Easy Weeknight Dinners

Easy Eggplant Parmesan Stacks

1 · Apr 1, 2014 ·

The post brought to you by Ragú® // I LOVE eggplant. One of my favorite meal memories was when my dad went out of town (he’s not a huge fan of eggplant) and my Mom took the opportunity to make Eggplant Parmesan for the first time. I was in my early teens and boy, oh boy… My mind was blown. I had grown up eating pasta, namely spaghetti like most kiddos, but when my mom paired our favorite Ragú® sauce with the lovely breaded eggplant I thought I had gone to heaven. Recently, the folks at Ragú® came to me and asked if I could jazz up the classic eggplant parmesan recipe, I was thrilled! I was for sure up for this challenge.

I decided to make a healthier version of this tasty meat free dinner. I oven “fried” my eggplant and then stack it with layers of Ragú® Old World Style® Traditional Sauce and fresh mozzarella Cheese. With 11 tomatoes in every jar, Ragú® Old World Style® Traditional Sauce is Ragú® richest, thickest recipe* ever and it’s PERFECT with this recipe!

Easy Eggplant Parmesan Stacks

2 large eggplants

salt & pepper

4 eggs

4 cups unseasoned Panko bread crumbs

cooking spray

24 oz jar of Ragú® Old World Style® Traditional Sauce

2 cups mozzarella cheese

1 cup parmesan cheese

Wash and cut eggplant into 1/2 inch slices.

Place on a baking sheet and generously salt both sides. Let sit for 15 minutes.

This will draw out some excess moisture. After 15 minutes wipe the water and salt off the eggplant slices with a paper towel and set aside.

Meanwhile, set-up a dredging station to prepare the eggplant to oven “fry.” In one bowl crack 4 eggs and whisk. The 2nd bowl will be for the Panko bread crumbs.

Take each eggplant slice and lightly cover with salt and pepper, then cover both sides with the egg wash and then place in the Panko bread crumb bowl, generously covering both sides. Place on a cooling rack on a baking sheet.

Spray the eggplant generously with cooking spray and place in a 425˚ oven for 8 minutes. Remove from oven and turn over each eggplant slice. Spray the eggplant one more time with cooking spray and return to oven for an additional 8-10 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes.

Here’s the fun part. Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper. Now you are going to create towers of eggplant. Lay down a large slice of eggplant. Add a spoonful of Ragú® Old World Style® Traditional Sauce and a slice of mozzarella.

Top that with another slice of eggplant and repeat the process until you have about 5 or 6 layers.

Top with a generous layer of parmesan cheese. Place in a 350˚ oven for 10-15 minutes or until the cheese has melted.

Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes. Serve warm.

Yields 9 servings

For more easy and delicious Authentic Italian recipe ideas visit Ragú® Facebook page. It’s full of all kinds of tasty weeknight meals that your family and budget will love.

For even more fun you can visit Ragú® Better & Better Sweepstakes. It has a ton of fun prizes that you can enter to win. You could even win a trip to Italy!!

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Legal residents of the 50 United States (D.C.) 18 years and older. Ends 5/6/14. To enter and for Official Rules, including odds, alternate method of entry, and prize descriptions, visit www.RaguSweeps.com. Void where prohibited.

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Ragú®. The opinions and text are all mine.

Greek Baked Eggs and Potatoes

0 · Mar 20, 2014 ·

I said it before and I’ll say it again… I LOVE eggs! I especially love the combination of eggs & potatoes. There is just something lovely about the rustic pairing. Both ingredients are wonderful on their own and yet they can both be blank canvases as well. They are just waiting to be dressed up with simple, yet fancy new flavors. Together they make the perfect pair and you can dress them up however you like. As a matter of fact, you can create a recipe of your very own out of your black slate, head over to Food.com and enter to win $3000 from Simply Potatoes®. All you need to do is come up with a 5 ingredient fix and submit it to the contest and you could have and extra $3000 to play around with this summer!

The folks at Simply Potatoes® challenged me to come up with a 5 ingredient fix and this is what I came up with…

Greek Baked Eggs & Potatoes! I am always looking for a quick weeknight meal for the family and this one couldn’t be easier. Now technically, this recipe does have 5 ingredients but that only if you count the salt & pepper as separate ingredients. But don’t be fooled… This recipe is packed full with flavor and some hidden ingredients as well.

I started with Simply Potatoes® O’Brien Hash Browns’ as my base for my baked eggs. Here’s where the magic happens… First of all, these potatoes are fresh potatoes that you will find in your refrigerated section, generally by the eggs at your market. You won’t find them in the freezer section or dehydrated because Simply Potatoes are always fresh with simple ingredients.

Next, these O’Brien Hash Browns also have onions and peppers in the mix. Two hidden ingredients that I didn’t have to purchase or prepare. They are already in the hash browns. SCORE!

I used a jumbo muffin tin, sprayed it with cooking spray and then placed two heaping tablespoons of the hash brown mixture in the muffin tins and then created a hash brown nest…

I topped the potatoes off with some salt & pepper and some more cooking spray. I placed it into a 400˚ oven for 18-20 minutes to cook the potato mixture. After the potatoes are baked and slightly brown, I remove the pan from the oven and add the…

You guessed it… My eggs. All you need to do is crack them right into the hash brown nests and top with a little more salt & pepper.

Return them to the oven for an additional 15 minutes to bake the eggs. Keep a close eye on them and remove them from the oven as soon as the eggs have set. You don’t want to over cook your eggs. You still want that yolky gold running through your egg & potato nest.

