Lasagna Vegetariana

Recipe Title: Lasagna Vegetariana
Recipe Link: http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2007/04/lasagna-vegetariana.html
Status: Approved!!!
Rating: 10/10

Jen's Notes: I made this night before last, with a friend of mine helping me out in the kitchen. Whether you are a vegetarian or not, you need to try this recipe. It was so insanely good. My husband polished off his plate in about two minutes (he's a fast eater), and my friend said that it was good enough to order from a restaurant. We will definitely be making this one again.

That said, this is a very time consuming recipe. There's a lot of ingredients, and a lot of them have to be chopped up or measured. It took me a little over an hour to get this in the oven, and that was with my friend helping me out. Part of this is probably because I kept having to stop and read the recipe in between doing stuff. Even so, I can't imagine the prep time being any less than 30 or 45 minutes, even if you have the recipe memorized. If you work full-time like I do, you might want to get this prepped the night before so that you can just stick it in the oven when you get home. I didn't get to start dinner until almost 6:30 this particular night, so it was almost 9pm by the time we ate.

The other adjustment you can make is the cook time. This was an accident, but it worked out. I was in a rush trying to get this thing in the oven, and I just skimmed through the cook time instructions and totally missed the fact that it was supposed to go in the oven covered for 30 minutes, then uncovered for 50 to 60. I only saw the second part of that, so I stuck it in the oven uncovered and set the timer for 55 minutes. I did realize my mistake before it finished cooking, but I decided to just let it ride - and everything turned out just fine. I really can't imagine that it would have turned out better (seriously, I don't think that's possible) if I had followed the cook time, but I may try it next time just to see. So, watch this space for updates!

What are you waiting for? Go make this lasagna!

Prep Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes
Cook Time: 60 minutes
Start to Finish: 2 hours, 15 minutes

Onion and Mushroom Pizza

Recipe Title: Onion and Mushroom Pizza

Recipe Link: http://delectablyfree.com/2010/02/caramelized-onion-and-shitake-pizza/

Status: Needs some work, but has potential

Rating: 4/10

Jen's Notes: This is one of those cases where I probably should have stuck to the recipe. Instead, I embellished and it didn't turn out to be an improvement. But, I have hope that this can be saved so keep on reading to learn from my mistakes.

First off, for the pizza dough, I substituted Bob's Red Mill Pizza Crust mix. I didn't have any pizza pans, so I decided to use one of my big cookie sheets (ala Bigfoot style). I wasn't sure how much of the dough to use, so I used all of it. I think that 3/4 or 1/2 of the dough would have worked out better, but it really depends on how you like your crust. Using the whole bag made it soft and chewy, and we usually like our pizza crust crispier. Next time, I'm going to take it out of the pan after the dough is in the oven the first time and cook the pizza directly on the oven rack. This will either make the pizza crispy, or make a huge mess in the oven, or both. Keep your eyes peeled to find out!

Another dough issue is that it ended up being very uneven when I pulled it out of the oven the first time. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to get the dough even next time (it certainly looked even when I finished shaping the dough), but I might try breaking out the old rolling pin.

TIP: Make the dough first, so that it can rise while you work on getting the toppings ready.

Next, the toppings. Because I am too cheap to buy shiitake mushrooms (you'll find this is a recurring theme for me), I bought a bag of regular baby bellas. I also decided to add some lean ground beef because the hubby gets cranky if there is not meat in his dinner. And because I love garlic, I tossed in a couple cloves of diced garlic. Then I decided to add in some pizza sauce (Chef Boyardee) - and I think this was my biggest mistake of the meal. After I tossed the toppings in a little olive oil and the dough had gone through round one in the oven, I covered the dough in sauce and toppings and popped it in the oven for the recommended time (which was plenty, for once).

The end result? Well, the toppings tasted very yummy together, so I plan to use the same combination next time. However, as I talked about up top, the dough was softer than we like. Second, I believe because of the added pizza sauce, there was way too much liquid on the pizza. In places, the dough was soggy. I suspect this was due in part to the unevenness of the dough. I think the pizza sauce pooled and then soaked through the low spots in the crust. In spite of all of this, the pizza was pretty tasty but definitely needs some work. Sure, we had to use a fork to eat the pizza but it was still good.

Moral of the story? Sometimes it's a good idea to resist the impulse to embellish.

Prep Time: 50 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Start to Finish: 1 hour, 10 minutes.

Penne Arrabiata with Brown Rice Pasta

Recipe Title: Penne Arrabiata with Brown Rice Pasta

Recipe Link: http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2006/12/christmas-penne.html
Status: Approved!
Rating: 9/10

Jen's Notes: I used chipotles instead of chiles on the first run – very tasty, but very very spicy. If you don’t like spicy (and I mean really spicy), don’t use chipotles. I also added some lean ground beef to it – I think it made it a much more satisfying meal. I used some of the sauce from the canned chipotles too - I'm sure this didn't help the spice factor but I think maybe it helped the YUM factor.

I also just used about six fresh Roma tomatoes, instead of fire roasted ones. I was a little worried about this recipe because I hate fresh tomatoes (it’s a texture thing), so I was afraid the tomatoes would be too much for me. I just let them cook for a good long time, and it was all good in the hood, baby. I've met a lot of people with the same tomato issue as me - if you are one of those people, do not shy away from this recipe. If I like it, so will you. I've been refusing to eat tomatoes since I was five, so trust me, I hate tomatoes just as much as you do ;)

Kitchen snags? Not much on this one. It was also my first time using Tinkyada pasta (try Whole Foods if you haven't been able to find it - much better than the DeBole's stuff I bought the first time around), and the penne tended to clump together worse than I am used to, so just make sure to give the noodles a quick stir here and there.

Prep Time: 20 minutes to chop up the onion, garlic and tomatoes. Also, if you are using canned chiles, you might need to chop those up too (I did).

Cook Time: 30 minutes, but this could probably be slimmed down a bit since I am not always the most effecient cook.

Start to Finish: 50 minutes, but you can reduce this if you let the onions and garlic cook while you chop up the tomatoes.