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Quinoa and Italian Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms

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Quinoa and Italian sausage stuffed mushrooms for the WIN! There really are so many ways to enjoy stuffed mushrooms but we have got to say that our latest creation has taken a front seat in our book!  We are sure that they will do the same for you too. You are not gonna believe how freaking delicious these guys are. The other best part is that they are really simple to make!  You know we like to keep our recipes obtainable and not overwhelming.  We know that you can do this!  If  you make these for your next dinner party, you are sure to impress your guests because stuffed mushrooms are just so fancy!

The other great news is that you don’t need a ton of ingredients.  Check it out…you only need, mushrooms, quinoa, Italian sausage, ricotta, parmesan, garlic and parsley.  How easy is that?  The other good news is that you could make the sausage and quinoa the day before if you are on a time crunch.

The first steps are to cook up both your quinoa and sausage.  (You can see how doing these steps the day before could really cut down your prep time right?)  Anyway, in a medium bowl, stir together the ricotta, quinoa, sausage, parsley and garlic until combined.  Don’t forget to season it with salt and pepper. Make sure you have removed all the stems from your mushrooms.  Get your oven preheated, line your baking sheet with parchment paper and get stuffing!  Fill each mushroom with your ricotta mixture, place them cap side down, top with the fresh parmesan and pop them into the oven.  They will take about 20 minutes to bake up and get all pretty and bubbly.  Look for a nice golden brown color on the cheese.  This is a sign of pure perfection.  Golden cheese is the best ever!

Remove these beauties from the oven and transfer them to a pretty serving platter or plate.  They are best enjoyed right away while they are warm.  You are going to love these!  We are sure of it!

Looking for some other easy appetizer suggestions?

http://www.goodthymekitchen.com/tomato-olive-tapenade-bruschetta/

http://www.goodthymekitchen.com/cilantro-jalapeno-hummus/

http://www.goodthymekitchen.com/caramelized-onion-bacon-dip/

Quinoa & Italian Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms
 
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Serves: 16
Ingredients
  • 16 large crimini mushrooms, stems removed
  • 1 C italian sausage, casings removed and cooked (browned)
  • ½ C quinoa, cooked
  • 1 C ricotta cheese
  • ¼ C italian parsley, chopped + more for garnish
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • ¼ C grated parmesan cheese
  • kosher salt & cracked pepper to taste
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
  2. In a medium bowl add sausage, quinoa, ricotta, parsley and garlic. Mix all ingredients together until incorporated. Season with S&P to taste.
  3. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Place mushrooms on the baking sheet cap side down. Fill the mushroom cavities with filling. Sprinkle parmesan cheese over each mushroom and bake for 20 minutes.
  4. Remove from oven, transfer to a serving dish, garnish with additional chopped parsley and serve immediately.

Zucchini Noodle Veggie Lasagna

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Zucchini noodle veggie lasagna might literally be one of our new favorite recipes.  There is a chance that we say this a lot but we can’t help it.  We just love good, healthy food.   This carb free lasagna is so delicious, we promise that you won’t miss the heavy pasta that is the norm for lasagna.  Well, okay, there’s always a place for the traditional noodle lasagna and we are by no means saying you should never have it, but if you are looking to cut the carbs, this is the answer for you.  You have to try it!  We use zucchini in place of pasta quite often and absolutely love it.  It does a great job as a stand in and is loaded with health benefits.  It also soaks up lots of yummy flavor.

Check out how easy this lasagna is to make:

We start by sautéing some mushrooms and spinach in a little olive oil.  Once  the veggies are cooked, then just remove them from the heat and set aside.  Next comes a really fun part.

You get to make these beautiful long thin strips of zucchini.  We use a mandoline to get these perfectly uniform strips but you can certainly use a nice sharp knife if you don’t have a mandoline.  It will be a bit more challenging but we know you can do it.  And, don’t worry if they are not perfect…we don’t wan to overthink this.  It’s just lasagna.

Get going on the ricotta mixture now.  It’s really easy!  Just mix the ricotta cheese, garlic, egg and salt and pepper in a bowl and set it aside for the layering process.

