Carnivore-Spicy Sauage Pasta and Lettuce Wraps

So despite now describing himself as vegan by proxy, The Carnivore is still having a dish with meat for dinner each night.

This week he requested pasta with sausage. He also requested that I make a thin, not chunky spicy tomatoe sauce to go with it.

Instead of a salad he asked that I make lettuce wraps, which I've never done.

Spicy Sausage Pasta
1 tube of Jimmy Dean Spicy Sausage
1 box of pasta-your choice
32 ounces of crushed tomatoes
1 container of baby portabella mushrooms
2 habanero peppers or spicy pepper of your choice
Parmesan cheese
basil
oregano

I think this is the first meal I've made that has taken less than 30 minutes to prepare in almost two months!

I cooked the sausage in a pan and then after if was cooked through I added the mushrooms.

Meanwhile, I added the crushed tomatoes, basil, oregano, and both habaneros to the food processor.

At this point the heat level made The Carnivore cough after tasting it due to the heat level. However, I added the tomato sauce to the meat and mushrooms and let it simmer for about 10 minutes while I cooked the pasta.

After draining the pasta I tossed it in the meat sauce and portioned it out for the week.

The Carnivore reported that some of the heat cooked out of the sauce but that it was still spicy.

Lettuce Wraps
1 bunch of green leaf lettuce
1 can corn
2 peppers-red and orange
1/2 red onion
feta
sesame dressing
sesame seeds

 After washing 3 leaves of lettuce I cut them in half long ways. Then I assembled a bit of each of the ingredients in the leaf and rolled the up. Once I had them in the container I drizzled the sesame dressing over them and topped them with some sesame seeds.

The first night I made these I use the whole leaf of lettuce. The Carnivore reported that it was too hard to eat so I cut them in half the next night and gave him chop sticks.

Yes, it is still basically a salad but more fun!







Meanwhile, I'm having a veggie tray for dinner with some white bean hummus and tahini sauce.

Vegan Stuffed Shells

I have a friend that makes the most amazing stuffed shells.

She made them for me years ago and when I complimented them she told me the recipe was on the noodle box. The recipe is there but I could never get mine to taste like hers!

In remembering those shells and wanting to branch out from linguine noodles and sauces I searched for a vegan recipe.

Here's the recipe I used when I was planning my dish.

Ingredients
1 16ox pkg of extra firm tofu
dried basil to taste
dried oregano to taste
garlic powder to taste

tofu mixture

(too lazy to cut up fresh garlic today!)
salt to taste
black pepper to taste
chopped fresh parsley (about a handful)
2 8oz can of organic diced tomatoes with Italian seasoning
1 box of vegan jumbo shells (check ingredients carefully)
1 bag of vegan shredded mozzarella

Directions
Add the tofu, dried spices, salt, pepper, and chopped parsley to a mixing bowl. Stir together until tofu is broken up and spices are incorporated evenly.

Pour 1 can of tomatoes in the bottom of a baking dish.

Stuff shells with tofu mixture.

stuffed!

Cover shells with the other can of tomatoes.

You can precook the shells if you want but as long as you cover them very well with sauce they will cook fully in the oven and you'll save some time and effort.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.

Sprinkle with vegan mozzarella and bake for another 5 minutes or so to melt the cheese.


I was happy with the way this recipe turned out.

straight from the oven to my belly

If you don't eat shells like this often you might be fooled. However, if stuffed shells are your favorite dish you'll likely notice the textural difference between the tofu and the more traditional ricotta filling.

I'll certainly make these again when I'm craving a stuffed pasta.

Gnocchi with White Beans, Tomatoes, Spinach and Mozzarella

Lunch this week was almost a one skillet meal, except for the gnocchi, which we discovered while in Venice last summer. I've heard Gnocchi described as a potato pasta but it reminds me more of a dumpling due to its density.

After attempting my own pasta earlier this week I took the easy way out on the gnocchi and bought them off the shelf at, of all places, Target.

We'd had them once before a few months ago and discovered last week that Target had started carrying several new varieties: mushroom and pumpkin! Yum!

I found the inspiration for this dish here but changed it a bit to suit our tastes.

This dish was very easy and took about 20 minutes to cook. Of course I soaked and cooked the beans the night before but you could always use canned to make it quicker.

The most complicated step here was chopping the onion and garlic. Onions must be out to get me. Every single onion I've chopped in the last two weeks has attacked my eyes without mercy.

Step 1: Boil the gnocchi and then crisp in a pan. They cook in about 2-3 minutes and float when they are ready.

Step 2: Saute the garlic and onions in olive oil. Add the tomatoes. Simmer. Add salt, beans, and can wilt and mix in spinach or serve on the side.

Step 3: Add mozzarella. I also added in a decent amount of pesto both in the sauce and on the mozzarella since I had some left over from the pasta experiment earlier in the week. I love pesto! The basil was nice addition to the dish.

Step 4: Plate and serve! So easy!

I love meals that cook together in one pan. The Carnivore hasn't complained but he doesn't like one skillet meals as much as I do.

I found this dish very filling due to the beans which is good since I'm juicing breakfast and dinner this week.

Each time I've made it this week I've added the ingredients in a different order but I've found it very important to simmer the mix for a good 5-10 minutes since it uses canned tomatoes. And I've also learned to put the beans in as late as possible since they are already cooked to avoid them turning in to a mushy mess.

Homemade Pasta and Pesto

The Carnivore and I took a once-in-a-lifetime type of trip to Europe last summer. Over four weeks we went on a 7 day Mediterranean cruise and spent time in Paris, Nice, Rome, Venice, and most importantly London, where he proposed.

Best. Proposal. Ever.

Quick Recap: I'm obsessed with London, Tower of London, Crown Jewels, "Are you jealous of the diamonds?," and the I got my own sparkly, amazingly perfect engagement ring. And, back to the food...

Our time in Italy sort of made us pasta snobs. I've only had one really decent bowl of pasta since in a French inspired cafe in Memphis. Random. I've wanted  to learn to make my own pasta since.

Enter another incredible feature of the juicer we recently bought. It will extrude 2 sizes of spaghetti, linguine, and fettuccine. Huge selling point due to the cost of the juicer.

And, since the last week of the month is "leftover week" I didn't have any fancy dinner to make and freeze so I decide to tackle making my own pasta for part of our special Sunday meal. Our favorite Italian dish was a pesto dish so that's where I decided to start.

Making the pasta took some trial and error to get the dough consistency right but was way easier than I thought it would be. I can't wait to try adding different juices and seasonings!

egg well in the flour

The Pasta

Ingredients: 2 cups flour, 2 eggs, 2 tbs olive oil, 2 tsp salt, and 8 tbs water

balls of pasta!

The Process: maybe 20 minutes to make 2 balls of pasta (6 servings). Then I let the dough balls rest for about 45 minutes. Feeding the dough through the juicer was very easy but took some coordination to pull the noddles, cut them, and get them in the boiling water all in one fluid motion.

The Pesto

the basil smelled SO GOOD!

Ingredients: 2 cups of living basil leaves, 5 cloves of raw garlic, nearly 2 ounces of raw pine nuts, and 1/2 cup of olive oil

The Process: washed and dried the basil, peeled the garlic, and emptied the pine nuts in to the food processor. added olive oil. I did this while the dough was resting. took about 15 minutes.

  

The Results

makes me want to lick the screen