Tilapia with Ginger Rice

Daddy Rating: 5

(This originally came from and Everyday Food recipe, but I doubled the ginger and the rice portion overall, they had peas (yuk) and served it with shrimp. This is actually fantastic with any seafood, I served it with my favorite micro green beans. You may want to do this on a weekend rather than a weekday, we had it on a hot Sunday night and it was perfect.)

Ingredients:
Tilapia (as much as you want to eat for dinner plus some for lunch as leftovers)
Smoked Paprika
Cumin
3-4 cloves Chopped Garlic
4 tablespoons fresh grated ginger (about a 4"-5" piece of ginger root)  (I've used the jar kind, and fresh is soo much better)
1 bunch green onion chopped (white and green parts separated)
2 tablespoons veggie oil
3.5 cups chicken broth
2 cups white rice

Ginger, White and Green portions of the onions separated

Chop green onions and separate green from the white sections. Grate ginger, I find the best way to do this is using a zester - it makes it so the ginger cooks down into the oil beautifully.

I highly recommend getting a zester to grate the ginger

Heat oil over medium high heat and add ginger and white portion of the onions. Cook for about 3-4 min.

Add rice and chicken broth, bring to a low boil, then turn down to simmer, cover and let cook, stirring occationally until rice is cooked. While the rice is cooking, line a cookie sheet with foil and brush with olive oil. Line Tilapia on the pan and sprinkle with paprika, cumin and maybe even some lemon...Mmmm. Broil the fish on high until opaque (about 7 or so minutes).

Yum!

Serve fish on a bed of rice and green beans on the side (these are my favorite microwave frozen green beans) - would also be delish with some reduced spinach, but then you are adding another pan to wash.

ENJOY!

Weekend Dinner - Baked Pasta With Chicken Sausage

(Daddy Rating 4/5)

(This is from an old "Everyday Food" magazine that I grabbed from my mom. I meant to cook this over the weekend, but I wasnt' feeling well and the Oscars were on so it got bumped to a Monday night...sort of a mistake, it was too much to do on a week night but it was good, so we'll keep it on hand for a Weekend Dinner or if we have company over)

Ingredients:
- Olive Oil
- Salt/Pepper
- 1 medium red onion (I used yellow)
- 1/4 cup vodka (Optional, I didn't use it)
- 1 can 28 oz whole tomatoes, lightly crushed with your hands
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 cup cream
- 1 lb rigatoni (I used cavatappi because I like the fun shape better, you won't use the hole pound, you will have some plain pasta left if you need to reserve some for picky eaters)
- 10 oz Baby Spinach (I used frozen and pressed out the water because I'm cheap, but fresh would have been a lot easier)
- 12 oz smoked chicken sausage (I used some chicken sausage from Target that has spinach in it)
- 6 oz fontina cheese (I used 8oz)
- 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese (Or enough to cover the top of the casserole in the dish)

Everything finally chopped up....

Start the water boiling for the pasta. Then heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat (as large as you can because you wind up mixing the ingredients with the pasta in this skillet). Add onion; cook until translucent (about 3 min). Stir in garlic. Turn down heat and add vodka if you're using it. Turn heat back up until evaporated (about 1 min).

Trying to occupy baby girl by making drums out of mixing bowls so I can chop ingredients.

Stir in tomatoes and oregano and cook until tomatoes are falling apart (about 10-15 min). Add cream and cook until warmed through (about 5 min). Season with salt and pepper.

Preheat oven to 400*. Start the pasta cooking.

Drums got old, so baby girl cleaned out the spice cabinet for me...

Add Spinach and chicken sausage to skillet until wilted (if using fresh).  Combine cooked pasta (do it in small batches, you may not want to use all the pasta) and fontina cheese to the tomato sauce in the skillet and toss to coat.

Divide evenly into whatever baking dishes you have. Top with Parm to your liking and back until browned and edges are crisp - about 20-30 min.

YAY! Finally in the oven! My husband ate the dish on the left for dinner and we still had plenty of left overs

Always serve with a glass of wine.