Let your eggs cool for a few minutes and then top with one of my favorite new ingredients, a prepared olive tempenade. It’s basically Greek olives that are chopped up fine with a little bit of olive oil to tie the olive caviar together. It’s tasty on bread or with veggies and hummus. It tastes GREAT on top of these baked eggs. Just top the eggs & potatoes with a small teaspoon of tempenade and then serve immediately.

Serve with a lovely Greek salad and you have the perfect SIMPLE week night meal.

What’s your favorite way to cook with potatoes? Remember, you can enter to win the Simply Potato 5 Ingredient Fix Contest and win $3000 with your simple, but inventive recipe!

For rules on how to enter the Sweepstakes click here.

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Simply Potatoes. The opinions and text are all mine.

Huevos Rancheros Bake // Recipe

8 · Feb 27, 2014 · 11 Comments

// huevos rancheros bake recipe //

I’ve become obsessed with eggs lately. I love how versatile they are, I love how they taste when dressed up, I especially love how they are easy on the grocery budget. I have started making egg dishes a couple of nights a week because they are EASY, inexpensive and the family is still getting a great source of protein without the more expensive meat or poultry options.

As a kid my Mom would make Huevos Rancheros every once in a while and I LOVED it. The flavor combinations are fantastic. A typical huevos rancheros recipe has some type of tomato based salsa, fried or poached eggs, tortilla and sometimes cheese on top. This version is a bit different. It still has eggs and salsa, but I took some liberties when it comes to the tortilla and the cooking method.

The other night we hosted a taco dinner with some family and we ended up with some left over spanish rice. I tend to over do it at times and we had rice for an army. I had just made a couple of packages of Old El Paso Mexican Rice and added a can of Muir Glen Organic Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes to the pot when I cooked up the rice. You’ll have to adjust the liquid a bit, but it sure makes a lovely mexican rice!

Anyway… I had a bit of left over rice and thought… I could use this as a base for a lovely baked egg dish! That’s how the recipe development started. I wanted something easy to throw together using some simple taco night left overs. You know those side dishes that we never know what to do with after taco night! Here is how I layered my egg dish…

The first layer is the leftover mexican rice, the second layer is just a can of rinsed black beans or refried beans, or any bean dish that you may have left over. Then a layer of your favorite salsa, we like Pace Chunky Salsa, then top with an egg and some salt & pepper. Super simple and a GREAT way to use up those leftovers!

Before I placed it in the oven I topped it off with some shredded cheddar cheese and some green onion a perfect way to add a little kick to the dish. After they finished baking, we let them cool for a few minutes and then dove right in. My husband and I had to do a double take. The addition of the egg to these simple ingredients made for a lovely meal, it tasted amazing!! I was thrilled to have a dish that came together so fast, not to mention a dish that the whole family loves and that uses up those pesky taco night left overs… It’s PERFECT! Here’s the full recipe with all the specifics…

Huevos Rancheros Bake

Save Print

Prep time

5 mins

Cook time

20 mins

Total time

25 mins

An easy weeknight dinner that capitalizes on those pesky taco night leftovers.

Author: Heather Thoming

Recipe type: Easy Weeknight Dinner

Cuisine: Mexican

Serves: 4

Ingredients

baking spray
2 cups mexican rice
1 cup black beans
1 cup salsa
4 eggs
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
¼ cup sliced green onion
salt & pepper

Instructions

For this recipe you can use a number of different baking dishes. You can bake the egg dish in a small baking dish, small oven safe ramekins or even a large muffin tin. Whatever you have on hand really. I've used each method and they all work great.
Preheat the oven to 350˚ and prepare your baking dish or dishes with non-stick baking spray.
Start with the rice layer on the bottom. Smooth it out and add the beans on top of the rice. Then add a nice layer of salsa. At this point, place the dish or dishes in to the oven for 10 minutes to bring up to temperature before added your eggs.
Remove from oven and add your eggs, salt, pepper, cheese and green onion and place back in the oven for an additional 6-10 minutes or until the whites of the eggs have set. You may need to turn in the oven once to promote even baking.
Remove from the oven and let cool for a few minutes, but serve not to long after it comes out of the oven.

Agave Chicken Lettuce Wraps

1 · Feb 11, 2014 · 4 Comments

Agave Chicken Lettuce Wraps // Maybe you have heard of agave syrup, but haven't taken the leap of trying it yet! I am like you, and probably wouldn't have, had I not visited a spa that served lettuce wraps with it as a dressing. After having those tasty lettuce wraps, I had to come home and try to recreate that amazing taste, and I knew the key was the Agave syrup. These healthy wraps are easy to make, only use a few ingredients and are delicious.

Ingredients:

2 Chicken breasts, cooked and cubed

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

1/2 cup roughly chopped pecans

1/2 lemon juiced

2-3 tbs agave syrup

Lettuce (Bib, Boston or Butter lettuces work great)

Cook your chicken breasts your preferred way and let cool. Placing them in a casserole dish with a sprinkle of salt and pepper is the easiest and then either bake in the oven or microwave, depending on what dish you have.

Once cooled and cubed, place your chicken chunks in a bowl. Mix remaining ingredients in and then lastly, add the splash of lemon before refrigerating.

This salad mixture is best served cold, spooned into leaves of your favorite lettuce.

When serving, you can add a drizzle of the agave syrup to the plate for presentation.

Feel free to change ingredients based on your taste!

Also consider adding:

-chopped cucumber

-diced green onion

-pomegranate seeds

-sesame or chia seeds

I'm super excited to welcome the newest member of the WhipperBerry Creative Team, Stephanie from Life Created! She is an incredibly talented food photographer with all kinds of goodies over at her blog. You should take a second to run over and check it out!!

Easy Weeknight Dinners

Easy Eggplant Parmesan Stacks

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