Skillet Tamale Pie - pg. 290 RR, just in time recipe book

Holly Heavenly PIE! Thou art SO delicious!

It was so thrilling to make this dish. I got home last night ready to make this meal thinking it wasn't going to be one of my repeats, you know the dishes that become a main stay in your house. Hello Dolly, this one is staying. So... So... GOODO! This is one of those recipes I look at and say, that looks to hard and to time consuming to make. Hot Damn it was good and easy to make, it's even better as left overs! It actually will serve up to 6 people or 4 fat people (my family).

I got home and cleaned up the kitchen so this time unlike last I would have a clean slate to work on. Last time I think I had Dexter's butt paste still sitting on the island. LOL! I started the clock with prep time this time. There were several things I had not worked with before, like the polenta and jalapeno's (I've handled the ones on nachos). I changed the recipe a bit to fit my style of taste, an example would be chopping the jalapeno instead of making thin slices. I can't imagine taking a big O' bite and getting several of those slices in one bite and dying from the heat. Early bathroom break, am I right, don't lie. So the prep time took me around 20 minutes, like on TV.

Note: To the left you will see that I'm using a chopper. I didn't think that I would have used this that much when I got this but I have whipped this sucker out every time I cook now. Big time, time saver! Chops nuts, veggies, fruit, and cheeses, you can do it to! Don't be scared to chop some air.

This particular model is from Pampered Chef. Yes Shaun I'm so glad you made me go to the party, oh thanks for buying it for me, and notice the RR knife and scissors I was using as well.

Its cooking time! 20 minutes later with my son looking on in his learning tower, I think the kids going to be a cook. When I started this process the recipe calls for a skillet that cooks from stove top to oven and for some reason I had none. I ended up putting a casserole dish in the oven to heat it up, so I could transfer the final dish to the oven in a hot dish. It seemed to work fine but I think I realize now I need some new dishes.

This time I had to cook in a pot and skillet all at once so I had to call on Evan to help out here and there. Dexter my Sous-chef was not available for helping just commentary. To the left you will see the main nectar of the pie, using pork, beef, some bacon, and veggies. Basically this part was the meat of the tamale tasting like the heart of a tamale dinner you would get a restaurant. So Yummy! The polenta was easier than I thought and just added icing to the dish. It's a sweet mexican style grit that I found with the cornmeal and of course the old school country grits at the store.

Calling on my hubby who seemed excited to help out, actually I think he called me Rachel? Hmmm.... I'll have to talk to him about that later. Anyway, with the meat mixture on bottom, we poured the polenta over top. This was only 1 and 1/2 cups of polenta and it covered an entire 9x13 dish at about 1" thick. It made a great tasting tamale cover to the meat. Now the one thing I should have done in the long run was to drain some of the grease from the meat before adding the final tomato sauce to it, but it didn't make that big of a deal in the end.

As you can see from the picture, the dish turned out TV perfect even with my unscheduled changes to the program. Gotta use what you have. It took 20 minutes to finalize the dish, so all in all it took around an hour to make. So worth it! Like my husband mistress says: You always have time to make a GREAT meal!

From Evan: "I'm not a big fan of tamales, but I LOVED this! It was wonderful!"

Dex my Sous-chef, in his learning tower helping mommy.

Groceries for a Mexican dish

Ok, I thought I was going to wait for payday to get the ingredients for my next dish but I couldn't wait. I love cooking and now I have something to look forward to. Also, Evan and I have decided to no longer shop at Walmart because of the way they treat their policies and their " do nothing/take care of yourself " approach with their employees. If anyone gets a chance watch the documentary on Walmart, it's an eye opener.

Anyway, after picking up my boys from home we made our 2nd grocery trip for cooking. It seems like each meal is going to cost around 20$ but it will yield to a serving of 4 so I think its worth it. I think the best part of this whole experience is cooking with new ingredients. This time I found everything in one spot. Not hard to find mexican ingredients in the south.

Oh and just another TIP: If you're working with fresh herbs, buy them or pick them day of cooking. They go bad really fast, but so good!

So tonight I am cooking, Skillet Tamale Pie. Sounds to hot for the triple digit weather but we will just turn up the air conditioner. Yummo, Rachel! This recipe will be something new for me, I have to make it stove top in a skillet and bake it to brown in the oven within the skillet. Also I have never used polenta, which is similar to grits, so this will be interesting. I'm going to prepare all of the food as Rachel would have her helpers do and lay it out in front of me to see if I can hit her 15 minute meal on this one. She forgets the prep time it takes to make these meals. LIAR! You cheap Hoe! Maybe thats how she measures her love to my husband.

