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The best pasta bake I’ve ever tasted

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I was recently sent some canned tomatoes (SPC Ardmona) to try out. I use canned tomatoes all the time so thought I’d give them a go. I was also sent a recipe book and I cooked the Mushroom Bolognese Bake.

These canned tomatoes are supposed to be rich and thick and I wanted to see if they really were. Some canned tomatoes I buy are more watery than tomatoey but these seemed to live up to their promise.

Ardmona rich and think canned tomatoes

Makes enough for 4-6 serves.

Ingredients

  • 250g dried Penne pasta
  • 300ml thickened cream (I used low fat cream)
  • grated rind of 1 lemon
  • 3 tablespoons lemon juice
  • salt and ground pepper to taste

Mushroom meat sauce

  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 400g pork or veal mince (I used beef mince)
  • 200g mushrooms – sliced
  • 410 can Ardmona wine infused chopped tomatoes
  • 1 cup water
  • 5 stalks silver beet chopped
  • 1/4 cup pine nuts (I didn’t use this as my son’s allergic to nuts)
  • 1 cup grated Mozarella cheese

Method

  1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees celcius
  2. Cook pasta in a large saucepan of boiling water according to packet directions. Drain and return to saucepan.
  3. Stir through cream, lemon rind and juice. Season to taste with pepper. Set aside.
  4. Heat oil in frying pan. Brown mince for 3 minutes over high heat, stirring often to break up lumps.
  5. Stir in mushrooms, canned tomatoes and water. Return to the boil, cover and simmer for 8-10 minutes. Stir in silver beet.
  6. Spoon a layer of mushroom meat sauce into 8 cup casserole dish, top with pasta mixture and remaining sauce. Lightly toss together.
    Pasta bake before cheese
  7. Sprinkle with pine nuts (if using) and cheese.
  8. Cover with foil and bake for 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake further 5-10 minutes until cheese lightly browns.

Mushroom bolognese pasta bake

When eating this my son actually complimented me on the taste which he very rarely does this. For me, the lemon made all the difference as I’ve never used lemon with pasta before and it was gorgeous.

I’ll definitely be cooking this one again. It was easy, delicious and big enough to last us for a few meals.

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My bean mix slow cooker recipe

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When I posted the slow cooker mushroom meatballs recipe I mentioned my bean mix recipe. As I was typing I wondered if anyone would want to know it and at least one person does so I’m sharing it. It’s also slow cooker week over at BlogHer so it’s kind of timely.

I used to do my bean mix in a saucepan on the stove top but because I do a large bean mix it nearly always burned on the bottom of the saucepan giving my kitchen that awful burning food smell and then I’d have to be careful to not mix up the good bits with the burned bits.

Using the slow cooker to do this, however, doesn’t give me those burned bits and I can cook that bit extra in one go, therefore saving me time. The slow cooker for me is ultimately about saving time.

Onto my bean mix recipe. It’s my own, adapted from vegetarian friends who have made me nachos in the past. You could also use this for tacos or anything Mexican that requires beans. I’ve got a 4.5 litre capacity slow cooker and this recipe pretty much fills it up.

Preparing the kidney beans

I buy a kilo pack of red kidney beans – I like the Siena ones as they tend to keep their red colour the best.

Soak half of them (500g) overnight in lots of water, drain, rinse and put them in a saucepan with new water to boil up. I boil them for around 40 minutes but it doesn’t hurt to do it longer so long as you have enough hot water. You could do this step in the slow cooker too I guess but I don’t.

Once they’re cooked, drain again, rinse and leave in the drainer.

Making the bean mix

Ingredients

  • 500g dried red kidney beans (prepared as above)
  • 1 onion – chopped
  • half red capsicum chopped (I do this because it’s the only way my son will eat capsicum)
  • 4 or so small mushrooms chopped (you don’t have to do this but it doesn’t hurt)
  • 3 x 410g cans of chopped tomatoes
  • 3 cloves of garlic
  • teaspoon olive oil
  • small teaspoon of chilli paste (use fresh chillis if you want and adjust amounts according to how spicy you like food)
  • 1tbspn Cumin powder or seeds
  • 2 tbspns tomato paste (optional)

Method

Heat up the olive oil in a frypan and add the onions and capsicum and saute them until the onion is soft.

Add the garlic and mushrooms if you’re using mushrooms and cook for a minute.

Add the chilli and cumin and stir them in for a minute.

In the slow cooker add the beans and the canned tomatoes and the tomato paste if you’re using it (I’ve found with the Siena beans and the slow cooker I don’t really need tomato paste).

Then add the onions etc you’ve cooked in the frypan.

Mix everything up with a wooden spoon and cook for 2-4 hours on High, or 6-8 hours on Low. If it’s too watery from the tomatoes, just lift the lid off at the end so some of it can evaporate.

