Nothing You Can Do That Can't Be Done

All You Need is Love (Lennon-McCartney)

There's nothing you can do that can't be done.
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung.
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game
It's easy.
There's nothing you can make that can't be made.
No one you can save that can't be saved.
Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time It's easy.

Is it easy?

If anyone has noticed, I haven't blogged in a while. I understand if you haven't been paying attention. I've been going through a crisis of sorts. Everyday I think about things I can blog about, recipes to share or thoughts about life. But then I over-analyze it all. I get the song "All You Need is Love" going through my head. Along with the philosophy that nothing in the universe is new - that everything has been done before. Most importantly I think about how I doubt my capacity to do it better than those who have come before me.

Honestly, I've always had this problem. I am only now realizing that this is the main reason why I have such a hard time finishing, well, anything. I am terrific at starting things, but finishing them... I know that this is not a healthy way to look at life, and yet I find it difficult to change.

I'm not working right now, because I'm supposed to be trying to write the "next Great Novel". But I find myself unable to write. Unable to put the ideas and thoughts I have to paper (or computer). I fight with myself because I am so afraid of hurting any one's feelings if I happen to write something that even as a hint suggests friends or family.

I guess you could say I'm really not sure what I'm doing. But I guess the next question I have for everyone is this: Does anyone really know what they are doing with their lives?

I truly envy those who know exactly what they want to do or be. A few years ago on our trip to Vienna and Prague we met this young woman who astounded me. She was an American visiting Vienna and it's symphonies. She was a high school student who played the flute, and her mother and aunt were with her. After talking with her mother for a while, I learned that this young woman had asked for a flute when she was 4. Four. She had seen someone playing a flute on TV, and decided that was what she wanted to do. She spent hours every day practicing her flute. She studied and was learning everything she could about Classical music. All I kept thinking as I was talking with this brilliant young woman was "Wow. To know without a doubt what you want to do in life. Wow."

I'm edging closer and closer to that 40 mark, and I still have no clue what I want to do when I grow up. Do you know what you want to do?

Okay, enough philosophy and ramblings for today. Because I do have a recipe I want to share with you.

I've made Baked Penne with Roasted Vegetables by Giada De Laurentis that I found on FoodTV twice now. Each time I make it I'm surprised with how much I like it. This last time I made it, we were shopping at the Commissary and I was unable to find either Fontina or smoked mozzarella. For those of you who are lucky enough not to have had the pleasure of shopping at the Commissary, it is the grocery store on all US Military Installations. The Commissary is a great store where you can normally save money on groceries. However, it is hard to get "gourmet" things there sometimes. I substituted regular mozzarella and gruyere cheese with wonderful results.

Baked Penne with Roasted Vegetables

from Giada De Laurentis

2 red bell peppers, cored and cut into 1 inch wide strips

2 each zucchini and summer squash, quartered lengthwise and cut into 1 inch cubes

4 cremini mushrooms, halved

1 yellow onion, peeled and sliced into 1 inch strips

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1 teaspoon salt, divided

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, divided

1 tablespoon dried Italian herb mix or herbs de Provence

1 pound penne pasta

3 cups marinara sauce (store bought or homemade)

1 cup grated fontina cheese

1/2 cup grated smoked mozzarella

1 1/2 cups frozen peas, thawed

1/4 cup grate Parmesan, plus 1/3 cup for topping

2 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces

Preheat the oven to 450F.

On a baking sheet, toss the peppers, zucchini, squash, mushrooms, and onions with the olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon pepper, and dried herbs. Roast until tender, about 15 minutes. (I roasted the vegetables the last time I made this recipe for a total of 25 minutes.)

Meanwhile, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Add the pasta and cook for about 6 minutes. Since you will cooking the pasta a second time in the oven, you want to make sure he inside is still hard. Drain in a colander.

In a large bowl, toss the drained pasta with the roasted vegetables, marinara sauce, cheeses, peas and remaining salt and pepper. Using a wooden spoon, gently mix, until all the pasta is coated with the sauce and the ingredients are combined.

Pour the pasta into a greased 9 by 13 inch pan. Top with the remaining 1/3 cup Parmesan and butter pieces. Bake until top is golden and the cheese melts, about 25 minutes.

