Wow, has it been a month already?  It seems like just last week I was doing my first Secret Recipe Club post.  It was so much fun that I came back for more.  Not only did I have fun, so did the Baby boy.  In fact he had so much fun making Southwestern Egg Rolls from The Freshman Cook, he wanted to cook for the next round.

Hey, if you can get a teenage boy interested in cooking through SRC, you are one lucky mom!  I got my assignment and informed the Baby boy.  He’s on the iPad and asks, “who is it”, I said Family Fresh Cooking.  He starts to type in Family, then he goes, “Wow, she’s popular, it’s the first thing that came up”.  Then he went rooting around the site, and stated “I don’t think I should cook one of her recipes, I mean, she has a lot of followers”.  Kind of intimidating for a teenager, I mean what if they thought he did a bad job?

I assured him that this was about trying recipes from different sites and anybody with “family” in their title would be happy to see one of the kids cooking!  He was convinced and set about immediately to find a recipe.  He was sold on the Chinese 5 Spice Harvest Chili with Bison.  He loves Chinese and he loves chili.  The fact that we had temps in the high 80’s was no matter to him.

A little about Family Fresh Cooking, Marla is an amazing person!  Not only is she a mom, she is also a food photographer, stylist and writer, she also does recipe development and somehow manages to travel.  Oh, and guess who designed the badge at the top of this post?  Yep, she’s one talented lady.  What amazed me most about Marla is that she gets up at 4 am!  Hello, I’m not such a morning person (you won’t see me until after 7 am).  She seems to have boundless energy, maybe it’s all that healthy living.  Looks like I have a few things I could learn from Marla.

Trying to get the Baby boys schedule and mine to mash (read he’s never home), took some finagling.  I finally pinned him down on a cold rainy day…perfect for a bowl of chili!  What luck.  Only he started feeling sick, and pooped out on me after just a little prep time…

I pressed on.  I made very few changes to the recipe (which you can see with the modified original below).  I used one of Marla’s substitute ideas, and used ground turkey instead of bison.  Bison was $8 a pound and the ground turkey was buy one get one free…what a deal (as long as we don’t get salmonella from it)!

This is also the first time that the Baby boy had parsnips, I mean “white carrots”.  Really, I don’t know why I don’t use them more.  I enjoy their flavor and they are popular in Montana due to our short growing season.

I also pulled out my three wimpy leeks that I planted year before last (they were a Farmer’s Market impulse buy at 10 cents each).  I’ve never grown leeks and had no clue what to do.  My leeks had kind of a bulbous end and upon peeling they broke off and there was my leek…which was more like a scallion.  I tasted the bulb part and it was not good…can it be used to replant?  Is that how it reproduces?  Any gardeners out there know?  Fortunately I had purchased some big girl leeks to supplement the meager 1/8 cup I ended with from my garden.

As far as the recipe goes…it was delicious.  A unique and enjoyable flavor.  The 5 spice hits you first and then it’s rounded out by the nice tomato and chili flavor.  McGyver refused to call it chili and instead referred to it as stew, guess he’s too much of a traditionalist (he still loved it).  Whether you call it a stew or a chili, call it wonderful and make it!

Thanks Marla for a great healthy recipe, I’ll be making more for sure!

Recipe

Chinese 5 Spice Chili with Turkey

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup Chopped Leeks
• A few cloves chopped Garlic or 1 tablespoon Garlic purée
• 1 cup chopped Mushrooms
• 5 large Carrots, chopped
• 5 Parsnips, chopped
• 28 2 14.5 ounce cans chopped diced Tomatoes
• 6 ounce can Tomato Paste
• splash of Lemon Juice
• 1  2 cup Vegetable or Beef Broth or a few cubes of Bouillon with 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon Chili Powder
• 2 teaspoons Cumin
• 1 tablespoon Chinese 5 Spice Blend
• 2 teaspoons Smoked Paprika
• Garlic Salt and Pepper to taste
• splash of Olive Oil
• 2 pounds ground Bison turkey

*Add an additional pinch of the above spices to season the meat, use the above measurements to add to the pot of chili

METHOD

In a large pot add a splash of olive oil, garlic and leeks. Over medium heat cook for a few minutes and add the measured spices. Cook until softened, fragrant and lightly browned. Stir occasionally. Add veggies. Cook to soften veggies for about 10 minutes while the meat browns. Stir occasionally.

