Cooking Day 17ish...Who knows...the days run together now. Spaghetti and Meatballs
Last week...
Oh man, I don't even want to talk about last week. Let's just say...it was rough. All of this WFH finally caught up with me and I could not recuperate fast enough. I cooked maybe once last week. I saved all those pictures though, so maybe I will get those posted...eventually.
But last night I was told (they may say it was requested, but I was told) that I needed to do pasta. I left it up to Tony to decide what kind of pasta we did. He chose spaghetti and meatballs. Now...we didn't cheap out and buy frozen meatballs...not that they are cheap or bad. We have used them pretty regularly. I mean, there is not ALWAYS time to make your own meatballs. we used 2 lbs of ground Italian sausage and 1 1/2 lbs of ground beef. I took about 6 slices of our oldest bread and soaked it in a cup of buttermilk and let that sit about 30 minutes. I did tear up the bread before adding the buttermilk. While we waited on the bread, I minced 2 garlic cloves and chopped up half an onion and sauteed both of them in olive oil until they were tender. We added the bread, onions and garlic to the meat mixture along with salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese. Once it was all combined, we used a scoop to portion them out onto a foil-lined baking sheet and put them in a pre-heated oven at 375-degrees for about 35-40 minutes.
While the meatballs cooked, we started the pasta water so it could start to boil once the sauce was ready. When the meatballs were ready, we put into a 12-inch skillet only what we wanted to use for tonight and let them brown for about 5 minutes, then we added 2 jars of sauce. Ya I know...we phoned it in here, but y'all...last week was exhausting AND Tony went back to work, so we both took a shortcut. It's ok...shortcuts are ok.
Oh ya, 2 jars of sauce, I like Monte Bene garlic and basil. It has no preservatives, no sugar and it is just really good. Feel free to spice up your sauce however you prefer, we usually add a little more garlic powder, oregano and basil. Let that simmer until your pasta is done.
Oh ya...side note. When you are cooking pasta, make sure your water comes to a full rolling boil before you drop it in the water. Also, salt your water...heavily and if you are saucing your pasta DO NOT ADD OIL NO MATTER WHAT YOU WERE TAUGHT. Oily pasta water will not allow your sauce to stick to your pasta. Lastly, only cook it for as long as the box says. If it says 8 - 10 minutes, just boil it for 6-8 minutes. Don't forget that usually, your pasta is cooking a couple of extra minutes in your sauce.
While we waiting for all of that to come together, I made a salad and Tony put the garlic bread in the oven, yes we phoned in the garlic bread too, but you will see why soon. The salad was pretty basic. I mean, I love salad, and I am trying to incorporate it into dinner as often as I can. You don't really want to hear about every salad I prepare, do you? Well, this one had mini sweet peppers. I love those things!
We put everything together, served it up, and topped it with parmesan and a chiffonade of fresh basil. Oh...what does chiffonade mean, it means sliced. The leaves are stacked and rolled like a cigar then sliced through. HA HA...there...now you know chiffonade.
Now...before we started prepping ANY of the dinner stuff, I was preparing dessert. Thanks to my friend, Elisa, I have been jonesing for some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. I don't know if mine were as good as hers, but they sure smelled great and looked so pretty. I used to have my own oatmeal cookie recipe that was lost when my old laptop's hard drive was corrupted and I was unable to retrieve any of my recipes from it. I know...it was years ago and I am still upset. Off to Pinterest, I went and I used this recipe as a starting base. There are things I would do a little differently, but the only thing I changed was adding nutmeg to the dough. I used fresh whole nutmeg, just a few passes on the Microplane. But this was enough work so I don't feel bad about any shortcuts I used.
Oh man, I don't even want to talk about last week. Let's just say...it was rough. All of this WFH finally caught up with me and I could not recuperate fast enough. I cooked maybe once last week. I saved all those pictures though, so maybe I will get those posted...eventually.
But last night I was told (they may say it was requested, but I was told) that I needed to do pasta. I left it up to Tony to decide what kind of pasta we did. He chose spaghetti and meatballs. Now...we didn't cheap out and buy frozen meatballs...not that they are cheap or bad. We have used them pretty regularly. I mean, there is not ALWAYS time to make your own meatballs. we used 2 lbs of ground Italian sausage and 1 1/2 lbs of ground beef. I took about 6 slices of our oldest bread and soaked it in a cup of buttermilk and let that sit about 30 minutes. I did tear up the bread before adding the buttermilk. While we waited on the bread, I minced 2 garlic cloves and chopped up half an onion and sauteed both of them in olive oil until they were tender. We added the bread, onions and garlic to the meat mixture along with salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese. Once it was all combined, we used a scoop to portion them out onto a foil-lined baking sheet and put them in a pre-heated oven at 375-degrees for about 35-40 minutes.
While the meatballs cooked, we started the pasta water so it could start to boil once the sauce was ready. When the meatballs were ready, we put into a 12-inch skillet only what we wanted to use for tonight and let them brown for about 5 minutes, then we added 2 jars of sauce. Ya I know...we phoned it in here, but y'all...last week was exhausting AND Tony went back to work, so we both took a shortcut. It's ok...shortcuts are ok.
Oh ya, 2 jars of sauce, I like Monte Bene garlic and basil. It has no preservatives, no sugar and it is just really good. Feel free to spice up your sauce however you prefer, we usually add a little more garlic powder, oregano and basil. Let that simmer until your pasta is done.
Oh ya...side note. When you are cooking pasta, make sure your water comes to a full rolling boil before you drop it in the water. Also, salt your water...heavily and if you are saucing your pasta DO NOT ADD OIL NO MATTER WHAT YOU WERE TAUGHT. Oily pasta water will not allow your sauce to stick to your pasta. Lastly, only cook it for as long as the box says. If it says 8 - 10 minutes, just boil it for 6-8 minutes. Don't forget that usually, your pasta is cooking a couple of extra minutes in your sauce.
While we waiting for all of that to come together, I made a salad and Tony put the garlic bread in the oven, yes we phoned in the garlic bread too, but you will see why soon. The salad was pretty basic. I mean, I love salad, and I am trying to incorporate it into dinner as often as I can. You don't really want to hear about every salad I prepare, do you? Well, this one had mini sweet peppers. I love those things!
We put everything together, served it up, and topped it with parmesan and a chiffonade of fresh basil. Oh...what does chiffonade mean, it means sliced. The leaves are stacked and rolled like a cigar then sliced through. HA HA...there...now you know chiffonade.
Now...before we started prepping ANY of the dinner stuff, I was preparing dessert. Thanks to my friend, Elisa, I have been jonesing for some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. I don't know if mine were as good as hers, but they sure smelled great and looked so pretty. I used to have my own oatmeal cookie recipe that was lost when my old laptop's hard drive was corrupted and I was unable to retrieve any of my recipes from it. I know...it was years ago and I am still upset. Off to Pinterest, I went and I used this recipe as a starting base. There are things I would do a little differently, but the only thing I changed was adding nutmeg to the dough. I used fresh whole nutmeg, just a few passes on the Microplane. But this was enough work so I don't feel bad about any shortcuts I used.
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