Cajun Chicken Pasta

For dinner the other night, I revisited a recipe I tried a few months ago and loved. Rich, decadent, highly seasoned, filling and totally satisfying. Cajun Chicken Pasta. Still meets all of those criteria. But I noticed one thing different this time. My "Cajun" seasoning was different and it gave a completely different taste. Previously, I used Penzey's Cajun Seasoning and this time I used a McCormick's Gourmet Collection Cajun blend. Both were fine, but now that I can compare, I'm certainly going with Penzey's. I'm not really surprised, I've had an ongoing love affair with Penzey's for many years. Afterall, I work not to support myself, but to support my spice habit. But in a pinch, I figured one can't be all that different from another. I felt there was a big different. This is based soley on my impression and not studying or research, etc, but I felt the McCormick's blend was very heavy on black pepper. All good! Love black pepper, but there wasn't a balance of other flavors in the blend. The black pepper stepped into the party and said "Hey, I'm black pepper, I'm dominant and I'm going to force you beneath me." Whereas the Penzey's blend just had the feeling of a bunch of friends hanging at a party, having a good time, everyone's working the room and no one is playing alpha dog. Again, I don't have a thing against black pepper, I love it and use lots of it, but with McCormicks, I think it was a touch heavy handed.

Anyway. Long story short. This is a fun, fast meal that I would recommend to anyone who wants a little zippy dinner. Now, if you're on a diet bandwagon, I wouldn't have any problems removing the butter from the recipe, or the cream. If I took the cream out, I might add in a tablespoon of tomato paste to add a little something more to the brothy sauce.

A quick heart attack recipe

White Cheese & Sausage Pasta
from Culinary in the Desert

I made this for dinner last night. It was good! Gut bomb good! Spicy from the sausage. Ridiculously creamy and gooey from the cheese and bechamel sauce. Stupid Good. I more or less followed the recipe; even though I didn't have it in front of me, so some of the quantities were off and I ad libbed a bit. Added some shredded white cheddar cheese (1/2 cup) as well as the mozzarella and parm.

Instead of using another baking dish, I made sure to boil the pasta in an oven-proof pot. After I drained the pasta, I dumped it back in the pot and poured the sausage/sauce mixture over, stirred and baked. Saved us a little extra clean up. I used a half pound of spicy ground pork sausage, not turkey sausage. I don't think it matters much. But use the spicy if you like some good heat. If not, use regular, but add a little red pepper flake. You want some heat to cut through all the creamy, cheesey goodness.



4 cups dry rigatoni or any other short tube-shaped pasta
8 ounces hot Italian turkey sausage, casings removed
2 TB butter
3 TB all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
3 ounces fresh grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1/4 tsp salt
4 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 400

In a large pot of boiling salted water, add pasta and cook according to package directions. Drain.

Meanwhile, in a large skillet over medium heat, add sausage - cook until browned, stirring to crumble. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate and set aside.

Add butter to the same skillet and allow to melt over medium heat - whisk in flour and allow to cook, whisking, for a minute or two. Gradually add milk, stirring with a whisk until smooth. Cook, stirring, until thick, about 8 minutes - remove from heat.

In a large bowl, toss together the sauce, cooked sausage Parmesan, crushed red pepper and salt. Scoop the mixture into a 7" x 11" baking dish coated with nonstick spray. Scatter the top with mozzarella. Bake until bubbly and the top is lightly browned, about 20 minutes.

Random Flavors

This was a fun adventure the other evening. We've been trying to avoid the store and use up any of our pantry items. I don't really have a name for this, but it's almost a cross between an Alfredo and Carbonnara sauce, with some French, German or Alsatian influences.

I started by browning some bacon pieces until crisp. I set the bacon aside and poured out the fat. To the pan I melted a TB of butter and browned about half an onion, diced small. When the onions were just beginning to brown I added some dried thyme and rosemary. I deglazed the pan with one cup of chicken broth. When that had reduced by half, I added some heavy cream. Bring this to a simmer and allow to reduce further until the sauce coats the back of a spoon. Turn off the heat and add about 1/2 a cup of grated Parmigiana Reggiano. Stir until incorporated, melted and smooth. Add half the bacon to the sauce and add whatever cooked pasta your are using. Stir. Garnish with the rest of the bacon.

