Thanksgiving Day Eve!

Eggplant Parmesan-Our Way!

It's been a busy couple of days in our house! Not only are we getting ourselves ready for Thanksgiving but our oldest daughter just tested and passed her blue/brown belt in karate!

Tying on her new Blue/Brown Belt!!!

As is our family tradition with a slight change, the dinner that night is all about her. Usually we go out but due to the fact that we have so much going on I decided it would be easier and an earlier night for them to make her a favorite meal. Her absolute favorite meal is Eggplant Parmesan but without the tomato sauce (tomato hater!). I didn't take pictures of hers as it's pretty straight forward. Use all the layers but don't use sauce and add more goat cheese! I made this the day before and cooked it off and just heated it up for us the next night. Worked out perfect and Italian always tastes better the next night!

Eggplant Parmesan-Our Way!!!

Ingredients:

3 medium sized eggplant or 4 small
2 cups Italian breadcrumbs
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
1 tsp black pepper
1 Tbsp granulated garlic
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1 Tbsp oregano
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp white pepper
5 eggs
1/4 cup of milk
10.5 oz of goat cheese cut into 1/2 inch slices (we love goat cheese so we use large ones - 10.5 ounces but use what you like)
1 lb of shredded mozzarella
2 jars of your favorite spaghetti sauce
Canola or vegetable oil (for frying the eggplant)

Directions:

• Preheat your oven to 375°
• Wash and remove the stems from the eggplant. Slice the eggplant lengthwise about 1/2 inch thick.
• Mix all of the dry ingredients together. This will be your breading for the eggplant.
• Mix eggs and milk together to make your wash.
• Preheat a skillet or fry pan with about 1/2 inch of oil (this will vary depending upon the size of your pan) on med-high.
• Dip each slice of eggplant in your wash and then in the breadcrumbs.
• Cook each slice until browned. Flip them and brown the other side. Remove from pan and place each slice on a rack to drain.
• In a small 8x8 casserole dish you will need to start layering your ingredients. Start with a thin layer of sauce to prevent sticking. Add a layer of eggplant. You will need to have these overlapped. On top of the eggplant you will use about 2/3 of the goat cheese. Cover with about 1/3 of the mozzarella and about 1/3 sauce. Top with another layer of eggplant. This is the last layer so you will want to use up all of your ingredients. On top of the eggplant layer the goat cheese, the last of the sauce and top with the remaining mozzarella.
• Bake this in your preheated oven for about 45 minutes or until bubbling and browned.
• Allow to rest for about 10 minutes, cut and serve!

Sliced eggplant-skin on and not salted and drained

Post fry and layered in casserole dish over sauce and mozzerella

Goat cheese sprinkles! This is topped with sauce and more mozzerella!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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WW: Eggplant Rollatini with Tomato Basil Sauce

For dinner tonight, I had a special guest over... my 6 year old nephew. To keep things healthy yet kid friendly, I made something similar to a lasagna (a favorite of my nephew's) - Eggplant Rollatini. Little did he know that it was completely vegetarian! I served this with a baked bone-in chicken breast, seasoned with italian seasoning. Thankfully it was a hit and he enjoyed it... so did the rest of the family.

*Tip: You could make this in advance and is freezeable too, just like a traditional lasagna!

Eggplant Rollatini with Tomato Basil Sauce
courtesy of Weight Watchers Best Eats cookbook

1 medium eggplant, unpeeled, cut lengthwise into 8 (1/4 inch slices)
1 teaspoon olive oil
3 garlic cloves, chopped
2 cup canned crushed tomatoes
4 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
1 small zucchini, diced
1/4 cup minced onion
1/2 cup part skim ricotta cheese
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley
1 large egg
3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Preheat the oven to 450F degrees. Spray a large rimmed baking sheet with nonstick spray. Arrange the eggplant on the baking sheet in one layer and spray lightly with nonstick spray. Bake until browned, about 10 minutes on each side. Reduce the oven temperature to 400F degrees.

To make the sauce, heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium hat. Add 2 cloves of the garlic and cook, stirring occassionall, until fragrant. about 30 seconds. Add the tomatoes and 2 tablespoons of the basil; bring to a simmer. Cook until thickened, 10 minutes.

