Macaroni and Cheese recipe

Some home made macaroni and cheese here, the kids love this and freezes great! When my first was a toddler I'd freeze it in 2ozs containers for her for quick meals. Now we never have enough left overs to freeze, if for some weird reason we do I freeze it in batches of one meal worth for 2-3 kids. I've also done it with ground beef mixed in (fry it first of course) to "beef" it up, and a few times have mixed in peas and corn which didn't go over as well.  So here is what you'll need.

1lb of elbow macaroni, I've done shells too but they stick too much for my liking. Still came out yummy though.
1lb cheddar cheese grated, use sharp or extra sharp. The mild doesn't give enough flavor and they come out a bit bland.
some grated parmesan for the top, probably about 2Tb worth, never measured this just make sure there is a good layer over the top of the dish.
3Tbs. butter
4-5Tbs. flour
3 Cups whole milk
1/2 tsp. grated nutmeg



Cook the pasta to al dente drain and pour into your baking dish. You can butter the dish but I don't bother, figure the sauce is buttery enough.

You can start your sauce while the pasta is cooking, melt the butter in a medium size sauce once the butter is bubbly and melted start adding your flour gradually, until you have a pretty dry paste going.  Cook that for a min or 2 stirring constantly, got to get that flour taste cooked out. Basically you are making béchamel sauce (there are more detailed instructions in the lasagna recipe post).
Once the flour paste has cooked for a min or so start adding your milk gradually and either stir or whisk to get all the lumps out. Once all the milk is in salt to taste and add the nutmeg (fresh is best).


Cook the sauce until it thickens just a bit, 3-5 mins. Turn off the heat and start to stir in your cheddar. I do a handful at a time stirring until it's melted in, then add more etc until all the cheese is in. Pour your sauce all over the pasta. The sprinkle the grated parmesan all over the top. I forgot to take a picture of this step until right after it all went int the oven, so you don't really see the parmesan because it already melted.


Cook at 375 degrees for about 30 minutes, or until the cheese is bubbly and turning brown, basically looks like this


Enjoy!

Homeschooling!

It's finally decided that we'll be homeschooling. Couldn't make up my mind for the longest time, I liked the idea of home school but didn't know if I can do it. Then I toyed with the idea of unschooling, which I still like.  I'm also a fan of all things Waldorf but the private school here is ridiculously priced and an hour commute each way, not feasible for us.  So when a friend offered a co-op opportunity to join a home school group where we use Waldorf curriculum for almost free I was stoked!  Penni on the other hand isn't so sure, she keeps asking to go to school, poor kid. I keep telling her that we will do school at home and then every once in a while will meet with other friends that do school at home, I think she isn't quite sure what it all means since she's never been to any kind of school. Our first project is making beeswax crayons and that she is super excited about, going to try to do that tomorrow.  I've been trying to get her interested in learning some of the songs and verses but she is not too into it just yet, we'll get there. In preparation I've banned all the battery operated toys to the garage, I love the simplicity of Waldorf toys and how they encourage imaginative play. I might have to allow the obnoxious toys back in to help entertain the littler kiddos that come over for nannying though. I will try to start a routine where those toys along with some others will have to be put away when the kids leave. Also want to change our toy storage system but that might have to wait since it might turn costly. So here goes a new page in our journey, exited what it might bring!

Baklava recipe with pictures

Love baklava? I promise you can make it! it's really not very hard, just very time consuming, and it's one of those things that once you start it you have to finish it in one "sitting". I usually do it after Penni is in bed and Cora has recently nursed and if needed David will take care of her. It takes me probably just under an hour, so plan to be unavailable (for anything but baklava making) for about an hour. Another tip, for the longest time I struggled with filo dough sheets sticking tearing and breaking. I'd end up swearing up and down the avenue and the dough, always would buy and defrost 2 boxes of it knowing that a bunch of it would go to waste.  Turns out I wasn't letting the dough defrost fully! The box said to let it sit at room temperature for 5 hours to thaw, I was giving it that much time but it wasn't enough. Now I usually take it out after breakfast if I know I'll be making the baklava in the evening and let it sit out for a good 10 hours or so. If I'll be making it in the morning for some reason I take it out before bed. When the dough is completely thawed the sheets should come apart nice and easy. Alright here we go...