Start by spreading some of the marinara on the bottom of the baking dish, then follow with he zucchini noodles, smear some of the ricotta mixture, then place a layer of the veggies.  Repeat the layers until you have used up the ingredients.

Top with marinara sauce and then fontina cheese and pop it into the oven.  Bake for 30 minutes until it’s nice and bubbly and the cheese is a pretty golden color.  Be sure to let it rest for about 10 – 15 minutes so it has time to set before you serve it up.  This is so delicious.  We hope that you love it as much as we do.


Zucchini Noodle Veggie Lasagna
 
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Serves: 6-8
Ingredients
  • 1 Tbsp good quality olive oil
  • 4 C crimini mushrooms, sliced
  • 5 oz fresh spinach
  • 2 large zuchinnis - sliced on madoline (see instructions)
  • 1 clove garlic, pressed
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • 15 oz lowfat ricotta cheese
  • ½ tsp kosher salt
  • ½ tsp cracked pepper
  • 2½ C marinara sauce
  • 1½ C fontina cheese, grated
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
  2. Heat olive oil in a large sautee pan over medium heat. Add mushrooms and sautee for 7-8 minutes. Add spinach, cook down for about 1 minute until wilted. Remove from burner and set it aside.
  3. Cut ends off of the ends of the zucchinis. Using a mandolin set to the 3/16 inch setting, slice zucchini lengthwise.
  4. In a medium bowl add garlic, eggs ricotta and S&P and stir until mixed.
  5. Spread ½ C marinara sauce on the bottom of a 9X13 casserole pan. Lay half the zucchini slices lengthwise over the sauce. Spread half of the ricotta mixture over the top followed by half of the spinach mixture. Spread 1 C marinara sauce evenly over the top and sprinkle with ½ C fontina cheese. Repeat with remaining zucchini slices, ricotta, spinach, marinara and top with fontina.
  6. Bake for 30 mins until bubbly. Turn the heat uo to broil and continue cooking for approx 2-3 minutes until the cheese turns golden brown.
  7. Remove from oven and let rest for 10-15 mins before serving.

Berry Bruschetta with Ricotta & Honey

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Today we are bringing you our beautiful berry bruschetta with ricotta and honey.  This appetizer is not only pretty to look at, but it also happens to be totally off the hook delicious!  Berries are in season right now which means we are always looking for new and creative ways to use them and this recipe is a top choice for sure!  It’s guaranteed to win over your crowd and is also really easy to make so, let us take a minute to show you just how quickly you can have this one on the table!  All you need is a baguette loaf of your favorite bread, a container of ricotta cheese, some blueberries, strawberries, honey and fresh mint.  Sounds easy enough right?

Start by slicing the baguette into 1/2 inch slices, lay them on a baking sheet and spray or drizzle lightly with olive oil.  Pop them into the oven to bake, turning one time so they are golden on both sides.  Remove from oven and set aside to cool.

Once the bread is cooled, spread the ricotta evenly over each piece.  Top with the strawberries and blueberries.

Drizzle with the honey then top with a pinch of kosher salt and a fresh mint leaf.  Place on a pretty platter or plate and serve immediately.  We assure you that everyone is going to love this recipe!


Berry Bruschetta with Ricotta & Honey
 
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Serves: 10-12
Ingredients
  • 1 small baguette loaf
  • olive oil spray
  • 1 15oz container ricotta cheese
  • 1 C blueberries
  • 1 C strawberries, chopper
  • 2 tsp raw honey
  • pinch of kosher salt
  • mint leaves to garnish
Instructions
  1. Heat oven to 400 degrees.
  2. Slice bread into ½ inch slices. Lightly spray each side of bread slices with olive oil spray and line on a sheet pan. Toast in the oven for 5 minutes. Remove and allow to cool.
  3. Top each slice of toasted bread with ricotta cheese, spread evenly. Top with strawberries and blueberries. Drizzle with honey, season with a pinch of kosher salt and garnish with fresh mint leaves. Transfer to a serving platter and serve immediately.

