Category: Spaghetti

Spaghetti Squash with Ground Turkey Tomato Sauce

10/1/2015

The veggie box strikes again with a spaghetti squash! This is another vegetable that I've never had, so I figured for the first time I'd go with a classic use- spaghetti squash with tomato/meat sauce.

Ingredients:

1 spaghetti squash
1 lb ground beef
Half a green pepper, diced
1 onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 portobello mushroom, halved and sliced
1 (28 oz) can diced tomatoes, drained
Salt and pepper
¼ tsp. dried thyme
½ tsp. dried oregano
¼ tsp. cayenne
Parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Stab the spaghetti squash with a knife a bunch of times to allow the steam to release. Place on a baking sheet and cooking for 30-40 minutes, or until a knife can pierce through the skin easily.

Slice in half and allow to cool. Remove seeds. Using a fork, run it inside the squash to create the spaghetti "noodles."

For the filling/sauce, heat a large frying pan over medium-high heat. Add the beef and cook for a couple of minutes. Add onions, garlic, and mushrooms. Cook until meat is browned.

Mix in tomatoes, green pepper, salt, and pepper. Sprinkle with thyme, oregano, and cayenne. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

I stopped here and put my "noodles" in a bowl and put the sauce on top with some cheese. If you want, you can instead reduce oven to 350F. Add the sauce on top of your prepared squash halves. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese if desired. Bake for 10 minutes, or until heated through and cheese is melted. I think that is a poor plan, because 1, the squash husk was really flimsy and thin after I got alllll the noodles out. 2) The squash and sauce made enough for 6 servings, and this implies only 2 servings (since there are only two halves to serve it in).

RP Servings: 6, but it would depend on the size of your squash.
Stars: I say 4, husband says 3. For me- the noodles almost didn't even have a taste, so when you compare 42 calories for a cup of spaghetti squash noodles vs. 400 calories for a cup or actual noodles? We're counting calories right now, so there's really no contest. Eric thought that it was good, but that it seemed a little too bland. He said that for example, you could technically eat noodles with just butter or oil and salt/pepper/parmesan, but that you'd definitely need a lot of sauce to make spaghetti sauce good. Which, to be fair, is true. But the good news was that we had a lot of sauce, so it was still tasty.

Speaking of sauce, that was also pretty good, but I think that a can of tomato sauce or blended diced tomatoes would have added a nice (and needed) liquid to it.

0 Comments

Elk Spaghetti Sauce

4/5/2015

0 Comments

You may not have ground elk lying around... I actually did, because I got some elk and venison shipped to me, and one package of elk had started to thaw. That meant I needed to go ahead and use it, and, with the warmer weather, I wasn't in the mood for chili. (I made an amazing venison chili a month or so ago!) You can use elk or venison, or a lean ground beef for this recipe. It's supposed to be a baked spaghetti recipe, but, since gluten free pasta doesn't reheat well, I'm just making the sauce and will serve it the usual way.

INGREDIENTS

2 cups canned diced tomatoes
2 cups tomato sauce
1 cup water
1/2 cup diced onion
1/2 cup diced green bell pepper (I didn't use, and doubled the onion to make up for it)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley leaves (I used flat leaf)
1 1/2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
1 1/2 teaspoons House Seasoning, recipe follows
1 1/2 teaspoons seasoning salt (I used Lawrys)
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
2 small bay leaves
1 1/2 pounds ground beef (I used elk)

House Seasoning:
1 cup salt
1/4 cup black pepper
1/4 cup garlic powder

NOTE: I didn't make the House Seasoning, I just used the approximate equivalents of each of the three ingredients separately. I figure I'll have to tweak the seasoning at the end anyway!

ALSO, I'm not sure why she (it's a Paula Deen recipe) used 2 c of each kind of tomatoes, when canned ones are usually 14 1/2 or 15 oz. I just used a 15 oz can of diced, and a 15 oz can of sauce.

Put the tomatoes, water, onion, pepper, garlic, spices, sugar and bay leaves in a medium stockpot with the water (I used 1/2 a can of water). Bring to boil on high, then turn down and simmer for 1 hour. Because everything was pretty roughly chopped, I decided to puree it (not too smooth, just to get rid of the big chunks) in my immersion blender. (DON'T do what I did and forget to remove the bay leaves... just sayin'...) That's just a matter of taste - you can leave it chunky!