What you'll need:

1 box of Filo (I started buying the organic whole wheat kind from whole foods)

2.5-3 sticks of butter

1lb of pecans or walnuts, I prefer pecans but most people use walnuts.

1 cup sugar

1tsp. cinnamon

1 1/4-1/2 cup of honey

1/2 lemon's freshly squeezed juice

9x13" glass lasagna pan

a pastry brush

a damp light weight (non-terry) kitchen towel or a cheese cloth

First thing you want to do is run your nuts through the food processor, you want them pretty fine but flour fine, I do them in batches and pulse each batch for about 30 seconds.  To the nuts add the sugar and the cinnamon.

Stir those together and set aside. Put your butter in a pan over low heat to melt. Open your Filo and unroll the sheets, mine are pretty much exactly twice the size of my lasagna pan so I cut them in half and one box of 19 sheets ends up giving me 38 sheets, perfect amount for a baklava. Some sheets are much thinner and you won't need to double your batch, you want close to 40 workable sheets to build a full size baklava. So maybe check the box when you are buying the filo and keep that in mind. So I cut my stack of sheets in half, stack the 2 piles on top of each other and drape a damp cheese cloth over the dough so that it doesn't dry out. Keep it covered! Because the dough is so thin it'll dry out really fast!

So by now your butter should be melted enough to start the baklava building process

Brush the bottom and the sides of your glass pan with a generous layer of melted butter

Then lay one of your filo sheets down and brush it with a pretty generous amount of melted butter. The first sheet is a pain and might slide around on you, so brush the edges against the pan first to keep it in place. and then make sure every inch of that sheet is buttered

For the initial layer if filo you need 8-10 sheets, if math is your thing you can count the amount of sheets you have and then divide them precisely. You'll need  8-10 sheets for first and last layer and 4-5 sheets for each layer in between nut layers, and I usually end up with 4 layers of the nut mixture. 

So get your 8-10 sheets of buttered filo (buttering each sheet as you go) and brush the last one with butter as well

Put about a 1/4 of your nut mixture on top of those 8-10 sheets and spread it out evenly

Cover that with 4-5 sheets of filo, brushing each sheet generously with the melted butter, and remember to keep your pile of non working filo covered with your damp cloth. Yes after every sheet you take, cover it backup. Tedious yes, but that's part of the reason it takes a while to make it. That and the fact that you have to butter each sheet individually. But you've set aside an hour to do this, right? 

So once you put down your 4-5 sheets of filo do another layer of nut mixutre, and keep going like this until the nut mixture is gone. I get 4 layers of nut mixture out of my batch usually. After the last batch of nut mixture is down put 8-10 sheets of filo over that (buttering each one generously). Hear Paula Dean in your head saying "just another stick of butter y'all!" I do haha. Anyways, once you are done your baklava will look like this, more or less. You might have more filo sticking out the sides, maybe less.

Now trim all that extra filo dangling over the sides and overflowing, just cut it all away with a sharp knife. Be gentle, filo is soaked in butter and quite fragile.

Now score your baklava, cut diamond shapes into it, about half way down. If you don't do it know it'll be really hard to cut once it's baked, practically impossible, it'll make the top layer crumble. So score your baklava, please.

Now bake it, at 350 degrees for one hour exactly. When it's done it'll look like this

When there is about 10-15 mins left for baklava to bake start prepping your honey. If you like a sweeter baklava do 1.5 cups of honey, if you like a slightly less sweet one or if your honey is excessively sweet then do 1 and 1/4 cups of honey. Put your honey and the juice of half a lemon in a small/medium pot and heat it over low/medium heat. You don't want to boil it or burn it, so keep stirring it pretty frequently, it should get very runny, almost like water. Side note, it doesn't matter if your honey is runny or solid when you are starting off, either way it'll melt and work just fine.

