Cheesy Pasta Bake, Revisited

I've been in the mood for comfort food, so we decided to give the cheesy pasta bake a second look. This dish used to be in regular rotation - it is easy to prepare, tastes great, fills you up, and makes good leftovers - but since the sodium restriction went into effect we haven't tried it many times. Our previous attempt at converting this recipe was not a bad effort, but it wasn't quite as wonderful as we had remembered. Something was missing, and it wasn't hard to define: this recipe just isn't the same without real smoked sausage. Out of all the adjustments, substituting raw homemade (and unsmoked) sausage for the Andouille had the biggest effect (in terms of sodium and flavor/texture).

Last night we cooked this dish with Thomas Ragin Cajun Andouille Sausage. Yes, it has 550mg of sodium per 2.5 oz, but I found a way to manage this and keep the sodium per serving of pasta at 700mg. I followed our previous recipe (other than the sausage) with these modifications:

1. We started with 3/4 of the package of sausage, saving the remainder for use in omelets and such. This left us with 10.5 oz (2310mg sodium).

2. After browning, I separated about 1/3 of the cooked sausage and did not return it to the cooking pot. This left only 7 oz of Andouille in the pot (1540mg sodium). The reserved portion of meat was added at the end to my husband's portions only. My servings had less of the salty meat, but it was enough to provide the correct flavor and texture. PDM certainly didn't mind taking one for the team and eating the extra Andouille.

3. With less meat in the dish, I increased the amount of pasta (16 oz instead of 12 oz) and low sodium organic chicken broth (3.75 c instead of 3 c).

While noticeably less meaty than our traditional version, this revised recipe had ALL of the yummy texture and taste of the original. Unless we get a smoker and start making our own real Andouille, this will be the "go to" version of the recipe, and the cheesy pasta bake will be back in the regular rotation.  Happy!

Orechiette with Cannelini Beans & Spinach

We had a busy week, so this week's new recipe was from one of our cook books. We did not make any substantial changes other than to omit the salt and use organic low sodium vegetable broth, which has much less sodium than the usual kind. I could not find no-salt-added cannelini beans, so I bought the normal kind and rinsed them thoroughly to remove as much sodium as possible. Since this is NOT an original recipe, I will simply cite the source and tell you it was very tasty. We'll definitely make this again.

Gourmet Meals in Minutes by The Culinary Institute of America, Lebhar-Friedman Books, NY, 2004, page 264.  ISBN 0-86730-904-0

Spicy Shrimp and Peppers with Orzo

A recipe conversion. Serves 4.

This was one of my first attempts at converting a former favorite recipe to low salt back in June, and I really made a mess of it. My first try was way too spicy, with an amateur idea to have heat replace the salt. It didn't work. The dish just tasted hot as hell, with no other discernible flavor to redeem it, and we couldn't even taste the shrimp. And it still tasted like it needed salt. Total fail!

This version was savory, shrimpy tasting, not overly spicy, and best of all did not seem lacking in salt (at least not to my altered taste buds). If you are not on a sodium restriction, this would be great as is but with some salt shaken onto your plate just before you eat it. That was all Marty needed to enjoy his portion and just about lick his plate clean. I was OK with some freshly ground pepper and Mrs. Dash lemon pepper seasoning on my plate.

Ingredients:

8 oz orzo, cooked and drained (we cooked ours without salt in Wyler's no sodium chicken flavored instant broth for added flavor) - this can be cooked concurrently with the shrimp dish and will be ready together.
4-5 cloves garlic, minced
3 T white wine
2 T low sodium organic chicken broth
4 T olive oil
1/4 t salt
1 t crushed red pepper flakes
1 lb shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 red, orange, or yellow bell pepper, cut into 1/2" squares
1 vidalia onion, diced
1 t cornstarch
1 lemon, cut in half

Method:

1. Combine garlic, wine, broth, 3 T olive oil, salt and red pepper flakes in a medium bowl and blend with a whisk. Add shrimp and toss to coat. Set aside to marinate at least five minutes.

2. Pour 1 T olive oil into a skillet and heat over medium high flame. Add onion and cook ~2 minutes until translucent. Add peppers and cook 1-2 minutes more, stirring often.

3. Spoon out about 2 T of the liquid marinade and mix with cornstarch in small bowl, set aside. Add the shrimp and remaining marinade to the pan. Cook shrimp, covered, stirring about every minute or so, until opaque pink through and curled, about 2-3 minutes.

4. Uncover and add reserved liquid and cornstarch mixture. Stir to combine. Cook about 1 more minute uncovered, stirring constantly until sauce thickens. Turn off heat. Squeeze in the juice from one lemon (using a strainer to catch seeds) and stir to combine.

5. Serve shrimp and sauce immediately over drained orzo.

Sodium content ~300 mg per serving, mostly from the shrimp. You can reduce this by about half by leaving out the salt altogether, but that 1/4 t really does add a lot to the flavor.

Recipe conversion secrets - not a whole lot really. We greatly reduced the added salt, and made up for it by adding the lemon juice at the end to brighten the flavor. We also increased the amount of garlic and red pepper flakes (but do not consider this a "spicy" recipe by our high standards). Also by cooking the orzo in the Wyler's "fake chicken broth" that has zero sodium we add flavor that would normally come from salted cooking water. If you can't find this product, you could add flavor with unsalted butter in the cooking liquid.