Now, you could eat it like this with your nachos or tacos but I like it all blended and doing that also hides the capsicum from those fussy eaters. If you want them blended just use a hand held blender, or put the mixture into a food processor.

This is enough for one huge meal or put it into containers to freeze.

Excuse me not taking any pictures here but I’ve been sick since Saturday so I left half my brain somewhere – probably the somewhere that didn’t tell met that I didn’t button up my cardigan properly this morning before I took my son to school.

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Slow cooker meatballs

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I recently wrote about my slow cooker and the Margaret Fulton crock pot cookbook. Yesterday I cooked the mushroom meatballs from her crock pot recipe book and despite my trepidation they turned out quite well. I wasn’t sure about the canned mushrooms as they looked very unappetising.

Meatballs in the slow cooker (crock pot)

You can see in the photo that I’ve got my red kidney beans soaking so that I can make a bean mix that I use for nachos and/or tacos. Soaking half a kilo of red kidney beans will eventually give me enough bean mix for four-five lots of nachos for the two of us. Now that I have the slow cooker I cook the bean mix in it because it nearly always used to burn when I did it on the stove top but I don’t have that problem with the slow cooker. See why I love it?

Here’s Margaret Fulton’s mushroom meatballs recipe (with my adjustments in brackets):

Ingredients

  • 500g (1lb) lean minced beef
  • 250g (8oz) minced pork and veal (I used sausage mince)
  • 1 egg
  • 3 tablespoons chopped parsley (I used parsley and oregano as my parsley’s mostly gone to seed)
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon pepper
  • 1.5 cups fresh breadcrumbs
  • (I added one small chopped onion to meatball mix)

Gravy

  • 240g (8oz) can muchrooms in butter sauce (I think I’d prefer to make my own next time)
  • 1 cup stock
  • 1/3 cup flour
  • 1/4 cup dry sherry (I should get some cooking sherry but I read you can also use a bit of vanilla essence which is what I did. It smelt awful at first but worked out okay)
  • 1 teaspoon paprika
  • 1 cup sour cream

Method

Combine all ingredients for gravy except sour cream in crock pot; stir thoroughly.

Mix all ingredients for meat balls. Shape into walnut size and brown in frypan. Add meat balls to gravy mixture in crock pot, cover and cook on Low setting for 6 to 8 hours, or High 2 to 4 hours.

Fifteen minutes before serving, stir in sour cream, reheat on High. Serve with noodles or boiled rice. We also ate with some steamed broccoli as it doesn’t seem right to have a meal without vegetables.

Serves 6.

It turned out quite well and will do us for a couple of meals and I’ll put the rest into the freezer for another meal.

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Making a trifle

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I had a few people around for dinner a little while ago and as I quite like making desserts I decided to have a go at making trifle which is something I’ve never done before. My main course – mango chicken – was also a first run which I wouldn’t normally do because I like to try things out before making them for people.

I didn’t have a trifle recipe in any of my books so online I went and found one on the Women’s Weekly website.

This is modified ever so slightly from that.

Ingredients
2 x packets jam sponge logs (I bought little sponge rolls, not the big ones)
1 x packet of wildberry jelly (any type will do)
1 x 825 tin of pears (I used peaches)
500ml custard, (optional if you make your own)
300ml fresh cream
Grand Marnier & dry sherry to taste (orange juice will do, but I used orange juice and Triple Sec which has an orange flavour)

Custard: (optional, you can just add custard purchased from supermarket)
2 level tablespoons of custard powder
1 level tablespoon of sugar
milk, enough to get desired consistency

Method
Bowl – 21cm x 9cm (deep) with a base of 13cm diameter.

First make a jelly to packet directions and refrigerate until set.

Cut the Jam Sponge Roll into slices of equal thickness. Place them around the bowl, starting from the bottom of the bowl then building them around the sides to cover the entire inside. Fill in all the gaps by halving the slices where required.

Drizzle the sherry over the cake so that it becomes moist but not soggy. Add a little Grand Marnier in the same manner for taste variation.

Mum likes to make fresh custard- combine custard powder and sugar (or less to taste), add milk slowly to form a paste then stir in the remainder. Over medium heat and stir constantly until the custard can be poured but not too runny. (I used bought custard).

Pour the custard over the Jam sponge and spoon it over the sides to fill in the gaps – then let cool, cover with cling wrap and refrigerate – this allows the sherry & Grand Marnier to meld with the custard and sponge

Once the custard is cooled take the jelly and mince it with a fork and spread over the custard – again up the sides of the bowl to fill in any gaps – then refrigerate.

Whip 300ml of fresh cream and spread over the jelly, garnish with pears cut into slices in a circular pattern around the bowl and any other seasonal fruit – berries if available – or just the pears will suffice.

The finish! This was more than enough for seven of us. JJ and I have leftovers for a couple of days and it kept just fine in the fridge.

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