In a separate pan, add splash of olive oil, cook and brown ground meat. Add pinches of the above spices, stir to combine. Add cooked meat, chopped tomatoes tomato paste, broth and lemon juice to veggie pot. Stir to combine. Bring to boil. Turn down heat to low and simmer for about 1/2 hour or until veggies are cooked thorough. Add additional broth or water if necessary to thin out. Adjust seasonings to taste.

Hop on over and check out all the other SRC recipes.

My final post in a 3 part series.  Soupa Avegolemono is traditionally made with eggs, chicken broth, rice or a small pasta like orzo with out the addition of chicken.  Although not traditional in the purist sense, many Greek restaurants serve Soupa Avgolemono with chicken in it.  In my version, I’ve omitted the eggs because I felt with the addition of chopped chicken that it wouldn’t be necessary.  Soupa Avgolemono is a snap to make, especially if you have leftovers from Crispy Roasted Lemon Pepper Chicken and Rice Pilaf with Vegetables from my previous posts.  If you haven’t made them already, you need to, just so you can make this soup with the leftovers.

Soupa Avgolemono is a light soup with a pleasant tartness from the lemons.  It’s a great starter because it doesn’t fill you up, it would also make a great lunch.  Adding chopped chicken gave the soup more substance, it ended up being a great light dinner accompanied with some fresh baked thyme rolls.  The soup can be ready to serve in less than 15 minutes if you have stock on hand.  I made homemade stock, using the carcass of the Crispy Roasted Lemon Pepper Chicken, which also layered in more lemon flavor.

Bon όρεξη!

Recipe

Soupa Avgolemono (Greek Lemon Chicken Soup)

• 2 quarts chicken stock (homemade or purchased)
• 2 cups chopped chicken
• 2 cups cooked rice or orzo
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Juice of 1 or 2 lemons
• Minced fresh parsley for garnish (if desired)

In a large pot, bring stock to a boil over medium high heat.  Add chicken, rice, salt and pepper.  continue to heat until chicken is warmed through, about 5 minutes.  Just prior to serving squeeze the juice of one lemon into the soup.  Taste for tartness, if it is not tart, add the juice of the second lemon.

Note: Because I used the leftover Crispy Roasted Lemon Pepper Chicken and Rice Pilaf with Vegetables, both of which already had lemon flavor, I only needed to add the juice from the one lemon.  Using the leftover rice pilaf also added some color from the carrots and spinach.

This is it, the last of the Prime Rib.  No surprise, when I get down to the last little bit of anything my mind wanders towards soup.  I love a “garbage” soup where you take all the odds and ends leftover and through them into a pot and turn them into something delicious.  Prime rib hardly seemed like an ingredient to throw into some garbage soup, so I pondered what would I make.  My mind was set on soup and I had some wild rice so I thought that would pair nicely.  The rest of my inspiration came from my favorite place, the grocery store.

I was just moseying on down in the fresh veg section, thinking about picking up some garlic (which I now can not find any where in my kitchen) and a couple of other odd ball things when I passed by baskets full of mushrooms.  That got the ol’ hamster wheel running.  Mushroom soup!  Yes, perfect.  I pondered my mushroom choices, button, baby bellas, oyster and shiitake.  Then my eyes dropped down and there were some dried morel mushrooms.  I’ve never, ever, in my life prepared or cooked a morel mushroom.  After looking at the price, I remembered why.  It is the season for indulgence, and I’ve been dying my own hair for at least a year now (saved about $120) so why not?

I put the morels in my basket, then opted for oyster versus shiitake and baby bellas (pre-sliced).  I quickly picked up the rest of my stuff and hurried home.  I couldn’t wait to make dinner.  Only I was scared.  The soup sounded perfect in my little pea brain but would it execute properly?  I was worried that the morels would get lost in the mix of ingredients, I was worried that this was going to be too over the top.  Would too many rich and wonderful ingredients combine into a flop?

Continue reading “Wild Rice, Mushroom and Prime Rib Soup” »

Baby it’s cold out there…

A hot bowl of soup is just the thing to warm you up.

Navy bean soup is in my all time top three favorite soups.  Normally I cook it with a smoked ham hock or the leftover ham bone.  I had some smoked turkey I needed to use up, so I used it instead.  I was pleasantly surprised on how good this tasted.  The smokiness really came through, honestly, if I didn’t cook it myself I would have thought it was ham.

