Pasta e Fagioli (Pasta & Beans)

If you are not Italian or know someone Italian you may never have heard of Pasta e Fagioli. When I was a little girl my Nana & Grandpi made this soup quite often, but it was not my favorite dish. It wasn't until years later that I realized how good it really is. You see I was in the North End of Boston (the Italian section) with some friends when we found this hole in the wall family restaurant, which sad to say I have no idea what is the name of the restaurant, but I do know it is family owned and operated. It was a cold winter day and all I really wanted was something warm and comforting and I think the cheapest and most filling dish on the menu. That was Pasta e Fagioli, it was so yummy I still think about it whenever I make mine.

Pasta e Fagioli is for the most part peasant food since it is pasta and beans, two very cheep ingredients that can fill you up and serve many. But don't let that stray you away from making it. It is so yummy. I will say I have been told that my version is quite fancy but why not, when you have the ingredients use them.

Pasta e Fagioli


2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/8 lb. pancetta, diced


1 teaspoon dried rosemary
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 bay leaf
1/4 teaspoon chili powder or crushed red chili's


1 medium onion finely chopped
2 carrots finely chopped
2 ribs of celery finely chopped
4 cloves of garlic chopped
salt n pepper to taste


2 cans of beans (cannelloni, garbanzo, or kidney your choice)
1 cup canned tomato sauce
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup water
1 quart chicken stock


1 1/2 cups of ditalini pasta


grated Romano or parmigiana

Heat a stock pot over medium high heat and add oil and pancetta. When pancetta is browned add the herbs, vegetables, and garlic. Season with salt n pepper to taste. But be careful how much salt you use since Pancetta is a cured meat. Brown the veggies, then add the beans, tomato sauce, tomato paste, water, and chicken stock, and raise heat to high. Bring it to a boil. At this point you can add the pasta, and cook for 6-8 minutes. Or what I like to do is let it simmer on the stove for a few hours so all the flavors meld. Then before I plan on serving I make the pasta.

When serving it is best to grate cheese over each bowl, either Romano or parmigiana.

What I can say is my Grandpi is very proud to eat my version, even though it is not like his. But one thing to remember mine will never be like his even if I make his version ... there is always something that makes Grandpi's different than mine. But the fact that I make Pasta e Fagioli now brings back all the memories of being in Nana and Grandpi's kitchen, and what great Grandparents I had and still have.

This is so Yummy ... you got to try it. YUM!!!

Lettuce Wraps

Any visit to P.F. Changs for dinner and you probably have tried Lettuce Wraps, or about 5 years ago they were a staple on Chili's menu. To find good ones are sometimes not so easy, and since the closest P.F. Changs to me is 30 minutes away I have been thinking baout making these, but have not been really sure where to start.

The other day the January 2010 Everyday-Food magazine came in, and low and behold there was a recipie for Lettuce Wraps. This was the perfect oppertunituy I had to fininally make these for my husband.

This is what I did ...

Lettuce Wraps

1/4 cup soy sauce

4 teaspoons fish sauce

4 teaspoons sugar

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 shallot, diced

2 tablespoons ginger, minced

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 small jalapeno, seeded and finely chopped

1 lb. ground turkey meat

2 large heads of bib or boston lettuce

2 carrotts julienned

In a small bowl whisk soy sauce, fish sauce, and sugar till sugar is dissolved. Set aside.

Heat up a large skillet over high heat. When hot add oil, and swirl pan round to coat the pan with the oil. Add the shallot, ginger, garlic, ginger, and chilli and stir until fragrant (the oils in the shallot and the chilli will over take the other smells). Add the ground turkey and cook, braking up meat as it cooks with a wooden spoon.

Remove the leaves from the head of lettuce. The leaves are going to serve as you "vessel" to hold the meat.

To serve; place piece of lettuce on dish, fill with turkey mix, carrots, and drizzel sauce over. Fold like a burrito and eat.

If you are not sure what a shallot is ... it is a French onion. They are not very big but can be found at any local grocery store, and if you cannot find them I would suggest substituting red onion for one. Sometimes white onions are too strong and a milder onion flavor is needed here.

A secret I can tell you is I did not cut the carrots thin ... I used my potato peeler to make thin pieces of carrots. they came out very delicate and were so super easy to make. sometimes thinking outside the box can achieve the same goal.

One very nice thing came of this ... when we sat down to eat dinner my husband was so excited before he even took a bit. He knew before he ate it that it would be great. When he bit into his first one he asked "where did you get the sauce?" When I told him I made it he did not believe me and thought I purchased it somewhere. That was the best thing I heard all week. YUM!!!

