Italian kale supremely pizza

Thanks to our unexpected chance to view a potential next apartment today, we decided to turn today's loaf into pizza dough! It is so convenient being married to an Italian - fresh dough, frozen aliquots of homemade red sauce, Italian sausage from famed Savenor's market, red bell peppers, crimini mushrooms, caramelized onions, and crisped kale made an excellent mozzarella pizza tonight. We caramelized the onions, turned off the heat, and added ripped up kale pieces to the warm pan before tossing onto the pizza (440def for 10 min then added the onion and kale to the pizza on the counter). It was perfect. Pizza stones and peels are awesome at getting that crispy perfect crust!

Pasta Carbonara

Deliciousness. Mike's first foray into adding wheat flour to semolina flour in pasta. Crispy bacon, scrambled eggs, grated Parmesan and fresh picked basil from our window garden = nursery fatigue gone :)

Spinach, Feta, and Sun-Dried Tomato Biscuits

HOLY COW!!!  We found these gems in a Ward cookbook from Cincinnati.  They are incredibly delicious cold or warm.  Fresh baked with a little bit of homemade butter on top?  Increible.  Fantastico.  Period.

Ingredients:
2C. bleached all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp sugar
1/4 tsp salt (we skipped this)
6T unsalted butter, frozen solid (we only had salted)
2 medium cloves garlic, minced
2 T. minced sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil, plus 2 tsp of the oil (we only had dry sun-dried tomatoes, so I added olive oil to the skillet for the garlic and threw the tomatoes in for the last minute)
1/2 C. frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry (we have a couple bags of different green leafy vegetables we can no longer tell apart, guessing this time it was rainbow chard)
1 C. cold buttermilk (YUM)

Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 450 degrees.  With a fork, mix flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a medium bowl.  Using the large holes on a box grater (or a food processor), coarsely grate butter into the dry ingredients; mix quickly with fingertips to blend evenly.  Briefly saute garlic in tomato oil in a small skillet.  Scrape garlic into spinach; add tomatoes and feta, and mix with fingertips.  Mix into the above dry ingredients.

Stir in buttermilk with fork and mix until dough just comes together.  If necessary, add extra droplets of buttermilk over any dry patches.  Turn dough onto floured work surface and pat into ta thick disk about 6" across.  Cut in half with a knife (or a dough scraper), then cut each half into five parts.  Pick up each piece and gently, without overhandling the dough, shape into a round.  

 Spray a 9" cake pan (or 2 8" rounds, or a cookie sheet...) with cooking spray and arrange biscuits in pan.  Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes (we did 22).  Serve immediately.  Makes 10 biscuits.

Stinkin Delicious.  Let me know what you discover to eat these with!  So far... they taste great for breakfast and with red sauce and pasta.

THE Sandwich

Ingredients:
homemade 1/2 wheat 1/2 white bread
mayonnaise
dijon mustard
green bell pepper
avocado
zucchini
yellow heirloom tomato
lettuce
honey turkey deli meat
sliced colby jack cheese

Observe...

bbbBest Butter bEver!

Mike and I did something crazy tonight -- we made butter!  It is ridiculously simple and reminds me of happy church Primary activities Mom taught us how to make butter by shaking a jar of cream really hard for as long as we could :).  Turns out, with adult hands and reflexes, it's a lot easier than I remember!

We had the idea because we have been racking up recipes we want to try but constantly forget to restock our butter.  We are also trying to get closer to the source in terms of our food -- make things on our own rather than buy more expensive processed items with preservatives etc. chemicals whose long-term effects are not known (with a bit of practicality thrown in so we don't go completely crazy but improve our health where we can).  Basically, when you make it yourself, you can be pickier about your ingredients and final product.

The Process: it is as simple as purchasing a pint of heavy cream, placing in a 1qt mason jar and tightening the lid [ Mike does that part :) ], then shaking said jar while watching 10 minutes of a Netflix episode of your choice, you almost have butter!  Last steps are to pour out the remaining cream (now buttermilk mmmmmm) and mash the butter in a bowl to spoon out the rest.  Finally, rinse with cold water.  I did that part like hand-wash laundry... fill, swish gently, pour, repeat... ~ 6 times until the wash-off comes clear.  Place into container and refrigerate!  Ours was set like normal butter in ~1.5 hours.

Well, it turns out that the cost breakdown, according to Stop n Shop, is 1 pint of cream $2.59, 1 box of butter $3.00, and packaged butter has "cream, salt" as its ingredients.  So 60cents for the same no-preservative result might not seem like a large payout in this case.  But here is what we did learn: making butter is fun and easy if you have the time and desire.  Also, this is an ideal way to control the flavor!  Next time we will try to add salt to one portion, chives and garlic to another, cinnamon to another -- the choices are endless!  Then we will become the coolest dinner hosts in all the land, and maybe make someone smile.

Not convinced?

As Mike just pronounced, "I think making butter has got to be the single most easy thing to do."

Additionally, "You know what's awesome about butter when you scoop it with an ice cream scoop?  It looks just like ice cream!"

Still not convinced?

Try it for your next date night.

Chicken saltimbocca and bruschetta

This is one from our newly newly wed days. Will add recipes later :)

Fileting Fish

This fish came from Haymarket - Mike fileted it himself!

(slowly catching up on our newlywed memories.)