This Week's Fancy Pants Meal: Skillet Lasagna.
Not quite a lasagna, more of a Hamburger, Spaghetti Sauce casserole. The chicken breast slices don't really do anything lasagna like to this but does bring the carb count way down.
It's tasty though. I'd do it again, but without the expectation of it being lasagna like.
# Skillet Lasagna
Quick & Easy Ketogenic Cooking
1.0 pound ground beef
2.0 tsp sea salt
24.0 oz marinara sauce
4.0 slices roast chicken breast (deli slices)
1.0 cup mozzarella (shredded) (divided into portions)
1.0 tsp oregano
1 - In a 10-inch cast-iron skillet, brown the beef over medium-high heat, seasoning it with the salt, until cooked through, about 5 minutes, breaking up the meat with a spatula as it cooks.
2 - Add the marinara sauce and stir well to combine.
3 - Remove the sautéed beef to a bowl.
4 - Layer the sliced chicken breast on the bottom of the skillet.
5 - Top the chicken with a half of the shredded cheese.
6 - Scoop the beef on top of the deli meat to create an even layer.
7 - Top with the remaining half of cheese and sprinkle with the oregano.
8 - Cover and heat on low until the cheese is melted.
5 servings at ~400 calories per serving
Calories 430
Total Fat 23g
Total Carbohydrate 19g
Protein 25g
Yields 4 servings normally
As part of my big backup, I decided to gather up all the hard drives sitting in my closet, sort them by how old they are, and then reshuffle all my backups so the oldest backups use the oldest drives. The old backups are good to have, but if I'm gonna lose one to a hardware issue, best it be an old drive.
I'm kinda glad I did it, because it turns out the drive that originally held my 2017-2019 backups went bad AFTER I pulled stuff off it. Originally, I encrypted that drive with BitLocker, and apparently removing BitLocker on the drive trashed the way the drive is set up. Any write access hung Windows, and Linux just wouldn't even find the drive. I couldn't fix the issue with a low-level format, so that drive is toast.
Secondly, I have a whole extra hard drive I didn't know about, which is 6TB of blank space. That's at least 4 years of future backups there, so I should be good until 2029 for new drives. :)
Also, I think it's hilarious that my 2006-2008 backups all fit on 250GB while 2018-2020 filled a 4TB drive.
Spent the evening dancing the night away for New Year's Eve in #secondlife, as I've done most every New Year's for years.
Brought a friend along who needed a nice night out after a rough 2023. As someone also having a rough 2023, it was good to finally bid it goodbye.
This Week's Fancy Pants Meal: Lasagne de Fornel
DESSERT LASAGNA!
I've been wanting to try this since I heard about it, and finally decided to make it as my last meal of 2023 (And for the first week of 2024).
There's a mild sweetness in this, and the main falvor is the apples. I don't even taste the raisins or walnuts, and there're just hints of fig. Honestly, I was expecting a sweeter dish, but a light sprinkle of sugar/sucralose helped. Your mileage may vary.
Suggestion: For ease of cutting, I'd boil the heck out of the pasta, cause it will thicken up again in the oven and make portioning the lasagna a little rough.
# Lasagne da Fornel
Italy Magazine
6 Servings
10.0 whole dried white figs (thinly sliced)
0.5 cup white wine
1.0 cup golden raisins
1.0 cup walnuts (finely ground)
2.0 whole red delicious apples (grated)
12.0 tbsp butter (melted) [cooking]
butter [greasing]
1.0 pound lasagna pasta sheets (cut into 2.5 to 3 inch wide strips)
2.0 tbsp poppy seeds
1 - Preheat the oven to 350 F/180 C
2 - Generously butter a 9-inch oven-proof serving dish or baking pan butter.
3 - In a small saucepan combine the figs and wine and bring to a boil over high heat.
4 - Boil on high for a minute or two, then reduce the heat to low and simmer until all the wine is absorbed, about 2 minutes.
5 - In a bowl combine the figs, raisins, walnuts, grated apples and 1/3 of the melted butter.
6 - Cook the lasagna strips in boiling, salted water until al dente. Drain and toss with 1/3 of the butter and the poppy seeds.
7 - In the prepared pan, put down a single layer of lasagna strips haphazardly (do not arrange the noodles end to end—just put them in a flat layer).
8 - Spread with 1/3 of the fruit mixture. Repeat for 2 more layers.
9 - Top with a final layer of noodles and drizzle on the remaining melted butter.
10 - Bake about 20 minutes, until hot throughout.
Made some cinnamon rolls for Christmas dinner, and the first batch came out SO bad (they literally melted into a sheet of dough when rising), that I made a second batch.
The second batch was sort of better, but still collapsed on itself. And the oven decided to overcook them. And I put too much evaporated milk in the icing when It came out too thick, and made it too thin.
Next time, I'm going to try making them in a casserole dish instead of a baking tray like the instructions say so the walls (and the other rolls) can hold the dough up.
But hey, dry cinnamon bread with a hint of icing! Maybe a few seconds in the microwave will save 'em.
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