Italian Sausage and Pinto Bean Stew

The days of class are dwindling, and so is my bank account.  So I have been stewing up some ideas to stay full on empty.  Soups and stews are great values for your money.  Both tend to be “set-it-and-forget-it” kind of recipes, great for exam periods when the only thing you (should be) involved in is studying.   Having a slow cooker or Crockpot makes your dinner just a click away, however, you can still do it old school – with a pot – like me.

Tonight’s dinner was a hearty bean and sausage stew.  It doesn’t require fancy vegetables, or great cuts of meat; it’s a pretty “pantry style” meal.  I loved this stew because it was not only savory the first time, but as a leftover, there were still unique ways to eat it.  In its original stew form, its velvety texture makes it a smooth criminal.  Spooned over rice or a thick slice of cornbread, you stretch it out, making it last for days.  Topped with cheddar cheese and a fried egg can make it protein packed and bursting with flavor.  So don’t be afraid of leftovers when you know you’ll have options.  It can be a good way to use less, and eat more.   

Italian Sausage and Pinto Bean Stew

Ingredients:

3 Italian Sausages (mild or hot)

1 onion, diced

1 green pepper, diced

2 cloves garlic, finely diced

1 jalapeno pepper, finely diced

1 (15 oz) can pinto beans, with liquid

1 cup diced tomatoes (½ small can, with liquid)

1 T paprika (smoked or sweet)

Salt and pepper, to taste

Instruction:

1.       First slice sausages in half, then slice each half into ½ inch pieces.

2.       Over medium heat, heat medium sized frying pan.  Add sausages and cook for about 4-5 minutes, or until well browned.

3.       Reserve about 2 T grease from sausages in frying pan, then add onion, pepper, garlic, and jalapeno.

4.       Over medium heat, cook onion mixture until vegetables are tender, about 5 minutes.  Season with paprika, salt, and pepper.

5.       Meanwhile, in a large saucepot, bring pinto beans and diced tomatoes up to a boil. 

6.       Once boiling, add sausage and cook until the liquid has reduced by about half, probably about 5-6 minutes.

7.       Add onion mixture, stir and reduce heat to medium. 

8.       Once sauce has come to desired thickness, remove from heat and serve.   (If you like a thinner stew, add water.)

Christmas Feast: Apricot Sausage Stuffing

Whether you are gobbling up turkey, hogging all the ham, or carving a nice slice of roast beast, everyone has his or her ideal Christmas Feast.   Mother Nature and I were up early this morning, and not just for the presents.   She provided the soft serenity of a White Christmas, I was the one banging and clanging with my own “Heavy Metal” in the kitchen.   Warm aromas of apricot glaze poured out of the oven and a saccharine smell of the makings of pecan pie wafted from the stove top.  This year, Christmas dinner featured a crown roast and apricot sausage stuffing.  If turkeys fear Thanksgiving, then pigs probably hate Christmas. 

In the morning, I opened my long-awaited present from Santa: the 13 inch All-Clad French Skillet with lid.  It was my “Red Rider BB Gun”.   I had a foodie moment as I admired the new lifetime cooking partner: sleek stainless steel, curvature of the handle, and aluminum core.  Cooking with it felt natural. “This is the way it’s supposed to be”, I kept repeating as I fried the sausage, onions, garlic, and celery for the stuffing.  It was a family affair as I taught my brother how to brown the sausage and vegetables and my grandparents gathered the other ingredients from the pantry.  I zested lemons, squeezed fresh orange juice, and chopped up dried apricots – eating half of the soft, sweet ones.   But that’s how one stays full until dinner!  A pound of white bread crumbs later, I was shoving a ceramic dish heaping with stuffing into the oven.

When it landed on the dining room table among the other holiday foods, the stuffing was still a standout.  The fluffy golden mass was the marriage of natural sweetness from the fruit and bold, salty flavor from the sausage.   Soaking the bread with chicken broth, orange juice, lemon juice and spices gave the stuffing a savory richness along with a citrus undertone.   We all enjoyed as many helpings as we could until our stomachs stopped accepting visitors.

*Side note: this recipe is adapted from Land O Lakes, Treasury of Country Heritage Meals and Menus for a holiday celebration, so it serves 8. 

Apricot Sausage Stuffing

Ingredients:

1 cup (2 medium) onions, chopped

1 cup (2 stalks) chopped celery, chopped

1 pound sweet Italian sausage

1 clove garlic, minced

1 cup fresh parsley, chopped

1 (14 ½ oz) can chicken broth

½ cup orange juice

1 T lemon juice

1 cup (6 oz) dried apricots, chopped

1 pound loaf white bread, dried and torn

1 egg, slightly beaten

1 tsp dried thyme leaves

1 tsp dried sage leaves, rubbed

Salt and pepper (about ½ tsp each)

1 T lemon peel, grated

Instructions:   

1.       Preheat oven to 325˚.

2.       While that is preheating, put sliced bread on baking sheets and toast for about 10-15 min, or until dried.

3.       In skillet, cook onions, celery, sausage, and garlic over medium high heat.  Stir occasionally until browned, about 10 min. Drain off fat.

