pasta

Eating Out at Bella’s Is a GF Yumm Fest!

Over the Christmas holidays I had a work related supper gathering at Bella’s here in Hellertown.  I was glad they chose Bella’s because not many places in the area have an actual gluten free menu.  I have eaten there twice in the past year and enjoyed some fantastic shrimp on pasta with a pink vodka sauce.  Yes, I got the same thing twice; it was soo good I could not consider anything else on the menu when we went back a few months later.

bella sign

This meal was no exception to the yummy rule.  I ordered the gluten free ravioli in the pink vodka sauce with some grilled chicken on top.  It was a healthy serving of ravioli, maybe not as extravagant as their linguine serving but plenty of pasta!  The sauce was every bit as good as the last two times.  I am not a big fan of pink vodka tomato sauce but their chef makes an extraordinary version and so Bella’s is the place where I order that particular pasta sauce.  It was full of flavor and smooth and went perfectly with the baked ravioli which were delicious in the traditional cheese ravioli form. The grilled chicken was tasty: in manageable chunks and was cooked properly.  There was a good sprinkling of fresh parsley which I appreciated.  And the waiter brought the cheese mill and added some fresh grated Romano on top.  Grazie!

Having enjoyed every bite of this beautifully presented dish I would happily order it again.  Next time I will take a picture of the plate before I dig in (to post here!) and take some home as I felt stuffed, like a thanksgiving turkey, after eating the entire entrée. Of course, I also ate a house salad and did have a small complimentary glass of house white wine.  The salad was decent and the wine was pretty good.

They had a couple of yummy sounding gluten free dessert choices but I was way too full for any of them.  Still, it was nice to know there were dessert options if I saved some room for such…next time!

I did not have any symptoms after the meal, so it was prepared properly and totally safe, just like the other two meals I ate there in the past year.  The service was great, the atmosphere is very comfortable and I highly recommend eating there to all my gluten free friends.  They now have some gf pizza on the menu; maybe next time!

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Spicy Baby Eggplant and Pasta Stew

This post is for my friend Diane, the queen of eggplants!  We have been friends for a couple of years and share garden space at the church garden.  She really knows how to grow eggplants, dozens on a single plant both years!

baby eggplants

This recipe is for dealing with those small eggplants you find yourself with when the frost strikes and all delicate plants die in the frosty fall air.  I pick them no matter how small and this is how we use them!  Yes, the eggplant recipe fest continues!

This stew is very suitable for the slow cooker although you could do it on the stove top, I used to cook them in a big pot and watch over it until the eggplants are tender but I really love being able to put it all in my crock pot and walk away for four hours.  No worries on burnt bottom of the pot syndrome when you use the slow cooker.

If you don’t have baby eggplants I think you could use Japanese eggplants cut into workable lengths.

I used to make it rather bland but I really enjoy this spicy version!

Spicy Baby Eggplants and Pasta Stew

Ingredients

7-12 small eggplants from tiny up to about six inches long

1-2 ounces hard parmesan cheese

1 32 oz can of tomato sauce

½ cup baby carrots

1 medium carrot diced

½ tsp smoked paprika

½ tsp. red pepper flakes (more or less to your personal taste)

½ tsp. sea salt

1 large garlic clove, smashed

½ cup oil cured black olives

1-2 tbsp. capers

Directions:

Cut the Parmesan cheese into tiny wedges.  Trim off the top cap of the eggplant.  Cut 3-4 slashes in the side of each eggplant going in the direction from the cap to the bottom.

Put a wedge of cheese into each deep slash.  I only put 2 slashes in tiny eggplants, 3 in bigger ones and 4 in the largest eggplants.  Put the eggplants into your slow cooker. Top with the chopped onion and carrots.  I cut my carrots in half as they were kinda large. Top with the herbs/spices. Pour the tomato sauce over it all. I used a quart of homemade tomato sauce out of my freezer. If you use a can of plain tomato sauce you might want to add 1 tsp. dried basil and same amount of oregano.  Top with the garlic, olives, and capers.  Cover and cook in your slow cooker on high for 4 hours.

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Cook gluten free ziti, enough for how many people you are serving, and drain it one minute before the package directions say it will be done. Put it back in the now empty pot and add the eggplant mixture out of your crock pot.  Cook a minute stirring it all around the pot.  This allows the ziti to soak up some of the sauce and get a great authentic flavor.

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Serve in a low wide soup bowl with a good grating of Parmesan cheese on top.  If you have some gluten free rolls or fresh bread – heaven with this stew!

I like this stew leftover for lunch served over a microwaved baked potato. I use a knife to coarsely chop up the baby eggplants before heating them and pouring over the hot potato.

Note I used olives with pits but if you can find them pitted, all the better! If you are an olive hater, leave them out but they really add to the flavor.  Add more salt if you leave them out.

Eggplant and Pasta Turrets Eggplant Fest Continues!