Just look at all that succulent smoked turkey.

Tender white beans.

Smoky salty broth.

Warm yourself up with a bowl of this soup, I know you want some!

Recipe

Ingredients

• 2 cups dried beans
• 1 tbs. oil
• 1 cup diced onion
• 1/2 cup diced celery
• 1 cup diced carrots
• 2 smoked turkey wings ( Smoked ham hock, Ham bone or leftover smoked turkey if you have some)
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions

Carefully sort through your beans and look for any stones.  The night before soak your beans in a big pot of water.  Next day, drain off the water.  In a large Dutch oven heat the one tbsp. oil and sauté the onions, carrots and celery until the onions become translucent.  Add the beans and enough water to cover the beans by a 1/2 inch.  Add the smoked turkey wings.  Bring to a boil then turn down to a simmer.  Cook the beans for 2 to 4 hours.  Remove the wings and let cool enough to handle.  Once the wings are cool enough to handle, pick the meat off and chop into bite size pieces.  Add the turkey back to the beans.  Salt and pepper to taste.

You can also cook the soup in a crock pot for 6-8 hours over low heat.

It’s official, I can’t deny it.  Winter is here and it’s here to stay.  I almost believed it wouldn’t come, we had a very wet summer (which uncovered that our basement leaks and we have a nice crack in the foundation).  Oh but the fall, the fall was perfectly warm, kind of balmy actually.  We made it through September, October and most of November without needing anything more than a light weight cover up to keep us warm.  I started to believe that global warmer had finally hit Montana.  Any thoughts of a mild winter were shattered, demolished, frozen from my mind.  It has snowed every day this week and our lovely temps are in the single digits, at nights sometimes we don’t even make a digit if you can consider zero as non-existent.  It’s so not going away, so much so, that I actually paid $17.99 for salt.  I’m not talking about Fleur de Sel, Amabito No Moshio, black, grey or SaltySeattle salt.  I’m talking about de-icer type salt, so I can walk to my car without having to strap on a pair of ice skates.

One thing that winter does for me, it puts me in the mood for warm comforting food.  Suddenly soups and casseroles and crock pot meals are turning out of my kitchen faster than I can eat them and more than my freezer can hold.  Soups and stews are always a favorite of mine.  Perhaps because my mother made them frequently.  Not so much to be warm and comforting, but mostly a way to use up leftovers and stretch a dime.  My mom was always pinching a penny when she could, she would buy products that other people would turn their noses up at.  No demand = cheaper to buy.  One of the items that she liked to pick up were oxtails.  Back in the day these guys were cheaper than burger!  Sure everybody likes to get a little tail, but mention ox and they steer clear, get it…steer clear.  Maybe I should change my tag line to the ramblings of a girl who uses bad puns?

Times have changed and so has attitude about food.  Somehow oxtails became popular, haute cuisine even.  Popularity = more expensive.  Needless to say, I was absolutely delighted when I saw a reduced sticker on a package of oxtails.  A lover of deals and $17.99 poorer, $4.51 for 3lbs of oxtail couldn’t have made me happier.  The cold weather got me yearning for some soup and oxtail soup would fit the bill nicely.  There was no secret family recipe for good oxtail soup, matter of fact I’ve actually never made it myself.  After searching the internet for awhile I settled on the version from Simply Recipes.  It seemed to be the one that mostly resembled what I grew up eating other then calling it stew instead of soup.

I made a few modifications, based on what I had on hand and taste preference.  Other than some minor changes,  I stuck fairly close to the recipe.  I started off by patting the oxtails dry and then adding salt and pepper.

I browned these beauties up in a little bit of olive oil. 

I chopped up some carrots and leeks.  I substituted the leeks for onions because my poor leeks were about to give up the last of their life.  The oxtail went off to drain on some paper towels and and I cooked the carrots and leeks until the leeks were tender.

At this point I veered from the recipe a bit by adding my broth and wine to the carrots and leeks to deglaze the pot.

The oxtail went back into the pot with the garlic, bay leaves, and thyme.  Simmer for 3 hours.

Meanwhile, dice and roast the rest of your veg. 

I used only one parsnip, because I might have possibly purchased the world’s largest parsnips.

I used rutabagas in lieu of turnips because my Baby boy doesn’t really care for turnips.

