So I had a frustrating grocery shopping day. I usually bring a list for more than 1 recipe in the event the store of my choosing doesn't have an ingredient I need. However, today I brought 4 recipes and my top 3 choices for recipes all had at least one ingredient missing from the grocery store. I was thinking of making halibut....hmmm no halibut...well they had frozen but I am not a big fan of frozen fish. The 2nd choice was shrimp stuffed poblano peppers....no chihuahua cheese and I don't know enough about the cheese to pick a substitute. The 3rd option was a flank steak recipe with a herb mustard sauce....no flank steak. Really? So the 4th choice was a penne pasta with a turkey ragu sauce. And so the dinner decision was made.



And although I was not super excited about the Penne with Turkey Ragu it was really good and very flavorful. The pasta is cooked just like every other pasta...in boiling water...and I am a salt in the water but no olive oil kind of girl. Meanwhile heat the olive oil and saute the leeks, garlic and turkey. Once the turkey is brown add the tomatoes...which I so enjoyed taking whole tomatoes and squashing them between my fingers. Yes it pretty much was the highlight of my cooking experience. Then add basil, parmesan rind...yeah another recipe that allows me to use rind...and simmer. Once the pasta is done add 1/2 cup pasta water to the sauce and grated Parmesan cheese. It was a warm, cozy and flavorful meal that felt healthy.



Plus since you were so healthy with dinner you can make these scrumptious Cocoa Thumbprints. My favorite part of these cookies is the fact that I could fill them with whatever the hell I wanted. So I made some with marshmallows...the baby kind, some with chocolate frosting...might as well die a chocolate death...and some with cherry preserves...I don't like cherry so I knew if I did that I wouldn't eat the whole batch of cookies.



I love cookie recipes that don't require a lot of shaping and this recipe fit the bill. You put the dough in the fridge for 30 minutes and then roll it into balls. You roll them chocolate balls in regular sugar and then powdered sugar. I did find that the recipe tells you to put the thumbprint in them before they bake and also to put the filling in but I thought the filling would melt. So I made the thumbprint which puffed up when it baked...so I had to redo the indentation once it came out of the oven. And I decided to fill them once they were a little cool. Just my opinion

I apologize now I have quite a few long nights at work this week so I may slack a bit on the blog and the cooking. But know that I am dreaming of food and thinking of what to make this weekend. I did order some Hersheys Cinnamon Chips which I plan on using to make scones with and some Spanish Chorizo which I plan on using somehow...don't you love that detail. Have a great week-cheers!