This was very tasty, but it was an interesting blend of flavors. With the rosemary and thyme, I felt the sauce was more of an Alsatian style cream sauce. With the cheese and bacon I felt it resembled a standard Alfredo or Carbonnara. The bacon also seemed to lend itself to a German influence as well. All in all, it was tasty. But a tad salty, with the bacon and cheese, I didn't need an extra few pinches of salt to the cream. Oh well. Great on a chilly night.

Delicious, easy and I've been lazy

Hi all,

Last week seemed virtually non-existent. I was out of town for work for a bit. We went to the beach for our annual planning session. Good times. We got a lot of great work done. But that kept me away from the blog for a few days. Then I'm back and was super lazy, so we had dinner out at The Alamo. A delightful Tex-Mex joint on Kenilworth Avenue. Check it out if you haven't. They recently changed the format of their menu. But the food is the same! And the margaritas...three will knock you out.

Ahhh, the beach.

Last night, Sunday, was the first night I cooked in a week. I made my favorite Rosemary Cream Sauce for some pre-fab fresh pasta I bought at the store. Easy. Super RICH and very delicious.

You need to start with the best butter. IMHO, this is the best. Way back when, I was able to participate in a butter tasting. It's hard to tell what's what, but the Kerrygold ranked right up there at the top.

Then you need some fresh rosemary. This is from my garden. On a side note, my basil, which was looking beautiful, has been devoured by some type of buggies. I'm sad. I love the gardening stuff, but I don't know how to deal with pests. We did buy some stuff to keep squirrels away. You spray where you want to keep them away...it is nasty! Putrified egg whites, vinegar and I think some pepper oil. Ugh!

Melt some onions and butter....yes melt...low and slow...you want to sweat out those onions, until they are very tender and translucent! You don't want color, or your cream sauce will be brownish. When the onions are done. Add some roasted garlic for more richness!

And you need some freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano. Only the best.

There is also cream in this recipe. But I was having some technical difficulties* at that time, so no photo!

I dressed some tortellinis with the sauce this time. It's great with any fresh pasta. Ravioli, fettucine! All good.

*So, my technical difficulties. It was boiling the pasta. I filled my pot with water and dumped the pasta in. Too much pasta for the amount of water I had. The tortellinis immediately poofed up and were nearly floating out of the pot as water kept pouring out. It was a huge mess and very frustrating. I should have only cooked half the amount of pasta at a time. But again, laziness is the key for the past week, so I didn't want to take the extra time. Lesson learned!

*~*~*~*

Well folks. I'm not sure how productive I will be over the next three days. Hopefully I'll have another one or two posts. Then on Thursday I head out for Sunny San Diego for several days. We were out there for a week about three years ago. I'm sure I'll have a post or two from So.Cal., but no promises.

Chicken in Indian Butter Sauce

Tonight I made Butter Chicken.

Indian Butter Chicken is very easy to make and very satisfying.

The sauce going for a swirl with cream.


Served on rice I flavored with garam masala spices. Delish!


The recipe for the sauce makes three cups. For tonight, for the two of us, I used 1 1/2 cups of the sauce. The remainder went into the deep freeze for a later date. I suspect I can take it out of the freezer the night before/morning of, let it thaw and heat over a very low simmer before adding the chicken.

Rosemary! J. Pierpont!

Easy
As
Sin

With a little help from the store we had a great, simple, fast dinner tonight.

Chicken and Roasted Garlic Ravioli
w/Rosemary Cream Sauce

Rosemary Cream Sauce
1 cup heavy cream
2 garlic cloves, smashed
2 TB roughly chopped rosemary

Add the three ingredients into a small saucepan and simmer for 10 minutes. Strain out rosemary and garlic. Reserve infused cream.

1 TB butter
Rosemary infused cream
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
Fresh black pepper
Pinch of salt
2 TB finely chopped rosemary

In the small saucepan, over medium heat, melt the butter until it begins to spit and sputter. Pour in the cream and bring to a simmer. Bring to a heavy simmer and whisk in the Parmigiano. Season with salt and pepper. Continue whisking and allow to reduce slightly. About three minutes. Add the chopped rosemary. Simmer for one more minute. Add to pasta and toss to coat. Serve hot and garnish with a sprig of rosemary.


This is the ravioli I picked up at the store. With this sauce, they were delicious! For a pre-made pasta, these little guys were great! I was very satisfied and would happily serve to guests as a first course. This package, 9 oz, is just barely two servings.



**Title of the post...that would be a reference to the musical How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying. Not the best show, but it is fun. I saw it ages ago with Ralph Macchio...the Karate Kid...he could sing! Who knew?