in Coho salmon, tail sections. I re-froze the scallops, cooked one salmon fillet and froze the other. I got a summer sun hat as there is no atmosphere here to keep the sun off one’s face, and Jim bought a leather one evocative of Indiana Jones.

For fresh fish here, you’ll probably get trout from the local rivers. Otherwise it’s flown in. But the Coho was gorgeous. I looked for pin bones and there were none, easily removed the skin with my fish filleting knife and cooked a marinade of 1/3 c soy sauce, 1 c water, several 1/4 inch coins of ginger, two large crushed garlic cloves, a pinch of freshly ground red pepper flakes and black pepper, and a few drops of roasted sesame oil. I used the microwave and cooked the sauce on high for about six minutes then let it cool. When Jim’s ribeye (he’s allergic to anything that swims) was ready on the grill outside, I put the salmon in the marinade and guessed cooking times but only used 50% power so it wouldn’t cook too quickly. I probably did it 6-7 minutes, flipping it carefully midway and ended up with the tail end a bit flaky and the rest just as I wanted it. I wish I had some lemon but wasn’t going to go back to the grocery store and I’ve two limes but they didn’t fit my personal flavor profile.

I served the ribeye and the salmon with an organic baked potato and 1/2 of the red and yellow cherry tomatoes, sauteed with a bit of extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper and dried basil from Penzey’s.

Here’s a photo of a unique welded metal “see saw” at our first try at Park Silly Market:

We had lunch at our favorite burger joint then went to see Julie and Julia across the street. It was a good weekend but now Jim’s coming down with something. Not good news. Husbands are never good patients, especially when they brought back some bug from the office, you have it worse than him and he still moans and asks for a cup of tea. Not to mention he’s on contract so every hour he doesn’t work is an hour he doesn’t get paid.

Luckily we have plenty of fresh OJ, chinese herbs, tea and chicken broth. We’ll see how it goes tomorrow. Cheers, Dee

was on the menu tonight. Our friends Trish and dog Sake stopped by tonight for a brief visit. Zoe jealously guarded her leather bone from Sake, who cared so little about it she gave it to Zoe a year ago! They were very sweet together. Sake’s an alpha dog, rescued as feral. Zoe’s beta and needy and gets her way by hook or by crook.

Tomorrow the Trail Riders come into town for the big Rodeo parade on Saturday. These guys are my peeps, with barbecue and everything. I just bring along a case of beer. Deputy Dawg is legendary and last year his wagon threw an axle so he spent the night welding something together so he could be in the parade. Hope all is well this year. I love talking with him about food and with the kids as well.

Deputy Dawg at the Grill

We love these guys! Our street is closed Saturday and I’ll make sure I have provisions to get by. While I hang with the Trail Riders, Jim’s going to invite girlfriend Trish over to compete on PS3 games. Better her than me. I’ll make sure they have dinner/snacks. The best part for me is watching them come back from the parade on our street. We stand out there and cheer them in. Only in Texas, I know. Best, Dee