Once baklava is done baking take it out and let it sit for a few mins while you finish waiting for the honey to melt to almost water type of runny. Once the honey is melted pour it all over the top of baklava making sure it gets into every crack. It'll seem like a lot but it'll be delicious! Get it all on there. I like to let it rest over night, if you HAVE to have it asap then at least let it fully and completely cool. But seriously, let it rest over night, you'll be glad you did. Voila!

Remember that it's just scored and not cut all the way through, so before trying to serve it take a good knife and cut it all the way down along the score lines, and run your knife along the edge. Enjoy!

Yummy lasagna, the way I make it.

It's not just my judgement, I've been told by other it's good. I sort of modified a recipe from Curtis Stout when he used to do "Take home chef" years ago. Anyways here is the final product



The ingredients are:
1.5 lbs ground beef (we use the organic from costco)
1 small or 1/2 a large onion
2-4 cloves of garlic (up to you how garlicky you like your meat sauce)
2 15ozs cans of peeled diced unsalted tomatoes
1/2 cup of red wine, I use Cabernet Sauvignon
1 or so cups of basic Marinara
3-4 Tbsp of butter
3-4 Tbsp of flour
3-4 cups of whole milk
10oz + shredded mozarella cheese
a few spoonfuls of shredded Parmesan cheese
Lasagna noodles, I get the kind you don't have to pre-boil
Some thyme, fresh or dry is fine
Salt and Pepper to taste
Grated nutmeg

If you have a lot of time then start the meat sauce early and let it simmer over low heat for a couple hours, the flavors will be amazing. I usually don't have that kind of time so I cook it about 45 mins total and that's that.
First sauté the chopped onion in some olive oil


When the onions are good and translucent add the garlic, I grate it. Also add the thyme, if using fresh 1 or 2 sprigs is plenty, if dry then about a teaspoon.


Stir that up and add the beef, cook until almost no pink is left then add the wine. Stir it in and cook until the liquid has reduced, about 2 mins. Add the canned tomatoes


Bring to a simmer turn the heat down and let it cook until the liquid is pretty much cooked out. The more time you have to cook it turn down the heat more, I keep it on medium low because I never have much time for it.


While the meat sauce cooks, prep your lasagna pan. Cover the bottom in a thin layer of your basic marinara sauce and put one layer of noodles over it.


After the liquid in the meat sauce starts to reduce start the bechamel sauce. Melt your butter in a medium sized pot. I never measure it to a "T" that's why it says 3-4Tbsp. Somewhere around there.


Once the butter is melted and started to brown start to add your flour 1 Tbsp at a time, stir it in well every time. It'll turn pasty


I like for this "paste" to be very dry, almost crumbly


Once you got all the flour you need in there cook it for about a minute, you need to cook that flour taste out of it. Then start adding your milk a little bit at a time, helps to prevent from too many lumps forming.


I usually end up taking a whisk to it to get the sauce smooth. Your proportions of butter/flour/milk should be about even so if you using 3Tbsp of butter then use 3Tbsp of flour and 3 cups of milk. I always eyeball it though.  Once you have all the milk added the sauce will be quite thin but it'll thicken up as you continue to cook it, over medium low heat. Also once all the milk is in flavor it to taste with salt and pepper and freshly grated (preferably) nutmeg. Since I grate it fresh I've never measured it, but I'm guessing about 1/2 tsp.



You don't want to boil this sauce so if it's starting to bubble before it's reached the thickness you want then turn the heat down. The thickness should be about runny yogurt, thicker than buttermilk but not by much.  Usually by the time I'm done with this the meat sauce is done too. Make sure to flavor that with salt and pepper as well, to taste. I also like to break up the tomatoes a bit with the wooden spoon. Time to start building the lasagna. I use a 13"x9" lasagna pan and end up with 2 layers of meat, so approximately put half the meat sauce into your prepped pan on top of the noodles.


Drizzle that with a little bit of the bechamel sauce


And sprinkle a little shredded mozzarella on top of that


Put another layer of noodles over that and repeat for the next layer. Cover that with noodles again and pour a generous layer of the bechamel sauce all over the top of your lasagna


Sprinkle that with a generous layer of mozzarella


And top it off with a light layer of parmesan, you can hardly see it in the picture, but I promise it's there.


Bake at 375 for 40 minutes, and voila!