Eggplant Parmesan Bake

I feel like half the meals I cook come from Pinterest or are ideas based on pins. One of my recent favorites is this one: Eggplant Ricotta Bake from marthastewart.com.

You can find the full original recipe at the link above. It really is worth your time! Even if you think you don't like eggplant, I highly encourage you to give this a try. As for me, I made some adjustments (mostly because I bought the wrong amount of some ingredients) and my recipe is below. Also, I've renamed it Vegetarian Eggplant Lasagna because I feel that 'Eggplant Ricotta Bake' doesn't do it justice.

Vegetarian Eggplant Lasagna
1 large eggplant
Salt & Pepper
Garlic Powder
Oil (I used safflower, but I'm sure olive oil would be great, too!)
1 tub of ricotta (14oz?)
1 T.(?) of Oregano (use your judgement, I don't actually know how much I added)
3 eggs
1-1/2 cups of Parmesan cheese
1/2 jar of marinara sauce

First, preheat your oven to 375F. Next, slice your eggplant. I cut mine in rounds, but if you're using a rectangular oblong dish, slicing them lengthwise might be better. (I don't actually own a casserole dish, so I used a glass pie plate).  Grease a jelly roll pan (or in my words: a cookie sheet with sides) with oil, lay the slices of eggplant in a single layer on the pan and make sure both sides are brushed lightly with the oil (again, in my words: drizzle with oil and just rub them down). Also, season both sides of the eggplant with salt, pepper and garlic powder. Roast the eggplant for about 25 minutes in the oven (turning over halfway through).

While the eggplant is roasting, mix together the ricotta, the eggs, oregano and one cup of the Parmesan. This lovely mixture will be part of your filling. Set it to the side and wait for your eggplant to finish roasting.

This is where you need to stop what you're doing and just eat some eggplant. Seriously. I'd never really cooked with eggplant before so I tentatively tried one of the smaller rounds. Holy cow (and other more emphatic words that definitely apply but I will refrain from using at this time). Delicious. DELICIOUS.

Once you get over how amazing the eggplant tastes, you can start assembling your lasagna. Because I forgot to buy two eggplants like the original recipe told me to, my layers are a little bit off. But essentially, you want to follow this pattern:  sauce, eggplant, cheese mixture, eggplant. Repeat this until you run out of eggplant. The only rule is that you must end with the cheese mixture on top. Once you smooth out your final cheese layer, top with Parmesan cheese and then put in the oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes (or until the cheese is starting to brown and is nice and bubbly).

Look at those layers! Yum!

I let mine brown more than other people might like, but it was still delicious!

Recipe Conversion - Egg Casserole

Growing up, egg casserole was a holiday tradition in my house. We'd all wake up on Christmas morning, open presents and then sit down to breakfast of cinnamon rolls (yeah, still haven't figured out gluten-free for that...) and egg casserole. Fluffy, cheesy, savory, egg casserole was always amazing.

When I went gluten-free I didn't even really think about how much I'd miss this until the holidays hit and then I remembered. Egg casserole is essentially a savory bread pudding. Yeah, there's that word: BREAD.  In the ten years since I first went gluten-free, the market has exploded with some great options for us GFree eaters and that includes bread, so after a long sabbatical, I decided to try to recreate my mother's egg casserole. This recipe below (which I pretty much eye-balled) filled an oval pan about 8x12".

6 Slices of Gluten-Free Bread (I used Whole Foods' Sandwich Bread), cubed
6 eggs
2/3 cup of milk
1 pound of gluten-free sausage (I used Bob Evans' original)
2 Tablespoons of yellow mustard
4-8 oz. of cheddar cheese (depending on how much you want)
Some nutmeg (not a huge amount, just enough to add some zip)

Preheat your oven to 350F.

Alrighty, so first things first: Brown the sausage and break it up into smaller bits (about bite-sized), next toss your bread cubes into the pan. I like to toss them with the sausage for flavor.  Layer the sausage/bread mixture in the pan with cheese throughout.

Beat your eggs and add the milk and mustard to them, mixing well. If you want to use Nutmeg you can also add it at this point.  (If you are making this ahead of time, i.e., overnight, you may want to add an extra cup or so of milk). Pour the egg mixture over the bread and press the bread down with a fork so it's all coated. It's totally alright if some edges stick up though because this will be crisp deliciousness later. Spread the remaining cheese on top and pop in the oven for 40 to 50 minutes until brown on top and the middle is set. Mine took about 45 minutes and it came out wonderfully.

Serve hot! Or, do what I did and divide portions up into individual servings for packed breakfasts. Going to try to freeze it and see if it will be okay, but that remains to be seen so far.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy. I know I did! For a (not-very-good-quality-cell-phone-)picture, see my tweet from last night. I will be posting the photos here eventually, but it won't be immeediately.

Happy Holidays!

Homemade Chicken Nuggets

Yes, they're gluten-free and, yes, they taste great!!

I based my recipe off of this fantastic recipe here, but I didn't have any regular gluten-free flour mix, so I decide to be inventive.

Preheat your oven at 450F.

I took four frozen chicken breasts and partially thawed them (I find still-slightly-frozen-chicken easier to chop up). After that, I cut them into just slightly-smaller-than-normal sizes for nuggets (think Chick-Fil-A sized nuggets).

In a large, Ziploc plastic bag, I combined equal parts chickpea flour and Parmesan cheese along with a combination of paprika, salt, pepper and cayenne. In all honesty, I added a little too much cayenne, but they're delicious. If you're not good with spicy, dial down or eliminate the cayenne all together.

Put the chicken in the plastic bag (if you're doing a lot like I was, this will have to be done in batches), seal the bag, and shake, coating all the pieces with the cheesy goodness.  After that, I spread them out in a single layer on a cookie sheet and baked them for 15 minutes, flipped them and then backed for another seven.

The results? Spicy, super-moist, and really easy homemade chicken nuggets! This made enough for several meals and so far it looks like it reheats really well.

In hindsight: I had run out of parchment paper and foil, and that would've saved me a lot of trouble with the clean-up afterward.

Sergio's Sarava - Shaker Square #CLE

How is it possible that I've lived in the Shaker Square area for over a year and never ventured into Sergio's Sarava? Oh. my. gosh. My mistake. BIG mistake.

Looking for a fun, but quick and simple happy hour, to celebrate some good news, a friend and I headed out to Shaker Square directly after work. There was some debate, but in the end Sarava won out and I'm so glad it did. Gluten-free, delicious, and did I mention gluten-free?

First off, the pao de queijo is amazing. According to the server, they make it with rice flour. I've made it with tapioca starch before, but I'm really liking the rice flour. If you've recently gone gluten-free and you're missing that lovely, elastic yeastiness, these would be a delicious gateway into other gluten-free options. My friend swore that she would never have been able to tell they were gluten-free if I hadn't asked.

Caiparinha and sangria in hand, we also tried out the beef churasco, empadas (her, not me), and the Prince Edward Island Mussels. All clean, uncluttered, and delicious dishes.

See below for a video on how to make pao de queijo.

More Gluten-Free Experimentation

I’m back to the chickpea flour. I haven’t tried baking anything with it yet and probably won’t be attempting a gravy any time soon, but what I’ve done so far I have loved. Last night was a flounder filet, dredged in a mixture of Parmesan and chickpea flour (very similar to this chicken) that I then
panfried.

Lovely flounder with veggies

Dessert? Gluten-free cookies (the ones from this post) warmed in the micro and topped with fat free vanilla frozen yogurt. Pretty tasty and, more or less, guilt free.

Gluten-free cookies and yogurt