You know what? It’s been a while since I wrote anything here. I mean, a really long time.
But, today, I had time to make a decent dinner for my family and I thought I’d share some deep thoughts and insights I had while working in the kitchen.
Really Deep Thoughts
Not really.
But, as I was scrolling the internet, looking for a recipe that I could use with the cheese ravioli that was getting a little frost bit down in my freezer, I realized how unprepared I was for the recipes that were presented by my search engine.
I know most people likely happen to have cream, fresh basil, chicken stock, pasta sauce, and other such essentials always available in their fridges and pantries, but I didn’t even have those “basics”.
What I did have
was some stewed tomatoes, Havarti that was going a little tiny bit blue, and some leftovers from a charcuterie with our friends on Sunday night. And some miscellaneous seasonings.
So….
I had to do the usual substitution or two to get the dinner on the table.
I did have some fresh garlic (2025 was the first year I ever successfully grew garlic – I don’t want to talk about the years I failed) hanging in my garage. Felt a bit like Martha Stewart running out there to clip off a bulb.
I did have some Smokey Honey Sausage Meat from the store. The guys always have a couple pounds left in the machine when they are making sausages, and there are usually packages in the fresh counter or in the freezer with various flavours in 1 lb packages. These make super easy and flavourful substitutions for just about any recipe. Even if a recipe is asking for beef, I will often use these little packages to save some money or inject a new flavour combo to the recipe.
After that, I was just winging it.
Internet video I found had the guy sautéing the garlic with tomato puree and chicken stock. I had the garlic, so I sautéed that in butter, added the sausage meat ( funny thing – internet guy didn’t even have meat in his ravioli! I know, weird, right? Well, I fixed that oversight), and then when that was cooked through, I simmered it with some white wine and a little bit of stewed tomatoes that I had run through the food processor.
Well that worked just fine.
Then he wanted sundried tomatoes, fresh basil and grated parmesan that he mixed in with some cream to make a creamy sauce.
Well, I had none of that, so I went back to my fridge and cupboard.
I have an immersion blender
and I’m not afraid to use it.
Call me crazy, but parmesan is just cheese, right? And sundried tomatoes are still tomatoes? So I took the rest of the jar of stewed tomatoes, and broke up that on the edge Havarti, some Italian seasoning mix, and a little bit of salt and ran the immersion blender through it all.
I was a little worried at this point, cause the Havarti didn’t really blend smooth, but was kinda gritty.
But, I had hope, and mixed all that into the meat mixture and started that simmering.
Oh, yeah, the fresh basil. Snort. Yeah, no, I’m not one of my amazing little sisters. Either of them would have fresh basil ready to go. But, nope. Nada. I did have some frozen spinach from Schinkels’ freezer section, though. That stuff is all cleaned and crumbled and ready to just plop right into any recipe to add some healthy, flavour and colour. In it goes.
Just let that simmer through a bit, and it was looking amazing! The gritty texture was gone, and the sauce looked creamy, smooth and the smells were fantastic!
It was super easy after that to add some cooked ravioli and give it a stir.
Then I remembered the other little bits of cheese left over from Sunday, and so instead of sprinkling shredded cheddar or anything normal over top before serving, I sliced up what was left of our Smoked Bacon Gouda and Red Leicester and let that sit on top, with the cover on while I waited for my people to get home.
I’m just saying – don’t be afraid of substitutions! Nothing to it.