The Baby boy took on look at my cutting board and thought, yum, Gouda and Monterey Jack.

He ended up being disappointed.

Roast for 1 hour at 350.

Add the roasted veg to the oxtail soup and serve immediately.

What to do with the leftover bone/cartilage? 

Somedoggy else loves oxtail!

Recipe

Get the original here.

We serve the oxtails with the bone-in, though if you want you can easily remove the bones from the meat before serving.

Ingredients

• 3 lbs oxtails with separated joints
• Salt and pepper
• Olive oil
• 1 medium yellow onion, 2 leeks, white part only, chopped
• 1 celery rib, chopped
• 1 large carrot, chopped
• 2 cups stock broth (chicken or beef)*
• 2 cups of red wine
• 3 whole cloves garlic, peel still on
• One bay leaf
• Pinch of thyme
• Parsley

• 2 carrots, cut into 1-inch segments, large pieces also cut lengthwise
• 2 1 ginormous parsnips, cut into 1-inch segments, large pieces also cut lengthwise
• 2 turnips rutabagas, cut into 1-inch pieces
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper

*If cooking gluten-free use homemade stock or gluten-free packaged stock.

Method

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Pat dry oxtails with paper towels. Sprinkle oxtails all over with salt and pepper. Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil on medium to medium high heat in a 6-quart Dutch oven. Working in batches, and not crowding the pan, sear the oxtails in hot pan on all sides until golden brown. Use tongs to remove oxtails to a plate, setting aside.

 2 Add the chopped onion, carrot, and celery to the pan. Cook for a few minutes until onions are translucent. Add stock and wine to deglaze the pan.  Add the oxtails back to the pan. Add the whole garlic cloves, the stock and wine. Add bay leaf, thyme, and half a teaspoon of salt. Bring to simmer. Reduce heat to low. Cover and cook for 3 hours, until meat is fork tender.

3 One hour before the meat is done, heat oven on 350°F. Toss carrots, parsnips, and turnips in olive oil in a roasting pan. Sprinkle well with salt and pepper. Roast vegetables for 1 hour, or until lightly browned and cooked through.

4 When meat is tender, remove oxtails from the cooking liquid. Either skim the fat off the top with a spoon, use a fat separator to remove the fat, or chill the cooking liquid for several hours so that the fat solidifies, making it easier to remove. If you are making ahead, at this point you can just put the stew in the refrigerator (let come to room temp first), with the oxtails still in it, and let it chill over night. The next day, scrape off the fat, reheat and then remove the meat from the dish.

 5 Pour the cooking liquid through a mesh strainer into a bowl, using a rubber spatula to press against the vegetable solids caught in the strainer. Discard the solids. Return the liquid to the pan and simmer until reduced by half. Then add back in the oxtails, and add the roasted vegetables to the pan. Heat on low heat for half an hour for the flavors to meld. Add some chopped parsley before serving.

Serves 4-6.

“I’d gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today” (Wimpy from Popeye).  A foodie grandma’s dream.  My little alligator dressed up as a hamburger for Halloween.  I just had to, had to, share.  It brings a tear to my eye.

Let’s not forget about the mystery I left you with yesterday.

Here’s another hint….

And if you noticed the title, yet another hint.

Have you solved my little puzzle?

Some of you know that I work for BioLife Plasma Services, which is part of Baxter.  I am so fortunate to work in the business of saving lives, a little bit different than my previous life of saving teeth.  Baxter and BioLife have selected November as healthy eating month.  Arrrgh, during the holiday season, are they crazy?  That was my first thought, my next thought was, why not?  It’s always a good time to focus on healthy eating.  Myself and Kimmers from work have teamed up to put together a month of healthy eating/exercising activities for our center.

One of which is keeping a food and/or exercise journal.  Being a public person, a public food person, I’ve decided to incorporate a healthier life style into this month’s blog.

I know I won’t be one hundred percent perfect, especially with the Foodbuzz convention coming up on my birthday weekend (oh yes it is) and Thanksgiving this month.  I will give it a good shot though.

First, I had to think what’s most important to me, quality or quantity?  Yes.  Okay, that doesn’t work out well.  More thinking…quality as in what?  Quality = good ingredients.  I’d rather have, no, I demand that full fat cheese, butter and bacon stay in my food repertoire.  In those cases, I’ll keep them but make sure I limit the quantity.  As for the rest of the stuff, I know I have enough cooking savvy and dieting experience to make my food taste good and reduce the calorie content.  If I want to splurge????? Simple solution, exercise.  We all know the math: burn more calories than consumed and you will lose weight.

