Taiwanese Spaghetti

I'm always looking for creative ways to serve spaghetti pasta because I absolutely love spaghetti. Its one of my favorite things to eat. And I think I've rubbed off on my daughter because she loves it as much as I do. So when this recipe came up on my reader from Steamy Kitchen, I was intrigued. An Asian pasta. Hmmmm....

The preparation was real easy. However, I wasn't too satisfied with the flavor. Maybe my preparation was off but it needed more umph. The meat mixture, however, would probably go great as a filling for a lettuce wrap. Or maybe with real Asian noodles. But not in a pasta. Not sure if I'd make this again as a pasta dish.

1 lb. noodles or any kind
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 Tbsp. dark soy sauce (or oyster sauce)
2 tsp. regular soy sauce
1 tsp. balsamic vinegar
1 tsp. five-spice powder
1 Tbsp. brown sugar
2 tsp. cooking oil
1/2 onion, chopped
1 lb. ground meat (beef, pork, chicken, etc.)
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
8 oz can bamboo shoots, diced
4 ounces shiitake mushrooms, diced
1 stalk green onion, chopped

1) Cook noodles according to package directions. Drain and set aside.

2) In a small bowl, combine broth, soy sauces, balsamic vinegar, five-spice powder, and brown sugar. Set aside.

3) Heat wok over medium-high heat. Swirl in cooking oil. Add onion and cook for about a minute. Add ground meat and cook until almost all the pink is gone. Push meat mixture to the sides of wok. Add garlic in the center of wok and cook until fragrant. Add bamboo shoots an mushrooms in the center. Toss everything together in the wok.

4) Pour broth mixture and bring to a simmer. Cook for about 2 minutes. Stir in green onions. Serve over  noodles.

Tuna Noodle Casserole

I've had this recipe bookmarked from the Betty Crocker website for a few months and had planned on making it for a Friday Lent. Tuna casserole is one of those comfort foods that everyone seemed to reminisce about when they were kids, but its something I've never really had. Unless you count Hamburger Helper/Tuna Helper, which I had often when I was a kid. So I've been dying to make something similar to flavors of the Tuna Helper I've grown to love.

I've had the ingredients ready for about a week and I've finally got around to making it tonight. The original recipe required leek soup mix, but I replaced it with onion soup mix. This version came out okay. But nothing to write home about. It was rather bland, in my opinion. The scent of onion from the onion soup mix was rather strong, which didn't seem appealing at first. But after having the first bite, it wasn't as bad as I thought. However, this wasn't the tuna noodle casserole recipe I was looking for. I guess my quest will continue.

8 oz uncooked linguine or spaghetti

1 cup frozen broccoli florets

1 package onion soup mix

1 1/2 cups milk

black pepper to taste

1 (5 oz) can tuna, drained

2 Tbsp. chopped drained roasted bell peppers

1 Tbsp. butter, melted

1/4 plain bread crumbs

1) Preheat oven to 350 deg F. Grease a 8-inch square (2 quart) pan. Cook and drain pasta according to package directions. Add frozen broccoli during the last 2 minutes of cook time. Drain.

2) In a saucepan, mix together milk and onion soup mix. Heat to boiling over medium heat, stirring constantly. Season with black pepper.

3) Add pasta, broccoli, tuna, and roasted peppers to soup mixture. Gently stir to mix well. Spoon into prepared baking dish. In a small bowl, combine butter and bread crumbs and sprinkle over pasta mixture. Bake uncovered for 20-25 minutes, until top is golden brown.

Marble Roll

I haven't posted anything new since last week. I got called on an emergency project at work that has me reporting to far away place every morning for 2 weeks. Baldwin Park, California. Its a 40 mile drive one way, as opposed to my 8 mile drive to my office. So yeah, that's far away. And because its so far away, I really don't have much time to plan for what to make for dinner. So I've resorted to leftovers and repeat recipes.

I woke up this morning itching to bake something new. I thought I would take a gander at making french macarons, which I've been dying to make. A little too complex for today. Then I remembered there was something in my dessert cookbook that I wanted to make - a Marble Roll. It looked pretty simple and I thought it would be a good recipe to get me out of this week-long hiatus. Well, it was pretty simple, and the concept was great. Unfortunately the end product didn't turn out as good as I expected. I was pretty disappointed with the way this cake turned out, so please excuse the photo. It doesn't look much like a roll. I tried my best to accentuate the best part of the cake, and it was hard to do that because there was no "best part." The cake was pretty dense and didn't have much flavor. I've perfected rolling my Pumpkin Roll, but rolling this marble roll was pretty difficult. The original instructions indicated to cool the cake before rolling. To make my pumpkin roll, I had to roll it before it cools to make for easy rolling. If I ever attempt to make this Marble roll again, I'll be sure to roll it the way I did for my pumpkin roll.