4.       In large bowl, combine all remaining ingredients.  Add in sausage mixture. 

5.       Spoon into large casserole dish.

6.       Bake for 55 to 60 min or until heated through.

I’m Not Full, I’m Stuffed: Stuffed Artichokes

Artichokes are the roses of fresh produce.  Just as every rose has its thorn, so too does this relative of the thorny thistle.  Half the population would never realize that if they only judged the lifeless, mushy canned variety.   Globe Artichokes are what you would most commonly see in stores.  Artichokes are at their prime in the spring, but the season does not always dictate my menu. 

Fresh out of the grocery bag I was staring at a spiky, green globe with coarse, mostly inedible leaves that tightly enclosed a hairy “choke” just above the heart.  How long this will take to get in my belly?!  Minus the fuzz that must be scooped out, the heart and some inner leaves are edible.  Even parts of the outer artichoke leaves are edible, but make sure you chomp down on the lower, fleshy part.   Most of us stopped eating leaves after we finished teething.    Now we have an outlet to satisfy this herbivore urge.   Even adults have fun with their food.

In the store, pick artichokes with tightly closed leaves.  Once they are slated to cook, then you want them to open up wide for stuffing.  To soften the artichokes, you boil them.  An artichoke may seem like a small vessel, but it packs a load of meaty stuffing and bubbles over with melted cheese.   The stuffing is just the opener, though.  The robust, meaty heart of the artichoke is the true show-stopper.   After being boiled, the heart is tender but bold with flavor.  Too soon did I devour the heart and leave myself with only the wreckage of teeth-scraped leaves.  Alas…

Stuffed Artichokes

Ingredients:

4 artichokes

¾ lb ground Italian Sausage

½ onion, finely diced

2 cups bread crumbs [can use toasted sliced bread cut into small cubes]

Dried Basil and Oregano, Garlic Powder, Salt and Pepper

Milk – enough to make a ‘wet stuffing’

1 cup Cheddar Cheese, shredded

Instructions:

1.       First, wash you artichoke in cold water.  Make sure that you clean between the leaves.  Dry with clean towel.

2.       Cut off the top 1-2 inches of the artichoke where most of the leaves are tightest.  Remove anything that can be easily removed.

3.       Use a pair of kitchen scissors to trim off the thorns on the remaining leaves. 

4.       Place the artichokes in boiling water for about 30-40 min or until they have softened.  Remove and let cool slightly.

5.       Pull leaves apart as much as possible to remove hairy “choke” and the purple leaves covering the heart [remove enough leaves to make adequate room for stuffing]. 

6.       Meanwhile, in a frying pan, cook the ground Italian sausage over medium high heat. 

7.       Remove sausage.  Reserve about 2 T grease.  Drain excess grease.

8.       Add in diced onions, cook until translucent – about 5-7 min.

9.       In a mixing bowl, combine the sausage, onions, bread crumbs, spices and milk to make the wet stuffing.

10.   Cover top with cheese. 

11.   Bake at 350˚ for about 25-30 min, or until heated through and cheese has browned.   

Meat Sauce

For the last three weeks I have been starving. Exams starve you of nearly everything: time, energy, food, brain space, will-power, and…did I say food? My kitchen table has been piled high with scraps of paper, highlighted text books, and coffee stains. But I am ready to put food back on the table where it belongs. After finally grasping the “meat” of my classes, I have had my fill of “brain food”. Homemade meat sauce was the warm, Italian welcome that I needed.

The sound of sizzling was no longer associated with my brain cells frying. It was the 2 pounds of ground beef and sausage singing “That’s Amore” on the stove top. The extra effort of hand-dicing tomatoes is therapeutic and I believe it makes the sauce taste better. It is also a practical way to make sure you don’t get any skins or pits in your sauce. Cutting up a whole can of tomatoes yielded me only half a can of hand-diced tomatoes. But that is because my mantra for tomatoes is: “One for me, one for the sauce”.

Meat sauce was one of the first secret family recipes I learned. Because it’s based in the “Holy Trinity” of spices: basil, parsley, and oregano, it’s unlikely the flavor will ever go wrong. Plus, I have been formally trained to be a vigilant taste-tester with anything I make. It’s really for the good of all, I say. This batch of meat sauce hit the fresh herbs lottery. A heaping handful of basil, rosemary, and thyme was tossed in along with dried oregano and parsley, courtesy of those who keep plants better than I. Fresh herbs jive well with meat sauce.

