Lasagna

 

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• 1 1/2  pound spicy Italian sausage

• 1 pound lean ground beef

• ½ cup minced onion

• 2 cloves garlic, crushed

• 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes

• 2 (6 ounce) cans tomato paste

• ½ cup water

• 6 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley, divided

• 1 teaspoons dried basil leaves

• 1 teaspoons salt, divided, or to taste

• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

• 3/4 teaspoon fennel seeds

• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

• 12 lasagna noodles

• 16 ounces ricotta cheese

• 1 egg

• 1 pound mozzarella cheese, sliced

• 2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese 

• 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

• • 1. Cook sausage, ground beef, onion, and garlic in a Dutch oven over medium heat until well browned. Stir in crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, and water. Season with, 4 tablespoons parsley, basil, 1 teaspoon salt, Italian seasoning, fennel seeds, and pepper. Simmer, covered, for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.

    2. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook lasagna noodles in boiling water for 8 to 10 minutes. Drain noodles, and rinse with cold water. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta cheese with egg, remaining 2 tablespoons parsley, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.

    3. Preheat the oven to 325 

    4. To assemble, spread 1 cups of meat sauce in the bottom of a 9x13-inch baking dish. Arrange 6 noodles lengthwise over meat sauce. Spread with 1/3 of the ricotta cheese mixture. Top with 1/4 of the mozzarella cheese slices and shredded mozzarella. Spoon 1  cups meat sauce over mozzarella, and sprinkle with 1/3 cup Parmesan cheese. Repeat layers twice, and top with remaining mozzarella and Parmesan cheese. Cover with foil: to prevent sticking, either spray foil with cooking spray or make sure the foil does not touch the cheese.

    6. Bake in the preheated oven for one hour m Remove the foil and turn oven to 400 degrees and bake for an additional 20 minutes or until top is golden brown. Rest lasagna for 15 minutes before serving.

Birria Ramen

This soup is really good if you like spicy you're going to love it. I did change a lot from the original recipe. I will leave the link for the original so you can check it out. I love Birria tacos so I knew this was going to be good. I don't like cloves in any dish besides dessert and especially  Birria tacos. I left the cloves and cinnamon out of the recipe, I also changed the beef broth out for chicken broth.

Here is the original recipe https://www.marionskitchen.com/birria-ramen/

3 lb beef short ribs, bone in.

1 T salt

1 t pepper

2 T olive oil

1 onion, chopped

7 cups Chicken stock

1 package 10oz ramen

Marinade

1 7oz can Chipotle peppers in adobe sauce 

1 14oz can crushed tomatoes 

1/4 cup rice vinegar 

6 cloves garlic, chopped

1 t  Oregano 

1 t cumin

Toppings

1 cup chopped cabbage 

2 soft boiled eggs

1 jalapeno 

1 lime, quartered 

Fresh cilantro to top

Place beef ribs in a deep rectangle container, sprinkle all sides with salt and pepper.

Place all marinade  ingredients in a food processor,  blend until smooth. Pour mixture over beef ribs making sure they're well coated. Refrigerate over night. 

Next day place a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add olive oil, followed by the chopped onion.  Saute gently for two minutes.

Add the short ribs to pan scraping off excess marinade beforehand (reserve marinade). Cook, turning often for about 5 minutes until all sides are a golden brown. Pour reserved marinade over beef short ribs in pan, followed by the beef stock. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to low and cook for 4 hours until the meat is very tender and the bone has fallen out.

After 4 hours scoop up roughly half of the red oil that is sitting on top of the broth and place into a separate bowl or container for later.

Place a frying pan over high heat and add about two tablespoons of the excess oil. Shred the beef, when oil is hot add beef to pan and cook until crispy.

While the beef is crisping turn the broth up to high and when it starts to boil add your ramen noodles and cook until tender.

Divide between four bowls, add your Ramen, broth then top with your beef short ribs, cabbage, soft boiled egg cut in half, cilantro, jalapeno and lime.

