Recipes from Helle

This is a favorite recipe in my household that is an adaptation from a cookbook I love called Mangiamo.

The sauce is the first part and it takes a while to prepare, but once its cooking you can basicly ignore it aside from an occasional stir.

• 1 lb ground beef, turkey or sausage
• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 4 tbsp butter
• 2 cups celery chopped
• 1 medium onion chopped
• 2 medium zucchinis grated
• 1 cup carrots sliced into coins
• 4 cloves minced garlic
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme
• 1 tbsp fresh rosemary
• 1 large can diced tomatoes
• 1 14 oz can tomato paste
• 1 cup Chablis
• 1 tsp sugar
• salt and pepper to taste

Brown meat in olive oil and butter. Add celery, onions, carrots, zucchini, and garlic. Salt and pepper to taste. Add spices, tomatoes, tomato paste, and whine… err wine. Cook for 3 hours over low heat stirring occasionally. Like I said its lengthy, not difficult.

For the Lasagna you’ll need

• 1 box of (12) no boil lasagna noodles
• 3 cups of cottage cheese
• 1 egg
• 4 cups shredded mozzarella

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Mix the eggs and cottage cheese in a bowl. Layer three noodles in a 9×13 pan followed by sauce, another layer of noodles, a layer of the cottage cheese mix, one final layer of sauce and the last three noodles. Top this all off with the mozzarella cheese and cover the pan with tin foil. Bake for 30 minutes covered, remove the foil, and bake for 15 to 20 more minutes til golden and bubbly. Let this rest for about 10 minutes before cutting into it. Then, Mange!

I often substitute colby jack for the mozzarella and its still wonderful. This makes about 12 servings, but in my house they go fast and even the veggie haters love it. As you can imagine if you follow my other blog, this is a wonderful use for my zucchinis.

I guess thats what you would call this particular recipe. I came up with it this morning quite by accident and thought I ought to share it with you all as it is a wonderful summer garden dish. Its a really simple side for whatever sort of evening you may have planned. I made a very small experimental dish of this so feel free to adjust the amounts on this recipe. The current measurments make about 2 cups of relish or whatever you want to call it.

• 2 ears of sweet corn
• 1/2 cup diced tomatoes (preferably fresh, but I don’t have any ripe yet so I used canned with great success)
• 3/4 red whine vinegar (gives a nice sweet and sour touch)
• 3 spicy banana peppers

So this is really pretty simple. Toss the ears of corn into lightly salted water and bring to a boil. Cook at a rolling boil for 3 minutes and remove from heat. In the meantime, thinly slice the banana peppers into rings and place in a bowl covering with the red wine vinegar. Add the tomatoes and stir. Run cold water over the ears of corn till they are cool enough to handle. (An alternative is to use leftover corn from another meal) Stand the corn on end and slice off the kernels and add to the rest of the ingredients. Mix thoroughly and refrigerate for a couple of hours. Its that simple! And its delicious. Don’t ask me how to serve this tho, because I just came up with it today. I plan to serve it as a topping for a garden fresh salad along with marinated artichoke hearts. Sound good? I think so.

Bon Apetit!

Okay so one of my addictions is the Bruschetta burgers at Applebee’s but I rarely want to pay their prices when I can make enough to serve several at home for the same price. Here’s my suggestions

I make my burgers with turkey. To make the patties more tasty, I crumble up a handful of….. cool ranch doritos or a handful of sour cream and onion chips– a good way to use up those crumbs that end up impossible to eat at the bottom of the bag. I am a little odd about this stuff anyway so don’t worry if this sounds weird. I make my burgers on the mini George Foreman grill and I really love that thing because it takes about 10 minutes (less if its warmed up for a while) to cook these and I can just kinda ignore it. Other options are of course the barbecue, the stove etc, but I’m just telling you how I do this. The nice thing about adding the chips is you don’t need much extra seasoning. You can use ground beef of course, but I like the turkey for the price and health benefits. To this you add fresh basil leaves, bruschetta either home made or store bought. Where there are Trader Joe’s I LOVE their Trader Giotto’s Bruschetta but here in the Joe’s bereft midwest I just buy mine from Wal Mart (gasp I know thats bad) when fresh tomatoes and basil aren’t available for making my own. (Recipe coming soon I promise) Okay so you’ve got your burger patty made up, all you need to do is top it with the fresh basil, bruschetta, nice thick slices of mozzarella and Claussen’s Kosher Dill pickles or similar. Hy Vee here in the KC metro area has a nice store version of these that is cheaper than Claussen. I serve these babies on light rye bread that is toasted just a little. These things are a bit addictive and I love love love them when going out to eat is out of the question. I have been known to make these with the garlic mashed potatoes and sit down with my sister in laws to watch chick flicks. Great way to spend a Friday or Saturday  girls night in.

Okay so I know its like a million degrees outside for most of you, but these are good recipes to use this time of year for the sheer deliciousness. The first is also a good use for all that excess zucchini piling up in the corners of your counter tops or going to waste out in the garden. It is a bit oily, but when its done it tastes buttery and delicious and if you feel it necessary, you can always substitute yoghurt for some or all the oil as long as the batter has a cake batter consistency.

