tomatoes

Recipe: Creamy Cajun Pasta

Abby H.

Last week, I was looking through the fridge, trying to figure out what to make with the chicken breasts that I had defrosted. None of the usual suspects sounded good, and then I remembered I has seen a video with a recipe for Cream Cajun pasta. I couldn’t find the video again, so I decided to wing it.

It’s super tasty, quick, and easy.

Creamy Cajun Pasta

Ingredients:

  • 2 T. AP Flour
  • 4 T. Cajun/Creole seasoning, divided
  • 2 large chicken breasts, slices in half (or 4 chicken breast tenders)
  • 2T. Olive or grapeseed oil, divided
  • 2T. butter, divided
  • 1 medium onion, chopped (I used a purple onion)
  • 2 bell peppers, chopped
  • 3 celery ribs, diced
  • 2 small zucchini or 1 large zucchini, cut into bite-sized pieces
  • 3 large tomatoes diced, or 1 can (about 15oz) diced tomatoes drained
  • 1 1/4 cups chicken stock
  • 1T. corn starch
  • 1/2 block cream cheese
  • 1 cup milk (I used whole milk if you want it extra thick and creamy use heavy cream)
  • 1/2 cup parmesan cheese
  • 1 lb. package of your choice of pasta, cooked per package instructions, reserve 1/4 cup cooked pasta water.

Directions:

  1. Mix flour and 2T of the Cajun seasoning in a shallow dish.
  2. Coat chicken breasts in flour/spice mixture.
  3. In a large skillet, heat half the butter and oil. Once the butter is melted, add chicken breasts. Cook for about 5-6 minutes on each side, allowing a light golden crust to form on each side of the breast.
  4. Once chicken breasts are golden brown on each side, remove from pan and set aside.
  5. Add remaining butter and oil.
  6. Saute onions, celery, and bell peppers in oil/butter until the onions are translucent, about 5-10 minutes.
  7. Add in the tomatoes and cook covered for about 5-10 minutes.
  8. While tomatoes are cooking mix stock and cornstarch to create a slurry. This mixture will thicken the sauce.
  9. Once the tomatoes have cooked and broken down, add the stock slurry, milk, and cream cheese. Stir and break down the cream cheese as it melts so there are no lumps. Add in the remaining Cajun Seasoning.
  10. Add back in the chicken breasts, and add in the zucchini, turn the heat down to low, and cook covered for about 5-10 minutes, or until the zucchini is tender.
  11. Mix in the remaining cheese, and taste. Add more Cajun Seasoning as desired. We added black pepper and red pepper flakes to taste (about 1 teaspoon each).
  12. Stir in reserved pasta water, and cooked pasta. Allow the entire dish to cook for about 3-5 minutes.

Serve topped with parmesan cheese if desired. This was an amazing dinner and it was done in less than an hour. I had prepped all the veggies ahead of time. I do about 2 hours worth of meal prep each week, including chopping veggies on Monday afternoons after the CSA box arrives.

Allergy variations:

  • To make this dish gluten-free, use Gluten Free AP flour, and gluten-free pasta.
  • To make this dish dairy free, use dairy-free milk, cream cheese, and parm.
  • This dish is not vegetarian or vegan. 

 

 

 

 

Recipe: Chicken Fajita Stew

Abby H.

If you follow me on Instagram, you saw that I made soup the other morning. This stew is easy to make. It’s hearty, filling, and is a great way to incorporate veggies into your diet without much fuss.

Oh, and it’s great with crunched-up tortilla chips and cheese on top!

Let’s get into it!

Chicken Fajita Stew

Ingredients:

  • 8-10 cups of chicken stock (I made my own, but you can use canned chicken stock or broth)
  • 1 T. Butter
  • 2 Onions, diced
  • 2 Bell peppers, chopped
  • 2 ribs of Celery, diced
  • The kernels from 2 ears of corn (about 2-ish cups). You can also use frozen or canned (no salt added)
  • 2 Yellow Italian Squash, cut into slices and then quartered
  • 2 Tomatoes, diced
  • 1 can of heirloom beans
  • 1 can of diced tomatoes
  • Roughly 3 cups of chopped rotisserie chicken
  • 1T. each: cumin, chili powder, garlic powder,  oregano
  • 1 bay leaf
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

  1. In a large stock pot, melt butter over medium heat and add onions, bell peppers, and celery. Cook, stirring frequently until onions are translucent.
  2. Add in stock and remaining ingredients. Simmer over medium/low heat for 30-45 minutes, or longer if you like.
  3. Serve with quesadillas or top your soup with tortilla chips and shredded/crumbled cheese.

All of the fresh veggies came from our CSA Box! To learn more about our favorite CSA, Yasukochi Family Farms, check out my post here.

