When it comes to cooking, I almost always overestimate how much I need to cook. I think it comes from watching my mom cook – she is the youngest of six kids so there were always lots of people to feed in her household. We are both the same in that we would rather have too much left over than not enough, and that is especially true of family gatherings.
Recently I moved out of my parents’ house and there are some challenges to cooking for a smaller group. With only two people eating dinner most nights, I’ve learned to adjust down some of the recipes I find. It can be hard and it can take some advanced planning to make it work. For instance, the Sloppy Joe recipe below serves eight and calls for one pound of lean ground beef. I only needed half a pound, but it is close to impossible to get that weight in a grocery store package. So I bought the full pound, cooked it up with onions, then put half of the meat mixture in the fridge to use for tacos another night. The rest of the meat mix was finished off with the remaining Sloppy Joe ingredients.
It makes more sense for me to divide the protein up into separate meals than to cook up the full recipe of Sloppy Joe and put it in the freezer because the things that go into the freezer don’t usually seem to be used up later. They become mystery packages that no one finds that appealing. But the leftover meat and onion mixture transformed well into taco filling for a quick Friday night meal.
The lasagna is another recipe that is easy to cut down to half. It uses some ingredients we already had on hand such as red wine and nutmeg. We had ricotta cheese left over from another recent meal and the leftover cottage cheese will be eaten as a snack with fruit. We had two sausage links leftover from a past meal and we used a smaller casserole dish, breaking the lasagna noodles in half to make them fit better in the pan. For both recipes I ended up with four servings, just enough for two dinner meals and two leftover lunch meals the next day.
Sloppy Joe
Recipe courtesy of Ellie Krieger
1 lb. extra-lean ground beef
1 onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 jalapeno, minced
1 red pepper, diced
1 can small red beans or pinto beans, preferably low sodium drained and rinsed
1 1/2 c. no-salt-added tomato sauce
2 tbsp. tomato paste
1 tbsp. red wine vinegar
1 tbsp. molasses
1 tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp. mustard powder
3/4 tsp. salt
Freshly ground black pepper
8 whole-wheat burger buns
Brown the meat and the onion in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat for 5 minutes, breaking up the meat into crumbles as it cooks. Pour the drippings out of the pan and discard. Add the garlic, jalapeno, and red pepper and cook 5 minutes more, stirring occasionally. Stir in the rest of the ingredients, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 5 minutes more. Place a half-cup scoop of the mixture onto each bun and serve.
Nutritional Information per Serving:
Calories: 248; Carbohydrates: 37 grams; Total Fat: 4 grams; Protein: 18 grams; Fiber: 7 grams; Sodium: 535 milligrams.
Sausage lasagna
Recipe courtesy of Food Network
1 (28-oz.) can crushed tomatoes
1/4 c. dry red wine
1/2 c. chopped fresh basil leaves, plus 2 whole sprigs
2 cloves garlic, minced
Pinch crushed red pepper flakes
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 (16-oz.) container 1 percent low-fat cottage cheese
1 (15-oz.) container part-skim ricotta cheese
1 (10-oz.) box frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
2 scallions, chopped
1/4 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
8 oz. lean sweet Italian-style turkey sausage, casings removed
1/2 c. finely chopped onion
9 sheets no-boil lasagna noodles, 5 1/2-ounces, (recommended: Barilla)
1 1/2 c. part-skim shredded mozzarella cheese, 6 ounces
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. In a small pot bring the tomatoes, wine, whole basil sprigs, garlic, red pepper flakes, and salt and pepper, to taste, to a simmer; cook until slightly thickened, 10 minutes; set aside.
Meanwhile, puree the cottage cheese in the bowl of a food processor until smooth. add the ricotta, spinach, 1/4 cup chopped basil, scallions, nutmeg, and salt and pepper and pulse until just combined; set aside.
Coat a large nonstick skillet with nonstick cooking spray set over medium heat. Cook the sausage and onion, breaking it up with a wooden spoon into small pieces, until the meat is browned and the onion tender, 10 minutes.
Assemble the lasagna: Mist a 9-inch by 13-inch baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. Spread 1/2 cup tomato sauce on the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Top with 3 noodles, half the ricotta mixture, half the sausage and 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese. Repeat layers with sauce, noodles, remaining ricotta and sausage and 1/2 cup mozzarella cheese. Top with remaining noodles and sauce. Cover with aluminum foil and bake until the noodles are tender and the sauce is bubbling around the edges of the pan, 1 hour.
Uncover, sprinkle with remaining mozzarella cheese and continue to bake until melted, 10 minutes. Let stand 15 minutes. Sprinkle with remaining 1/4 cup basil. Serve.
Nutritional analysis per serving:
Calories: 350; Total Fat: 12.5g; Protein: 29g; Carb: 30g; Fiber: 4g; Cholesterol: 36mg; Sodium: 848mg.