Of course, this isn’t just about losing weight, although I really need too.  It’s mostly about being healthier.  Healthier really does equal happier.  Healthier also requires planning, especially meal planning.  If you don’t plan your meals, you will fall victum to Halloween candy, fast food, or what ever treat someone brought into work (remember those Joy Cupcakes from yesterday…I had to turf them…sorry to start by sabotaging everyone at work…self preservation I tell ya, I had to do it).

I plotted and I planned, I also had a couple of things that I didn’t make last week that I needed to cook…not entirely healthy things either.  So I converted them to a healthier version.  The first of which was Seafood Chowder.  The word seafood itself evokes images of healthy food, but cook it with salt pork and cream, well, it’s just lost it’s healthiness.  Is healthiness a word?  If not it should be.

I started with Martha Stewart’s recipe for Seafood Chowder.

I made some changes, some for healthy reasons, some because it’s what I had on hand.

I used boxed seafood stock…it was on sale and seemed easy.

I added the shrimp shells to boost the flavor.

Drain the clam liquid into the pot if you use canned clams.  Flavor booster!

Drain out the shells…yukky shells.

While the stock reduces, get a little prep work done.  I chose to use bacon instead of salt pork.  Now I love salt pork, it’s full of flavor and its cheap.  But it is mostly fat.  Bacon isn’t the leanest meat but it beats salt pork.  Also 1/4 pound distributed by 12 servings, worth it for the flavor.

In a post long ago, that for the life of me I can’t remember when I posted,  I had a picture of a potato that looked like, well, a butt.

I am still juvenile, if I find food that looks like, well, umm, certain body parts…I can’t help but think it’s funny.

Now I have another potato; is it in old mans butt or some old biker chicks saggy boobs?  Wait I think I resemble that remark.

Enough of my silliness, now back to the serious side of cooking.  I used Yukon Gold potatoes because that’s what I had.

Mealy potatoes like the recipe originally called for, probably would help thicken the chowder, but I felt I should use up my saggy bottom/boobie potatoes first.

Cook the bacon until the fat is rendered.  Drain if needed but leave at least 1 tbs of fat.

Add the celery and leeks.  If you have trouble cooking it down add a little of the stock.  In retrospect, I could have drained all the fat and cooked down the celery and leeks with just the stock.

Add the stock and two bay leaves.

Since the stock was already warm, I added the potatoes straight away and cooked until tender, about 15 minutes.

 Then add your seafood.  I used a variety of frozen and canned.

 After cooking the seafood for about 5 minutes, I added some evaporated milk.  Fat free would have been perfect, but I didn’t have it.  The great thing about evaporated milk, it mimics the richness of cream without all the fat.

 Season it up….I was pretty generous with the cayenne because that’s just the kind of gal I am…Spicy!

 Then serve it up nice and hot in a fabulous new bowl that you only paid a dollar for )

Let the journaling begin.

Recipe

(with modifications)

 Ingredients

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil over medium-high heat. Add salt pork and cook for 10 minutes; drain.  Bring 2 quarts of Seafood Stock and shrimp shells to a boil.  Turn down to medium high and reduce to 1 1/2 quarts.  Drain and discard the shrimp shells.
2. Heat olive oil in a medium Dutch-oven over low heat. Add pork bacon and cook for 5 minutes, do not drain. Add onion and celery and cook, stirring, until soft [if needed add stock to help cook]. Add fish Seafood stock and bay leaves, and bring to a simmer. Add potatoes and cook until just tender, about 15 minutes. Add shrimp, clams, [mussels] and fish, and simmer for 5 minutes.
3. Heat cream in a small saucepan over medium-low heat; add [evaporated milk] to Dutch-oven. Season chowder with cayenne, salt, and white black pepper. Serve hot.

Read more at Marthastewart.com: Seafood Chowder – Martha Stewart Recipes

I love corned beef and cabbage, and I would eat them again just as is the next day except I love reinventing leftovers even more then I love eating them.  It always seems there is plentysome left overs.  March is still soup weather so I combined one of my favorite soups, potato soup with the leftovers and wowser, what a great soup.  Depending on how much I have left over, I have to supplement with more fresh ingredients.  I must warn you that my measurements are approximate.

