Long time, no post. I have reasons (excuses?) for my lapse in posting over the last month. First, this pregnant lady only wanted to eat cupcakes and Tootsie Rolls until late January. I didn't think those eating habits warranted any new blog entries. Second, as soon as I felt like eating normal food again, I was off to Houston for ten days. The trip did give me an excuse to try out some yummy freezer meals. The week before I left I prepared double of everything, wrapped them in individual servings and left heating instructions for my sweet but domestically challenged husband. Peter very much appreciated the homecooked meals and he managed to only eat at Chipotle twice while I was gone. I call that a huge success!
I did a lot of research on freezer friendly options and settled on five meals. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the finished results but I am providing links and reviews for each dinner. This was a trial run for when little Ruppenthal arrives. I plan on making a month's worth of meals ahead of time so that when we're tired and cranky, we don't have to resort to fast food...but I'm sure there will be a few Chipotle nights in our future :)
Next week I will be back with all new recipes!
- Baked Chicken with Penne and Sun-Dried Tomatoes- this was by far Peter's favorite. He loved it so much that he has already asked for it again. Martha Stewart has a nice collection of freezer friendly options on her website. I am definitely going to refer back when I need new ideas. The reheating instructions indicate that the dish needs to be in the oven for 1 1/2 hours. I reduced the time to an hour and everything turned out great!
- Green Chile-Sour Cream Chicken Enchiladas- these were a very close second. I loved them more than Peter did because I thought they really tasted like good Tex-Mex restaurant enchiladas. Yum...I want to make these again!
- Crab Manicotti/Cannelloni- OMG, these are amazing! They are so rich, yummy and perfect. I had to increase the reheating time to about 75 minutes.
- Beef Lasagna- I'm not Italian nor do I have even a drop of Italian blood running through these veins so I was very nervous about making lasagna from scratch. I won't lie, it's a messy process but SO worth it! It turned out perfectly and reheated wonderfully. I did change th original instructions a bit. I put the leftover lasagna in the fridge overnight and cut it into individual squares the next morning. I froze two servings in each foil pan. I reheated at 400 degrees for one hour, removing the foil for the last ten minutes.
- Stuffed Shells- I didn't get to these because we had a ton of leftover lasagna so I will be trying them next week!
A few weeks ago we hosted a housewarming party at our new place in Denver. It was a ton of fun but for me, the best part was all the cooking I did before the big event! I made goat cheese tomatoes, truffled potatoes, sliders, chocolate cupcakes and pigs in a blanket...er, puff pastry. It was my first time working with frozen puff pastry and I WAY overbought. I left the extra in the freezer hoping that one day I would stumble across a good puff pastry recipe. Last week I bought the current issue of Real Simple and there it was, a yummy puff pastry idea! I decided to make these as an appetizer for one of our Friday date nights. P loved them and they were able to tide him over until dinner was ready.
The original recipe served 20 so I drastically altered the amounts to just serve the two of us. I am not much of a baker so instead of using a 2-inch cookie cutter (that I don't own) I simply used a pizza cutter to divide the pastry into squares. I figure it probably doesn't affect the taste!
Crab and Chive Puffs
1 sheet frozen puff pastry, thawed
3 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup fresh chives, plus more for garnish
juice of 1/2 large lemon
sea salt
black pepper
1/4 pound lump crabmeat
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Using a pizza cutter, cut the pastry into 1 inch squares. Place on a greased baking sheet.
In a medium bowl, mix together the cream cheese, mayonnaise, chives, lemon juice, pinch of salt and pepper to taste. Fold in crab.
Dividing evenly, spoon the crab mixture onto the pastry squares.
Bake, rotating the baking sheet halfway through, until the pastries are golden and crisp, 20 to 25 minutes. Serve hot.
