posted on Feb, 18 2005 @ 08:51 AM
The pastry disks are stellar to keep stocked in your freezer; they're usable after about 1/2 hour at room temp.
I like making a big slow cook pot roast with lots of root veggies, that turns into several meals:
Meal 2. Refrigerate seperate the meat. Get a SHARP KNIFE and slice it very thin. Layer it on a crusty French baguette with thinly sliced red onion,
lettuce & tomato, topped off with a spicy horseradish mayonaisse
Meal 3. Warm the meat up in the pot so that the fibers loosen a bit. Take a big pan ( like a lasgana pan) and two forks. Start seperating the meat
into strands...it'll come apart easily.
Sautee diced onions & garlic, add some sofrito & tomato paste along with some pimento stuffed olives. Add the beef, along with beef stock & red
wine....just enough liquid to almost cover the meat. Cook uncovered on medium heat until the liquid reduces by half.
Serve over white rice. In Latin cuisine, this dish is called Ropa Viejo which means old rags or clothes .
Meal 4. take the left over meat drain it thouroughly, and place into pastry disks & deep fry.
Meal 5. Remove the potatoes from the stock & rinse & let dry. Mash them in a bowl, ad a tablespoon or two of flour & two eggs. Take the mixture &
roll it into the size of gumballs. Take the gumballs into the palm of your hand & then take a dinner fork in the other...you are going to start at the
base of the tines & roll the ball, so that grooves form on the dough. You then drop these into boiling water & remove after they float.( Also try
in on a floured surface. I also add this edit: get a "dough consistency" by adding flour in small increments. I normally use baked potatoes, so
there's less moisture. I think like my elders when it comes to food....don't waste! That's where the gnocchi experiment came from....they do come
out good, though!)
You've just made gnocchi.
I've finished those two ways: hand blender the pot of veggies & then put it through a fine strainer into a pot & adding chicken stock. I then serve
that with the gnocchi on top with some grated chees & crumbled bacon.
The other is to do the same, but strain into a pan and let reduce by two thirds, add butter, toss the gnocchi, and serve as a meal.
So if you look over a week span, you've done five meals fairly simply. The turnovers &sandwich make a great portable lunch, and the rest make for
meals you cal serve within 30 minutes of starting.
[edit on 18-2-2005 by Bout Time]