Cake

1 cup all purpose flour

1 Tbsp. cocoa powder

1 oz. semisweet chocolate, grated

1 oz. white chocolate, grated

3 eggs

1/2 cup sugar

Filling

6 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened

1 1/2 cups confectioner's sugar, plus more for garnish

1 Tbsp. cocoa powder

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

3 Tbsp. chopped walnuts

1) Preheat oven to 400 deg F. Grease a 12 x 8 inch jelly roll pan, then line it with waxed paper.

2) Sift 1/2 cup of the flour with the cocoa into a bowl. Stir in grated semisweet chocolate. Sift the remaining 1/2 cup into another bowl. Stir in the grated white chocolate. Set aside.

3) With a hand mixer, beat eggs and sugar in a heatproof bowl. Place bowl over a saucepan of boiling hot water. Continue beating mixture with the hand mixer until it holds its shape when the mixer is lifted, about 5-7 minutes.

4) Remove the bowl from the heat and transfer half of the mixture into a separate mixing bowl. Fold the white chocolate mixture into one portion of the egg mixture. Fold the semisweet chocolate mixture into the other egg mixture. Stir 1 tablespoon boiling water into each bowl to soften the mixtures.

5) Place alternate spoonfuls of the mixture in the prepared pan and swirl lightly together for a marbled effect. Bake for about 12-15 minutes or until firm. Invert cake onto a sheet of wax paper. Cover with a damp dish towel and cool completely.

6) For the filling, beat butter, confectioner's sugar, cocoa and vanilla extract together in a bowl until smooth, then mix in the walnuts.

7) Uncover the cake, lift off the wax paper and spread the surface with the buttercream. Roll up carefully form the long side and place on a serving platter. Dust with confectioner's sugar or chocolate curls

Easy Dirty Rice

I've never had dirty rice. I always see the boxed version of it and always thought it looked yummy. I came across a recipe from my crockpot recipe cookbook and thought to give it a try. It was pretty easy, but thought that it tasted a little bland. I don't know if I would repeat this recipe again. Maybe, I'll adjust it to better suit my taste.

1/2 lb. bulk Italian sausage
2 3/4 cup water
1 cup uncooked long grain rice
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 large green bell pepper, finely chopped
1/2 cup finely chopped celery
1 3/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground red pepper/cayenne pepper
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

1) Brown sausage in a skillet for 6-8 minutes over medium-high heat, stirring to break up meat. Drain fat. Place sausage in slow cooker.

2) Stir in remaining ingredients, except parsley. Cover and cook on low for 2 hours. Stir in parsley.

Crockpot Chicken Stroganoff

Its the first week of hubby's night classes. That means that I'm flying solo in the evenings for the next 2 years or so. That also means that I need quick and easy dinner recipes so that I'll have time to feed, bathe, and put my daughter to sleep myself, on top of getting everything ready for work the next day. While shopping at the grocery store last week, the first thing I thought of making was a huge batch of my bolognese sauce. That should cover at least 3-4 different meals (Spaghetti, lasagna, baked pasta, moussaka). Then I thought, "The crockpot!" I remembered glancing over some quick crockpot chicken recipes that I wanted to try out when the time came. So this was the first recipe I wanted to try from cdkitchen.com. It only had 5 ingredients and looked pretty easy.

When I made it for dinner today, I came home to an almost dried out crockpot. I guess that was my mistake, because the directions said to only cook for 6 hours. But I didn't get home until 4 hours later, so it sat in the crockpot. The color didn't look anything like the picture and didn't look too edible. I poured it over some cooked pasta, and when I finally had a chance to taste it, the chicken was very dry and tasted pretty bland. My daughter liked the pasta, though, and she ate quite a bit of it. I don't think I'll be making this again. I decided not to take a picture of it, but I thought to add it here anyway. Maybe someone else will have better luck with this recipe.

6 pieces boneless, skinless chicken
1 can condensed mushroom soup
16 oz sour cream (I used plain yogurt because I didn't have sour cream)
1 envelope of dry onion soup mix
water

1) Pour enough water to cover just the bottom of the crockpot pan. Place chicken on top of water.

2) Combine the remaining ingredients together and pour over chicken. Cook in crockpot on low for 6 hours. Serve over egg noodles or rice.