Snow Pea Stir-Fry

One of the easiest stir-fry dishes ever is this. Snow peas, zucchini, mushrooms and bacon (or pancetta in my case), chopped into bite-size pieces and sautéed together for 5-10 minutes on medium-high heat. Oil is not necessary since the bacon releases its fat but you do have to get that going first, before all the veggies. Add salt, pepper and maybe a bit of garlic or garlic powder, and bam, dinner is ready.

Orzo with Asparagus

When my cousin was here for a visit, she made pastazotto, which is a spinoff from risotto. Risotto is made with rice and pastazotto, well, you can probably guess, is made with pasta. The pasta used is orzo, which is small in size and shaped like rice. She cooked it slow with onions, white wine and chicken stock, just like regular risotto, then added lots of parmesan. It was delicious.
The next day, we had leftovers, so I sautéed about a cup of chopped asparagus with 1/4 of a cup of pancetta (or bacon) and tossed in the pasta. I added more parmesan because there can never be too much cheese and the whole thing turned into lunch in less than 10 minutes.

Green Beans Bundles

I had the idea to par-boil green beans, meaning cook them in boiling water for a couple of minutes, and then wrap them in prosciutto before sautéing in a pan. Don't think the picture does it justice but they were perfect little bundles even my husband was impressed with. However (of course there has to be a however), I should have thought about how much prosciutto I used. Although they ended up perfectly cooked, due to the large ribbon of meat, they actually ended up kind of salty. At first it was delicious but into the second bundle, I chugged a tall glass of water. So the learning lesson for next time is to cut the prosciutto into one inch strips to avoid salt overload.
The chicken pictured was drumsticks cooked with a sliced onion, 2 chopped cloves of garlic, 1 cup of whole mushrooms, 2 cups of water, salt and pepper and a few sprigs of fresh thyme. They simmered together for about 30-45 minutes and it came out good and was easy as pie.

Roasted Vegetables

Since I talked about roasted pumpkin seeds last time, I figured I'd share a photo of the roasted bell peppers and fennel I made some time ago. Just forgot to post it.
I chopped up the veggies into strips, drizzled them with olive oil, salt and pepper, and threw them in the oven. I want to say at 375 degrees, although I might have been feeling dangerous that day and done 425 degrees. Either way, I have done both before and you will get the same result, although at the higher temperature, they will cook faster. I tend to roast veggies for 30 minutes (my default time for pretty much anything) and if they need to cook longer, add on another 10-20 minutes, depending on how many vegetables you have in the pan.
I'm actually quite proud of the picture. It looks like a kaleidoscope of fall colors.

Pumpkin Seeds

It's a short entry this time around, not because I haven't been cooking or eating, there is always plenty of that to go around, but simply because I wanted to share awesome photos of our Halloween pumpkins, which contributed to very nicely roasted pumpkin seeds. It seems there were about a million of them and they are a pain in the butt to eat, so we still have a bunch left. They make great snacks during scary movie night though.
I cleaned and roasted them in the oven at 375 degrees for about 15 minutes or so. When the whole house smells like roasted seeds, you know they are done.