One Dish Wonder: Tomato and Ricotta Potato Bake (gluten free, low sodium)

Tomato and Ricotta Potato Bake

Easy, easy easy! Take a few minutes for prep, layer the ingredients in a pan, and pop it in the oven. After about an hour you will be rewarded with a garlicky, cheesy potato dish that is perfect for a side or solo as a meatless entree.

2 medium potatoes
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tsp salt or lite salt (omit if using cottage cheese)
tomatoes (four large, eight small)
1/2 lb ricotta or drained cottage cheese
parsley
garlic
basil
2 tbsp parmesan cheese

Finely slice the potatoes. (G-man and the Cadet do not mind the peels, and if you can get away without peeling you will have even less work. Just use the word, "rustic.") Toss the potato slices in olive oil and the salt. Slice the tomatoes.

In a covered casserole dish sprayed with olive oil, assemble the layers: Place a third of the potato slices at the bottom of the dish and sprinkle with garlic, parsley and basil. Top with half of the ricotta and half of the tomato slices. Layer with another third of the potatoes and seasonings, then the rest of the ricotta and tomatoes. For the final layer, arrange the last potato slices over the top. Sprinkle them with the seasonings and parmesan cheese. Gently press down to take out any air bubbles then put the lid on.

Bake at 350 for an hour, or 375 for 45 minutes. 

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One Dish Wonder: Beef and Potato Bake (gluten free, dairy free, low sodium)

One Dish Wonder: Beef and Potato Bake

There were no cans of soup harmed in the making of this hearty bowl of manly-man fare. None opened, nor even purchased, actually. It is just as easy to make a quick beef and potato casserole, with its own creamy mushroom sauce, without the soup! As a bonus, when cooking with grassfed beef, you do not even have to brown the beef first. Just chop, layer, and pop it in the oven. Find something constructive to do for an hour, and return to find that dinner is done! (There is a serving of vegetables stashed in there, too.)

1 lb ground, grassfed beef
4 medium potatoes
1/2 lb mushrooms, finely chopped
3-4 stalks celery, finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
1/4-1/2 tsp salt, or lite salt to further reduce sodium
1/4 tsp black pepper

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Chop the mushrooms, celery, and onions and put them together in a bowl. Mix in the salt and pepper. (This replaces the seasoning and moisture of a can of soup.) Chop the potatoes and set aside.

Layer the ingredients into a lidded casserole dish: First, put half of the potatoes, and sprinkle with a handful of the mushroom mixture. Next, spread half of the ground beef on top, followed by chopped mushroom mixture. Top with the remaining potatoes, then mushroom mixture, the rest of the beef, and the rest of the mushroom mixture. Gently press down on the top to fill in the gaps.

Put the lid on and bake for an hour. (If the oven is not quite preheated yet, pop it in as it is and add a couple of minutes to the timer.)


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Pork, Cabbage and Potato Bake (gluten free)

Pork, Cabbage and PotatoBake (gluten free)

This is really, really easy. Take a couple minutes for chopping and assembly, pop the casserole dish into the oven and dinner will be ready in an hour. In a single dish you will have bites of pork sausage, baked cabbage, and a side of mashed potatoes. Yum!

A few posts ago, I shared almost the same recipe, but with grassfed beef. It is crazy how differently the two versions taste, considering how similarly they are prepared.

2-4 medium potatoes, peeled (if necessary) and sliced
1/2 head cabbage, shredded
1 pound good quality ground pork*
1/4 tsp black pepper
8 oz plain, unsalted tomato sauce
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 375F. Spray a pyrex dish (approximately 12" x 12") with olive oil.

Wash and slice the potatoes and cabbage. Mix the pepper into the ground pork. Mix the tomato sauce, water, and salt together.

Place the potatoes into the bottom of the pan. Layer a third of the cabbage on top of the potatoes. Place half of the pork over the cabbage layer, breaking off bits like little meatballs. Top with a third of the cabbage, the rest of the pork, and the rest of the cabbage. Gently but firmly pack everything down. Pour the tomato sauce over the top.

Bake for an hour.


*The trick is to use lean pork from a small farm, not the typical grocery store variety. It will be leaner and not have grease to pour off.



I shared this recipe with the Hearth and Soul Hop, Allergy Free Wednesday, Gluten Free Wednesday and Healthy 2Day Wednesday and Simple Lives Thursday.

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Beef, Cabbage and Potatoes Bake (gluten free)

Beef, Cabbage and Potato Bake

Beef, Cabbage, and Potatoes. It is hard to go wrong with that time-honoured combination. As a one-dish wonder, you can quickly throw this together, put it in the oven and have dinner ready in an hour. (If your kids aren't picky like ours you can even skip peeling the potatoes!)

2-4 medium potatoes, peeled (if necessary) and sliced
1/2 head cabbage, shredded
1 pound ground grassfed beef*
1/4 tsp black pepper
8 oz plain, unsalted tomato sauce
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 375F. Spray a pyrex dish (approximately 12" x 12") with olive oil.