Spaghetti is an American classic.  I don’t make it often enough, especially since going gluten free.  That may change since I started to read Mario Batali’s newest cookbook “America Farm to Table”.  I cooked up a storm this past weekend making his eggplant and angel hair turrets.  What’s a turret?  A tower of yumminess!

farm to table cookbook

Having a surfeit of eggplants I was diving into all my eggplant recipes to determine the best way to utilize my crop of purple beauties. This one is a winner!

eggplants

We devoured it by candlelight on my back porch Saturday night, bees wax candles to be exact.  I thought for a moment that my man was going to lick his dinner plate! It was rewarding to see him so enraptured by my cooking.  I served it with a side of Italian sausage but it does stand alone as a complete entree.  We had a greens and tomato salad to complete this wonderful meal.

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I took this picture by candlelight!

I made a few changes so this is an adaptation of the recipe.  I advise reading it through twice so you don’t screw it up! I used less red pepper flakes than the original recipe; up it to a tsp. if you dare!  Yes, it uses instant potato flakes and they work fantastically to coat the eggplant slices.  Don’t be squeamish about the anchovies; they totally disappear into this spicy but lush sauce that coats the pasta and provides a base for the tower.   I used tomato sauce I had made the night before from the last fresh tomatoes as the base to build this extra spicy sauce which can hold its own with the eggplant headliner.  This recipe serves 4.

Eggplant and Pasta Turrets

4 tbsp. EVOL (Extra virgin olive oil)

2 large eggs

1 cup instant mashed potato flakes

1 large eggplant or 2 medium ones

½ cup onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, sliced

2 oil packed anchovy fillets plus 1 tbsp. of the packing oil

1 28 oz can of tomatoes, crushed by hand plus all the can juice or your own homemade tomato sauce, unseasoned

½ tsp. red pepper flakes

Kosher salt

1  12 oz package gf spaghetti

½ cup shredded whole milk mozzarella cheese

Fresh basil leaves

Eggplant: Place the eggs in a wide shallow bowl, beat well.  Put the potato flakes into a second shallow bowl or a wax paper covered plate.  Slice the eggplant into 1/3 inch slices.  Dip into the eggs, let excess drip off and dredge in the potato flakes.

Heat a large Teflon pan, add 2 tbsp EVOL.  Let heat to medium hot, add the eggplant slices, cook 2-3 minutes a side.  Place cooked eggplants on a paper towel lined plate.  Do a second batch of slices.  I put my cooked slices on a small baking sheet and put them into a 350 oven which I then turned off.  They stayed hot and I felt a tad more sure that they were fully cooked.

Make the sauce: heat the remaining EVOL in a large pot, add the onion, sauté until slightly softened; 2 minutes, add the sliced garlic, red pepper flakes, mashed up anchovy fillets, oil of fillets and the tomatoes.  Cook, stirring often; 12-15 minutes.

Pasta: Cook the pasta in a big pot of boiling salted water, I used Barilla by the way.  Drain it one minute before the package directions say it will be done. Save a cup of the pot water to thin the pasta.

Use the eggplant fry pan (wipe out the brown bits of crust) and ladle in 2-3 big scoops of the sauce and the pasta.  Cook one minute, turn off the stove and add the cheese, stir well.

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Construction of the turrets:

Place a big spoonful of sauce on each plate.  Top with an eggplant slice (I used my biggest slices for the bottom layer) and then top with a big twirl of the pasta mixture.  Top with another eggplant slice and then another pasta twirl.  Do this again.  Top with a dab of the red sauce.  You can also top it with some red pepper jelly but I didn’t go there!  I did sprinkle our towers with a few torn basil leaves. My towers were a tad sloppy Saturday but I made another one for Sunday lunch and that time I got the right amount of pasta between the eggplants and it looked amazing!

Dive in to this wild but yummy dish!  And check out this new cookbook; chock a block full of great relatively healthy recipes. This was one of the more complex ones; most seem fairly straight forward and sound darn delicious.

Spaghetti Bacon Primavera, the Bacon Fest Continues!

The tomato season is winding down but I have a few around and I thought I would enjoy them with pasta at least once more.  This recipe is a blending of two different recipes from two different cookbooks. One is a pasta primavera which has a creamy tomato sauce and fresh veggies and the other is a classical pasta carbonara with bacon and parmesan cheese.  This is their offspring! Bacon primavera pasta, ta da!  I have made and love both recipes but I wanted to have all their flavors together in one dish so I threw this together earlier this summer for the first time. It turned really quite yummy.  I made it again tonight and my three year old grandson ate lots of it; he loves veggies.  It was just so tasty that I had to have seconds.  The photograph is of that second portion before I dove into its creamy, bacony goodness.

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So round up some garden veggies, a block of real Parmesan cheese, bacon and a decent box of spaghetti and whip this recipe up for a late summer treat. I used spaghetti but you could use any shape of pasta that floats your boat!  If you are a wheat lover this is easy to make with your standard pasta off the shelf.  Of course, I made it with GF pasta, Barilla to be exact and it really tasted like regular flour pasta when made with this sauce.

Spaghetti Bacon Primavera

Ingredients:

4 slices bacon, cut into ½ inch lengths

1 medium onion chopped

½-2/3 cup sliced yellow squash, 1/3-1/2 inch thick

½ to 2/3 cup sliced zucchini, same thickness

1 cup halved cherry tomatoes

1/3 cup heavy cream

2 egg yolks

1 whole egg

¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese

½ lb GF spaghetti

1 tbsp. unsalted butter (optional)

Directions:

Heat a large pan of salted water and cook the pasta until just barely al dente, drain.  I do this cooking while I am cooking the veggies.