Biscuits

 

These biscuits are really good. I will put the link to her page down below hope you get a chance to go over and visit her page.

https://sugarspunrun.com/easy-homemade-biscuits/#recipe

2 cups all-purpose flour (250g)

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 Tablespoon granulated sugar

1 teaspoon salt

6 Tablespoons unsalted butter very cold (85g), unsalted European butter is ideal, but not required

¾ cup whole milk¹ (177ml) buttermilk or 2% milk will also work

• For best results, chill your butter in the freezer for 10-20 minutes before beginning this recipe. It's ideal that the butter is very cold for light, flaky, buttery biscuits.
• Preheat oven to 425F and line a cookie sheet with nonstick parchment paper. Set aside.
• Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in a large bowl and mix well. Set aside.
• Remove your butter from the refrigerator and either cut it into your flour mixture using a pastry cutter or (preferred) use a box grater to shred the butter into small pieces and then add to the flour mixture and stir.
• Cut the butter or combine the grated butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
• Add milk, use a wooden spoon or spatula to stir until combined (don't over-work the dough).
• Transfer your biscuit dough to a well-floured surface and use your hands to gently work the dough together. If the dough is too sticky, add flour until it is manageable. 
• Once the dough is cohesive, fold in half over itself and use your hands to gently flatten layers together. Rotate the dough 90 degrees and fold in half again, repeating this step 5-6 times but taking care to not overwork the dough.
• Use your hands (do not use a rolling pin) to flatten the dough to 1" thick and lightly dust a 2 ¾" round biscuit cutter with flour. 
• Making close cuts, press the biscuit cutter straight down into the dough and drop the biscuit onto your prepared baking sheet.
• Repeat until you have gotten as many biscuits as possible and place less than ½" apart on baking sheet. 
• Once you have gotten as many biscuits as possible out of the dough, gently re-work the dough to get out another biscuit or two until you have at least 6 biscuits.
• Bake on 425F for 12 minutes or until tops are beginning to just turn lightly golden brown.
• If desired, brush with melted salted butter immediately after removing from oven. Serve warm and enjoy.

Wonton soup

 

I picked up one of those huge bags of the cilantro chicken wontons from Costco. I knew I wanted to make soup with it but it wasn't for sure what I was going to do with the rest since it's a lifetime supply for Just the Two of Us. But I think I will be making the soup a few more times so it should have a package covered and I may actually have to get another one before they go off sale.

Next time I think I will get some mushrooms maybe some dried shiitake and soak them in boiling water for a little bit and then add them to my soup, even chopped up broccoli would probably be really good and baby bok choy would be great in it. I like the mushroom and baby bok choy together ideal. I only had a zucchini and garlic and a little bit of ginger in my refrigerator so I just threw those in. But it's really a tasty quick soup. Be great for a cold night and something fast and easy to make when you get off work. From start to finish this didn't take no more than 20 minutes to make.

6 cups chicken broth

1-2 T  soy sauce

1/2-1 t finally grated Ginger

2 chopped garlic cloves

I  added one finely diced zucchini to it since that's all I had. But if I would have thought about this ahead of time I would have added shiitake mushrooms and baby bok choy.

4 thinly chopped green onions

30 small Frozen wontons. I used the chicken cilantro ones from Costco. Any wontons would work.

salt and white pepper to taste 

Sesame seed oil

garnish with chopped cilantro.

Add the first six ingredients to your pan and bring to a boil, add your wontons and cook until they're done about 5 to 7 minutes. Add your salt and white pepper to taste.  Ladle into your serving bowl and drizzle a little sesame seed oil on top and garnished with some cilantro.

Enjoy!

