Post By Request

I made dinner last night, like I do every night & when I posted a photo on Instagram & Facebook I had a lot of friends ask for a recipe, so I figured I would post it up here! Forgive me for the lack of step by step photos - I wasn't planning on posting this one :)

Creamy Pepper Pasta

1 table spoon of Olive oil

1 Large onion (I love onion so if you're not a fan you can do a small one)

4 cloves of garlic (again, love of garlic so this is a taste thing)

6 basil leaves (1/2 tablespoon if using dried)

2 good shakes of red pepper flakes (these are HOT so again, adjust to taste)

1 large jar of spaghetti sauce (I used sauce that has pepper in it, if you use a plain sauce, add 2-3 chopped sautéed peppers)

1/2 cup of heavy cream (next time I'm going to try Greek yogurt to cut some calories)

Salt & Pepper to taste

3/4 box of angel hair pasta

Sauté oil, onion, garlic in a pan for 3-5 minutes, till the onions are clear (if you are adding peppers, sauté them with the onions & garlic). Add basil & red pepper flakes & continue to cook for another minute. Add spaghetti sauce, salt, pepper & cream and lower heat to a simmer. This will cook while you cook the spaghetti. 

Fix the pasta according to the box - angel hair tends to cook much faster then other spaghettis. 

Top your meal with fresh chopped basil & take your Instagram picture! Voila! 

For the sausage, in the US I would have used an Italian sausage, but here they don't have it so I used Venison & Pork sausages which were delicious. 

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

I'm the one who does the majority read all of the cooking, but since Steve sometimes reads this blog I shouldn't say that of the cooking. I don't mind, most of the time, because I really enjoy being creative in the kitchen. Now that I'm not working I tend to watch a fair amount of food network. Its one of the few decent channels we get, as 20+ of them are home shopping channels. So when I watch food network I get inspired and itchy palms to get into the kitchen and make something yummy.

Unfortunately the furnished apartment we have wasn't furnished to my medium standards in the kitchen. Crappy pots and pans, no measuring devices, just not good. Now that my stuff has arrived I feel much more at home in the kitchen & its more fun. Mind you, I was worried as my oven is about 1/2 the size of a normal US oven... hello no thanksgiving turkey this year. But my biggest pan fits inside, barely. 

So I decided I would start blogging about some of the meals I fix. Sometimes it will be a recipe I have made myself, aka I didn't google a recipe. Sometimes I will link up to another blog or website where I got the recipe. If I do make any changes to the recipe I will let you know. 

Tuesday night after watching too much food channel I decided to do a chicken bake, but I was going to upgrade it. What you're looking at is my turkey bake. I filled my pan about 1/2 an inch deep with white wine (didn't measure because it depends on the size of you pan). Then I added 2/3 of a bag of baby potatoes all cut in quarters. Then I cut up some peppers, onions, shallots & garlic. It's a little like stone soup, just sort of toss in what you have laying around the kitchen aka what I did. 

This is my new favorite thing! Piri Piri seasoning goes into pretty much everything I make theses days. Its a perfect blend of onion, garlic & peppers (aka the base of 90% of my meals). I seasoned the turkey with this, but again, you can use chicken or pork. 

Once all the veggies and turkey were in the pan I sprinkled a good spoonful of french mustard around the dish and put the lid on. This way the dish sort of steams itself in the oven while its also cooking. Leave the meat on top to begin with, somehow it makes it juicer. 

Voila! This is the same dish after being in a 300 degree oven for 30 minutes. Keep in mind, this varies depending on what meat your using and how much you cook. Never a bad idea to keep check it after 30 min or so. 

After you pull it out to check it, go ahead and mix it up. Spoon the yummy wine over everything, mix the veggies with the meat, it won't look as pretty but it helps disperse the flavors. Pop it back in the oven for another 15 min or so. Again cooking times depends on what meat you're using. 

I didn't get a photo of the next step, forgive me. Use a slotted spoon to get the turkey out of the pan as well as most of the big veggies. You want just the liquid in the bottom of the pan left. It will have bits in it, mostly shallots and garlic which is perfect. Get your cream out, either double or single, depending on what you have on hand and slowly pour into the pan and keep whisking. Feel free to add a little more mustard. This will make the cream sauce. I like to do it like this because this wine is full of all the yummy bits from the dish & it saves you using another pot. 

Not the best photo of the dish but Steve loved it. Plus it makes really yummy leftovers aka what I'm eating for lunch today. 

 For dinner I wanted to use up the pineapple I used earlier to make a special smoothie for Steve's migraine. I bought a whole pineapple instead of a can and I didn't want to leave it after I'd cut it up. I got the idea from watching Ready Steady Cook.

Here is the link to the recipe: Griddled pineapple with a yoghurt and mint syllabub

Sounds fancy? That's what I thought but I had all the stuff so I figured why not. Grilled the pineapple in our grilling pan, folded the extra cream from my mustard sauce in with the yogurt & added a little honey. They recommend serving it in a wine glass - see below - but I was too scared I'd break the glass so I dumped mine into a bowl. The fresh mint really

The fresh mint on top really made it yummy. So easy and if you're already grilling this summer its such a quick think to throw the pineapple on the BBQ after the meat has cooked. 

Did you enjoy reading about my cooking? Would you try this recipe for yourself? How can I improve these type of posts?