Cheese spaghetti. Most people's first impressions reach far from the classic red marinara sauce we associate so well with the word "spaghetti". Most people don't even know what to think.
Cheese spaghetti is a lot more simple than most people's imaginations lead them to believe. It's basically a cheese sauce over spaghetti noodles.
The ingredients for the sauce are pretty simple. The recipe calls for flour, butter, milk, cheese,and one, 8 oz. can of tomato sauce.
The base of the sauce is made up of what the French called a roux (pronounced "roo"). The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines it as, "a cooked mixture of flour and fat used as a thickening agent in a soup or sauce."
Now, don't go thinking that the base is lard and flour. It's simply just melted butter in a sauce pan. I use salted, stick butter, and I use a good half an inch chunk. Once it's melted, I pour a little bit of flour, just enough so that it dissolves into the butter. The roux should run off of the spoon pretty smoothly, it should be just barely a liquid. All of this should be done off of the heat of the stove.
Once the roux is mixed, open up the tomato sauce and pour it in. Next is the milk. I use two cups of milk, which is the equivalent to 8 oz. so I just use the can of tomato sauce as a measuring cup. I pour two in and let it warm up over medium heat.
Now, the good stuff comes out. I always buy the sharpest cheddar cheese I can find because the sharper the cheddar, the more cheddar flavor there is in the sauce. I slice the cheese up and throw it piece by piece into the sauce, stirring the entire time so that the cheese doesn't melt to the bottom of the pan. It helps if you throw in three or four slices and wait till you see the cheese melted and swirling around in the sauce.
The sauce itself can need quite a bit of salt, so I add in some seasoned salt to my liking. I'm a salt fiend, so my salt might not be exactly what your salt liking is. It's all a matter of opinion.
It's pretty easy to make a larger batch of the sauce too. Just add either more milk or more cheese, or both, and the sauce magically expands. Crazy concept, I heard it's got something having to do with physics or some smart subject like that.
But wait, we can't forget about the noodles! It's best to start the water boiling first and by the time the sauce is done cooking, the noodles are usually done. Throw a couple of handfuls of dry spaghetti noodles in the water and don't forget to stir every now and then.
The recipe is pretty flexible, with the exception of the main ingredients, but it's become a delicious habit of mine to make it, almost weekly now. My roommates, who have continually become my taste testers love the stuff and ask me quite often to make it for them. Even if they ask me half way through, I can still make more. That's the great part about it.
As far as where the recipe came from, my dad has cooked it for my family for a while, and my grandparents have been cooking it for him for as long as he can remember.
I asked my dad where it came from, and he wasn't to sure but he knew that we are not the only family who cooks it. Apparently there have been a handful of other families who know about the odd recipe. The dish is, surprisingly, known outside of my family. Where it originated from, or how it was came about is beyond me.
It's a good recipe and it's fun, cheap and easy to make. Just make sure you don't leave the sauce pan in the sink for more than a couple days, it starts to smell like rotten eggs. But I wouldn't know that from experience or anything...
Monday, October 27, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
Splurging on meat
This past weekend while looking through a heap of paper on the dining room table, I came across an ad for Safeway, where I get everything that I can't usually get at Trader Joe's. I flipped through it, not expecting to find anything good, but discovered an ad for steak.
Now, I don't normally eat a whole lot of meat. I've been meaning to because, as an athlete, I need to keep a healthy dosage of protein. And it's pretty common knowledge that most red meats have quite a bit of protein in them.
It's not usually on my cooking agenda because the stuff is hard to prepare and can be very touchy. Meat is far more unforgiving if you cook it wrong. Not only can it cause a night of cuddling with the toilet, but the tab is often a hefty one.
Regardless, I figured I'd give it a shot. Let's just say I was feeling dangerous. The price was what sealed the deal. Safeway had a variety of steaks on sale, from New York to T-bone. I don't really know a whole lot about each one to determine a taste difference, so I settled on a type that seemed to be moderately priced and sized. The price for two good sized steaks ended up being around $6.00.