The torturous, bold aromas had me pacing the kitchen. “Are we there yet?!” was all I could think. Finally, it was dinner. The meat sauce gently blanketed the al dente angel hair, and parmesan fell soft as snow on top. Meat sauce is a romance food. Light a few candles, turn on some jazz, and you are in love. It has bravado and sexiness without being overbearing. It will keep you warm at night. And it will appeal even to kids. Some call it the “full package”, I call it meat sauce.

Meat Sauce

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef

1 lb ground Italian sausage

1 large onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 cans (28 oz) whole tomatoes, hand-diced (remove pits and skins) *DO NOT DRAIN

2 cans (small) tomato sauce

1 can (small) tomato paste

Basil, Parsley, Oregano, Rosemary, Thyme, Salt and Pepper (to taste)

1 bay leaf

10 mushrooms, sliced

Instructions:

1. In large pot, fry ground meats over medium high heat.

2. As soon as just browned, remove meat and drain off most of the excess grease. RESERVE about 1 tablespoon.

3. In same pot, sauté onions and garlic over medium heat until translucent. Add meat back in.

4. Cut up tomatoes and add to meat and onions, along with the reserved tomato juice, tomato sauce and tomato paste.

5. Add herbs, s&p, bay leaf and mushrooms.

6. Bring sauce to a boil, reduce to simmer. Let simmer, covered, for at least 1 hour – flavors embolden with time. [I let mine simmer for about 4 hours]. Occasionally stir and check liquids.

Fall with Style: Stuffed Pumpkins

Carving pumpkins used to be one of the most anticipated events of fall for me. A night flickering lights inside hallowed out gourds. These creative cut-outs glow for a few days in the windows, porches or front lawns across the country. Within a week there will be pumpkin blood on the streets. Punted from porches, chucked at churches and bashed on bridges you will find their remnants, wasted on some pumpkin punk’s cheap thrills. This fact keeps me from going public with my prized pumpkin presentations. Unfortunately, I know it will all too soon become a beacon the night calls someone to smash. College campuses are exactly not pumpkin-friendly. So I have to turn to edible alternatives.

People will stuff candles inside pumpkins, and maybe bake their seeds for a late-night snack, but somehow the train stops there. Why not stuff them with couscous, sausage and apples? Surprised to hear that your favorite Halloween decoration is actually edible? Don’t be. This is not just another gourd in the patch, but a versatile edible vessel. Native Americans baked, boiled and roasted pumpkins hundreds of years before anyone thought to scrape out their nutrients and set them out to rot. While you probably want to stick to the smaller, pie pumpkins for baking and eating, you could hypothetically eat your Jack-o-Lantern [though it’s not recommended – they are mostly grown for commercial use].

Thus, the Pumpkin Party evolved. Okay, so fresh pumpkins are more expensive than Easy Mac and require an oven, but their novel value and savory taste will have you more in the mood for fall than a giant bag of pumpkin-shaped candy corn.

Three small pumpkins fed five hungry people. But next time I will be making my guests their own personal pumpkins. We just couldn’t get enough of the tender, earthy pumpkin. With each bite, we got the soft texture of couscous, the celery-like taste of fennel seed in the Italian sausage, the sour bite of granny smith apple chunks and the sweetness of white wine and raisins. The “ooo’s” and “aaaa’s” bounced around the table; some surprised with the savory, wholesome meal that the Great Pumpkin had yielded. Gourds and squashes might not be traditional items on your menu, but to get in the seasonal, holiday spirit I would suggest a stuffed pumpkin.

Stuffed Pumpkins

Ingredients:

3 small pumpkins

1 box [or about 1 cup uncooked] couscous

1 lb sweet Italian sausage

½ large onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

1 granny smith apple, peeled and chopped

¼ cup white wine

½ cup raisins

Thyme

Oregano

Rosemary

Salt and pepper

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 425˚ F.

2. Clean pumpkin. Cut off top of pumpkin. Pull out the guts, separate the seeds if you wish to cook them. Scrape insides of pumpkin with spoon to get out all the stringy mess. Rinse inside of pumpkin.

3. In a frying pan, cook sausage until cooked [brown]. Drain off grease. Put into mixing bowl.

4. Meanwhile, make couscous according to package instructions. Add to bowl.

5. Cook onions and garlic in frying pan until translucent. Add to bowl.

6. Add apple, raisins, wine, and spices/herbs. Mix all together.

7. Spoon stuffing evenly into pumpkins. Put top back on pumpkin.

8. Completely wrap pumpkins in tin foil.

9. Bake for about 30 min – or until fork tender.

10. Enjoy this fall treat! But I wouldn’t recommend the outer skin of the pumpkin, as it is tough.