Surprise Pumpkin Muffins

1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese 1 egg 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 3 tablespoons brown sugar 1/2 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp nutmeg 1/4 tsp cloves 4 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour 5 tablespoons white sugar 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 tsp nutmeg 1/2 tsp ginger 1/4 tsp cloves 3 tablespoons butter 3 tablespoons chopped pecans 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 2 cups white sugar 2 teaspoons baking powder 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 1 tsp nutmeg 1/4 tsp ginger and cloves 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 eggs 1 1/3 cups canned pumpkin 1/3 cup vegetable oil 2 teaspoons vanilla extract Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease and flour 18 muffin cups, or use paper liners. To make the filling: In a medium bowl, beat cream cheese until soft. Add egg, vanilla and brown sugar. Beat until smooth, then set aside. For the streusel topping: In a medium bowl, mix flour, sugar, cinnamon and pecans. Add butter and cut it in with a fork until crumbly. Set aside. For the muffin batter: In a large bowl, sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in the center of flour mixture and add eggs, pumpkin, oil and vanilla. Beat together until smooth. Place pumpkin mixture in muffin cups about 1/2 full. Then add one tablespoon of the cream cheese mixture right in the middle of the batter. Try to keep cream cheese from touching the paper cup. Sprinkle on the streusel topping. Bake at 375 degrees F (195 degrees C) for 20 to 25 minutes."

Sourdough Focaccia

 

This is a really good Focaccia, I added the link for the original post. Go check it out.

The tomato Focaccia is the recipe on the page. I changed one of them up to a jalapeno cheddar Focaccia. I added some olive oil, Italian Seasoning and then cheddar cheese then topped it with jalapeños.

https://veenaazmanov.com/sourdough-focaccia/

Levain

• ▢30 g Sourdough starter
• ▢30 g Bread flour
• ▢30 g Water

Focaccia dough - 75% hydration

• ▢500 g Bread flour
• ▢9 g Kosher salt
• ▢90 g Levain made ahead or use starter
• ▢315 g Water
• ▢1 tbsp Olive oil

Toppings

• ▢1 cup Cherry tomato halves
• ▢2 sprigs Rosemary cut into small pieces
• ▢100 g Mozarella thinly sliced
• ▢¼ cup Extra virgin olive oil
• ▢10 Basil leaves
• ▢1 tbsp Sea salt I used garlic sea salt

Instructions

• Levain - In a medium bowl, combine the sourdough starter, water, and flour. Stir well to combine. Cover and leave to rise for 3 hours at room temperature.

  Pro tip - You can make the levain for up to 5 days in advance and leave it in the fridge.
  30 g Sourdough starter,30 g Bread flour,30 g Water
• Autolyze - In a large bowl, combine the water, levain/starter, olive oil, and flour. Combine well until no dry flour is visible. Cover the bowl and leave it on the counter for an hour.

  Pro tip - This is a wet dough so don't be tempted to add more flour. A loose dough will give an open crumb.
  500 g Bread flour,90 g Levain,315 g Water,1 tbsp Olive oil
• Stretch & Fold - After an hour of resting, sprinkle the salt over the dough and knead the dough using a stretch and fold method for 2 minutes. Rest for 30 minutes, then stretch and fold one more time. Transfer the dough to a clean oiled bowl.

  Pro tip - You can use a stand mixer with the dough hook attachment if you prefer. But I usually just stretch and fold the dough a few times in the bowl.
  9 g Kosher salt
• Bulk ferment - Cover the bowl and leave the dough to rise in a warm place (24C/74F) on the counter for 5 hours or in the fridge for up to 12 up to 24 hours.

  Pro tip - Transfering the dough to a clean bowl is optional but I do it to avoid any dry bits that are stuck to the bowl from getting into the proofed dough.
• Shape - Transfer the dough to an 8-inch oiled cast Iron skillet or 9 x 13-inch oiled rectangle baking dish lined with parchment paper. Using the flat of your fingers, gently spread the dough in the pan.

  Pro tip - This is a high hydration dough so it will be very loose. Use a flexible bench scraper to work instead of your hands.
• Proof - Cover the pan with plastic wrap or a clean tea towel. Leave to rise on the counter until it doubles in volume for about 2 to 3 hours.

  Prop tip - You can also cold proof in the refrigerator overnight but use a lined baking pan or cast iron pan.
• Oven - about 30 minutes before baking preheat the oven at 425°F/220°C/ Gas Mark 7
• Assemble - Once double in size, create dimples/holes in the dough by poking your fingers into the dough. You can break the big bubbles but leave some to become crisp during baking.

