Luxury Cooking

I love being able to set aside an entire night to cook a delicious meal.  It somehow seems like a luxury to be able to spend 2 hours cooking dinner with no distractions.  Tonight I made eggplant parmasean, spaghetti squash, and roasted cabbage.  DELICIOUS!!!!!

Here is what I did:

Spaghetti Squash

(I promise I'll get better at food photography)



Let me just say, I love spaghetti squash!  It is a delicious and healthy alternative to pasta if you are looking for a less traditional meal.  If you don't know how to handle a spaghetti squash this is an awesome video to get you started http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=mPFErHz6zOM.

After I finally got all of the seeds out of my squash (only difficult art of the cooking process) I decided to mix in about a quarter of  a bunch of parsley, dash of salt, dash of pepper, and the juice of one lemon.  Number 1 delicious dishl!

Eggplant Parmesan

(Not the prettiest food, but scrumdidleyuptious)

I have been craving eggplant parmesan lately something fierce.  I love eggplant parmesan because it isrich and full of flavor, however, I would like mine without the whopping calorie count please. I followed Gina's Skinny Taste recipe with a few tweeks of my own.  Here is the original recipe http://www.skinnytaste.com/2009/03/lighter-eggplant-parmesan-5-pts.html. 

For my eggplant parmesan I didn't use the Pecorino Romano, and you know what? I couldn't tell the difference! The ricotta adds such richness, creaminess, and saltiness that the missing Pecorino Romano didn't seem to be missing at all.   I'm always looking to cut a few calories here and a few calories there, so this was an easy to change to make a healthy recipe even healthier.

The other difference that made this eggplant parmesan difference from others I have made is that I used homeade tomato sauce.  The recipe comes from The Homeade Pantry: 101 Foods You Can Stop Buying and Start Making.  I received this book recently, and if this recipe is any indication of the quality of the rest of the recipes in the book I can't wait to cook them all!  Here is a link to buy the book if you want to start stocking your kitchen with delicious homeade delicacies.  http://www.amazon.com/The-Homemade-Pantry-Buying-Making/dp/030788726X

Lemon Roasted Cabbage

(This was taken from the website, that's why it's prettier)

I had pinned this recipe a long time ago and I'm so glad I finally got around to trying it!  Here is the link to the recipe http://www.kalynskitchen.com/2010/03/recipe-for-roasted-cabbage-with-lemon.html.  The only caution I would give is to be very careful when turning the cabbage over while roasting.  To help with the process I would keep the ends of the cabbage intact until after cooking.  By keeping the hearts intact the leaves will stay attached, this will make the flipping process much easier.

A Note

Since I had all night to cook without worrying about feeding anyone else, no meetings to go to, nothing to rush me at all I took my time with this meal.  I am sure that it wouldn't take 2 hours to cook this meal if you planned your time a little better.  The sauce can be made ahead of time, and if you have a large oven (I do not) then you could roast several vegetables at once.