31 Pins: Day 3

Original pin:

Actually, this is not the original-original pin.  I specifically remember pinning (or at least seeing) some type of spaghetti bread on Pinterest.  However, it is nowhere to be found on my boards.  A quick search remedied that and brought me to this wonderful blog post (linked in photo above). 

Here is how today went down:  This was not my original pin to complete today.  I had plans of an organizational task today, but could not find what I needed to hang something on the wall.  Of course, it was recently moved (not by me) after being in the same place for MONTHS.  Anyway, I moved on and worked on some other things.  I did finish a kid's birthday gift for my niece that will make its blog debut shortly.  Then 2:45 rolled around and I thought to myself, "I had better decide what's for supper."  (No, being a stay at home mom has not changed this last-minute-supper habit.... yet). 

I saw some meatballs in the freezer and decided on spaghetti.  Then I remembered that pin with the spaghetti inside the bread!  I looked at the time again... knowing I would need 1.5 hours to make dough (I LOVE my bread machine!!).  Perfect timing!  Just enough to make the dough and bake the meal.  In the last half-an-hour, while the bread was kneading and rising in the machine, I cooked the pasta and heated the meatballs in sauce.  Coincidentally, I made the sauce myself a few weeks ago... and was supposed to blog about it but have not.  Sorry!

The results:

I used a semolina pizza dough recipe from my Bread Lovers Bread Machine Cookbook.  I had some semolina/durum flour sitting in the cupboard from my pasta making endeavor and had been thinking of trying this.  The dough was very easy to work with and extremely tasty!

You can kind of see it, but there is also mozzarella cheese inside of this shell.  The recipe calls for an egg white wash on top, but I opted for butter instead.  And lots of garlic salt.  And parmesan cheese.  I figured we would want it to taste as much like garlic bread as possible.

Half an hour later...

The WHOLE family... yes, ALL 4 of us!!!  were eating the same thing for dinner.  Max only took one bite, but he is sick, so it still counts. :)  I am calling this one a huge success.

BONUS: There was so much dough and so much spaghetti that I had enough to make 2 loaves!  The other one is sitting in the freezer for a busy day. :D

Expense rating: Cheap

Difficulty rating: Easy

Keep pinning, but start doing!!!

Day 1:  Fun Photography

Day 2:  Family Conversation

Pierogi

Teresa and I decided to tackle home made pierogi (which is the plural form in Polish, I believe). :) She loves the browneyedbaker .  So that's where we headed for a recipe.  Here's the link we used:

http://www.browneyedbaker.com/2008/10/03/homemade-pierogi/

First of all, we LOVED the dough!  It was so easy to use, didn't tear, didn't stick, soft, etc., etc.  A bakers dream!

For the filling, we added about 1/3-1/2 block of cream cheese for extra richness.

You could put anything you want in these things, and they would be great!

Don't forget to soak your potatoes to eliminate excess starch...

Roll and fill...

Fold and press closed - we used a fork, but I saw another blog with a cool pinch pattern that looked nice.

We boiled until they were floating, then sauteed in butter an onions.  DELICIOUS period

The hubby was out west helping with forest fires at the time, so I saved him some by par-boiling and freezing.  This evening, I revived by completing the boiling (until floating) and then sauteed in butter and onions.  They fell apart a bit but tasted just the same.