Suzette Cooks » Pasta/Rice

Macaroni Cheese with Asparagus

Suzette — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 03:39:38 +0000

This macaroni is with white cream sauce. I have been trying to bake using ingredients from scratch, but finally settled with ready made cream sauce. :p This is very yummy though!

INGREDIENTS
3 cups macaroni elbow
6 scallops
8-10 prawns, shelled
1/4 red, yellow and green pepper, diced.
1 large onion, finely chopped
3 large fresh button mushrooms, cut into quaters
3/4 can of white cream sauce
1/4 pack of grated/shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 pack of mozzarella cheese
1/2 tsp paprika
Salt & pepper to taste

1 bunch of asparagus, washed and break into halves.
Some olive oil and salt to taste.

METHOD
1. Cook macaroni as per instructed on pack. Drain and stir in some olive oil.
2. Marinate scallop and prawns with some pepper and salt for a few minutes.
3. Heat some oil in a saucepan, saute onion until translucent. Add in paprika, some salt and pepper.
4. Stir in pepper and mushroom and fry for a while before adding prawns and scallop.
5. Add in cream sauce, mix well until bubbles. Remove from stove, add in the cheddar cheese and half of the mozzarella.
6. Scoop the mixture into an oven proof bowl, top with the remaining mozzarella.
7. In a separate baking pan, arrange asparagus, rub in olive oil and salt.
8. Bake both the macaroni and asparagus in a pre-heated oven at 180C for 20 minutes.

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Homemade Tomato Pasta Sauce

Suzette — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 03:28:14 +0000

Hubby doesn’t like it if I use ready-to-eat tomato pasta sauce, like Prego. Kids love macaroni in tomato sauce, occassionally they also ask for angel hair in tomato sauce as well. I have experimented a few times and found this recipe quite tasty. My kids love it!

INGREDIENTS
10-12 red tomatoes
1 tbsp dried basil
1 tbsp oregano
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 onion, chopped
3-4 pips of garlic, finely chopped

METHOD
1. Boil a pot of water, scald the tomatoes for a few seconds. Wash in cold water. Then, the skins can be removed easily.
2. Heat some oil in wok, stir fry chopped onion until translucent. Add in garlic and sugar and stir fry a while.
3. Add whole tomatoes, basil, oregano, pepper and salt. Simmer in wok, covered, for about 30 min until tomatoes softened.
4. Mash the tomatoes with spatula.

This gives you the very basic tomato pasta sauce. Can serve hot immediately with cooked macaroni or spaghetti/angel-hair. I like to cook a lot, and keep them frozen for future usage. If frozen, can keep for a few months (but I usually use within 1-2 weeks).

When used on pasta, can add in other ingredients like meat balls, sausage, etc.

The tomatoes can be roasted instead of boiled, which gives more aroma, but I dislike that because it means more consumption of electric. LOL!

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Very Simple and Tasty Vegetarian Fried Rice

Suzette — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:49:49 +0000

Well, I think most people know how to fry rice, so this post looks like a bit useless to many. :p Anyway, I think the rice is very tasty, so I just wanna share!

INGREDIENTS
2 cups of rice, washed and steamed with 4 cups of water. Set aside for frying later.
1 cup of corns
1 cup of chopped vegetarian Charsiu
1 bowl of finely chopped onion (about 2-3 onions)
Some oil for frying
3-4 eggs, lightly beat with some soy sauce for seasoning
2 tbsp dark soy sauce
1 tbsp light soy sauce
Some salt for seasoning
[If you want, can add 1 cup of chopped carrots too]

METHOD
1. Heat oil in wok.
2. Saute onion until fragrant and transparent.
3. Add in rice, corn and charsiu, fry until rice loosen up and heated up.
4. Add in soy sauce and mix well.
5. With high-heat, slowly pour in egg mixture while keep on stir frying.
6. The rice will be sticky, keep stir frying until the wok finally become light and no longer sticky (it will have very nice fragrance).
7. Season with salt and serve hot.

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Vegetarian Baked Macaroni Cheese

Suzette — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 15:16:16 +0000

Actually this version of baked macaroni is just so similar to the non-vegetarian type. What I do is just substitude the meats in the original baked macaroni cheese with sliced button mushrooms.

Ah! Also, in this version, I added some grated cheddar cheese as well. I think this gives the topping a better texture compared to purely mozarella cheese.

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Carrot Fish Paste Porridge with Corn

Suzette — Fri, 22 May 2009 14:38:08 +0000

Do you experience difficulties to let your children eat vegetables? I always have that problem, especially with carrots. So I figured out that if I grate the carrots finely and mix into my dishes, my kids won’t realize they eat so much of it, and the dishes taste sweet as well.

Here is how I integrate grated carrot into this delicious porridge.