Chicken Marsala

Chicken Marsala is one of, if not my ultimate favorite dishes to eat. My husband realized a few years ago that I should try to make Chicken Marsala myself, since every time I went for Italian food I ordered Chicken Marsala ... and I can tell you where it is good and where it is bad, for there are some places that I just think it is bad. The bad ones are the ones that inspired me to make this dish at home. At first I thought this was going to be so difficult but it is really one of the easiest things to make.

One of the best parts of this recipe is it is versatile in that you can use any meat ... chicken, veal, pork, etc. They all taste good with this recipe as the foundation.

Chicken Marsala

2 tablespoons of unsalted butter
3 slices of Italian prosciutto cut into small pieces
1 package of sliced mushrooms

4 chicken cutlets
3 tablespoons of flour
2 tablespoons of unsalted butter

1/4 cup of Marsala wine
1/4 cup water
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar

Saute 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter, prosciutto, and mushrooms till golden brown. Set aside. Return pan to heat.

Pound chicken till 1/4 inch or less thick. Dredge in flour and saute two pieces of chicken in 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter. Till golden brown. Set aside. Saute the other two pieces of chicken in rest of butter. Do not clean the pan.

The pan now has all yummy goodness stuck to the bottom and that is where most of your flavor is going to come from.

The step is deglazing the pan. Pour the liquid, Marsala wine and water, into the pan return to the heat, slowly scraping the bottom of the pan to release the yummy goodness. Add the dark brown sugar, and stir till dissolved. Remove from heat. Return the everything you have set aside; chicken, mushrooms, prosciutto. Cover and set aside for a few minutes before serving. This helps all the flavors marry.

Before serving sprinkle with parsley. YUM!!!

(This time when I served Chicken Marsala we also had mashed potatoes, the sauce on the potatoes was perfect!!!)

Beer Braised Short Ribs

Beef is something that is not cooked as often in the winter time as it is in the summertime at our house. For in the Summer the grille is on almost every night and my husband knows how to cook a mean steak. When it comes to the Winter the grille is still in use and accessible but a juicy steak is not craved as much, since I don't consider steak comfort food, and in the winter that is what I crave the most ... comfort food.

A couple of months ago we went to a Beer Dinner at Summer Winter in Burlington, MA. we had never been to a beer dinner, wine dinners are so common, but a beer dinner seemed to really interest us. We went and the food was to die for. The first one was a Sam Adam's beer dinner and the last one we attended was an Allagash beer dinner. Beer dinners are a bit different from wine dinners in that not only is the beer paired with the food ... in most cases the beer is used in preparation of the food (Cherry Wheat vinegarette on my salad, and Cream Stout ice cream for dessert). Both of these dinners featured a Beer Braised short rib as the main course, and in both cases all that was left only our plates was the bone. I knew I had to find a way to make this, and I knew my Crock Pot was the secret component.

This is what I did ...

Beer Braised Short Ribs

1 -1 1/2lbs. of beef short ribs

1 tablespoon soy sauce

2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

3 cloves garlic minced

1 teaspoon if thyme

1 bay leaf

1/4 cup flour

1 bottle beer - Wheat Ale (or stout, or a beer with a bold loud flavor)

1 cup chicken or beef broth

Add dry ingredients to crock pot; beef, brown sugar, garlic, thyme, bay leaf, in slow cooker. Sprinkle with flour and toss to coat meat.

Add wet ingredients; broth, soy sauce, and beer, pour over beef.

Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours (or high for 4-5 hours). Cook until meat is fork tender. (I will advise to cook for 8-10 hours, slower and longer makes meat tender.)

Remove beef from sauce, and set aside. Ladle out two spoonfuls of the broth and put in a small sauce pan on medium low heat. In a cup mix 2 tablespoons of cold water with 1 tablespoon of cornstarch, add to the broth on the stove top. Whisk till thickens.

When serving put sauce over meat.

Yum!!!

PS ... sorry no picture, we ate it all before i could even take the camera out.

Turkey Soup

Turkey Soup

What better thing to do with your turkey carcase but to make turkey soup. This has go to be one of the easiest things to make, and since you are most likely using items in your kitchen, that makes this a Frugal Find also. This though does need some fore-thought after you have carved your turkey. Take the carcase and place it in a large stock pot and put it in a cold place till you can get to it (mine sat in my 3 season porch overnight, the coldest place in my house that night).