This recipe makes 10-12 servings. It freezes well, and yes, like most soups, it’s better the next day.

This recipe is naturally gluten-free.

 

Recipe: Veggie Cheese Tortellini Soup

Abby H.

We’ve been doing a lot of meat-free nights around here lately. To be honest, meat is really expensive lately, and the kids and I don’t eat it often anyway.

I was craving soup over the weekend, so I rummaged through the cupboard and fridge and dug out some ingredients that made a super easy and filling soup.

Veggie Cheese Tortellini Soup (makes 4-6 servings)

  • 2 t. oil of your choice
  • 1 package TJ Farms Seasoning Blend (From Dollar Tree). Contains Onions, bell pepper, celery, and parsley
  • 2 carrots, peeled and diced*
  • 1 cloves garlic, diced
  • 3 tomatoes*, deseeded and diced 0r 1 14.5 oz can of diced tomatoes in juice
  • 6 cups of your favorite stock- I used veggie stock
  • 1 bag of washed spinach leaves*
  • 1 bag shelf stable cheese tortellini
  • 2 T Italian Seasoning
  • 1 Bay Leaf
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

  1. In a large stock pot, heat oil.
  2. Add bag of seasoning blend and carrots. Cook until onions are clear, about 5-10 minutes.
  3. Add garlic, cook over medium until fragrant.
  4. Add tomatoes, stock, bay leaf, and Italian seasoning. Reduce heat to low, cover pot and simmer on low for 10-20 minutes.
  5. After soup has simmered and adjust the seasoning as needed. Add in spinach leaves and tortellini, cover, and cook on low for an additional 15-20 minutes. The pasta will swell as it cooks. Discard the bay leaf prior to serving.
  6. Serve topped with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese and hot, crusty bread.

All ingredients that have an * next to them came from our Yasukochi Family Farms CSA box. I love these boxes- Farm Fresh produce is delivered to our door once a week, no traveling to the store, worrying that I am overpaying for produce, or that I am going to pick the wrong melon or corn.

If cheese tortellini isn’t your speed, here is a shelf-stable mushroom tortellini that sounds tasty! If you want another type of filled pasta, use the suggested cooking time on the package instead of the time in step 5.

This soup is even better on the second day, and freezes well!

Family Recipe: Baked Red Pesto and Roasted Veggie Pasta

Abby H.

This recipe is easy to make, and amazing. It uses Red Pesto, which has a tomato base. It’s warm, filling, and comforting.

The first thing you need to do is roast some veggies. Check my recipe here. I roast 5-ish lbs of veggies each week, so we usually have some in the fridge.

 

Baked Red Pesto and Roasted Veggie Pasta

Ingredients:

Directions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
  2. Boil salted water and cook pasta per package directions. As you drain, reserve some of the pasta water (about 1/2 cup).
  3. In a large baking dish (11×13) mix roasted veggies, pasta, red pesto, and add pasta water a little bit at a time, until all the pasta is coated. You may not need all 1/2 cup.
  4. Mix in 1/2 of the cheese.
  5. Smooth the mixture down into the baking dish, and bake for 20 minutes covered.
  6. After 20 minutes, top with the remaining cheese and continue to bake uncovered for 10-ish minutes until the cheese is brown and bubbly.
  7. Serve with garlic bread and a green salad.

Serves 6-8. This re-heats well, if there are any leftovers.

Notes:

  • This dish is vegetarian, but not vegan. This is a vegan red pesto, but I’ve not tried it. To make it vegan, use a vegan red pesto and vegan Italian Cheese blend.
  • Pesto is not a nut-free product! If you have a nut allergy, be careful!
  • Feel free to use your favorite pasta (high protein, gluten-free, made from soy, etc). I do not recommend shirataki noodles- They have a weird texture and smell (seriously).

 

Recipe: Roasted Onion and Caramelized Onion Bisque

Abby H.

I saw a video online someplace (I want to say Facebook, but it could have been on Reddit too), and it showed how to make tomato bisque using freshly roasted tomatoes.

I was excited to try it since we’ve been getting tons of big tomatoes in our CSA box over the past two weeks and I had them sitting on the counter.

This recipe is simple, but it does involve a few steps and does take some time.

It’s worth it in my opinion.