Ingredients

Left over corned beef, cabbage, potatoes and carrots

8 cups leftover broth or 4 cups chicken broth and 4 cups beef broth

3 or 4 extra medium potatoes

1/2 head of cabbage (or just leftovers)

1 cup sliced carrots (fresh and/or leftover)

1 cup milk, cream or half and half

Salt and pepper

Butter

Flour if needed for thickening

 Directions

Skim any fat off of your leftover broth.  I stored my meat and veg in the broth, so I separated them out and left the broth in the pot.

Side note….Baby Boy loves it when I save dishes and by storing my leftovers in the pot.  Then reusing the pot the next day, just made his day!

Return pot with broth to stove and and 3 cups diced raw potatoes.

Bring to a boil and cook until potatoes are tender.  Meanwhile cut up the the corned beef, cabbage, carrots and leftover potatoes. 

Once the potatoes are tender use an immersion blender to puree the potatoes and broth.  If you didn’t have leftover potatoes you may want to remove some so you have some bite size pieces.  Alternatively you can use a blender or food processor to puree the potatoes and broth.

Add cabbage, potatoes, carrots and corned beef.  Cook until cabbage is tender.

Add milk and season with salt and lots of pepper.  If you like a thicker soup, shake up a couple of tbs of flour with the milk, slowly add to the soup and bring to a boil.  Boil for one minute, then simmer.

Serve with a pat of butter.

Have I told you that I love, love, love my new Dutch Oven?  It heats perfectly, looks great and it’s easy to clean (which makes the Baby Boy happy too).  Speaking of Baby Boy, this recipe is adapted from his Nana’s Pasta Fazool recipe.  Traditional Pasta Fazool also known as Pasta e Fagioli is an Italian soup/stew that can be found in almost every region of Italy.  It’s variations include prosciutto, sausage, or potatoes.  But it always has pasta in it and beans in it, most commonly cannelini beans.  Nana’s recipe calls for Pepperoni and Ceci beans (a.k.a. garbanzo beans or chickpeas).  I love it because it is spicy and has a rich tomato base.  Add a salad and some garlic bread for a perfect comfort meal.

Ingredients

8 – 10 oz pepperoni, thickly sliced

2 tsp garlic powder

1 tbs dried oregano

1 tbs dried basil

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp fresh ground pepper

2 cans (28 oz) crushed tomatoes

1 can (6 oz) tomato paste

2 cans (6 oz) water

2 cans chickpeas

8 oz of dried small pasta such as shells or ditalini

Fresh Parmesan and crushed red peppers if desired

Yes, I buy store brand, they’re cheaper and it doesn’t seem to make a difference in this dish.  Also, the dried herbs are fine too, you can subsitute fresh is you like, but again, the dried is very good.  If I could buy better pepperoni, I would, it’s the star of the dish.  When you live in one of the least populated states, you manage with whats available.

Directions

Start a large pot of water to boil for the pasta and heat up your Dutch oven or heavy bottomed pot.  Meanwhile slice up the pepperoni.

Add the pepperoni and cook for about 10 minutes to render some of the fat.  This is an important step, if you skip it, your Pasta Fazool will be greasy.  Sometimes greasy is good but not this time.

Drain the pepperoni.

Return the pepperoni to the pot.  Add the garlic, oregano, basil, salt and pepper.  Cook for about 30 seconds so the spices bloom.

Hopefully you had your cans of crushed tomato opened, because 30 seconds isn’t long and it doesn’t take long for the spices to burn, like another 30 seconds or what ever time it takes to open the can.  Add both cans of crushed tomatoes.

Next the tomato paste.

Then add 2 cans of water (I don’t like to dirty up a lot of dishes so I often use the cans to add water).

Cover and simmer at least one hour.  Please admire the shiny red Le Creuset. Please ignore my dirty stove.   Also ignore my teapot, I have no idea why it’s spout is still open.

Let’s not forget our pasta.  Boil it for approximately 10 minutes or what ever the directions say for al dente. 

Drain the pasta and set it aside.

After simmering for one hour plus, add the chick peas.

Then add the cooked pasta and stir.

Doesn’t that look good and comforting?  Thanks Nana for sharing.  Don’t forget to add fresh parmesan and red pepper flakes if desired.