Viva Italiano and um, some pancakes

I have three little mini highlights from the past few days.

First is the pizza the boy makes. He recently got into making his own pizza dough, which is great since he LOVES pizza. Big surprise that a guy likes pizza. I don't like all the grease and fat usually that come with it, so this is a perfect way to have our pizza, make it healthy, and taste WAY better that store bought.

We are still working out the cooking of it though, since it seems to have a mind of its own. We are fantasizing about a stone oven (read article in Bon Appetit this month) and the boy has been begging for a pizza stone the past year. In any case, he has been using the Giada DeLaurentiis recipe for the dough, and we vary the ingredients, but this one had spinach, olives, salami, fresh mozzarella, basil,and regular old canned spaghetti sauce on it.

Saturday I made banana pancakes from my torn up, worn down bible: Fanny Farmer's Cookbook. (The BEST source for the oldie but goodie stuff). I used the recipe below...sublimely easy and added two organic bananas that had gone too squishy, a little vanilla and some honey. We served then with honey instead of syrup and they were just lovely.

Standard Pancake recipe (Makes about 9-12)

Mix:

1/2 c milk or soy milk

2 tb melted butter

1 egg

Sift: (I use a tiny metal colander for this)

1 c flour

2 tsp baking powder

2 Tb sugar

1/2 tsp salt

(To banana-fy, add two squished bananas to the first stuff along with a splash of vanilla and a squirt of honey.)

Mix it all together and cook, two tsp per pancake in a hot non-stick pan coated with cook spray. Don't flip until there are a lot of bubbles on the uncooked side.

Serve with honey and butter or try some marscapone or clotted cream....mmmmm.

This evening I tried my hand at eggplant parmigiana. I had never made it before, and it was really good. The eggplant came out tender with a decadent crisp crust, and the sauce was nice too. It was a tiny bit labor intensive, but not bad. We served it with a sort of "chopped salad caprese."

Eggplant Parmigiana

1 eggplant

1 cup of flour or more

1 cup of romano or pecorino cheese

2 eggs

2 tb water

1/2 cup chopped fresh basil

salt

spaghetti

store bought sauce + whatever you like

Slice the eggplant and salad lightly, put in colander to drain for about 30min.

Put flour in a grocery bag.

Mix cheese, eggs, water and basil in a bowl.

Boil water for 1/2 spaghetti noodles.

Prepare your sauce. I like to use store bought and then dress it up. I sauteed 5 cloves of garlic and threw the sauce in there with a cup of chopped fresh oregano, parsley and basil, about a tsp of smoked paprika and 1/2 c of vermouth. Let it simmer till time to serve everything.

Your water is probably boiling now, throw your noodles in for 10 min. and start preparing eggplant. Pat them dry wit a paper towel. Heat about 1/2 c corn or canola oil in a skillet with sides till it shimmers (on lo hi). Throw the eggplants into the bag with the flour and shake around till they are coated. Take each out, dip/coat in egg/cheese mixture and put in pan w/oil. Cook till brown on both sides.

By now, everything should be about ready. Drain spaghetti and plate it, put a little sauce on the noodles and then top with 3-4 eggplants, top with more sauce and then a little cheese.

Chopped salad caprese

Chop and mix olives, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, fresh basil and a squirt of lemon juice. Taste for seasoning.

We are grateful for: The boy is grateful this class is relatively easy. I am grateful for the heat. I have been able to dry three loads of laundry this weekend on the line and not have to run the dryer. I figure I save the energy from the dryer and pass it to our poor air conditioner which is working over time.

Note to self, work on food photography skills. Too much color in that eggplant photo!