Italian Stuffed Zucchini Boats

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So these Italian stuffed zucchini boats are a fun way to mix it up!  If you are anything like us, we are always on a mission to come up with new ideas for dinner to keep the family interested and coming back to the table.  Why not carve your zucchini into a little boat and stuff it with some cheese and sauce?  Genius right?  Think of all the things you can call these to get the kids on board?  Anything that has sauce and cheese qualifies for a pizza title in our house!  wink wink  This might be a stretch but try it anyway!

Stuffed zucchini boats are really easy and fun to make.

Start out by cutting the zucchini in half the long way and use a spoon to scrape out some of the flesh from the middle.  The place them skin side down on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Then get the cheese mixture going in a medium bowl by combining the ricotta, spinach, egg, basil, garlic and a little salt and pepper and stir it all up.

Spoon a little marinara onto the bottom of each of the boats and then top with the cheese mixture.

Sprinkle with the parmesan and panko bread crumbs and bake for 20 minutes.  It may be necessary to turn the broiler on at the end to get a nice golden brown color.

Remove from the oven and serve immediately.  These stuffed zucchini boats are seriously so good.  Can’t wait for you to try them!

Italian Stuffed Zucchini Boats
 
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Serves: 4
Ingredients
  • 2 zucchinis
  • 1 C spinach, stemmed and finely chopped
  • ¼ C fresh basil, finely chopper + more to garnish
  • 1 C low fat ricotta cheese
  • 1 clove garlic, pressed
  • 1 egg, beaten
  • ⅓ C marinara sauce
  • ¼ C grated parmesan cheese
  • 2 Tbsp panko breadcrumbs
  • ¼ tsp kosher salt
  • ¼ tsp ground pepper
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  2. Cut the ends off of each zucchini. Slice zucchini down the middle, lengthwise. Use a spoon to scoop out the middle (flesh) of the halved zucchinis. Place skin side down on a parchment lined rimmed baking sheet.
  3. In a small bowl add spinach, basil, ricotta, garlic, egg, salt and pepper. Mix thoroughly with a spoon.
  4. Line zucchini with marinara sauce. Divide ricotta mixture evenly between the 4 halved zucchinis. Top each zucchini boat with parmesan cheese and panko breadcrumbs.
  5. Bake for 20 minutes. Turn oven up to broil and allow the tops of the zucchini boats to turn golden brown, watch carefully as not to burn.
  6. Remove from oven, garnish with additonal chopped basil and serve immediately.

Chicken Sausage and Mushroom Lasagna

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This chicken sausage and mushroom lasagna has got to be one of the easiest, most delicious weeknight dinners you will ever make!!  Holy flavor party going on in this dish!  The secret ingredient that makes this recipe so simple is the no boil lasagna noodles.  Have you ever used them before?  If not, you have got to add them to your next grocery list because your life is about to change!  Literally!  I think people are usually afraid of lasagna because they fear that it’s too time consuming.  Well, I promise you, this dish is not.  I get asked to make it by friends and family all the time and I can’t say no because it’s just too easy!  So, let me just take a few minutes to explain.

Another secret ingredient is the sweet Italian chicken sausage.  Using sausage is a game changer in the flavor department but so are fresh herbs but we’ll get to that in a second.  Start by removing the sausage from the casings and browning it up in a skillet then set it aside because it’s going to be added into the sauce.  This is a time saving move.

In a medium bowl, combine the ricotta cheese, egg, oregano, fresh basil, flat leaf parsley, parmesan and salt and pepper. Stir it up and set it aside for the assembly process.

Then you can cook up the mushrooms, onion and garlic in a large saute pan.  I say large because you are going to be adding the sauce and sausage into this pan to make a delicious meaty sauce.  We don’t even use a homemade sauce for this recipe.  We absolutely love homemade sauce but we don’t always have time for it.  There are lots of delicious, clean marinara sauces available these days.  Just pick your favorite.

Once the mushroom mixture is cooked, add the sausage and the sauce to your pan and stir to combine.  Now you are ready for the layering process.

