sunday is funday. aka. cooked a lot

OK so I have been not feeling like cooking a lot on the week, so I tried an experiment of cooking a lot of freezable items on sunday to see how well they turn out unfrozen. this is because I do not like the taste of reheated/frozen food so much that its an experiment. I was looking at giadas first cookbook and found that tomato sauce is freezable. Although I do not use her recipe, I do use a lot of sauce during the week, and it does take awhile to cook. So I tried it. yesterday I tried to reheat it, and it takes a while. Not as long as cutting up all the stuff for the sauce and cooking it, but I guess if you have a microwave it will help to thaw the sauce first. here is my sauce recipe:

Marinara sauce:
saute onion (I don't like a lot of onion, so I usually only do half of one)
with 1 carrot and 1 celery
with 2-3 garlic cloves (clyde likes garlic)
Until it is pretty soft
Next I magic bullet 2 cans of diced tomatoes and add
add:
1 table parsley
1 table basil
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf
salt and pepper
Cook until tasty, about 1/2 hour

I also tried cooking ravioli to freeze. THIS DOES NOT WORK. very disappointed. The recipe was good, and without the freezing problem it would have worked. The advise was to line the ravioli on wax paper in the freezer for 15 minutes, then put into a ziplock bag.
Problem #1: they stuck to the wax paper when peeling off. made holes.
Problem # 2: they stuck to each other in the bag and made a lump. I tried to pry them apart. make a mess.

So if your not freezing them, here is the recipe:
Ravioli
The first thing you want to do is press a container of tofu. This is easiest by cutting it lenghwise into 4 pieces, wrapping it in a towel or shirt, and laying a baking sheet on top if it with many heavy items on top of that. if the tofu isn't pressed for this recipe it is too watery, and you can really tell. After about 1/2 hour or more take the tofu out and crumble it by just squeezing it thru your fingers until its in small pieces. In this recipe I am using it to substitute for ricotta, so it should have a similar texture when finished. add a little bit of sauce, garlic powder, salt, pepper, about 1 or 2 tablespoons of basil and 1/2 teaspoon of red pepper flakes. mix and set aside.

next you need
10-15 mushrooms cut
1 ten oz. pack of frozen spinach- thawed and drained
I added a few pieces of broccoli, optional though
1 egg mixed with a teaspoon of water
1 package of won-ton wrappers

about 10-15 mushrooms cut into pieces. saute until they have lost all of their liquid. when these are finished you can decide whether to food process them with the spinach (as suggested by recipe) before mixing with tofu, or just mix them with the tofu, like I did. its total preference.
lay out won-ton wrappers.
one at a time use brush to put egg around the edges of wrapper, add spoonful of filling, then egg another wrapper, and top it. squeeze the edges together. it should seal. put them on floured baking sheet until its time to cook.
It helps me to wash fingers occasionally, or they stick to wrappers and make mess.
bring salted water to boil. add oil and ravioli, 4 at a time so they don't stick. The cooking time varies. she says 3 minutes, but that isn't really enough. I just pull some out and try it every few minutes until they taste done. cheese on top.
I use the extra filling and put in my red sauce I pour on top of this. I serve it with penne.


Man, I haven't even gotten to the curry, flat bread, and yeast bread I made on sunday, but its time to make dinnerd. fajitas. mmmmm.