Classic Veal Florentine (Sorta)
Every now and then you come across a recipe you just truly love. I took a Classic Veal Florentine recipe and modified it. Seems my family including myself found it to be by far the best recipe in the world.
I’ll post the original recipe and then my super great modified version.
You’ll need:
6 ounces fresh spinach
6 tablespoons of butter
2 cloves of garlic minced
1 can (14.5 ounces) whole peeled tomatoes
¼ cup dry white wine
¼ cup water
1 tablespoon of tomato paste
½ teaspoon sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ cup all-purpose flour
4 veal cutlets (3/8 inch thick)
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 ounces mozzarella cheese (shredded)
Homemade angel hair pasta
- To steam spinach, rinse thoroughly in large bowl of water. Drain but do not squeeze dry. Trim and discard stems. Stack leaves; cut crosswise into coarse shreds. Place spinach in large saucepan over medium heat. Cover and steam 4 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Add 2 tablespoons butter; cook and stir until butter is absorbed. Remove from pan; set aside.
- Heat 2 tablespoons butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat until melted and bubbly. Add garlic; cook and stir 30 seconds. Press tomatoes and juice through sieve into garlic mixture; discard seeks. Add wine, water, tomato paste, sugar, ½ teaspoon last and 1/8 teaspoon pepper to tomato mixture. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to low. Simmer, uncovered, 10 minutes, stirring 0ccasionally. Remove from heat; set aside.
- Mix flour, remaining ¼ teaspoon salt and 1/8 teaspoon pepper in a small plastic bag. Pound veal with a meat mallet to ¼ inch thickness. Pat dry with paper towels. Shake veal, 1 cutlet at a time in a seasoned flour to coat evenly.
- Heat oil and remaining 2 tablespoons butter in a large skillet over medium heat until bubbly. Add veal to skillet; cook 2 to 3 minutes per side until light brown. Remove from heat. Spoon off excess fat. Top veal with reserved spinach, then cheese. Pour reserved tomato mixture into skillet, lifting the edges of veal to let sauce flow under. Cook over low heat until bubbly. Cover and simmer 8 minutes or until heated through. Serve with pasta.
My awesome modification!
See, we don’t do veal. I use chicken breasts. Also, the recipe above doesn’t make that much sauce which I believe is the WHOLE secret to this dish.
12 ounces of fresh spinach
2 sticks of butter
4 cloves of garlic (however I use the already minced garlic)
1 can of 28 ounces of tomato sauce (fuck the straining)
½ cup of white wine
½ cup of water
2 tablespoons of tomato paste
1 teaspoon of sugar
1 ½ teaspoons of salt
½ teaspoon of pepper
½ cup of flour (or more)
5 chicken breasts (boneless)
8 ounces of mozzarella cheese
Linguine or pasta of your choice
- Steam spinach in a steamer (pretty much your done with step 1)
- Heat 4 tablespoons of butter in a large sauce pan. Add garlic and sauté for a minute or two. Add tomato sauce, wine, water, tomato paste, sugar, 1 teaspoon of salt, ¼ teaspoon of pepper. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to low. Simmer. I let it simmer the whole time I’m cooking the other stuff.
- Boil whatever pasta you plan on using. Kill heat to it once done and leave in pot.
- This is the fun part. You need to beat the chicken breast to about ¼ inch. You will need a mallet and A LOT of wax paper. Put the chicken between the wax paper and beat. Just a warning – your chicken will be the diameter of a small plate when you’re done. Do all five chicken breast to get them out of your way. Separate them with wax paper.
- Hopefully by now, the spinach is done steaming. Remove from steamer and place in small pan with a few 4 tablespoons of butter. Cook and stir until butter is absorbed. Remove from stove and place in a bowl.
- Mix flour, ½ teaspoon of salt and ¼ teaspoon of pepper in a large freeze bag. Now, it seems the chicken will take more of this mixture than veal. So, I don’t stick strictly to the measurements. I add more flour as it’s getting low and more salt and pepper as I deem necessary.
- Heat oil and a pat of butter in a pan. You’ll need a hell of a lot more oil and butter than the original recipe since the flour seems to soak it up. Put a breast in a bag and shake it up until it’s completely coated with flour. Put breast in pan and cook on both sides until lightly brown and juices run clear.
- Place each breast in plate with pasta. Cover with sauce. Put some spinach over the chicken along with some cheese. Serve hot.
- When everyone is done eating use the sauce as a nice soup.
Why we care about The Jersey Shore cast and the Kardashians
20 years ago I would have said – “Hell, no one cares.”
That was 20 years ago.
Now, it seems everyone cares. Well, not quite everyone.
Let’s break this down a little bit. We have two groups of folks who consistently make the top headlines in all news mediums. Both groups have had their own reality shows, videos, products, spin offs, and in one case – porn.