INGREDIENTS
1 carrot
1 corn
1 pack of pre-prepared fish paste, or just use fish balls/fillets
5 dried oysters
1 cup of rice
4-6 cups of water

METHOD
1. Grate carrot finely

2. Chop corn into 3 segments.
3. Bring a pot of water with rice to the boil.
4. Add in all other ingredients and cook in low heat for 30-45 min until rice expanded and porridge turn fine. Serve hot.

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Vegetable Baked Cheese-Rice

Suzette — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:19:40 +0000

I baked this healthy vegetarian baked rice with cheese, because I wanted something very simple. It is nicer if the rice is not too hard, and with a lot of tomato sauce with a lot of cheese on top.

INGREDIENTS
2 bowls of streamed/cooked rice
60g Broccoli
60g Cauliflower
2 Baby corn, blanched
1 tomato, diced
3 button mushrooms, sliced

SAUCE
3 tbsp ketchup
3 tbsp tomato pasta sauce
1 tsp sugar
Mixed herbs
1/4 tsp salt

TOPPING
100g shredded mozarella cheese
60g grated cheddar cheese

METHOD
1. Put cooked/steamed rice in casserole or oven proof dish.
2. Mix SAUCE well, cover the rice with sauce.
3. Top the sauce with all vegetables.
4. Cover all vegetables with mozarella and cheddar cheese.
5. Bake in preheated oven at 200′C for 10-15 min or until cheese turn golden.

* Serves 2 *

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Vegetable Couscous

Suzette — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 15:32:44 +0000

Last year my best friends introduced me to couscous, but since I didn’t cook much last year, I didn’t really pay attention to it. However, the impression of couscous still stays as –> a very simple and easily made dish.

I couldn’t find couscous in many stores here, but one day surprisingly I found it in Carrefour Kepong (couldn’t even find in Tesco Mutiara).

So, I bought 1 pack for a trial. Surprisingly, I love the taste and it is really simple to make. What I need is just some pasta sauce and some vegetables.

I made this a few times already, and every time the ingredients varies, really depend on what I have in my fridge.

For this one above, I happened to have only some carrots and zucchini left, and I was cooking for myself only. If you have other stuff in your fridge, you can make many variations from it. One that I really like is the combination of eggplants (brinjal), zucchini and carrots. You can use other ingredients like mushrooms, asparagus, broccoli, cauliflower, etc. And if you like meat, you can include some sausages too.

INGREDIENTS
1/2 zucchini sliced
1/2 carrot sliced
4 to 6 spoonful of tomato pasta sauce (depending on how much saucy you like)
1/2 cup couscous
1 cup boiling water
1 tsp olive oil
Some salt to taste
A pinch of ground nutmeg

METHOD
1. Fry vegetables till golden and frangrant.
2. Add tomato paste and stir fry until well mixed.
3. Cover couscous with boiled water and olive oil and seasonings. Wait for 5 min (or depending on what written on package).
4. Serve couscous on plate together with vegetables.

Yummy, delicious, simple and filling lunch for me!

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Another Variation of Baked Macaroni

Suzette — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 11:51:16 +0000

This is a variation of the previous baked macaroni. This time, I didn’t have any tomato paste, but I had a can of Cambell soup, some sausages and crab filaments. So, I made a slight variation.

Instead of red tomato sauce, I made my own white sauce using the Cambell mushroom soup. Instead of adding 1 can of water like making the soup, I reduced the water when I boiled it. Scooped half of the paste into the bowl of cooked macaroni, I added more water to the left over and made it soup.

The rest was the same as how I baked my macaroni cheese previously – simple. The result was: 2 dishes – a baked macaroni with cheese, and a bowl of mushroom soup.

The ‘white source’ was delicious too, and my son ate the whole bowl by himself. Burp! A good lunch. I am a bad mama, using all unfresh ingredients (can, sausage, cheese, crab filaments).

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Baked Macaroni Cheese

Suzette — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:30:59 +0000

This is a dish I made early last year – my second attempt after a failed pizza.

This is something extremely simple - macaroni cheese. I didn’t take any photo of the process, coz it was something really simple…

First, boil the macaroni in a pot of water until tender, add salt in the water to taste. After it is cooked, drain the water, added some olive oil to avoid them being sticky. Then, place the cooked macaroni, cooked+sliced saussages and crab filaments into a bowl that is oven safe, mix in the pasta sauce. Then, covered all the stuff with shredded mozarella cheese and baked in a pre-heated oven for 25 min.

I baked 2 bowls, forgot about taking photo until we finished the 1st bowl! Luckily I still had a second untouched bowl to take photo.

This is a very simple cooking – my mom would sure laugh at me. If a dumb cook like me can make it delicious, I’m sure it is fool-proof. LOL!

It actually tasted very yummy! (Of course, Prego sauce is good, not my cooking. Hahaha!) Especially the cheese at the side of the bowl – a little crispy and chewy. Slurp!

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