Moving and a simple recipe

It has been over a month since I've sat down with the computer, and tried to write something here. I wish I had a good excuse, but I don't think there is such a thing!

Things are still in flux, but we are not moving from the St. Louis area. The last time I wrote, we were most likely moving to DC. Well, the negotiations fell through for that job, so we decided to stay here. Within a week of realizing that we weren't moving to DC, a friend and co-worker of Patrick's put their house on the market. We have been to their house before and loved it. They bought in a little over a year ago, brand new, and he put a lot of work into the house. The biggest reason for wanting this house was the finished basement that Jim did. He put in a spacious bar and pool table which is staying with the house! SO... we put a contract in on it. We are moving right before Halloween. Which is VERY soon!

Now, the house that we are renting is the first actual house that either of us have ever lived in. We've lived in apartments, condos and townhouses - but never a house. And now we are going to have one of our very own. It's in the country, but close to Patrick's work in Illinois. You can see cornfields from the backyard! I'm not sure how I'm going to adjust to it, being the city girl that I am. But, I'm so excited. We finally are going to have room to put all of our stuff. We have so many beautiful things that we have picked up from our travels, and we've never had them all out. Plus, we are going to have room for guests! So, pack your suitcases, and come to stay for a while... I am looking forward to having visitors that I can cook for!

I haven't been cooking very much for the last month or so. Mainly just heating things up. But I was standing in line the other day at the grocery store, and was staring at the magazines, when I saw a picture for Ravioli with Apples and Walnuts on the cover of the October issue of Real Simple. So, I bought the magazine, and tried the recipe last night. It has been so long since I've served something good or even thought about writing, that I didn't think about taking a picture of the finished product, but it was absolutely delicious. I have to say I was a bit unsure as I was putting the ingredients together, because it didn't seem like much. But one bite changed my mind. I can't describe how the ingredients come together, but wow. This is definitely something that we will be making again, and soon!

Click on this link to get the recipe from Real Simple.

Pasta with artichokes and carrots

I know it's been much too long since I've stopped by to say hello. I have no real excuses, because honestly, I haven't been very busy. The only exciting thing that has happened this past month was that we got to go to the All Star Game that was held here in St. Louis. How often do you get the advantage of living in the city in which something big like that is happening? Patrick is a huge baseball fan, so we knew we had to go. We had a great time, and got to spend some time with friends who came from Virginia to see the game.



When we took this job, we knew that Patrick would be doing shift-work, and that the rotation would be every 3 months, switching between days, swings and mids. So, when his schedule changed again we weren't too upset. He is now working the swing shift which means he leaves the house just before 1 in the afternoon, and gets back home about 10:45 at night. The only real problem with this, as I'm sure you can guess, has been the change that I've had to do in order to get lunch and dinner ready. We like to have lunch before he leaves for work, and he normally takes his dinner in to work. I've come to realize that I don't like to do a lot of cooking at 9 in the morning. I'm just not quite awake enough to be wielding a knife with anything but trepidation before I've had coffee. Breakfast items are O.K. at that time, as are getting things started that need to cook for hours such as pasta sauce or a roast. But to cook the main meal at that time, and then eat immediately afterwards is just a little daunting at that hour. I really don't know what we have been eating, although I have vague recollections of some less than appealing foods. Things that I've tried to pull together as well as - horror of all horrors - prepared foods. Which hopefully explains my absence!



Needless to say, what I am attempting to do is begin cooking the day before. Which means that in the morning I'm not rushing around trying to get lunch ready. For the following dish - Pasta with artichokes and carrots, I made the sauce last night, so this morning all I had to do was cook the spinach fettuccine and crumble the goat cheese. I normally would prefer to use fresh artichokes, but this time I took the easy way out and used frozen. I love artichokes, but they can be unwieldy to prepare. This is a really great dish, very light tasting, which is great for the summer, but it is also very filling and best of all good for the waistline.

Pasta with artichokes and carrots
From "The Mayo Clinic Williams Sonoma Cookbook"


1 pound dried spinach fettuccine
1 tablespoon olive oil
16 oz frozen artichoke hearts, cut lengthwise into thin strips
8 carrots, finely diced
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/3 cup dry vermouth
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme or 2 teaspoons dried thyme
1/2 cup crumbled soft goat cheese

Fill a large pot three-quarters full of water and bring to a boil. Add the pasta and cook until al dente, about 10 minutes, or according to package directions.