  Pro tip - Dip your fingers in oil or water to prevent the dough from sticking to them. This will create better holes.
• Top - Dot the top with cherry tomato halves, slices of mozzarella, rosemary, thyme, basil leaves, and a sprinkle of garlic sea salt. Drizzle the olive oil all over the bread.

  Pro tip - Moisten the herbs with olive oil will prevent them from burning during baking.
  1 cup Cherry tomato halves,2 sprigs Rosemary,100 g Mozarella,¼ cup Extra virgin olive oil,10 Basil leaves,1 tbsp Sea salt
• Bake - Transfer to the oven and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until the top is golden brown. When baked, remove from the oven and cool on a cooling rack at least 10 minutes before you cut. Garnish with more fresh basi

Bakery Style Coffeecake muffins

 

I pulled this recipe up to make pumpkin muffin. For some reason I was thinking they were pumpkin. I am so glad i was mistaken because these are so good. I did change the recipe just by adding nutmeg to them. I change every recipe I make so to only add nutmeg to the recipe just shows you how perfect these are. I will leave the link to Ashley's page, go on over and check her page out. These are the first thing I made of hers but after this recipe I will be checking out her page more. They are very tender muffins and not overly sweet like some coffee cakes can be. I will be making these again. 

Head on over to https://bakerbynature.com/bakery-style-coffee-cake-muffins/#wprm-recipe-container-43850

For the Buttery Crumb Topping:

• 1/2 cup (57g/2 ounces) all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup (50g/1 and 3/4 ounces) granulated sugar
• 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup (57g/2 ounces) unsalted butter, melted

For the Cinnamon Sugar Swirl:

• 1/3 cup (50g/1 and 3/4 ounces) granulated sugar
• 1 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

For the Muffins:

• 3 cups (361g/12 and 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (113g/4 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 cup (198g/7 ounces) granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup (53g/1 and 7/8 ounces) light brown sugar, packed
• 2 large eggs plus 1 egg yolk, at room temperature
• 1 and 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup (113g/4 ounces) buttermilk
• 1/2 cup (113g/4 ounces) full-fat sour cream

For the Glaze:

• 1 cup (113g/4 ounces) confectioners' sugar, sifted
• 2 to 3 Tablespoons buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

Instructions

 

For the Buttery Crumb Topping:

• In a medium mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Stir in the melted butter, mixing just until combined. Set aside while you prepare the rest of the recipe. The mixture will absorb the butter as it sits and become more crumbly by the time you’re ready to use it.

For the Cinnamon Sugar Layer:

• In a small mixing bowl, combine the sugar and cinnamon. Set aside.

For the Muffins:

• Preheat oven to 400°F (204°C). Line a 12 cup muffin tin with paper liners and set it aside.
• In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Set aside.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, or in a large bowl using a handheld electric mixer, combine the butter and both sugars and beat on medium-low speed until light and fluffy; about 3 minutes. Add in the eggs and yolk, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Slowly beat in the vanilla, buttermilk, and sour cream. Reduce mixer speed to low and gradually add in the dry ingredients, mixing just until combined. Be sure not to over mix here.

For the Glaze:

• In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the confectioners' sugar, buttermilk, vanilla, and salt until smooth. Add more confectioners' sugar to thicken or more buttermilk to thin. 

Assembly:

• Scoop a large spoonful of batter into each prepared muffin cup and, using a lightly greased spoon, spread it into the edges of the cup. Evenly divide the cinnamon sugar on top of the batter, aiming to pile it in the center of the each cup. Divide remaining batter evenly among the muffin cups, then use a lightly greased spoon to push it down on the sides to enclose the cinnamon sugar.
• Crumble up the topping and evenly distribute it on top of the 12 muffins, piling it high in the center. Gently push the streusel into the batter. This helps it stay put as the muffins bake.
• Bake for 20 to 22 minutes, or until the tops are lightly golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow the muffins to cool in the pan, placed on top of a wire rack, for 10 minutes, then transfer them to a large serving plate.
• Drizzle a little glaze on top of each muffin and serve warm.