"chicken" "macaroni" soup

okay, that's too much quotation marks in one title, hahaha. but, for the curious, it's a soup out of a chicken macaroni soup recipe but, instead, using bacon and rotini. so, technically, this should be called bacon rotini soup :D

anyway, formalities with the name aside, the very simple recipe is as follows:

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups elbow macaroni → like i said, i used rotini
• 1/2 can evaporated milk
• 1 small can mushrooms, sliced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 2 cups chicken broth
• chicken/bacon/ham
• 1/2 white onion, diced
• butter
• salt & pepper to taste

Cooking Instructions

• Cook meat beforehand and shred.
• Heat butter and saute onions and carrots.
• Add mushrooms and cook for 5 min.
• Add meat and cook for a few minutes.
• Add chicken broth and bring to boil.
• Add pasta and cook for 15 minutes.
• Add milk, cook until it has boiled.
• Season with salt and pepper as needed (mine tasted fine during this step, i think because of the chicken broth, so i didn't have to season further)
• Enjoy!

tastes like heaven, pwomise.

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leila's ravioli

Henceforth this dish shall be called "leila's ravioli" to commemorate the start of my friendship with leila, chris' dog, who's not only.smart and sweet but also makes an excellent assistant in the kitchen, tasting the food every step of the way :) according to her it tastes so good with or without seasoning, so yeah, apparently, i have skills in the kitchen haha :P

Ingredients

• 1 pack ravioli
• 1 cup room creme (heavy)
• 1 cup mushrooms, sliced
• garlic
• onion
• butter
• salt & pepper to taste

Cooking Instructions

• Cook ravioli according to instructions (usually 2-3 min in boiling water)
• Meanwhile, heat butter in a pan. Saute garlic and onion.
• Add mushrooms and cook for 5 min. Add salt & pepper as needed.
• Add creme and simmer until thick.
• Add ravioli and mix until well-coated.
• Serve to the dowgeeee! :D

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pasta alfredo

here's the thing - titas need to be good cooks. at least, that's what i can say based on what my aunts are for me :P

given that i hate cooking, i'm thinking i should have at least one good recipe i could easily whip up for visiting nieces and nephews. so, tadaaa, what about pasta alfredo! (because spaghetti is too mainstream haha)

the only downside is, it's heaped with dairy. and by heaped, i mean, HEAPED. butter and cream cheese and milk AND parmesan. but then dairy should be good for children, right?

anyway, i went to the grocers for my weekly grocery and also went shopping for cheese to add to today's adventure. i never stop by the cheese and dairy section because (1) it's cold, and (2) the number of different kinds of cheese scares me. haha. the good thing is, virginie was at the grocers as well and we had a little study on the common kinds of cheese and where to use them. my prior knowledge of cheese is limited to normal and quick melt and cheddar which you normally see on junk food, hahaha. so, to name a few, there's the deep yellow-colored cheddar, some fromage cremeax (just cream cheese), the gruyere which is most commonly used in soups, parmesan for pastas, feta cheese usually goes into salads, emmental which is, i dunno, normal cheese, and mozzarella - everybody knows mozzarella! pizzaaaa! haha stress balls on the dairy aisle! and so much more, actually, diversified from places of origin and which animal it came from, etc etc..but i couldn't care less.

back to the pasta, aside from the different sorts of dairy products the only things left to add are chopped onions, a sprinkle of parsley for color, and, if you want, some meatballs or bacon. oh, and broccoli because good, old broccoli goes with everything from soups to pastas to nomnoms for snacks. it's like your most trustworthy, go-to vegetable when you want to add a dash of color to your meal or make it look healthier :P

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