So, everyone knows the whole “Kim Kardashian Wedding” debacle. Even I – the guy who isn’t plugged into reality TV knows about this. I’m force fed news about the wedding through commercials on TV, radio spots, magazines on display at Target. Then I got to thinking to myself – “what am I missing?”
Why don’t I care about this?
It could be my self-diagnosed aspergers . However, if that was really the case then I don’t think I’d be excited about the new Underworld movie coming out in January.
For me there is an answer to everything. The old parental saying “just because” or “I feel like it” doesn’t fly in my book.
I started comparing entertainment values and news that I found interesting and try to apply it to the Jersey Shore and Kardashian camps.
I asked myself: “Self, why do I have a subscription to Entertainment Weekly?”
Self responded: “Because you like movies. You like to see what’s coming out and who’s going to be in it.”
That’s a good starting point I thought. I like movies. And movies have actors (even animated ones). I find it interesting how a actor prepared for a role (Jonny Depp), or the hard ships in working in foreign country (Hang Over II), or even how they got in shape (Castaway).
Pretty sure the Shore and Kardashian folks don’t act. I don’t think they have been in any movies (notable and entertaining movies that is).
Ok, so they don’t have any movies type talents. That’s ok. I can’t be narrow minded and I have to look at other fields that can bring fame. I seen a blurb on the news about Rihanna doing some sort of half nude video.
Self said: “You like music.”
Maybe there is some music talent in the groups. After a quick internet search and watching Kim and her mom’s music videos – I shot that idea down like a U.S. spy plane over Iraq.
Then I figured that maybe ‘their’ entertainment value fell into the ‘other contributions’ type category. I remember seeing the cover of a People Magazine with Steve Jobs on the front.
I told my self: “I wouldn’t mind reading about Steve. He built up Apple, had cancer, left the company and came back, reinvented the cell phone.”
After a few more web searches I really came up with nothing on either group that would register as a ‘contribution’.
I think Bruce Jenner (husband of the mom kardashian) HAD some talent. He won the decathlon in the Olympics years ago and was on the cover of a weaties box. That’s cool in my book.
Then I thought maybe these folks all fell into the comedy category – however it’s a reality show and not a sitcom so I ruled that out.
Then the answer hit me.
All this time, I was wondering how these talentless people rule the news. The answer really has nothing to do with ‘talent’ or for that matter any thing else THEY do.
The answer is simple: supply and demand.
Over the past 20 years our ability to get up to the minutes news has increased at such a rate – that I believe our demand for news (sports, world, health, ENTERTAINMENT, etc) has far surpassed the supply.
There is a limited bandwidth of actual “useful” and “interesting” news as individuals we consume (that fits our taste). The rest is filled with the never ended useless and uninteresting stuff like no name weddings, reality shows, and who lost the most weight.
It’s easier, cheaper, and ten faster to serve up shows and entertainment news like Jersey Shore and Kardashians along with useless news about teen girls marrying 50 year old men then it is to deliver something more palatable.
This brings up an interesting correlation – a majority of Americans are over weight. The right food and exercise is available however most folks go with the easy and less healthy choices that are presented to us.
I guess the same goes with entertainment.
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Occupy
The news seems to be buzzing with “Occupy, Occupy, Occupy”. Honestly, I wasn’t really sure what all the commotion was about. I decided that a little bit of due diligence on my part might prove beneficial. I started reading up on it.
For those interested, I visited OccupyWallst.org and Wearethe99percent.tumblr.com websites.
This is what I found out about the movement on the OccupyWallst site:
“ we don’t need Wall Street and we don’t need politicians to build a better society.”
The rest of the site was dedicated to Occupy dates and bitching about police. What “I” took away from the OccupyWallst site was people believe that society can build a utopian society. However, the movement has no leader, no demands, and no plan.
My next visit I went to the Wearethe99percent.tumblr.com – to see what messages or ideals they were advertising.
What I found there was disturbing and prompted this article.
The message from The Wearethe99percent.tumblr site in a nutshell : %1 of our society is the “rich” and control everything. The other 99% of our society is poor and is losing everything.
I did my research and firmly believe I grasp the under lying ideological fundamentals of this whole movement.
Basically – the whole movement seems to fall into four different categories:
Group 1 – These folks made a ton of financial mistakes and want someone else to foot the bill.
Group 2 – Folks in this group want money, power, and status. They want to get from point A(the now) to the point C(financial stability) without having to go through point C (the work). Instead of increasing one’s self worth through what ever means is necessary it’s easier to create a movement and adopt the motto: “I’m only making minimum wage while those other guys are making five times that! It’s unfair!”.
Group 3 – These folks were just dealt a raw deal in life.
Group 4 – People who have nothing better to do. These folks lack any type of personal ambition or goals. They hear someone talking about a “Movement” and say “I’M IN!” – without really educating themselves on what’s going on. These guys/gals are the first to drink the kool-aid.
At times, II didn’t know where the next meal was coming from. I’ve have been laid off more jobs than I care to admit. I was paying for two student loans while making minimum wage. I spent thousands of dollars on medical bills because I had no insurance. I hand more credit card debt that most people will face in a life time.