Spoon a little of the sauce onto the bottom of a 9×13 pan.  This ensures that the pasta doesn’t stick to the pan and adds more flavor as well.  Then put down a layer of the noodles followed by a layer of the ricotta mixture, then the sauce, then sprinkle the shredded cheese and repeat.  Noodles, ricotta, sauce, cheese, etc.  Your last layer will be noodles, sauce, then shredded cheese.  No ricotta on the top layer.

Pop into the oven and bake for 30 minutes or until the cheese is deliciously bubbly and golden brown.  You are gonna love the way your kitchen smells when this is baking.  Oh yum!!!

Once it’s done, ring the dinner bell and the people will come running!!  For an easy side, this would pair perfectly with our simple lemon kale salad

 

Chicken Sausage and Mushroom Lasagna
 
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Serves: 6
Ingredients
  • 1 pound sweet Italian chicken sausage - casings removed
  • ½ yellow onion- diced
  • 2 cloves garlic - minced
  • 1 teaspoon oregano
  • 1 tablespoon good quality olive oil
  • 1 large jar of marinara sauce (we use Victoria White Linen 40oz jar from Costco)
  • 1 8oz. package sliced mushrooms - chopped
  • 1 9oz. package oven ready lasagna noodles - no pre-boiling required
  • 1 15oz. container ricotta cheese
  • 1 cup shredded Italian cheese blend (or shredded mozarella)
  • 1 egg
  • ¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
  • 1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
  • 1 tablespoon chopped flat leaf italian parsley
  • kosher salt and fresh ground pepper
Instructions
For the Sauce:
  1. Heat a large stock pot or saute pan over medium-high heat and cook sausage until golden brown. Break sausage up into small pieces with a wooden spoon or spatula while cooking. Once cooked, remove from pan and set aside.
  2. Add olive oil to pan and allow to heat up. Add onions and saute for 2-3 minutes then add in the mushrooms and cook for another 2 minutes. Add minced garlic and saute another minute, add sauce and stir sausage back into mixture to combine. Remove from heat and set aside
For the Ricotta Filling:
  1. In a medium bowl, combine ricotta cheese, egg, basil, parsley, oregano, parmesan and salt and pepper to taste.
  2. To Assemble Lasagna:
  3. In an 9x13 pan, cover bottom of pan with a thin layer of the sauce.
  4. Lay lasagna noodles in a single layer over sauce.
  5. Cover noodles with a layer of the ricotta mixture then spoon sauce mixture over ricotta layer.
  6. Sprinkle shredded cheese over sauce then add another layer of noodles, ricotta, sauce and cheese.
Continue with these layers, ending with a layer of noodles, sauce and shredded cheese. Bake 30 min. or until bubbly and golden brown.

Sautéed Vegetables with Ricotta

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Sautéed vegetables with ricotta is a winning flavor combination. Thanksgiving is over and it’s possible that you might still be in a food coma.  Chances are you might need some more veggies in your life about now….I know I do!  Think of this dish as a hearty, warm spinach and veggie salad, the spoonful of ricotta on top finishes it off perfectly…and let’s face it, everything is better when it’s topped with ricotta!  The inspiration for the dish came about by simply getting creative with the ingredients that were in the fridge.  Turns out it was a giant win, we love it when that happens!! There is just something that works perfectly with this combination of flavors.

veggiericotta

Freshly sautéed vegetables topped with a generous dollap of creamy ricotta is all this meal needs.  Serve it as a side or as a meal, you will love this combo!

ricottabite

Sautéed Vegetables with Ricotta
 
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Serves: 2
Ingredients
  • 1 tsp olive oil
  • 1 clove garlic, chopped
  • 2 zuchinnis, chopped into 1 inch pieces
  • 1 ear corn, steamed and kernels removed
  • 2 roma tomatoes, seeded and chopped
  • 2 C packed fresh spinach
  • 2-3 Tbsp low fat ricotta
  • S&P to taste
Instructions
  1. Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and sautee for 1 minute, being careful not to burn. Add chopped zuchinnis and cook, flipping occasionally browning all sides. Add spinach, tomatoes and corn. Cook until spinach is wilted, season with S&P to taste. Transfer to serving bowl and dollap ricotta on top.