Saute the bacon in a large frying pan.  I used my mini wok which is great for many frying projects.  Cook while stirring constantly, for 3-4 minutes until rendering the fat is well underway; say half done bacon.  Add the onion and continue cooking while it softens. Stir often. After 3-4 minutes add the two kinds of squash. If you couldn’t get yellow squash just green is okay.  Keep stirring!  Cook a few more minutes until the squash is close to done.  Stir in the tomato halves and cook 1 minute. Mix the cream, eggs and cheese in a bowl.  Add the hot pasta to the frying pan and dump in the liquid from the bowl, stirring well.  Turn off the heat as soon as you dump it in.  Add the tablespoon butter, some sea salt and freshly grated pepper and stir a bit more.  Serve immediately.  If you like to guild the lily top with a good sprinkle of more grated Parmesan cheese.

Last time I made it I used some sliced red bell pepper, sweet onion and green squash. Yes on tomatoes, no on bacon; vegetarian style for my god daughter.  It was good but I think I prefer the bacon version.  So it is totally up to you as to which version you prefer to create.  I have also made it with half and half instead of heavy cream; works pretty well too.  Last time I used 3 whole eggs as I didn’t want to waste the whites. I left out the butter this last time, forgot it; still good. I slightly overcooked my tomatoes in the latest version but they were tasty non-the-less. I think it is a very flexible recipe, just the kind I like!  Enjoy an easy to throw together late summer Italian veggie feast!

Glorious Gnudi to Enjoy!

A while ago I saw this interesting recipe for something called gnudi.  It appeared to be a lot like gnocchi but with spinach built in.  I kept putting off making it and finally, out of curiosity more than anything I made some this past Saturday. And no, I am not sure how to pronounce it.  I think the g is silent so it sounds like “nudi” when I say the word.

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I found a similar recipe on Food Network, made with wheat flour, but what was really interesting were the comments.  A lot of whining about how they fall apart while cooking and words as to how bland they are.  Many comments later I was ready to make them with a few modifications. Despite all the negative comments this recipe got 3.5 stars so I knew it had something going for it.

I made sure to get as much liquid out of the spinach as humanly possible.  I even pressed the spinach in a strainer using a paper towel to force out as much liquid as could be expelled.  Then I was careful to chill the dough well.  And I remembered, for the most part, to turn down the stove temperature once I put the gnudi in.

My best friend’s mom made these but she called them “maflda” according to Bernie.  Unfortunately Sparky has been gone for many years and I cannot confirm that name.  I do know they remind me of her fabulous authentic Italian home cooking.  They have a delicate ricotta and Parmesan cheese flavor and are pillow like bundles of yummy Italian flavor.  I declined to serve them with marinara as both recipes I found suggested. I like them with a touch of butter and Bernie says that is how her mom served them.  I think the marinara sauce would cover up their delicate and subtle symphony of flavors.  The nutmeg in them has an affinity with spinach and really makes the flavor perfect, don’t leave it out.

gnudi on plate

GF Gnudi Dumplings

Ingredients

1 cup whole milk ricotta cheese (if it seems watery drain it for a while)     I didn’t see the need but some in the comments on line suggested draining.
1 pound frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan (best quality you can afford)
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg [I used nutmeg from a jar I had recently opened and it was really fresh smelling and worked great.]
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper (I didn’t measure; just ground a bunch up!)
6 tablespoons all-purpose gf flour, plus 1 cup for coating

Directions

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  I used one that was wide but not that deep for ease of plopping in the dumplings.

In a large bowl, mix ricotta, spinach, Parmesan cheese, eggs, and yolks. Stir in nutmeg, salt, pepper, and flour. Cover with plastic and refrigerate 30 minutes to an hour.

gnudi dough and formed dumplingsUse two spoons to form mixture in to small, slightly flattened balls about an inch to 1 ½ inches in diameter.  I used my favorite gf flour which is mostly brown rice flour with some potato starch and tapioca flour; see previous posts for a recipe. Use it in my pie dough and brownie recipe.

Put the cup of flour in a low flat bottomed bowl or on a plate. Roll the formed gnudi in the gf flour to coat, tapping off the excess. Slide formed gnudi into the boiling water. Be careful not to overcrowd the pan; I like to work in batches of 12. Remove the cooked gnudi using a slotted spoon after they float to the top and have cooked for about 4 minutes.

Place them in a serving platter and dot with small bits of fresh butter.

I served them as a starch along with some chicken kebabs but I am guessing they could go with most any protein or even standing alone as the entrée.

I served some to my family on Sunday as an appetizer and everyone but the two year old adored them.  He ate most of his but wasn’t quite as thrilled as the adults were!  i have some in that Tupperware container you see in the photograph.  I will be having them for supper tonight!

They aren’t that difficult to make; easy to form with a spoon.  Just follow the recipe pretty closely and you will be thrilled with the end results. Manja, manja!