...And Dine We Must

The last potential day for frost passed on Monday, so this week housecleaning has taken a backseat to garden planting and since we have a shorter growing season every day counts so now most of my house resembles this:

However, though I may be able to let the house go, there is one thing that I can do nothing about : Herr Baker hat immer ja hunger. So, lets clear and clean off about 1 1/2 sg foot of counter space and make something to eat. (No I did not use the above pictured table with all the dirty pots and pans so you know)
My inspiration came from the $0.93 26 oz can of Hunt's tomato sauce which I bought on sale this morning at Broulim's. Originally Mr. Baker and I went there to capitalize on the 5 for $20.00 meat sale going on there--that is 5 packages of certain marked meats for $20. The catch is that on any given day we can go to Albie's (Albertsons) and buy pork or $1.99 per lb. So some basic math tells you that a 5 items of $20 = $4 an item. In order for this sale to be to our advantage we have to find  5 packages of meat that are at least 2 lbs a piece. Sadly this was not the case we found at Broulims. I was disappointed at the prospect of not scoring some fresh beef, but what was worse was seeing  that sad, dejected look on Mr. Baker's face as we walked from the meat section to pick up some milk. He was so excited about this sale--the man loves a bargain and he loves meat. So it was my hope to make him a smashing lunch before he went off to work and then make him feel better. So here it goes, Today I made Spicy beef spinach Ravioli
I started with this lovely can of beef chunks

Thank you Mr. Baker's parents!

When I opened my first can of beef chunks from a box provided by my inlaws, I was more than skeptical--I was grossed out --canned meat?  But then I got over it as it didn't taste bad at all an is really quite versatile. Since it's from the LDS Church cannery you know it will be good quality. Well I started with this lovely gadget:

To get the beef into a ground beef consistency as follows:

There's just one problem that I could have avoided if I thought it through--the meat's already cooked, so when I mixed it up with the other ingredients it became more of a beef pate. This gave the resulting ravioli filling a "Chef Boyardiee" texture, which--although delightful to some--was not what I was planning.

 Looking back I would have simply reheated the beef chunks in a skillet with olive oil.
Next I chopped up some spinach--a helpful tip: spinach is much easier to chop up when frozen, so I always store my spinach in the freezer unless I plan to use it raw.

Bring on the Spice! Chopped up a few of the these bad boys and mixed it all in with some Basil, garlic and other spices

I thought that a hint of mushroom would also serve me well

I then added half a can of cream of mushroom, some olive oil and some of the beef juice from the can. In the end, I would have rather used real mushroom for a more potent flavor, but it didn't detract from the overall taste.
I mixed it all up and began to feel somewhat dubious that the results would be as palatable as I hoped, but perhaps it was my inner picky eater rearing it's ugly head from the depths I have tried to squelch it to. You'll have to decide for yourself if it looks like the makings of pure yumminess or bleh!

I promise this tastes good in the end

At this point I began making the pasta for the ravioli. I used a simply recipe of flour, water, and egg like any of the many you can find on the internet. I was running behind schedule and had to get it all made and on the table by 1:30 before Mr. Baker went off to work so I didn't take the time to snap a few pictures. After kneading and rolling out the dough I placed it on some wonderful pieces of plastic known as dough presses which Mr. Baker and I snagged at DI for  $0.50 a pop--perfect for making 3 different sizes of filled pastry or pasta. I scooped a spoonful or so of filling inside then folded the press over. Meanwhile, Mr Baker set water to boil so it was ready to go as soon as I was ready with the first batch of raviolis. I cooked the ravioli for about 3 minutes or so then scooped them into a colander to drain. After heating up some pasta sauce and plating the lovely results were as follows:

One thing I would have liked to have added was some provolone or mozzarella cheese slices to top, but Mr. Baker didn't seem to mind

Here's wind up...

...And the pitch...

...AND IT'S A HOMERUN!!!

Mr. Baker inhaled these puppies and went back for more! I had to gingerly remind him to save some for me as I was in the middle of finishing up the last of the batch. After sending him off to work, I had my taste of them. The taste was great, albeit I wasn't happy about the texture, c'est la vie

Tschuss!