My dad taught me that if I wanted something I had to work for it. Nothing is giving to you for free. I paid off my student loans. I found other jobs. I worked until I got insurance. I’ve paid off a lot of my debt.
I helped my self and honestly I can’t think of one time I had to blame some rich guy for me being poor.
I read numerous letters on that Wearethe99percent.tumblr site. It seems that a lot of folks have put themselves in situations that could be easily avoidable.
Here is some advice:
*If you can’t find a entry level job – your full of shit and not looking hard enough.
*If you write and spell like a two year old – don’t take a snap shot of your letter and post it on a website for the world to see. It doesn’t say much for your cause.
*If you have a shit load of money in student loans – I feel your pain. I’m pretty sure if I could pay mine off by roofing, butchering, and working on cars – you can too.
*If you have an exorbitant amount of students loans and write a letter bitching about them – don’t take out student loans. Is it better to be in debt and resort to writing letters whining about your situation or not be in debt and working at a McDonalds?
*If your from another country and don’t like how you are being treated or think your being treated unfairly – you have every right to move back.
*If your rent is high – move.
*If you don’ t like your pay – find a new job.
*If you can’t afford to feed your five kids – don’t have five kids.
*Don’t throw in how your father, mother, sister, cousin, what ever has cancer and xxxxx. My dad had cancer and went through hell for years until he died. However, he never sat around blaming anyone for his situation. Using a medical condition is a pretty pathetic way to further someone’s financial agenda.
*If you’ve been dealt a raw deal in life and it happens to all of us from time to time: Shit happens – deal with it. That’s part of being an adult.
*If your under the age of 20 and living at home with your parents – just shut the fuck up.
*If you are working for a non-profit to help make the world a better place – more power to you. However, if you not also working a ‘real’ paying job in conjunction with that not profit job you are a dumbass. I worked a real job while volunteering at a women shelter for years. Use your brain.
Read MoreWhat’s cookin?
What’s cookin?
Over the past few posts I’ve introduced “John”. Nothing is made up about these posts and all are factual. Here is one more story and I’ll move on to other topics.
John lived with us for a while when I was young (I think I was eleven or twelve). In my part of the woods in rural Oklahoma (and I mean “rural”) deer season was ‘sacred’.
Folks planned all year long for the last two weeks of November – which was rifle season for deer. Kids at school would scout for hunting spots all through summer and fall. Who killed what, when, and how was always the talk at the gas pump. Looking back, I guess there really wasn’t much else to do.
One of the most coveted activities was ‘deer camp’. Folks who were lucky enough to own land would invite friends out for a weekend camping trip. The guys would hunt all day and drink and shoot the shit in the evenings. My family didn’t own any land and we didn’t have any ‘deer camp’ connections.
John did.
John and his crew left Friday afternoon for deer camp.
Like clockwork, dad and I prepare for Saturday morning. We got our gear ready, set our alarms, and headed to bed early.
Around 3:00-3:30 am (it was early is all I know) there was a loud banging at the door. I flip on the lights to the kitchen and living room as I headed for the front door. Dad and mom come out of their bed room in front of me. Dad beats me to the door and pulls it open.
John is completely passed out.
He had two of his friends supporting him by each arm. The first thing that mom and dad thought was he was in a shooting accident. It was cold that night. You could see everyone breathing hard from holding up John.
However, there was smoke coming from John’s leg and his jeans big hole in them. It went from his left knee to the ankle. When dad seen his leg he turned to me and told me to go back to bed. Now, he told me in that “angry, don’t make me tell you twice” type voice that all of kids know way to well. I obeyed and went back to bed.
It didn’t take me long to fall asleep. John and I shared a small room. His bed was on the opposite wall from me and we faced each other.
I woke up the next day and John was in his bed. I thought maybe I had dreamt the whole episode. Then I saw his leg. It looked black. I walked over to his bed for closer inspection. There was this black circle thing that covered his leg from knee to ankle. It had red things going through it and was kind of purplish.
I had no clue what it was.
I got as close as I could without touching it. After a few minutes I just gave up on trying to figure out what he had or what he had done to his leg.
Later in the day – dad filled me in on what had happened last night.
John and his friends were at deer camp getting hammered (drinking) and who knows what else. Everyone went to bed and John passed out by the camp fire. Some of his friends started smelling something weird burning.
It was John. He had rolled over into the fire while he was asleep and his leg was burning. His friends pulled him out of the fire and brought him home.
That’s was my first encounter with a true 3rd degree burn. Mom and dad had taken him to the hospital and he was released that night. I’m pretty sure he was passed out the entire time.
Later in the day when he was conscience I told him I thought about touching his leg that morning. He informed me he would have killed me. And that regardless of what they say about 3rd degree burns – they still hurt.
He found out when the cat jump up in the bed and landed on it.
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