My Mama's Garlic Bread

Crispy, buttery, garlic PERFECTION.

I noticed a lot of garlic bread recipes call for an ass-load of butter mixed with garlic and herbs - but that's not Mama's way. The amount of butter some people use is, well, grotesque. Remember people, this is a SIDE. It's not supposed to contain enough calories to solidify the cholesterol in your arteries. It's supposed to be yummy!

Super simple, here we go.


You will need:

• SO MUCH GARLIC, 4-5 nice-sized cloves, diced up super tiny
• Nice, sliced, crusty bread, preferably
• 2-4 TBSP olive oil
• 2-3 TBSP butter

Preheat the oven to 450 OR use your toaster oven!

Heat a skillet over medium heat. Give it a moment to let the pan heat up then add the butter. Coat the pan with the butter while it's melting. Sop up the butter with the bread slices on both sides, then set them aside. Now add the olive oil to the skillet and let it get hot.







Test the oil to see if it's hot by dropping one piece of garlic into the skillet. If it sizzles, stir in the rest of the garlic. Gently stir the garlic around until it's aromatic, or the smell of garlic permeates your kitchen. Take your pre-buttered bread and smoosh it onto the hot garlic oil. Press a few times until the bread slice has picked up a good amount of garlic bits.

Depending on how crispy you like your garlic bread, put the slices on a pan for less crispy and straight on the oven rack if you like it extra crunchy! About 5-6 minutes should do it. Wait for it to cool, though, or risk burning your dainty little fingers. Have it with your pasta, lasagna, lamb chops, or, MY FAVORITE, broccoli cheddar soup!

Simple Sausage Marinara

I've made this a few times now and I find it super savory! This red sauce with sausage is super easy. Its one of those meals you do a bunch of prep work for, and then you relax while the sauce simmers it's way into the juiciest parts of the sausage. Let's get started.

You will need:

• 6 hot or sweet Italian sausage, whichever you prefer or mix it up
• 14 oz. can of crushed tomatoes
• 14 oz. can of whole peeled or diced tomatoes
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 2-3 cloves of garlic, diced
• fistful of basil, chopped
• salt & pepper to your taste
• olive oil

Start prepping by filling a medium sauce pot 2/3 full of water. Set that on medium-high heat and let it come to a boil while you're dicing up the onion, garlic, and basil.

Pour olive oil into a large sauce pot, enough to cover the bottom of the pot, and put it on medium-low heat. Once the olive oil has heated up a bit, dump in the diced onion. Let the onion cook until it looks a little translucent and then stir the onions to the sides of the pot to make a little landing pad for the garlic. Let the onion and garlic simmer for a while until the garlic looks yellow, then stir it up. If the onions start to burn or cook to quickly, definitely turn the heat down.

Before you place the sausage in the boiling water, use a fork to poke each sausage three or four times. Let the sausages cook for 4-6 minutes each at the most. After they're done, I like to cut them into twos or threes so the sauce gets in. My Nonno (grandfather) preferred cooking them whole. It's alright if they aren't cooked through because they're going to be in the sauce which is still thickening.




Turn the heat way down and let your sauce simmer for at least 30 minutes. I like to simmer my sauce for as long as possible. Well, go try this and tell me what you think. Whatever, you'll like it.

Love,

Liz

A Few Quick Tips For Extra Yumminess

Just sitting around, thought I'd share a couple of hard earned cooking secrets.

NUMBAH ONE!

Next time you're making cupcakes from a box, try adding chocolate syrup! Give each cupcake one good squirt on top of the batter before you pop them in the oven. The chocolate syrup makes them ridiculously moist and super chocolately! It works great with Devil's Food as per my recent experience tonight.

For any cake flavor, substituting sour cream in place of milk or water will give your desserts a moist, fluffy texture. I hear tell you could even use fruit yogurt!








NUMBAH TWO!

Shallots! Shallots are a scrumptious alternative to regular onions. Trust me, after you try a shallot you will never buy a red onion again. I use them in pretty much everything to anything. They're terrific in a salad, sandwich, a light tomato sauce, with beef, topped on a steak, with chicken, in pasta salad, potato salad, whatever you want. They're a lot more crisp and lighter than a red onion, but on the other hand a bit stronger. If you don't like onions, I don't know what to say, you're hopeless so I don't expect you to appreciate anything like this.

