Quick and Healthy Turkey Bolognese

I always have to find a way to make ground turkey just taste good. I can’t stand how dry it is when made into turkey burger and usually flavorless. Turkey is a great alternative for lean protein but trying to find ways to make it taste good is tricky. My favorite way to enjoy ground turkey is cooked to be taco meat for Mexican night. That sounds good but I was really in the mood for a hearty tomato sauce. I remember last year I tried out Barefoot Contessa’s Weeknight Bolognese. I used grassfed beef and my own homemade sauce. This time around I wasn’t going to spend several hours in the kitchen making my sauce again (no time!) and I had this turkey that needed to be cooked up.

My favorite store bought sauce was in the pantry and then a light bulb clicked. I can make a bolognese sauce with ground turkey and my favorite sauce, it will be just as delicious and will be very quick to put together.

I didn’t use this sauce to top on pasta, instead I used it to top on sweet potatoes and roasted vegetables. It was a quick meal to take to work and kept me satisfied for hours. This recipe makes a lot and you can easily freeze it but that wasn’t the case for me.

Quick and Healthy Turkey Bolognese
By Fallon

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pound organic ground turkey
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 1/4 cup red wine (make sure it is a wine you love to drink)
2 cups of your favorite red sauce
2 tablespoons tomato paste
Salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoons coconut milk (cream or half and half works too)

Directions:
Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the turkey and cook, crumbling the turkey with a wooden spoon, for 5 to 7 minutes, and has started to brown. Stir in the garlic, oregano, and red pepper flakes and cook for 1 more minute. Pour 1 cup of the wine into the skillet and stir to scrape up any browned bits.

Add the red sauce, tomato paste, salt and pepper to taste, stirring until combined. Bring to a boil, lower the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

To finish the sauce, add the coconut milk and remaining wine to the sauce and simmer for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally until thickened. The sauce will be thick and hearty.

The reason why I used coconut milk is because when I use it for my iced coffees, it is super creamy and delicious. You really can’t taste the coconut and I wanted to see how it worked in the sauce. My mom who isn’t a coconut lover said she didn’t even detect any flavor of it after I told her I added coconut milk.

If you are a pasta fan this will be delicious with rigatoni pasta or if your trying to watch your carbs like me, sweet potatoes and vegetables are just as good!

Enjoy,
Fallon    

Sunday Supper

I made a delicious lasagna Sunday night. I finished off all the red sauce I had stored in the freezer and decided to make use of it. Once I leave Augusta, Mike won’t get homemade meals and since he isn’t one to cook, unless you call boiling eggs a cooking technique he is going to rely on pizza and sandwiches. I’ve already started to freeze some items for him and this lasagna is one of them. It will be a delicious meal he can pull out of the freezer and enjoy for dinner one night.

These are awesome!

I made a ricotta mixture with fresh spinach, eggs, shredded mozzarella and parmesan cheese. I added Italian sausage to his side of the lasagna, while mine was sausage free. I loved the no bake noodles I picked up, they were flat and so easy to assemble. Once cooked they were thin and light, just like a homemade lasagna noodle.

It was a delicious dinner that had Mike going back for seconds. I’ll miss cooking him dinner, especially our Sunday suppers.

   

Someone is camera shy!!

Buon Appetito,
Fallon

Another HOT and Delicious Dinner

I swear I thought I was done with baking huge dishes in my oven after having this baked pasta dish because I was practically sweating while eating dinner that night. Now that eggplants are in season I couldn’t help myself when my boyfriend mentioned that eggplant parmigiana sounded kind of good. That is of course one of his favorite meals and he actually likes my version! My sauce making skills are going pretty well too. This time around I added in some beef spare ribs with the Italian sausage. It added a nice flavor to the sauce, that was lacking in my last red sauce when I couldn’t find beef spare ribs. I let the sauce simmer for a few hours, easy as that! Might as well make plenty extras of sauce to freeze for future meals and that way you aren’t always cooking red sauce.

The ribs and sausage cooking away, making my red sauce taste delicious.

Oh yes, back to my eggplant parmigiana. I followed my favorite recipe here, with a few tweaks to the original version.

Baked Whole Wheat Eggplant Parmigiana
By Fallon

Ingredients
4-5 eggplants, sliced slightly thick (I ended up using 1 HUGE eggplant, it was HUGE.. trust me)
2 large eggs
2 large egg whites
100% Whole wheat flour
Salt and pepper
Whole wheat Italian style bread crumbs (homemade works too)
Extra virgin olive oil
Red sauce (homemade is the best or use your favorite store brand)
Goat cheese (or mozzarella cheese)
Grated parmesan cheese
Fresh basil, julienned