When you are ready to make the soup fill the stock pot 3/4 or more with tap water. Cover the pot and bring it to a boil. Let it boil for a good hour. The idea is for all the meat to fall off the bone. At this point there is no need for seasoning, for the turkey will do all the work (if there is any skin left over please add that to the pot, the flavor can boil out of it too and can be discarded later).

After the hour has passed you can de-bone the turkey. This is a bit of a tedious process, but well worth it in the end. This cavity of so you think tiny bits of meat and skin will not only give you amazing flavor on their own but they will give way more meat than you can imagine. The amount of meat you will get will make your soup into stew.

No is time to add the following
2 cups carrots chopped

2 large onion chopped

1 celery heart chopped

1 medium/large potato peeled and diced

salt n pepper to taste

(fresh cilantro or parsley can be added if you have them on hand in you fridge)

Put the stock pot back on the stove top and bring to a boil. Turn down heat and keep on low for at least another hour.

You can serve it now but since turkey has more fat than chicken it is a good idea to cool the soup in your fridge overnight so the fat can rise to the surface of the soup and can be skimmed off the top.

After skimming the fat reheat the soup and serve. The soup can also be put in freezer containers and saver for later meals.

A perfect dinner for those cold January nights, warm home-made soup!!! Yum!!!

Sweet Crescent Rolls

This morning I was trying to figure out what can I make for breakfast that is not only easy but looks good too. Then it came to me ... I forgot to make the crescent rolls last night with dinner maybe I can use them to make some yummy pastry. That is just what I did, a Frugal Find for breakfast ... how sweet is that.

Sweet Crescent Rolls

Cinnamon Rolls

1 package of Crescent rolls

1 egg (for wash)

1 tablespoon sugar

1/8 teaspoon cinnamon

pinch of ground nutmeg

pinch of ground cloves

Preheat oven according to Crescent Roll package. Unroll the dough and tear accordingly to make 8 rolls. In a small bowl beat one egg to make an egg wash, then brush the egg over each of the triangles. In a small bowl combine the sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and clove (you can also use pumpkin pie spice in place of all of these). Once all the triangles have been egg washed sprinkle with the sugar mix. Roll into crescents. Egg was the finished crescent roll and sprinkle with sugar. This will give the outside a nice flaky top.

Bake accordingly.

Serve hot.

YUM!!!

Raspberry Turnover Crescent Rolls

1 package of Crescent Rolls

4 tablespoons of raspberry jam*

1 egg (for wash)

pinch of sugar

Preheat oven according to Crescent Roll package. Unroll dough and tear accordingly to make 8 rolls. In a small bowl beat one egg to make an egg wash, set aside. At widest end of triangle dob 1/2 tablespoon of jam. Fold over the tips of triangle to form an enclosed turnover. Egg wash the finished turnover and sprinkle with sugar.

Bake accordingly.

Let cool a few minutes before serving for jam is very hot and can burn.

YUM!!!

*In the case of the jam version, any jam will do. if you like another it can be used in place of the raspberry, the sky is the limit, or what you can find at the local market.

Upside down Apple Pecan Pie

I told you I like to make pies ... here is another one. Yes, this one like the last one has apples and pecans it also. But this one is very unique in that it looks like what would happen if an apple pie were to marry a pecan pie and they were to have a child ... it would be an Upside down Apple Pecan Pie. This pie is super easy to make and looks like you spent all day in the kitchen. But that can be our secret. Here we go ...

Upside down Apple Pecan Pie


1/2 cup seedless raisins
1 tablespoon bourbon/port/brandy
1/2 cup unsalted butter softened
1 cup pecan halves (or whatever it will take to cover the bottom of a 9" pie pan. They also need to be perfect pecans, not broken)
1/2 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar


2 pie crusts

6 peeled, cored, sliced apples
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon flour
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon ground nutmeg


Preheat the oven 450 degrees


Mix raisins & alcohol and set aside

Spread butter onto bottom of 9" pie pan. Press pecans topside down into butter. Pat brown sugar evenly over pecans. Place one pie crust over pecans.

Drain raisins and discard liquid. Toss raisins with apples, sugar, lemon juice, flour, and cinnamon. spoon over crust in pie pan. Take second pie crust and cover. Crimp edges to seal being careful not to tuck any of the crust under the pan lip. Prick crust with fork to allow to vent.

Bake 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees. Bake additional 45 minutes, or until top crust is lightly browned.

Cool on wire rack for 5 minutes or until pie stops bubbling. Place serving plate over pie bottom side up, and FLIP. Remove pie from pie pan and cool completely.

This pie is best if made the day before you want to eat it.

This pie needs to settle and the brown sugared pecans need to harden up.