I actually like them in my salad sandwiches. Say what? Salad sandwich. I get a whole wheat pita half, romaine lettuce hearts, tomato, shallots, red wine vinegar, olive oil, and a dash of salt. So tasty.

NUMBAH THREE!

When boiling up some pasta, add a drop of olive oil and a sprinkle of salt. The salt flavors the pasta, and the olive oil prevents it from sticking to the sides and bottoms of the pot.


NUMBAH FOUR!

Who spilled my cocaine!?

Which brings me to my next point. The previous tip usually gets me into the pickle of having wet salt. Wet salt sucks. It clumps up your shaker and ruins the rest of your salt. Easy way to prevent this, rice. Put a few grains of rice into your salt shaker. The rice will absorb any extra moister within the shaker saving your previous little time and temper.

That's all my tips for now. I'll call my Nanny and see if I can't squeeze out some of her Great Depression tips or my sister for some busy-mother-of-two tips.

Keep a look out for news on the up-coming READER GIVE -AWAY of Andrea Lynn's The I Love Trader Joe's College Cookbook and the book tour under the same name! Check out the link above to visit Andrea Lynn's website and peruse her fabulous recipes and articles.

Love,

Liz

Italian Style Anchovies, the way my grandparents made them

I know what you're thinking because it's the same thing all of my friends were thinking: Ew.

But that's likely because the only way you're had anchovies is on a pizza or Caesar salad. Lots of people say that anchovies are too salty. Well, you've probably never tried anchovies the way my Nonno (Italian for grandfather). When they're made this way, these little fish become addictive. I've made 3 plates of this stuff in the last week. It's so good, trust me.

So, if you want something a little different or you need a special appetizer or maybe just a snack, this recipe is simple, healthy, and delicious!

Ok, here's what you need:

• red wine vinegar (a good brand like Star. I bought some Kroger brand red wine vinegar a while ago and it was garbage)
• extra virgin olive oil (again, a good brand like Filipo Berrio)
• 1-2 tins of anchovies in olive oil (you can get whatever brand of this you like. I prefer them from a tin rather than the ones you find in glass jars. Anchovies also can also come marinated in olive oil and capers. Never tried that, but I'm not a fan of capers.)
• escarole (it's like lettuce but different. It's a little thicker, a little bitter, but it goes so well with a nice bite of anchovies)
• celery with leaves (the leaves of the celery plant are delicate and tasty and also go very well with anchovies)
• nice crusty bread, crackers, or French rounds (French rounds are those little pieces of crispy bread that you eat bruschetta on)

Now that you have everything you need, you will be astounded at how simple it is to make a plate of anchovies. First, crack open your first tin of the little guys and drain out some of the oil. Have a big clean plate ready and next to you. One by one, remove the anchovies from the tin, and rinse it under cool running water. Place the anchovy flat on the plate and repeat the steps. *If you're using more than one tin, make sure you organize the anchovies so that they all fit on the plate.

Once all the anchovies are rinsed and on the plate, take your red wine vinegar and pour it over the anchovies. You should use enough vinegar so that the anchovies are submerged. Now carefully trot the plate to your fridge (I hope you made some room) and let them sit in there for 2-4 hours.

During this time the anchovies are marinating in the red wine vinegar. I usually leave them in there even longer, like overnight. But that's because I usually forget. Either way you do it, it's a hard thing to screw up.

After your anchovies have been marinating for a few hours, take them out and drain them of the vinegar. Just hold the plate over the sink, carefully tilt it, and try to make sure that none of the anchovies fall off!

Right now, you should have a plate of anchovies and nothing else (maybe a little vinegar residue). Now take the extra virgin olive oil and pour it all over the anchovies so that they're covered with it. Put it back in the refrigerator for another hour or until you're ready to serve it.

When serving, I recommend that you first put some of the olive oil from the anchovy plate onto your nice piece of bread, cracker, or whatever. Then place a few anchovies on there. Garnish with celery leaves and/or escarole.

Personally, I prefer to take a huge bite of the bread and anchovies, then shove half a leaf of escarole in my mouth as well.

I'm not very lady-like, it's true. But hey - I know how to eat.

Love,

Liz