NFA: Meals 2 & 3

Oh my gosh!

So the recipe was Ziti with Sausage and Canellini Beans. It was legen...wait for it.. DARY!

In all of my forays to the places I normally shop, I have never once found ziti. I know what it looks like. I know how to spell it. It's nowhere. It's not at Winco. It's not at Walmart. It's not at Safeway. The rigatoni that I ended up using was the bomb, so it's not a big deal. I've never thought to use beans with a pasta dish, especially not a red sauce, but this was AMAZING!

I made this for dinner on Friday night. Josh's parents came over and got to enjoy NFA (as I'm calling it now) with us. The only blight on the night was that Noah refused to eat any of it, desiring only to nosh on my fabulous garlic bread. He spent most of dinner time screaming in his crib. Awesome.

I feel like this project is totally opening my eyes to what I can do with a few ingredients. I know, everyone in the world knew this but me. Still, it's only been three meals and we're all (except Noah the Contrary) loving it. Home made food makes me happy. And it makes my house smell good.

Saturday was a busy day for us, so I didn't plan anything for dinner, knowing we'd probly just go out. We did however have kinda new food: Bam's bellybuster pizza. Nice. That's all that needs said 'bout that.

Sunday was Easter and I didn't plan anything new for that, but I did manage to make a new recipe for Pea Salad that I got off allrecipes.com. It was OK. No awards would have been won, I assure you.

Which brings us to yesterday. Yesterday, the list said Turkey Corn Chili. Again, I used the Rachael Ray Comfort Food cookbook. This time, I DID manage to make it in a half hour, so that's something. It called for red bell pepper, which is not my favorite, or even my least favorite. In fact, I hate bell pepper, but I am really trying to stick to the recipe so...there. When I shopped for the week, I beligerently skipped buying the bell pepper, so I wasn't gonna put it in. Then I remembered that Jackson picked out an orange pepper the other day, so I felt compelled to use it. I did. Everyone liked it, but me. Noah surprisingly, ate two bowls. Jackson ate it because I promised him chocolate. He's going through a phase.

Anyway, here it is:

I liked how colorful it was with the orange pepper and the scallions and the corn.

On a side note, if you ever see Rachael Ray, ask her if she feeds lumberjacks, because, so far, everything of hers that I have made has served twice the people the recipe says it will. I think I should have scheduled leftover days.