Wash and slice the potatoes and cabbage. Mix the pepper into the ground beef. Mix the tomato sauce, water, and salt together.

Place the potatoes into the bottom of the pan. Layer a third of the cabbage on top of the potatoes. Place half of the beef over the cabbage layer, breaking off bits like little meatballs. Top with a third of the cabbage, the rest of the beef, and the rest of the cabbage. Gently but firmly pack everything down. Pour the tomato sauce over the top.

Bake for an hour.

*Grassfed beef is leaner than "mystery rolls" from the grocery store, so you will not have to pre-brown it. You can also try old-fashioned ground pork.


I shared this recipe with Fight Back Friday, a weekly collection of natural food recipes submitted by bloggers all over the 'net.

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Beef 'n' Tater Bites (gluten free)

Beef 'n' Tater Bites

I really did not know what to call these. "Tater Tot Bites?" They contain none of the usual suspects of tater tot casserole: frozen potatoes or canned soups.  "Burgers and Fries Balls?" That would work if they had breadcrumbs. Any bright ideas?

These are meatballs with shredded potatoes, mushrooms, and celery baked right in. Brown and crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, you could serve them as a party food or for a living room picnic.

Curried Chicken (crock pot, gluten free)

Chicken Vindaloo

We used to use Patak's curry pastes. They are easy and flavourful and come in a range of spiciness from mild to mind-blowing. The Mild Curry Paste contains 910mg sodium per two tablespoons, however, and the first ingredient listed is canola oil. Canola oil, then salt.... We can do better. Learning to blend the spices that could be commonly found in a small town grocery store, and then to adapt them to the palates of our little kids took a few tries.

You will find this recipe for curried chicken to be quick and easy. Just pop everything into the crock pot and come back in a few hours to discover an aromatic pot of tender chicken and potatoes in a smooth, barely spicy sauce. (You can easily crank up the heat if you like.)

Summer Veggies and Lentil Soup (gluten free, vegan)

Summer Veggies and Lentil Soup

Our garden is growing! Despite a couple weeks of highs at or near a hundred Fahrenheit, there are some edibles a few feet from our front door. Some things are doing better than others, so preparing a meal with our small harvest was like a bizarre episode of Chopped. My "basket" contained small beets and a zucchini. In my "pantry" there were organic Yukon Gold potatoes, lentils, and seasonings. The oven and range were strictly off limits due to the heat wave... Thank goodness for crock pots!

Beets are interesting because they are like two vegetables in one. The tops are delicious as greens and are rich in Vitamin A. The roots have a sweet and slightly peppery flavour and when cooked have a texture like a potato. Except for trimming the root ends, I chopped up the beets- tops and all- and added them to the pot.

Our Local Farmers' Market is Open!

Buttery Baby Potatoes

Our local Farmer's Market is open for the season! I was amazed at the bounty of early vegetables offered yesterday. We got our garden in late- okay, way late-  but a couple of the vendors must have been digging through frost! Zucchinis, beets, cabbages... G-man picked out these baby potatoes and green onions to be a perfect companion to last night's grassfed burgers.

Baby potatoes are so sweet and fresh tasting that they need no "recipe." For these, I just washed them and put them in a pyrex dish. I stirred in a couple of chopped green onions, added a tablespoon of butter on top and popped the dish into the microwave. After four minutes I gave them a stir, then put them in for another three minutes. Done.



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Fries On the Grill (gluten free, vegan)

Yukon Gold Fries on the Grill

Want fries with that burger? If you are firing up the grill, you can make oven-style fries without heating up the oven.  All you need is a good, solid cast iron pan or skillet to keep the taters from burning on the bottom. (The one in the photo is actually the lid from a cast-iron casserole dish.)

potatoes
olive oil
salt or lite salt

Wash, dry and cut up the potatoes into whatever thickness you want as long as they are consistent. Toss the potato pieces with the oil. Sprinkle with salt before cooking if you wish.

When the grill is hot, shut the lid to heat the inside like an oven. Spread the fries out on a sturdy, seasoned cast-iron pan or skillet. Place the skillet on the grill and close the lid again. Bake for about ten minutes, depending on the temperature of the grill. (Ten minutes is good for 400F, if you have a thermometer.) When the fries are golden on the bottom, turn them over. The pan will retain a lot of heat energy so if you take it off the grill after about five minutes the potato pieces will keep browning on the bottom. That is pretty handy if you have other items to cook and want the fries to stay hot.

[Note: It is not a great idea to bake fries on the grill at the same time as cornbread. Opening the lid slows the oven-effect and the cornbread can burn on the bottom before it is baked. Don't ask me how I know.]


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Potato Pudding (gluten free)

Potato Pudding

I was feeling playful... In the past few weeks we have eaten lots of organic potatoes. Soups, casseroles, baked, mashed, oven fries.... All these great things can be done with 'taters. We still have plenty of potatoes left and have not made a dessert yet.