Pasta

Penne with Vodka Sauce

July 16, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

This dish required a technique I had never tried before–flambe. Flambeing alcohol involves setting the alcohol on fire in a saute pan until it burns out. What’s leftover is all the aroma and flavor of the vodka, without all of the alcohol. The vodka is the critical component of this dish because it reacts with the sauce and brings out the flavor of the tomatoes. I have tried this dish before without the flambe technique and I like the results of flambeing a lot better. I have also tried this dish with bacon instead of pancetta, but I have come to prefer the pancetta. Lots of vodka sauces are pale pink but I only put 1/2 cup cream in the sauce so mine was a pale brick red instead. I prefer the darker sauce–I think the cream can mask the flavor of the tomatoes. I topped the pasta with a little grated parmesan and basil.

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Roasted Red Pepper and Goat Cheese Lasagna

March 21, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

Lasagna is a great staple dinner but I wanted to experiment a bit with the ingredients. Instead of using ricotta cheese I used a Bechamel sauce with goat cheese and feta. Bechamel is a white sauce made from milk, cheese, and butter. The goat cheese and feta added a tangy flavor that was good with the roasted red peppers. This recipe was very unique and it was a lot of fun to make and the results were great. Lasagna takes forever (about 2 1/2-3 hours) to prepare and cook so take some time to try this one out.

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Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Brown Butter and Sage

February 27, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

Italian food is great with fine ingredients and simple flavors. Butter and sage, two simple ingredients on their own, make an excellent gnocchi sauce. Gnocchi is a type of potato dumpling pasta–it reminds me of a cross between polish Perogies and ravioli pasta. Gnocchi is usually made with white potatoes but I decided to try sweet potatoes for a more savory flavor. The sage fries in the butter as it browns which smells and tastes great.

As for the gnocchi making process it was surprisingly easy. The only thing to watch out for is overcooking the gnocchi. It really only needs 3 minutes and should be immediately scooped out when it floats to the top. I learned this the hard way by overcooking it by about 2 minutes which created a slimy bunch that was totally gross. I thought this recipe turned out really great, and I will be making this again–perhaps with pumpkin the next time to mix things up.

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Zucchini Lasagna

January 1, 2011 by The Partial Ingredients

I have always had kind of a conundrum with lasagna. Since I don’t eat ground beef and I don’t really care for the creamy white veggie lasagna recipes, I had to get creative and combine my favorite parts of both types. I like the marinara sauce from the traditional lasagna but I also love the flavors that come with the vegetables in the other lasagna. If you are like me–a weirdo who shuns ground beef and cream sauces then this is the lasagna for you. I love zucchini and I thought it would make a tasty layer. I chopped the zucchini in small triangles even though its more “correct” to slice them in long pieces and boil. John frowned at my unorthodox zucchini preparation but I thought it turned out very well. The cheese layers were excellent–a mix of melted ricotta and mozzarella. I really liked this recipe, which is good because I will be eating a lot of leftovers this week. Oh, and happy New Year everybody!

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Eggplant Parmesan

December 26, 2010 by The Partial Ingredients

Eggplant can be so delicious if prepared correctly. For eggplant Parmesan, the eggplant needs to be drained of the water and bitterness before pan frying. You can find a lot of different methods on how to drain eggplant but I just use some paper towels and something heavy to press on top of the slices. I also like to strain the tomato sauce because it prevents the dish from becoming too watery. The eggplant parmesan turned out well–after the second round of cooking. I took it out the first night and it was just a little undercooked. The next day I cooked it about twice as long and it tasted great.

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