Direction
Begin by washing your eggplant and slicing thick slices with skin on. Place in a colander and generously sprinkle salt to release the eggplant bitterness. After 30-40 minutes rinse eggplant off and lay on paper towels to dry.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Prepare a baking sheet with a drizzle of olive oil, to prevent from sticking and make extra crispy eggplant. Make your assembly line for eggplant dipping. Start with the flour seasoned with salt and pepper, whisk the eggs with salt and pepper and the bread crumbs. Take a slice of eggplant, dredge in the flour, dip into the egg and into the bread crumbs. Shake off any excess flour, egg and bread crumbs respectively and place on the prepared baking sheet. Repeat until all eggplant has been breaded. You may need to prepare an additional baking sheet. I don’t recommend smashing it altogether onto one sheet. Bake for 30 minutes or until lightly brown. Usually 15 minutes into baking I will flip them over, so both sides are nice and crispy. Remove from oven and let cool. Continue to keep the oven on to finish the dish.

 

In the mean time you should already have the red sauce warmed up and ready. Sauce up a glass casserole dish or lasagna pan to bake the eggplant parmigiana. I decided to use goat cheese over mozzarella. It was a nice change and added that creamy, pungent flavor goat cheese is known for. It felt like a summer dish with the addition of the goat cheese. Start with a layer of eggplant, top with sauce generously and sprinkle goat cheese on top. Continue until all eggplant is used up and your last layer is cheese.

My favorite brand!

Top with a handful of shredded parmesan and place into oven for at least 10-15 minutes. When the cheese is bubbling the dish is done. Remove from oven, garnish with basil and let cool before serving.

 

The blue placements just don’t work for meals with red sauce, sorry!

I cooked up some spaghetti to serve alongside. My boyfriend enjoyed Italian sausage and beef ribs with his meal as well. This was a winner once again! He doesn’t even know I used whole wheat flour and bread crumbs or that I added in some egg whites instead. I love how versatile this meal is and I didn’t feel like a slave to the kitchen. It was a quick, healthy and delicious meal for a Sunday night dinner. This was worth the extra sweat once again. ;)

Enjoy,
Fallon

PS: I also just learned how to avoid double spacing whenever I hit the enter key on Windows Live Writer. I have to hit shift and enter at the same time. DUHH FALLON!

Red Sauce

I am here today to share my red sauce recipe with you. It still needs tweaking but my boyfriend told me it isn’t a bad start. Score! His mother makes one of the best red sauces. He always tells me that it has to have Italian sausage and beef ribs. That is how you get the flavor and to make a great red sauce for spaghetti, lasagna, parmigiana etc. I then told him I’m not his mother and It won’t ever taste exactly like hers but I will do my best. I made sure to make plenty, so I’d have enough for several meals. I made so much I ended up putting some in the freezer!

     

Mason jars work beautifully for homemade sauces. I used a smaller jar for the sauce in the freezer.

I had a hard time finding beef ribs at the store and didn’t feel like driving all over the place. I decided to just go with the Italian sausage. As for sauce making I had exchanged emails with the Proud Italian Cook. Her food always looks so wonderful, fresh and vibrant. She knows her Italian cooking and she gave me a simple guideline to follow. Many people will add carrots and celery to their sauces but she kept it very simple with the use of onion, garlic, San Marzano whole tomatoes, olive oil and salt.

I know next time to get the sauce just right with the addition of beef ribs and I finally was able to find them at the supermarket! Until then we have plenty of red sauce for several more meals! Who wants to come over for dinner? ;)

Fallon’s Red Sauce

Ingredients (I had almost 7 lbs of tomatoes, so I’m not going to list actual amounts since I kept adding more)

Italian sausages

Garlic (I used a whole bulb for 7 lbs tomatoes)

Sweet onion (Approx. 1 1/2 onions chopped)

San Marzano tomatoes

Dried oregano

Salt (For every 28oz San Marzano tomatoes add 1 tsp salt)

Black pepper

Sugar (optional)

Olive Oil

Direction

In your largest pot, add olive oil on a medium heat setting. Add the sausages to the warm pot and cook up till nicely seared and releases any extra fat. Have a large plate with a paper towel ready to set semi-cooked sausages on.

In the mean time, chop your onion and garlic. Once the sausages are browned, place on paper towel plate and add in half your garlic and all the onion. Add more olive oil and sauté till onions are translucent. Lower heat to medium- low and add the tomatoes. Squeeze each tomato into the pot and remove access stems/seeds. Then add the remaining liquid from the can. Turn up the heat to medium- high and stir. Once the mixture starts to bubble add in the remaining garlic (I threw some whole cloves in), oregano and salt. Stir and wait till it boils. Next put the Italian sausage back into the sauce and cook on low/simmer. Keep covered with a lid to avoid splattering and stir every 10-15 minutes.

Don’t worry about keeping your kitchen clean, I had tomatoes everywhere!

Taste the sauce, too acidic add a little sugar. Balance the flavors out with salt and pepper. I added red pepper flakes to add a little heat to the sauce. Cook for at least 2.5- 3 hours before serving and making sure the sausages are fully cooked. Otherwise cook all day to really let the flavors marry into each other.

