Showing posts with label Mealtime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mealtime. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

PumpkinPalooza Part 1


 Bourbon and Pumpkin Spice Milkshakes!

 Fezzik is a fan.

Pumpkin Ravioli Recipe:

INGREDIENTS:

For The Filling:
  • 1 Two To Three Pound Pumpkin
  • 1 Tbsp Butter
  • 1 Onion
  • 2 Garlic Cloves
  • 2 tsp Ground Sage, or 6-7 leaves fresh sage, chopped
  • 2 Tbsp Honey
  • 4 oz Goat Chevre
  • Salt & Pepper, to taste


For The Pasta:
  • 2¼ cups Flour
  • ⅓ cup Water
  • 2 Eggs
  • Tablespoon Olive Oil
  • Pinch of Salt


DIRECTIONS: 
Filling:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Farenheit. Quarter pumpkin and remove all seeds (set these aside and you can toast them!)Place pumpkin face down on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 30-60 minutes, or until a dull knife pierces the flesh easily (the skin may still be tough). When pumpkin is cooked, be sure to let it cool some so you don't burn yourself!

2. Meanwhile, pour yourself a cup of tea or glass of wine, and get started on prep work. Dice the onion finely, mince the garlic.

3. Cook onions and butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. When Onions just start too look clearish, add sage, garlic and honey. Remove from heat

4. Using a large spoon, remove the flesh of the pumpkin from the skin. Mash pumpkin with a fork (or toss it in a food processor)and stir into the onion mixture.

5. While mixture is still slightly warm, stir in Goat Chevre and mix until everything looks creamy and delicious. Add Salt and pepper to taste. Cover and set aside.

Pasta:

6. Combine flour, water, eggs, olive oil and salt in a medium bowl and stir with a wooden spoon until it becomes too solid to stir.

7. Remove dough from bowl and knead on a clean, floured surface for a few minutes, until the dough has a smooth texture. You can use a pasta machine, or simply roll your dough with a rolling pin either way you want your dough to be thin enough that you can see the shape of your hand through it when you hold it.

Putting it all together:

8. Working on a floured surface, Start with two pieces of pasta, one slightly longer than the other. Using a spoon, place small dollops of filling in rows on the smaller piece of pasta - leave about 3/4" between drops of filling.

9. Starting at one side, gently lay the larger piece of pasta over the other, pushing it down onto the bottom piece of pasta in between each of the lumps of filling (if the pasta is too dry and won't stick, use a pastry brush and water to moisten it slightly). There is a bit of a learning curve here, but don't worry because this ravioli is always well received, even if it looks ridiculous!

10. Cut the ravioli apart from each other with a sharp knife, to be extra sure they'll stay together, and for a decorative touch, use a fork (or one of those fancy ravioli rollers) to crimp the edges

11. Put the ravioli in boiling water and remove with a slotted spoon as they begin to float.


 For the sauce, Sean and I went a little crazy. We browned some butter and sage and added some Alfredo sauce and these sundried tomato and garlic chicken sausages. It was pretty decadent.

 The final product, aka Pumpkin Overload

And then we carved some pumpkins.
 Pumpkin Carvings.
Of course, Ron Swanson has to make an appearance on the ATHP blog.


Happy (belated) Halloween!

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Pizza and Beer

Last night, Promethius created fire....in my mouth.


Home made pizza night! Store bought Pillsburry dough boy crust, enhanced sauce, freshly grated mozzarella, and savory salted meaty pepperonis combined to form a miracle. Topped the pizza off with some magical powdery stuff, (spices, not cocaine) and boom. It really was surprisingly good considering we used pretty basic ingredients. It's all in the loving tenderness you put into your food...that and again, the spices.

We would have taken pictures of our masterpiece, but we also sampled some beer, a lot of it. As you know, beer often leads to either taking a ton of pictures, or none at all. Latter for us. Sean has the exact names of all the beers we tried. They were all delicious and made a fine contribution to the night.

Speaking of contributions to the night, it wouldn't have been anything without the company.
Me and Sean knocked out some Mario on the Wii and Christine laughed at us every time we tried to knock over the coffee table. And then awed at our awesomely fast reflexes. Sean and Christine are quickly becoming painfully annoying, like a torn cuticle that gets worsened every time you reach into your pocket to grab your cell phone. By that I mean that they are quickly becoming even better friends. Thanks for making me feel at home guys.

OH, and can NOT forget the late night munchies. Sean and I double teamed some breasts, of chicken, and made some chicken philly sandwiches. Spiced up with Montreal Steak seasoning by McCormick, some garlic pepper, and this sauce that's extremely hard to spell by Lea & Perrins. Nestled between some hot dog buns with some american cheese and hot pepper relish...does it get any better? Not for two drunk dudes. Once again, not hard to make, very simple ingredients, but tasted better than chicken phillies I've had at some restaurants.

Until next time.
-Thomas

Monday, October 3, 2011

Welcome to my nightmare. Tonight Thomas aka MasterBrewMaster and I chowwed down on some polish sausage laced with sweet onion. Tasty. More to come.

-Sean