Pretty much sums up my absence from the blog and cooking/creating in the kitchen. My fridge is completely full of crap, literally just a bunch of stuff in there I can do nothing with. Therefore, it is crap. I haven't been visiting the grocery store as often because construction has brought death to my daily shopping. We have been eating out, and been eating randomly. Hubby and I haven't been going on our bike rides. My house is crazy looking. My months are packed before they even begin. And my bank account, well, let's not speak of this. I've been all over the place mentally and physically.
It so nice that people think of me enough to invite me places or to share in their special moments or think of me just to hang out, and I love that. But I think, sometimes, I just need to say no. You'll still invite me next time though, right?
It's time to take a step back, clear up my calendar a bit, slow down, breathe, and get my life together. Sometimes I throw myself into too much, become overwhelmed, and then hide in a corner to recoup. It's a vicious cycle. Although I enjoy my social life, I am beginning to enjoy my introverted life more. Slowly, as I am getting older, day by freaking day, I'm realizing I've come to a point where I don't want to do EVERYTHING, mainly because I have experienced so much in life that doing it more than once, twice, or even three times has gotten old. For so many years I've been told by those closest to me that I keep myself way too busy and am always running around or out of town, but I think I just needed to come to that point on my own. I'm here now. And I'm finally okay with it.
Here's a comforting recipe adapted from The Cozy Apron. It's simple and good. Exactly what I needed.
Italian Drunken Noodles: you can make these sober noodles and substitute wine for stock.
- 4 spicy Italian sausage links, casings removed (I used turkey)
- Olive oil
- 1 medium onion, halved, and sliced- 1 small red bell pepper, sliced
- 1 small yellow bell pepper, sliced
- 1 small orange bell pepper, sliced
(I used halves of large bell peppers)
- 4 large mushrooms, sliced
- 3 tbs minced garlic
- sea salt
- 1 tbs Italian seasoning
- coarse black pepper
- red pepper flakes
- 1 cup white wine (I used Chardonnay also) or 1/2 cup stock
- 1 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes with juice (I used the basil, oregano, garlic ones)
- handful flat leaf parsley, chopped
- 3 large leaves basil, sliced thinly
- 8 oz Pappardelle noodles, uncooked
Heat 2 tbs of olive oil in a large pot over medium high heat. Crumble in the sausage in chunks, and brown. Once browned, take the sausage out with a slotted spoon and transfer to a plate or bowl for later.
In the same pot, add the onion and let it get brown, beautiful and caramel-y. Don't let it burn. Add in the sliced bell peppers and mushrooms and allow them to get a little color on them (few minutes). Next, add the garlic, a dash of salt, the Italian seasoning, a few cranks of cracked pepper, and red pepper flakes to your liking. The sausage already has a kick, but we like spicy, so we added quite a bit to ours. Give this a quick stir.
Add in the wine, and let it reduce until it's almost gone, I kept about 1/4 cup in there. If using stock, you can let it simmer for a few minutes.
Next, add the tomatoes with the juice and the cooked sausage. Fold and mix it all together, add some of the chopped parsley and some of the sliced basil (keeping a bit of each for garnish) and let simmer.
Move on to the noodles, bring a pot of water to a boil. Add salt and your noodles. Cook until desired bite (I like al-dente), and drain.
Add a couple tablespoons of olive oil to the sauce because it makes it amazing. Then, depending on which pot is bigger, add the noodles to the sauce, or the sauce to the noodles. Toss together gently.
Garnish with parsley and basil.
ENJOY!
FYI, "drunken" noodles are actually a Thai dish known as pad-kee-mao (my favorite) and has been thought to have derived it's name because someone, after a night of drinking, wanted something that could be thrown together with whatever ingredients were handy and thus this person created a spicy noodle dish that later gained popularity. To say this is true or not, who knows. I just know it's a delicious noodle dish that can be enjoyed with or without a night of drinking.
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