Mama West's Lazy Stuffed Shells

I know I already posted today.  I'm probably going to post again.  I live by my own rules.

Actually, I'm procrastinating because I don't want to write a bio lab, and I remembered that I had three blogs worth of pictures on my camera.  But this meal was way successful, so I'm excited.

Last Friday, I got the urge to make Italian dinner for a bunch of people.  I'm 50% Italian, so that is just a genetic thing that happens every once in awhile.  You can trust me.  I'm in bio 105.

One of the meals my mom used to make a lot at home was these noodles with sauce and ricotta mixed in.  She usually mixed in some cooked ground beef, too, but the recipe is fine without it.  Without further ado--

MAMA WEST'S LAZY STUFFED SHELLS

Ingredients:
A box of shell pasta (or whatever shape you like)
A jar of sauce (I used prego, because some lady in Tops gave me a lecture on sauce and told me to buy it)
A container of part-skim ricotta (I am pretty positive it is 16 oz.)
A chopped up tomato

I also made salad with mixed greens, tomatoes, cucumbers and green peppers, which is exactly what it sounds like, and garlic bread, which I'll walk you through.

For the shells, just boil them, strain the water, and mix in the sauce, ricotta, and tomato.

Good shit, huh Miroki?

All I did was chop the vegetables and toss the salad, but it was pretty, so here's a picture of that, too.

These were the first fresh vegetables I'd had in days.
They tasted like Jesus.

The garlic bread was easy and delicious.  Cut a loaf of fresh italian bread into slices about an inch wide, butter one side, and broil the slices butter side up.  Then flip the pieces, add butter and garlic to the other side, and broil them again.

I can't say anything sassy about garlic bread.
It is too wonderful.

Overall, the dinner was well received.  I liked having home-cooked mama food.  It was a good night.

Taking a flattering group eating shot=impossible.

This isn't really related to the noodles, but I also made chocolate chunk cookies that night for some friends who helped me with a flat tire.

You know you are Susie Homemaker when you exchange
cookies for car help.

I used nestle chocolate chunks and just followed the recipe on the bag.  They were way tasty.  Highly recommended.

Hi guys! Eggplant is gross!

I have an awkward relationship with eggplant.

Basically, it goes like this:

1. I forget that I hate eggplant.

2. I eat eggplant.

3. I remember that I hate eggplant.

The problem is, one of the things that I really miss since becoming a vegetarian is chicken parmesan.  And at home, we have a restaurant nearby called Tony's that makes an eggplant parmesan that I love more than most other foods.  Mostly because they fry the eggplant beyond recognition, melt a brick of mozzarella on it and cover it in their super awesome tomato sauce.

So when I saw this in Tops, a combination of step one in the eggplant cycle and me missing Tony's made me buy it.

Quick, delicious meal my ass.

It just was not good.  I'll walk you through it, but I'm telling you, it was not good.

So first, I, innocent, wide eyed, hoping for nothing more than delicious eggplant parm, cooked some eggplant.

Warning sign number 1: it still looks like eggplant.

I also cooked up some spaghetti, and then I decided to get fancy.  That's usually when things go wrong for me.

It sort of looks like roadkill...

I thought that if I put the spaghetti, sauce, eggplant and cheese in the pan and then broiled the whole business, it would taste like Tony's.  False.

I was so hopeful when I took this photo.

The noodles/cheese/sauce thing wasn't really bad, but the eggplant peel was weirdly hard and it just made the whole experience unpleasant.  My roommate made something similar later in the week, though, and she seemed to be successful.  You can see her blog post here.  Also, she has a really cool blog that you should read.

Anyways, the eggplant cycle completed itself one more time.  When I reread Becky's blog post just now, I couldn't help thinking it looked delicious, so I guess it's only a matter of time before the cycle starts again.

Peanut Soup

Good news: I'm not dead.  Just too busy to blog.

Mediocre news: Peanut soup is sort of weird.

I actually am not overloaded with plans or homework today, so I decided I should cook something (after sleeping in till 11:30.  Lovely!)  I love thai food, so when I found a peanut soup recipe in one of my cookbooks, I was excited.  One of the roommates and I took a trip to Tops, which is a decent store, but still makes me miss home/Wegmans.

While trying to find all the stuff we needed, we learned (maybe relearned.  I feel like I've gotten confused by this every time I enter a grocery store) that canned tomatoes are not with canned fruits and vegetables.  I wanted to get some sauce, too, because I eat noodles like 800 times a week.  We were trying to figure out which was the best deal when this lady came up to us and not only recommended a type of sauce (Prego) but also told us an entire recipe for homemade sauce.  So a future foodblog project might be making the Tops lady's sauce.  It was cool and weird.

Anyways, peanut soup.

You need a bell pepper...

I forgot to take photos until I was already chopping.

...and an onion.  Chop 'em up!

Fun fact: I don't actually like the abbreviation "'em."
"Them" is a one syllable word.   No abbreviations necessary.

Then you sauté them with margarine in a saucepan for about 5 minutes with a little garlic powder (or a clove of chopped garlic.)

My garlic powder burned onto the pan a little.  It was weird looking.

Then, add a 24 oz can of chopped or crushed tomatoes with the liquid, a can of water, a few sprinkles of chili powder, and 24 oz of vegetable broth.  Bring it to a boil, then cook uncovered on low for half an hour.

As is often the case, it will look better soon.

After half an hour, add 1/2 cup instant brown rice and cook covered for 15 minutes.  When the rice is done, turn off the heat and stir in 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter until it dissolves.

Okay maybe not much better.

Overall, it was decent.  I really failed when I was trying to get the seal off the chili powder container, then I ended up adding too much and it kind of made my tongue numb.  But it tasted nice, if unfamiliar, and will probably be good with some grilled cheese later this week.  And I'm proud of myself for trying something new.

Wow.  This looked way cooler on my camera.
Like a magazine or something.   Now I'm disappointed.