While the pasta cooks, in a large nonstick frying pan over medium-high heat, heat the olive oil. Add the artichoke hearts, carrots, and red pepper flakes and saute until the carrots are tender, 5 - 7 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds longer. Add the vermouth, lemon juice and thyme. Cook, stirring, 30 seconds longer.

Remove 1/4 cup of the pasta cooking water, then drain the pasta thoroughly. Add the reserved cooking water and pasta to the vegetables. Stir and toss to combine.

To serve, divide among 6 individual plates. Top each with an equal amount of the goat cheese.

Ginger Love

Do you love ginger? Than you need to talk with Patrick. He LOVES ginger. I am a little more ambivalent about ginger. I like it in moderation, but I wouldn't use the term love for it. When I say that Patrick loves ginger, I truly mean it. He has been known to eat or drink something that is defined as being ginger-y - ginger beer is a good example - and comment that it is not ginger-y enough. In Korea he used to drink this ginger honey tea, that made me gag, but he couldn't get enough of it. Ginger Altoids, ginger chews, candied ginger... you name it and he loves it.

Which is the one of the reasons why I decided to try this recipe for Pasta with Shrimp and Ginger Cream from "Fish Without a Doubt" by Rick Moonen and Roy Finamore. As I'm sure you've heard, if you read anything about healthy living, that eating seafood several times a week is very good for your overall health. When I read about this book from "Gourmet" magazine, I realized that I needed to own it. Not only because we are trying to live healthier but also because I need to overcome my fear of fish!

Seafood is something that I have never been very comfortable cooking. I have had more practice cooking shrimp than I do any other forms of seafood. Whenever I think of serving seafood, I remember my mom's attempts at cooking fish, and quickly think of something else to cook! As I've mentioned, my mom is not a good cook - she will be the first to say it. I decided that I must overcome this fear, and this is a start. I am planning on trying to cook fish at least once a week, and will be sharing my trials and tribulations with you. Wish me luck!

Now, before I go on with the recipe, let me say that the ginger is very understated. The soaking of the ginger in the wine mellows the flavor. I was a little afraid when I took my first bite of the finished results and thought "Wow! This is really good." I think that you will be pleasantly surprised. It made a great light spring dinner, with the snow peas and tomatoes. The plum tomatoes did not look great when I was at my local store, so I bought grape tomatoes, and they added a wonderful extra sweetness to the dish. As for the fat content... well, we've got to splurge every once in a while, don't we?

Pasta with Shrimp and Ginger Cream

From "Fish Without a Doubt" by Rick Moonen and Roy Finamore

1 (4 inch) knob fresh ginger, peeled and cut into very thin matchsticks

1 cup dry white wine or dry vermouth

Olive oil

1 pound large (21-30) shrimp, shelled and butterflied

Coarse salt and freshly ground white pepper

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/4 cup minced shallots

1/4 cup champagne vinegar

2 cups heavy cream

3/4 pound thin spaghetti

1/2 pound snow peas, tipped, strings pulled, and cut on an angle into thin julienne

1/2 pound plum tomatoes, seeded and chopped

Soak the ginger in the wine for about 15 minutes

Put a large pot of salted water on to boil for the pasta.

Heat a large skillet over high heat. When the skillet's hot, pour in a slick of olive oil. Add the shrimp, season with salt and white pepper, and add the butter. Saute the shrimp until pink and cooked through, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a bowl and cover to keep warm.

Put the skillet back on the heat and add the ginger and wine, the shallots, and champagne vinegar. Bring to a boil and boil to reduce the liquid to about 3 tablespoons. Pour in the cream, season with salt and white pepper, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat so the cream simmers actively and cook until the cream has reduced by one third. Add the shrimp and any juices from the bowl.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta. When it is al dente, add the snow peas to the boiling pasta and then drain.

To serve, make a mound of the pasta in the center of four dinner plates. Spoon some of the sauce on the past and the rest around it. Arrange the shrimp in a circle around the pasta. Garnish with the tomatoes and serve immediately.