Roasted Onion and Caramelized Onion Bisque

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

  • 8-10 Tomatoes, tops cut off. If the tomatoes are not a uniform size, cut them in half /into large uniform hunks
  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 2 cloves of garlic, diced
  • 2 tablespoons avocado oil
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 1 can (approx 16 oz) chicken or veggie stock
  • salt
  • pepper
  • 1 Teaspoon each: Basil, Rosemary
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 cup half and half
  • dash red pepper flakes (optional)
caramelized onions…. mmmmm

Directions:

  1. Preheat Oven to 425 degrees. Place tomatoes/tomato hunks on an oiled-up baking sheet. Brush tomatoes with oil and a sprinkle of salt and pepper.
  2. Roast tomatoes for 35-45 minutes.
  3. While tomatoes are roasting, melt butter in a stockpot, and over medium/low heat saute onions. in the last 10 minutes of cooking the onions, add the garlic and stir frequently to keep from burning. You will need to stir frequently.
  4. Place tomatoes in with onions, and add stock, and all herbs/seasonings, EXCEPT the bay leaf and red pepper.
  5. Using an emersion blender, blend soup until it’s smooth.
  6. Now that soup is smooth, add bay leaf and simmer for 30-45 minutes on low.
  7. Add half and half, stir well, add red pepper if desired.
  8. Serve topped with croutons.
This is what roasted tomatoes look like in a lonely stockpot.

Note: If you don’t have an emersion blender, pour tomatoes and onions into a blender and pulse until smooth.

This recipe does not make a ton of soup, as most of my soup recipes do. This recipe takes time, but it’s so good. It’s worth the time and effort for sure.

I recommend my 4-way grilled cheese to go with this soup too!

Slow Cooker Recipe: Sausage and Peppers!

Abby H.

This recipe is dead simple and so tasty! The best part is you can use any kind of Dinner sausage you want. We used Italian Sausages (made with pork), but you can use whatever you like (including veggie sausages if you are meatless).

You can use fresh or frozen peppers and onions (Yes, you can buy frozen peppers and onions at the store- They are often branded as “Fajita Mix”), it’s really up to you.

And you can load your yumminess onto a hoagie roll, top with cheese and chow down, or top a bed of pasta or Zoodles- It’s really up to you.

The best part is this recipe makes a lot, so there are always leftovers!

Sausage and Peppers Makes 6-8 servings

Ingredients

  • 1 Package Dinner Sausages (Italian or your choice)
  • 2 medium onions, thinly sliced
  • 2 bell pepper, thinly sliced
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1 can of tomato paste
  • 1 small can tomato sauce
  • 1 20-ish ounce can of diced tomatoes
  • 2 T Italian seasoning
  • salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

  1. In your slow cooker, combine all the ingredients.
  2. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.
  3. Turn up to high, remove the lid and cook for 30-45 minutes.
  4. Serve on a roll/bun, on pasta or zoodles.
  5. OPTIONAL- Top each serving with cheese.

New Recipe: Baked Tortellini

Abby H.

00169 (1).jpgThis recipe is dead simple. Make it as complicated as you want. Use jarred sauce, make your own from scratch, or take a jar of sauce and church it up yourself. Whatever.

Frozen pasta, fresh pasta, heck, you can even use the shell stable/dried tortellini. You could use ravioli if you wanted.

You can make this Vegetarian, Vegan, Chock Full o’ Meat, Gluten-Free, it’s up to you.

This is one of those recipes that’s a big hit at potlucks too. It’s pretty inexpensive, and we always have the ingredients in one form or another to make a batch.

Baked Tortellini

Ingredients:

  • 6-8 cups of Red Pasta Sauce.  I usually make a big batch of this sauce and portion some out just for this recipe. If you use jarred sauce, I recommend  you add 3-4 cups of veggies (carrots, onions, celery, bell peppers, zucchini, chopped/diced tomatoes, etc.)
  • 22-30 ounces of Tortellini/Ravioli, cooked per the package directions (this will probably take a couple packages)
  • 2 Cups Italian Cheese blend

Directions:

  1. Cook the pasta per the package directions. Drain.
  2. Pour pasta sauce into a baking dish (I use a 9×13), toss cooked pasta in sauce.
  3. Sprinkle cheese on top.
  4. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-ish minutes until food is bubbly, and cheese is brown and delicious looking.
  5. Serve with hot French Bread or Garlic Bread and a green salad.

This serves 8-10 people as a main.

 

If you are vegan, substitute in filled pasta and cheese that works for you.

Recipe: Chicken Meatball Skillet

Abby H.1 Comment

FullSizeRender(256).jpgThis recipe came to me, as I was staring into the fridge wondering what the hell I was going to do with all spinach my friend gave me.

I used a package of Aidell’s Chicken caramelized onion meatballs, but feel free to use whatever kind of meatballs you like (or make your own!).

Mix it up with whatever veggies you have on hand! Peppers or kale would be great in this dish!