To make the filling, spray a large nonstick skillet with nonstick spray and place over medium-high heat. Add the zucchini, onion, and remaining 1 garlic clove; cook until the vegetables are softened, 5 minutes. Transfer to a medium bowl; allow to cool slightly. Stire in the ricotta, parsley, egg, remaining tablespoons basil, 2 tablespoons of the Parmesan, the salt and pepper.

To assemble the rollatini, spray a 1 1/2 quart baking dish with nonstick spray. Spread 3 tablespoons of sauce in the dish. Place 2 tablespoons of the filling at one end of each eggplant slice. Beginning at the filled end, roll up the eggplant slices and place, seam side down, ina single layer in the baking dish. Spoon the remaining sauce over the rollatinil sprinkle with the remaining 1 tablespoon Parmesan. Bake until heated through completely, about 25 minutes.

Serves 4
Serving size: 2 rollatini
WW Points value: 3 Points

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Sunshine Citrus Chicken and Eggplant Fritters???

Eggplant Fritters with Sunshine Citrus Chicken!

Yesterday was the last day of school for this year. The girls were both super excited and so was I. I actually love the slower pace that we are able to enjoy in the ungodly hot months of June, July and August. We seem to be in our summer weather pattern already too (torrential rain and horrific thunderstorms every afternoon) which really inhibits what we can do later in the day. Of course we will still have the ice skating lesson 3 or 4 times a week and karate but at least it won't be so hectic. I also really am able to appreciate that I stay home with the girls. I love that we are able to spend a whole summer together getting to know one another!

Fresh Ginger - the skin hadn't even dried out yet!

Anyway for dinner last night I bought some boneless, skinless, chicken thighs (organic, free range, no antibiotics or hormones of course) and I marinated them in my Sunshine Citrus Marinade (I had some really old oranges and some really fresh ginger that I needed to use up).


Sunshine Citrus Chicken

Juice from half and orange
1 cup soy sauce (low-sodium if you like!)
1 tsp orange zest
fresh ground black pepper
1/2 tsp ground ginger
2 Tbsp Canola Oil
4 chicken thighs

Allow to marinate for at least 30 minutes (longer is better). Grill or bake until done!

Now the real surprise came when I decided to make a new side dish using an eggplant that I had bought last week! I got the recipe (sort of a recipe) from Jenn's blog The Leftover Queen. During the week of her wedding her Mother in Law came to stay with them from Italy. Jenn's post had these really great looking meatless meatballs made with eggplant! I just had to try them. Well I must have done something wrong because they looked nothing like her MIL's did!!! I think I should have drained my eggplant after I had roasted it and scraped out all of the seeds. I had to drop them by the spoonful to fry them. They were like a fritter by the time I was done with them. But we were all really pleasantly surprised by them!

This was the consistency that I got. I was afraid to add more bread crumbs (smother the taste of the eggplant) so this was as good as it was going to get!

Here's what I did:

I poked several holes in 1 large eggplant and roasted it at 400 degrees for about 40 minutes. Once it had cooled a bit I cut it open and removed the seeds and placed the remaining pulp in my food processor with a handful of dried parsley (I didn't have fresh), about a cup of seasoned bread crumbs and processed it all together. I kept adding bread crumbs until it was a consistency that I could drop from a spoon. Jenn's MIL were very dry looking (in a nice way) and mine sure weren't'!!! Fried up though in some hot oil they were wonderful!

Would I make these again? Oh yes definitely!!! They were delicious fried up like that!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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Coming Out of the Dark: Chocolate Blackout Cake

As I was shopping at my local Whole Food's Grocery store, I was inspired to bake after coming across their beautiful bakery case. The case was filled with scrumptious looking fruit tarts, fluffy layer cakes, deep chocolate brownies... it was enough for me to hit the kitchen and bake something myself. The question was, what should I bake? Looking at the random ingredients I had on hand and stashed away, it became clear the thing to make was Brooklyn Chocolate Blackout Cake.

I decided to adapt the recipe from The Best of America's Test Kitchen: Best Recipes & Reviews 2008 (pg 62). This chocolate layer cake is unique in that the chocolate pudding filling doubles as frosting and the entire cake is covered in reserved chocolate cake crumbs. Heavenly! Here's the recipe... enjoy!