(RR) Tip 1

So Evan has picked a new meal out of the book, which I will share later because I left the book at home. Anyway I'm totally broke so I'm waiting until next paycheck to by the food. I did want to share one thing that I learned with doing the last pasta meal.

Tip:

Heat the pan first, then add EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) and then throw meat or veggies into the oil and they instantly start to fry. Heating the pan first is the key, I used it last night on some cornmeal covered veggies.

Cheesy Pasta Presto - 15 minutes

The big night is finally here, Evan is salivating as I write this I'm sure. I'm excited about making this actually, I don't think I've ever made a pasta dish from a recipe, at least one that isn't lasagna.

I called Evan about 4:30 to start the water for the pasta. He seems to do a better job with pasta than I so I have to admit I let him take care of that. He has a great technique for pasta, boiling water, toss pasta water, immediately cover (no steam can escape) and remove from heat, let sit for 15 minutes covered and Whala! All done, perfect pasta!

Rachel you know the only way these recipes take 15 minutes is if I have a studio audience and everything set out in front of me all done. And of course a big pay check helps. It took about 30 minutes counting all the prep time. Right off the smell was intoxicating, the pancetta, onions, and garlic really got me salivating. It went pretty quickly once I started cooking. Ricotta, basil, parmigiano, pancetta pasta, and arugula, Yummo! I have to admit I have never had arugula, it really has a specific taste to it, not bad.

All in all the pasta was PRIMO, it taste like something you would get from a restaurant. After all the grocery store trips though to I would say the pancetta could have been easily replaced with bacon or thick ham, make Okie style. It was very flavorful, thick, and cheesy. It serves 4, so Evan and I have leftovers for tomorrow.

I have to say it wasn't a panty dropper because if you eat to much of it you won't be able to do anything but unzip and take a load off. I have dreams though!

From Evan:

"The pasta dish was so good, it makes me want to slap myself. I never knew a somewhat simple pasta dish could taste so delicious. Kuddos to my wife,my love (and RR)..."

Shopping for Groceries

So since I don't live in NY like Rachel I have to depend on my chain super stores to provide me with all the ingredients I need. I have found with this supposedly easy task that this should be done with the cook book and not just with a written scribble. You always forget to write down the exact thing and think to yourself, now was that sliced or diced? creamed or whole? french cut or short? flakes or ground? These are what one thinks of on her first trip to the market.

So after getting to the market for the 2nd time now, of course I still wrote it down again thinking I was good to go, I run into another problem. Here in middle america our chain markets don't necessarily carry the ingredients needed. We here in middle america are good country folk, heck we raise our own meat. But aged meats? LOL!!! Now I do give credit to the grocery stores who had the meat, the problem is I still didn't find exactly what I needed and it took 3 trips to 3 different stores to find it. I do admit I will be calling around to our large number of local butcher shops, 2 that I know of to see if they actually carry "Pancetta" next time, but I digress. So all in all this 30 minute meal has turned into a 3 hour grocery hunt, so it better be a panty dropper. Rachel so far the only one you are turning on is my husband!

So I kept my receipts but of course now I can't find them. I believe the meal with all the trips cost up to 20$, this is why I'm only going to make one recipe a month.

Making A Conscious Decision

So after looking at all of my recipe books one day and of course deciding I didn't care if I'm ramping off of the Julie & Julia movie, I have decided to make it my goal to actually use one of my recipe books. Now this wasn't a had decision. My husband LOVES Rachael Ray! He actually refers to her as his food mistress and I think he dreams about further out of the kitchen "lickings". She's Yummo!!!

So here I am with the mistresses cookbook in hand. I have chosen her 30 minute meals book because it seemed like it would be the easiest to conquer. I plan on following one recipe a week unless I can afford to make more. I went through and tabbed all of the chapters and I'm going to let Evan, my husband pick the chapter and I will just go in order from there.

His first pick? Cheesy Pasta Presto... Mind you that I will absolutely not cook anything like soups or chili's until the weather is not in the triple digits or high doubles. Even making this dish I think is pushing it.

So we begin...