Spicy Pork, Mushrooms, and Noodles

I have to tell you, I've been a hot mess lately. Literally.  The blower on our house AC died the first hot day we tried to use it. The hoses on The Wife's truck's AC gave out. We've also been busy with having the roof of the garage torn off and reshingled, and we're still in the process of filling in the in-ground pool once and for all. In all that excitement, I've fallen off on giving you the High Quality Content that you all deserve. I thought for sure I had lost this particular recipe, but while The Wife was moving stuff around, it materialized. So here you have it. A simple recipe for spicy pork and noodles. We used some leftover pork from pork steaks we had cooked before. If you don't have precooked, you can just cook it up in the pan before you add in the veggies. The heat on this dish is easily adjustable. It's also easily made vegetarian by leaving out the pork and using sauteed tofu or some more veggies. 

Spicy Pork, Mushrooms, and Noodles

Ingredients

• 8 oz. Thai red rice noodles (we found them at ALDI. If you can't find them, just use fettucini)
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 cup sliced, cooked pork
• 1 cup sliced mushrooms
• 3 scallions, sliced
• 2 tablespoons spicy mustard (we used a couple packets of hot mustard from the Chinese restaurant. Look around, I'm sure you have some in a drawer somewhere. Maybe in the bottom of the lettuce crisper)
• 1 tablespoon black bean garlic paste
• 1 tablespoon hoisin sauce
• 1 tablespoon sriracha
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon white sesame seeds

Directions

1. Cook noodles a little shorter than the directions on the package call for (they will finish cooking at the end)
2. In a bowl, add the mustard, bean paste, hoisin, sriracha, pepper flakes, soy sauce and sesame seeds. Stir to mix.
3. In a large pan/wok, heat oil over medium high heat. Add mushrooms and scallions. Stir-fry for about 5-7 minutes.
4. Add the cooked pork and noodles to the pan. 
5. Pour sauce over everything and toss to coat. Lower heat to medium and cook another 3-4 minutes, tossing regularly, until the noodles are the desired tenderness.

Good times!

Slow Cooker Turkey and Noodles

     After Thanksgiving, we usually have a terrifying amount of leftovers. This is because I have no idea how to cook for small groups. This year, for myself, The Wife, and The Spud, I cooked a 12 pound turkey. That's all well and good, but there's only so many turkey sandwiches you can eat. At The Wife's request, we took a Chicken and Dumplings recipe we have used from The Gooseberry Patch Super Fast Slow Cooker Cookbook. This works great because I promised some of you the recipe some time ago. Simply replace all instances of "turkey" here with "chicken" and you'll be fine. This makes a nice, thick, dish. Remember, this isn't soup, so don't come fussing when you say it is too thick. If you want soup, just keep adding stock until it's the consistency you want. This is a real winner on a cold day.

Slow Cooker Turkey & Noodles

Ingredients

• 1-1/4 pound shredded cooked turkey
• 2 cans (10.5 ounce) cream of chicken soup
• Chicken/Turkey stock equal to 4 cans (about 5.25 cups)
• Seasoning of your choice to taste. (We used Ukrainian Village Seasoning from the Spice House) 
• 24 ounces (two frozen bags of wide noodles or dumplings. I am referring to the thick square noodle type dumplings, not pot sticker or kreplach style)

Directions

1. Load everything except the noodles/dumplings into a slow cooker (5 quart or larger).
2. Cook on LOW for 6 hours.
3. Add the noodles/dumplings and cook another 30 minutes on LOW.

Good Times!

Kung Pao Pork and Vegetables with Noodles

     Sometimes you have more leftovers than you know what to do with. That happened to me when I made a seven pound pork shoulder. I started running out of things to do with it. I finally wound up digging around for ingredients and cobbled this dinner together. I posted it on Facebook and people responded fairly well. A couple people asked for the recipe. Looking at the picture, it appears that this is a very involved dish. Edamame? That's not something most people have in the house? How did this dish happen?
     I cheated. The veggies are a microwave steamer pack. The sauce is store bought. The noodles are 10 cent Ramen. However, the meal was delicious. Maybe a touch high in sodium, but overall fairly healthy. It doesn't have to be expensive or complicated to be good.

Kung Pao Pork and Noodles

Ingredients

• 1 pack Ramen noodles (do not use seasoning packet)
• 1 10 oz pack Pict Sweet Steamables frozen Broccoli Florets, Celery, Carrots and Edamame
• 2 cups pork (beef, chicken, shrimp or tofu would all work. Hell, throw them all in there if you want!), cut or torn into 1-2" pieces
• 1/4 cup Yings Kitchen Extra Spicy Kung Pao Sauce
• 1 tablespoon sesame oil

Directions

1. Heat oil in pan. Cook until browned on all sides.
2. Cook frozen vegetables in microwave according to directions. Use minimum cooking time suggested.
3. Reduce heat on pork, add cooked vegetables from bag.
4. In a saucepan, bring water to boil. Cook noodles until al dente. Drain. Add noodles to pork and vegetables in pan. 
5. Add Kung Pao sauce. Toss so sauce covers everything evenly. 
6. Serve and enjoy!

Good times!

Bonus Recipe: Orange Teriyaki Beef With Noodles

    Due to the overwhelming response by one person to request I post a pictured meal, I present to you another fine selection from the Betty Crocker 300 Calorie Cookbook.  As I've mentioned before, sometimes I mess around with recipes. Substitutions and omissions happen with alarming frequency. That occurred with this particular recipe. I couldn't have been happier with the results. So, in the interest of full disclosure, I will print the original recipe in black. All changes will show immediately in blue. Here we go:

Orange Teriyaki Beef With Noodles

Ingredients

• 1/2 pound beef sirloin, cut into thin strips (I used stew meat)
• 1 cup reduced sodium beef broth (this dish is crazy sodium packed. I just used water)
• 2T teriyaki sauce
• 1T orange marmalade
• Dash of cayenne pepper (I left this out and substituted a tablespoon of my hot pepper jelly)
• 1/4 cup sugar snap pea pods (omitted and substituted with a red bell pepper and 2 scallions)
• 1/4 cup uncooked fine egg noodles (omitted and substituted with a pack of Ramen noodles. Save the seasoning packet for something else.)
• 1.5t corn starch
• 1.5T cold water

Directions

1. Heat 1T oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Cook beef in skillet for 2 to 4 minutes, stirring occasionally, until brown. Remove from skillet; keep warm.
2. Add broth, stir-fry sauce, marmalade and red pepper to skillet. Heat to boiling. Stir in pea pods and noodles; reduce heat to medium. Cover and cook about 5 minutes or until noodles are tender. (Big changes here. Add broth, teriyaki, marmalade, pepper jelly, pepper and scallion. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5-7 minutes.)
3. Cook Ramen noodles as directed, strain and set aside. DO NOT USE THE SEASONING PACKET.
4. In a small bowl, combine corn starch and water. Stir until dissolved. Pour into broth mixture.
5. Stir in beef. Cook uncovered 2-3 minutes or until sauce has thickened.
6. Serve over Ramen.

Serves 2. About 270 calories per serving

Good times!