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup oil
• 2 cups shredded raw zucchini
• 1 3/4 cups sugar
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp cinnamon or pumpkin pie spice
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup chopped nuts
• 2 cups flour

This first part is very important so don’t be lazy about it. I was and learned the hard or actually soggy way. Put the zucchini in a strainer or failing that a colander and press or squeeze with hands to get excess liquid out. Beat those eggs a bit with the sugar and oil til its nice and glarpy. If you’re using the yoghurt, just make sure this is a fairly liquid mess at this point — you can always add more if its not the right consistency, but you can’t take it out so be careful. Add the dry ingredients and the vanilla and mix by hand. (with a spoon of course….) Add zucchini minus that viscus liquid that comes out of it when you drained it. Beat it again till its properly submissive. Bake for 1 hour at 350 degrees F. And then try to be patient till its done. Enjoy!

Banana Bread

This recipe comes from a cookbook that I received as a wedding present from Jarell’s aunt. Its called America’s Best State Fair Recipes and I adapted it to leave out the macadamia nuts and use walnuts instead. It may sound a bit odd using vinegar in banana bread, but you won’t taste it when its done. I made this recipe at Christmas time and it was almost gone before we even ate dinner. Its yummy!

• 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 3 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 1/4 cups mashed ripe bananas
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 tsp vinegar
• 3 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 3/4 cups chopped walnuts or macadamia nuts

Preheat oven to 350 (175C). Generously grease a 9″x5″ loaf pan. In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients except the nuts. (we always try to keep the nuts separate from the rest of us) Beat at a medium pace speed with a mixer for about 30 seconds till dry ingredients are just moistened. Stir in nuts. Spoon into greased pan. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes or until center is completely done. Cool for about 10 minutes before removing from pan.

As a side note, I made this in two loaf pans and that spread it out a bit more evenly. Watch it carefully so it doesn’t burn because burned banana bread leaves a nasty smell for weeks… Not that I’m speaking from experience or anything. Except for that one time when I misread the instructions and used 2 cups of baking powder instead of 2 teaspoons…..

Now for this recipe that I alluded to in my other blog, I have to give a bit of background. I dated a guy in high school who was really into Tae Kwon Do. During his Sophomre year of school he got to go to South Korea for about a week and when he came back he raved about the food. In particular Bul Go Gi and Bam bebop. The second one I haven’t ever found a recipe for because he was never sure of the spelling or anything else for that matter, but I found and decided to make Bul Go Gi for him. As it turned out, that particular dish became one of my favorites and altho I haven’t added any changes to make it my own, I would like to share it here with you all. Oh and if you look at my other blog and see that picture of me from high school with a guy, that would be Alan, the inspiration for this dish. He is now a chef and I assume he can make his own Bul Go Gi. Congrats Alan if you’re out there somewhere reading this.

Bul Go Gi

• 1 lb beef sliced very thin (easier to do when it is slightly frozen
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1tsp sugar
• 3 cloves garlic crushed or thinly sliced
• 2 green onion sliced very thin
• 1 tsp grated fresh ginger
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 2 tbsp toasted sesame seeds
• 1/4 tsp black pepper

As always, amounts are approximate and can be altered to taste. Marinate the beef in the sauce for about an hour (some people do it overnight, but this seems to be overkill to me!) Cook the meat on med high heat in a skillet with marinade until well done.  Serve with rice, bean sprouts, and kim chee as sides and Napa cabbage. The trick to this dish is to use the large cabbage leaves as tortillas and wrap your meat, rice, bean sprouts, and kim chee up in them. This makes for a really crunchy texture for each bite, and I can almost guarantee you will love it.

This is another one of those recipes from my Mom’s archives that I enjoy making because it is quick easy and yummy. I added the rosemary to the dish myself and you can use fresh or dried, but it adds a nice almost piney taste to the mix giving it a little bit of a gourmet taste almost for cheap. I like to serve this with homemade tartar sauce and veggies for an easy meal in a hurry.

• 2 6 oz cans tuna drained
• 1 can mackerel drained
• Saltine crackers smashed into small pieces
• Eggs slightly beaten
• 1 c flour
• 1 tbsp seasoned salt
• fresh rosemary to taste
• pepper
• Oil for frying

In a large bowl, mix fish, breaking up any large pieces with a fork. Add eggs, rosemary, and crackers and mix well until ingredients are moist and hold together like meatloaf. Shape in to balls. Set aside. Coating: mix flour seasoned salt and pepper. Roll each fish ball in coating mix until well coated. Heat oil to 375 degrees. Carefully place fish balls in pan cooking 5-8 at a time depending on size of pan. Turn fish balls occasionally until all sides are a crisp golden brown. Drain on paper towels and serve with tartar sauce.

Tartar Sauce

• 1 cup mayonaise
• 1/4 cup chopped onions
• 4 tbsp sweet pickle relish more or less
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

Mix together and allow to chill for at least 20 minutes to let the flavors mix a bit.