Denise from There's A Newf in My Soup challenged all of us to do an old times dish, a classic gumbo. I chose to use chicken and chorizos because of my allergy to seafood - what a bad allergy, well, it's not deadly, just uncomfortable, enough for me to limit eating my favourites to the very minimum amount.
The recipes for different gumbos, chicken & smoke sausages, seafood and vegan, and their methods are here.
I used mainly what I have in the pantry:
1 chicken,
2 chorizos
several sprigs of parsley
1 onion
2 cloves of garlic
2 green chilli
1 egg plant
2 zucchinis
4 button mushrooms
2 tomatos
Plain flour
Stock
canola oil and chicken fat (dripping)
For the spice mix:
All spice powder
smoke paprika
cajun powder
salt
cracked black pepper
Made the roux first, and then stir in the onion garlic and chilli.
Stir in the chicken pieces with spice mix.
Simmer and wait...
It was lovely. We ate with rice, but somehow I thought the bread roll might looked a bit more decorative in the photo than white rice....
Tuesday evenings are usually a rush for us, the boys will go for their music lessons, that's hubby's guitar and the boy's piano lessons. So everything have to be quick and pasta is actually the most common dish on Tuesday nights.
Tonight, I made a simeple pasta bake, with enough vegetables and my favourite Ricotta cheese and Mozzarella cheese...
Double Cheese Chorizos Pasta Bake
2 Raw Chorizos sausages
5 Sprigs of parsley
1 Green Capsicum
1 zucchini
2 medium ripe tomatos
250g Ricotta cheese
100g Mozzarella cheese
Salt and Ground white pepper to taste
1/3 cup olive oil & 1.5 tbsp extra
1 small onion
300g big shell pasta
Water to boil pasta
Extra salt
Method
In a big pot, boil pasta as per instruction of the packet, add bit of salt to taste to water, simmer till it’s al dente.
At the mean time, slice chorizos, onion, capsicum and zucchini and tomatoes.
Finely chop parsley (I usually use continental parsley)
Drain pasta in colander and put it back into the pot, add 1/3 cup olive oil and stir through.
In a non stick frying pan, add the extra 1.5 tbsp olive oil, gently sauté the onion and capsicum in medium heat and add chorizos, sauté till almost cooked.
Add these to the pasta, and add tomatoes, stir through ricotta cheese and salt and pepper, mix well.
Put in ceramic baking dish and top with shredded mozzarella cheese.
Bake in 190C oven for 25-30 minutes.
This is a single serve baking dish actually, but I still prefer it in the plate:
