Lunchtime! Back at it with the “Filled Pasta/Dumplings” topic, this time headed to Eastern Europe with this Potato Pierogi Skillet with Kielbasa and Cabbage dish. True comfort food with cabbage, sausage and pierogi. You could also make a similar dish with sauerkraut (just a different iteration of cabbage) and I did put a little bit of whole grain mustard in this to give it a little zip. Double the recipe to feed a crowd.
Item Number two for Filled Pasta / Dumpling Week in this week’s Ingredient of the Week. I made something pretty over-the-top decadent yet comfort food at the same time. This riff on Lobster Mac & Cheese uses tortellini, a creamy cheese sauce and a healthy portion of Maine Lobster — you can swap out your favorite crustacean for crab meat or even shrimp/prawns of you don’t have lobster handy. Very rich, but also very yummy. Maybe the perfect thing for the seafood lover in your life for Valentine’s Day.
Long-time followers of this here Cup of Sugar :: Pinch of Salt page will know that even though I find Valentine’s Day silly, I always manage to make a few varieties of Valentine’s Day Cookies. This year is no different so I present his year’s four varieties: Red Currant Lemon Linzer Cookies, Valentine’s Day Shortbread Blossoms, Baci di Dama (Lady’s Kisses) and Double Chocolate M&M Cookies. Recipes follow after the jump:
We’re on to week 4 of the Ingredient Game Challenge. Up this week, filled pastas/noodles and dumplings. I guess that isn’t really an ingredient per se, but a theme or topic, but nevertheless, lots of ideas to choose from — Italian (ravioli, manacotti), central and eastern European (maultaschen, pierogi) and Asian (dumplings, wonton, gyoza, shumai, har gow), Just to name a few! And I purposefully picked this as the week where dumplings could play a roll, given Lunar New Year. I can’t wait to see what you all come up with.
First up for me: Hazelnut-Nutella Ravioli, Chocolate Sauce! Surpised? Yes, I thought that I would throw in an odd-ball right at the beginning. Dessert Ravioli! Totally decadent lunch actually. I might need a sugar-coma nap later, or at least some energy to go for a decent walk!
One more stop on the Banana ingredient in this little ingredient game that we are up to this winter: Banoffee Waffles, with Banana Cream, Salted Caramel + Toffee Crunch. I hadn’t actually intended to make these — I thought maybe Banoffee Doughnuts, but then I didn’t want to wait for yeast to do it’s thing so I went with these instead. They are sweet — between the pudding cream layer, the salted caramel and the toffee bits, this will definitely send you to sugar overload. I even intentionally made the waffles and whipped cream fairly neutral to cut the sweetness. Maybe better as a dessert than a breakfast thing. They are delicious, just very sweet, so if that is your thing…