Ingredients:

  • 1 package chicken meatballs (about a dozen, if making from scratch)
  • 1/2 purple onion, diced
  • 1 T. olive oil
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1.5 c. grape tomatoes, sliced in half lengthwise (about 1 package)
  • 3-4 c. fresh spinach
  • Juice of 3 lemons
  • zest of 1 lemon
  • 1 T. Thyme
  • 1 T. Rosemary
  • 1 T. air-dried shallots
  • 1 package pasta (I like ziti) cooked per package instructions
  • 1/2 c. grated parmesan cheese
  • salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste

Directions:

  1. In a large saucepan, saute onion until translucent.
  2. Add garlic, and cook on medium/low until fragrant.
  3. Add meatballs, tomatoes, and herbs. Cook on medium/low, until meatballs are heated thoroughly.
  4. stir in lemon juice and zest. Scrape pan to remove any browned bits.
  5. Toss in spinach, turn to low, and cover with the lid. Allow spinach to cook down by about half- this takes only a few minutes.
  6. Remove from heat, stir in cooked pasta and cheese.
  7. Season with salt and pepper as needed,  and serve ASAP.

 

This is a great 1 dish meal! It’s very filling, but the acid from the lemon and the chicken meatballs keeps the meal feeling very light.

To make this dish Gluten-free: Use GF pasta and make sure your meatballs are GF.

To make this dish Vegetarian: Use meat-free “meatballs”

Summer Veggie & Goat Cheese Tart

Abby H.

PICT0097.JPGI was talking about this really amazing dish with my mom the other day, and I realized that I had not posted the recipe!

I can’t find the original recipe for this, but I was driving around the week before Independence Day, and I was listening to NPR when this recipe was discussed.

I made this tart for our 4th of July celebration, and it was gone almost instantly! I didn’t even get a photo of it after it came out of the oven.

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This recipe is great with veggies fresh from the garden!

 

Oh man was it good! It’s easy to make, and you can substitute any veggies that you have in your kitchen (or garden).

Easy Summer Veggie & Goat Cheese Tart

Ingredients:

  • 1 pie crust (make it from scratch or use a mix like this one)
  • 1 4-oz. package of goat cheese, your choice of variety (I used garlic and herb) at room temperature
  • 2 medium-size RIPE tomatoes, sliced
  • 1 small zucchini, cut into thin coins
  • salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

  1. Spray a baking sheet with non-stick spray, and pre-heat over to 400 degrees.
  2. Roll out pie crust, and smooth out into a circle.
  3. Spread goat cheese in an even layer in the middle of the pie crust. Leave about 2 inches around the edges.
  4. Layer veggies over goat cheese.
  5. Fold up sides of pie crust to cover veggies- leave about a 2-inch opening in the top (see photo below).
  6. Bake for 20-30 minutes at 400 degrees or until pie crust is toasty brown.
  7. Cut into 6-8 wedges and serve. It’s yummy hot or at room temperature, but it won’t be around long enough to get cold!

Family Recipe: Veggie Loaded Pasta Sauce

Abby H.1 Comment

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I’m always on a mission to add more fruits and veggies into our diet. My pasta sauce recipe is full of veggies: Onions, peppers, carrots, zucchini, celery, fresh tomatoes.

And because I love meaty sauce, I can’t forget the 80/20 ground chuck!

I served it last night with both whole wheat pasta and Italian squash that I ran through the spiralizer (I have this one).

The kids aren’t too big on zoodles, but that’s ok. We paired our meal with a green salad (cucumber slices for the kids), and garlic bread (a family favorite).

 

Veggie Loaded Pasta Sauce

Ingredients

  • 1.5 lbs ground chuck or your favorite ground beef (don’t use super lean beef)
  • 2 T. olive oil
  • 1 white onion, diced
  • 1/2 c. each chopped or diced: carrots, celery, bell peppers (I used red)
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 6 ripe tomatoes, cut into quarters
  • 1 large can (28 ounces) fire-roasted tomatoes 
  • 2 cups red wine
  • 1 can tomato paste
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 2 t. Shallot pepper seasoning
  • 2 T. Italian Seasoning
  • 4 large zucchinis, spiralized, ends diced and reserved for sauce

 

Directions

  1. Brown meat in olive oil over low, breaking up meat as it cooks.
  2. Add onion, carrots, celery, bell peppers, and cook until soft and onions are translucent.
  3. Add garlic, cook until fragrant.
  4. Add fresh and canned tomatoes, and tomato paste.
  5. De-glaze pan with wine, add seasoning, and small pieces of zucchinis leftover from spiralizing.
  6. Cook on low for 2+ hours, stirring occasionally.
  7. To cook zucchini spirals, steam for 6-8 minutes, drain and serve right away!

 

This sauce freezes well too and gets better overnight in the fridge.  You can also use this sauce to make lasagna.