Chocolate Blackout Cake
adapted from ATK
serves 10 to 12

Pudding:
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
2 cups half & half
1 cup whole milk
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Cake:

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus more for pans
1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, plus more for pans
(I used cake flour)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
(I used extra dark cocoa powder)
1 cup brewed coffee
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

FOR THE PUDDING
1. Cook the granulated sugar,, chocolate, half & half, milk, cornstarch and salt in a large saucepan over medium heat, whisking occassionally, until the chocolate is melted and the mixture begins to buble, 2 to 4 minutes. Stir in the vanilla. Transfer the pudding to a large bowl and refrigerate, with plastic wrap pressed flush against to surface, until cold and set, at least 4 hours or up to 24 hours.

FOR THE CAKE
1. Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour two 8"inch cake pans. Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the cocoa and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Off the heat, whisk in the coffee, buttermilk, and sugars until dissolved. Whisk in the flour mixture. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cake pans and smooth with a spatula.
2. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the centers come out clean, 30 to 35 mintes, rotating the cake pans halfway through baking. Cool the cakes in the pans for 15 minutes, then invert onto a wire rack. Cool the cakes to room temperature before frosting, at least 1 hour.

TO ASSEMBLE
1. Using a large serrated knife, slice each cake into 2 even layers. Crumble 1 cake layer into medium crumbs and set aside. Place 1 cake layer on a cake plate or cardboard round. Spread 1 cup of the pudding over the cake layer and top with another layer. Repeat with 1 cup more pudding and the last cake layer. Spread the remaining pudding evenly over the top and sides of the cake. Sprinkle the cake crumbs evenly over the top and sides of the cake, pressing lightly to adhere the crumbs. Slice and serve.

WARNING
This cake is extremely dense, creamy and rich. Be sure to have coffee or a glass of cold milk on hand!

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Things seem normal again!

My Slice of Eggplant Parm!

After a couple of very long days of chaos it is so nice to have things back to normal (at least what seems normal to me anyway). Last night for dinner T. decided to cook and he made us his super special Eggplant Parmesan! He only made a half of this recipe because I had only bought one eggplant.My new Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker!

I mentioned yesterday that I had just gotten a Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker. I have made 4 batches of it already and was about to throw it into the pool because everything was just turning out not firm enough!!! The first one was my fault. I decided I was going to cheat and not cook the milk...the next time I cooked the milk and the third time I cooked the milk and let it incubate longer!!! And the texture still wasn't right!Ignore the orange color but see what I mean about the texture!

Last night I decided to give it one last attempt before it was pool bound and it seems to have redeemed itself. I had made all of the other batches using goat milk and I only had enough for a batch of pudding and a cake I want to make today so I used 1% Organic Cow Milk. I don't know if this made the difference but I am going to try to get some more goat milk and try this again. This time I flavored the yogurt with some fresh fruit and sugar. I made this over night so it still wasn't ready for the girls to eat this morning but I bet they will like it for an afternoon snack!!!

Happy, firm berry yogurt!

I have also been tagged several times for meme's. Right now I don't have the time but I will get to them when I can. Thanks so much for tagging me! I am struggling with my Daring Baker's Challenge (time wise) for this month and then I need to find time to do the Royal Foodie Joust! I promise I will get to it when I can but for some reason I have lost the whole month of February!!!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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Royal Foodie Joust

One of the things that I have loved so much about blogging about food is that I am learning that there are soooo many things that I don't know. I love the challenges because they encourage me to go beyond my comfort zone again and again! One of my favorites is the Royal Foodie Joust hosted by Jenn, which I love participating in. The winner from the previous month gets to choose the 3 ingredients that need to be used for the next month. Last months winner Dharm from Dad~Baker and Chef choose eggplant, Lentils and cinnamon as the ingredients. Wow what was I going to do with those???!!! First I thought I would do a dip like a Baba Ghannoush but then I thought that I should challenge myself a little more. So I came up with a stuffed eggplant dish that was to die for! I will definitely be making this one again!

Lentil Stuffed Eggplant Recipe

Thanks Dharm for choosing these ingredients and to you Jenn for hosting this challenge!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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