In thinking of the side dishes for a meat of such stature, asparagus popped into my head. Now, during the summer time, my roommate went on a BBQ spree and probably grilled everything that could possibly be grilled. She came up with a fancy little number which consisted of asparagus wrapped prosciutto, which is a very thinly sliced Italian ham.
The stuff is to die for, but prosciutto will put a dent in the grocery budget. It had cost about the same as the steak for about eight slices of this salty goodness. It's tucked away near all the fancy cheeses and meats which usually have a home by the deli.
But, since I seemed to be on a haughty, carnivorous feeding frenzy, I splurged and bought it all.
Friday night rolled around and I fired up the grill.
Steak preparation seemed to be easier then I thought. I was cooking at a friend's house and rubbed the slabs of meat in what is formally known as "steak rub". Steak rub can be bought at pretty much any grocery store and is basically just a bunch of herbs and spices thrown together in a bottle and then rubbed on the outside of steak to give it some punch.
To prepare the asparagus, I washed it off and broke the stems off the bottom. The best way to know where to break the stem is to start a bit up from the bottom and just start bending it and moving up the stalk until it actually snaps. This is to ensure that the tender part of the asparagus is not wasted.
Then, just open up the prosciutto and wrap it around the spear.
Grill this up until the prosciutto looks crispy.
To check the steak, just get a knife and cut a little slit in the middle and take a peak inside. It's done when most of the pink on the inside is gone, but then again it depends on how well you like your steak to be cooked.
Here's a website with an index to help you decide:
http://www.redmeatandnutrition.com.au/Recipe/CookingTechniques/BBQ/
The meal over all was absolutely delicious. It was a little on the salty side, but that can all depend on what kind of steak rub one's using. Those are always up in the air.
Now, I don't normally eat a whole lot of meat. I've been meaning to because, as an athlete, I need to keep a healthy dosage of protein. And it's pretty common knowledge that most red meats have quite a bit of protein in them.
It's not usually on my cooking agenda because the stuff is hard to prepare and can be very touchy. Meat is far more unforgiving if you cook it wrong. Not only can it cause a night of cuddling with the toilet, but the tab is often a hefty one.
Regardless, I figured I'd give it a shot. Let's just say I was feeling dangerous. The price was what sealed the deal. Safeway had a variety of steaks on sale, from New York to T-bone. I don't really know a whole lot about each one to determine a taste difference, so I settled on a type that seemed to be moderately priced and sized. The price for two good sized steaks ended up being around $6.00.
In thinking of the side dishes for a meat of such stature, asparagus popped into my head. Now, during the summer time, my roommate went on a BBQ spree and probably grilled everything that could possibly be grilled. She came up with a fancy little number which consisted of asparagus wrapped prosciutto, which is a very thinly sliced Italian ham.
The stuff is to die for, but prosciutto will put a dent in the grocery budget. It had cost about the same as the steak for about eight slices of this salty goodness. It's tucked away near all the fancy cheeses and meats which usually have a home by the deli.
But, since I seemed to be on a haughty, carnivorous feeding frenzy, I splurged and bought it all.
Friday night rolled around and I fired up the grill.
Steak preparation seemed to be easier then I thought. I was cooking at a friend's house and rubbed the slabs of meat in what is formally known as "steak rub". Steak rub can be bought at pretty much any grocery store and is basically just a bunch of herbs and spices thrown together in a bottle and then rubbed on the outside of steak to give it some punch.
To prepare the asparagus, I washed it off and broke the stems off the bottom. The best way to know where to break the stem is to start a bit up from the bottom and just start bending it and moving up the stalk until it actually snaps. This is to ensure that the tender part of the asparagus is not wasted.
Then, just open up the prosciutto and wrap it around the spear.
Grill this up until the prosciutto looks crispy.
To check the steak, just get a knife and cut a little slit in the middle and take a peak inside. It's done when most of the pink on the inside is gone, but then again it depends on how well you like your steak to be cooked.
Here's a website with an index to help you decide:
http://www.redmeatandnutrition.com.au/Recipe/CookingTechniques/BBQ/
The meal over all was absolutely delicious. It was a little on the salty side, but that can all depend on what kind of steak rub one's using. Those are always up in the air.
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