Nothing like a big plate of pasta and a green salad on the side!

How do you make your red sauce?

Buon Appetito,

Fallon

Skinny Italian

Who else watches The Real Housewives shown on Bravo? It all started with Orange County and now I just can’t get enough of it. I watch each and every season. While some I enjoy more then others, I don’t like to miss out on anything going on in their lives! One housewife that I really enjoy watching on TV is Teresa Giudice from New Jersey. I love her attitude, personality and the fact that she dresses her girls up like little dolls. Being she is an Italian girl she grew up being surrounded by wonderful food and lots of family. In her own home she cooks for her family every night and makes sure it is as authentic and healthy as Italian can be.

Teresa wrote her own cookbook called Skinny Italian. I wanted to see what it was all about in person before ordering it online, so I went to the bookstore first. I skimmed through her recipes and loved how simple her meals were. I figured this be a great book to have for when I start living with my boyfriend because she has recipes with meals containing meat and cooking it the Italian way. Something I’m not fully familiar with but willing to learn so I can cook my man some good meals! Luckily my birthday came and one of my presents was Skinny Italian. She explains about ingredients and what is authentic in Italian cooking. I loved the chapter on pasta and the myths stated.

Pasta Myth 1- White Pasta is Bad

To make pasta 100% Italian make sure the label states “100% durum wheat semolina” or “100% durum wheat.” Italian pasta is actually considered a whole grain and not part of the white flour family.

Pasta Myth 2- Pasta is Fattening

If you look at the nutritional label on pasta most of the time it is only 1g of fat per serving. The stuff that is fattening is the crazy amount of cheese people will put on their pastas. As long as you dress the pasta lightly with healthy oils, vegetables and fresh ingredients you will have a beautiful pasta dish.

Pasta Myth 3- Pasta Has No Nutritional Value

The durum wheat used in Italian pasta has 8g of protein per serving and the same amount of fiber you’d find in wheat bread. In the US, companies often “enriched” their pastas adding vitamins and minerals.

That really opened up my eyes when it came to eating pasta. I was only buying 100% whole wheat pasta because I thought it was healthy. Which don’t get me wrong it is still healthy but now I know I can enjoy 100% durum wheat semolina pasta and get the same nutritional benefits like the whole wheat kind.

Make sure you buy a red wine you’d like to drink as well as cook with.

My first recipe I made from her cookbook was Milania’s Marinara Sauce. It starts with using her “quickie” tomato sauce recipe and turns it into make her marinara sauce with red wine, mushrooms, onion, garlic and fresh herbs.

My boyfriend is very picky when it comes to sauce and if it doesn’t taste like mom’s then it isn’t the best. His mom gets a lot of her flavor from meat and meat bones. It is a great sauce. For me, I like a more fresher and chunkier sauce with tomatoes and good red wine. I made this sauce for a Sunday dinner.His words were, “some meat bones cooked in while simmering would be even better.” Maybe next time. ;)

I already have more recipes I want to try like Gabriella’s Bolognese Sauce, Giardino Minestrone, and Chicken Breasts with Lemony Thyme Marinade.

I find her cookbook to be very educational and straight to the point. It isn’t overly wordy and it is easy to understand for the home cook. Her recipes are simple and fresh, guaranteeing a great dinner for the night.

Always,

Fallon

No one is paying me to write up this review. I like Teresa and wanted to support her cookbook with positive feedback. To get the recipes you will have to purchase the book.     

Linguine with Spinach Sauce

Holidays are coming and I’m going through all my recipes I’ve printed out and stored in a binder. Time to find those holiday cookies, cakes and candies. Yikes, just thinking about that is making me feel 5 pounds heavier! Luckily in the miss of all the sugar, butter and flour I came across a recipe I’ve never tried! Giada De Laurentiis Penne with Spinach Sauce. Such a simple recipe and I had everything in my fridge. I love when that happens.

The best gourmet pasta ever!

Back in September when I visited my boyfriend in Texas, we went to a wine tasting event and I purchased some homemade pasta by DeCio Pasta. I picked up their top seller, spinach basil garlic linguine. I remember it being delicious and flavorful. You don’t need anything fancy for this pasta. I decided I wanted this pasta instead of penne. After mixing everything up, I realized the contrast in color was very green and not as appealing. For the taste factor though, it was AMAZING! I felt very healthy eating all this green and not guilty at all that it involved pasta. ;)

The beautiful sauce.

Pasta water is your best glue for making a sauce stick like this one. Blended in a food processor, the spinach sauce comes together quickly. This was a perfect meal right before heading into work. I like anything quick, healthy and delicious!

 

 

I followed the recipe exactly, except using different pasta! Click HERE for Penne with Spinach Sauce or in my case linguine. ;)

Buon Appetito,

Fallon