Brown, crumble and drain your meat and add to the sauce. (How gorgeous is that elk?! It's so lean it didn't really have anything to drain.) Simmer for at least 20 more minutes, or until ready to serve. With game meats, I like to cook low and slow, so I cooked it on very low for over 4 hours. Serve over pasta. Of course we used gluten free spaghetti!

If you want to make the baked spaghetti dish, head over to the original recipe - OR basically you cook 8 oz of pasta, drain, and layer 1/2 in a 13x9 baking dish sprayed with cooking spray. Add a little less than 1/2 of a combination of 1 c shredded cheddar and 1 c shredded Monterey Jack. Repeat the past and cheese, the top with the sauce. Bake 30 min at 350, then add the remaining cheese. Cook 5 more min or until the cheese is melted and bubbly.

RP Servings: 3 if you want meat in every serving. 4 if you're not too worried about meat quantity!

RATING: 3 1/2 - but it could be a 4!
The only thing keeping this from being a 4 is that it was way too salty. I added about 1 tsp of agave to the sauce before I served it which helped, but it was still a bit on the salty side, especially with parmesan. The recipe doesn't specify no-salt-added tomatoes, but that's one option for reducing the saltiness. Another would be to leave out the salt from the "homemade seasoning". We really liked it, though - my husband came in after he finished his (we didn't eat together because Duke was playing in the Final 4 and, well, let's just say it's best if he watches that alone (and texts the kids). :)

0 Comments

Country Club Chicken

1/20/2015

0 Comments

While we're on an artery-clogging kick with the Marshmallow Popcorn, let's just go ahead and make some Country Club Chicken while we're at it. Cheese, bacon, cream of mushroom soup, wine, pasta... there's no way this can fail. Right, guys? Right?

Ingredients:

1 pound spaghetti
4 chicken breasts
1 large onion
7 oz mushrooms
2 10oz cans cream of mushroom soup (I used fat free)
4 or 5 slices bacon (I used turkey bacon)
1/4 cup dry white wine
2/3 cup sharp cheddar
1 apple
butter or oil
salt & pepper

Peel the apple and wash the mushrooms. Mince and onion and apple, slice the mushrooms.

Cook the bacon, then drain the pan. (Don't wash!) Salt and pepper the chicken, add a little butter to the bacon-y pan, then brown the chicken on both sides. Remove and add chicken to a casserole dish.

Ignore the super dirty pan...

Cook the onions for 2-3 minutes first, add the mushrooms and cook for another 2-3 minutes, then finally, add the apples and cook it all for a final 3-4 minutes.

Season with some salt and pepper, crumble the bacon into it, and add the white wine. Add the soup and cheese, and mix everything together until the cheese melts.

Pour everything over the chicken breasts in the casserole dish. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 25-30 minutes.

While that's in there, cook the spaghetti. Serve over spaghetti and garnish with parsley.

THIS WAS SO DISAPPOINTING. I mean, look at those ingredients. LOOK AT THEM. IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. But there we were, my husband and I, looking in consternation at what should be a glorious pile of rich, buttery, cheesy, bacony goodness, and do you know what we said? We said, "huh. This is bland." BLAND.

BLAND!!!

RP Servings: 4
Stars: 2. Sure, it was edible. But... just... so incredibly disappointing.

0 Comments

Ground Turkey Meatballs

1/15/2015

0 Comments

Spaghetti is wonderful. I would eat spaghetti all of the time if I could, and I would always be happy. Spaghetti is not only delicious, but it is easy, which is even better. But, the thing about spaghetti is that it it has basically no protein in it whatsoever. To keep in line with the “everything is easy” aspect of spaghetti, I wanted an easy meatball recipe, so this is what I found!

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef (I used ground turkey)
1 small onion, grated
1 egg
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/3 cup Italian seasoned dried bread crumbs

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a medium bowl combine all ingredients. Mix well. The recipe said to try not to squeeze the mixture through your fingers, but just combine, as “squeezing” will give your meatball a tough texture.

The recipe then gave a very convoluted way to get even meatballs. Eh. Just roll them into 1-inch balls, or do like I do and use a melon baller.

Bake for 14-18 minutes.

RP servings: 5
Stars: Ehhh, probably a 3.5. We had a friend over and he and my husband said that it was really good, but I definitely feel like they could have been better. They were certainly fine, but they just seemed to lack the flavor that I wanted them to.

0 Comments

Spaghetti Squash with Ground Turkey Tomato Sauce

Elk Spaghetti Sauce

Country Club Chicken

Ground Turkey Meatballs

Author

Archives

Categories