Spas and Sausage

I have been avoiding cooking this entire week. The sink was full of dishes and I didn't have the energy to clean them all. So instead, I have been enjoying a week of ZinBurger, B-Line, sushi, and Miss Saigon. Unfortunately, this means my precious CSA veggies have been sitting very patiently in the fridge waiting for me to use them. Sundays are my favorite night of the week to cook dinner. You can enjoy a relaxing day (or un-relaxing day of studying) and then have a nice, leisurely dinner. Best part is, you have leftovers to take for lunch on Monday.

I bought a Groupon a couple of weeks ago because it was advertised as "Unlimited Spa Services for 1-week for $20." How could I pass that up? I snatched up the deal and then started to look into the company a little more. It is for a spa called Planet Beach located in the Total Wine and More parking lot on Oracle. Upon further online searching, I came to realize the deal was really too good to be true. What makes this spa different is that none of the services are done by real people, everything is a machine. No real massages done by trained individuals--rather, they provide aqua massages and some sort of state-of-the-art robotic massage chair. No facials--rather, you slop a package of jelly on your face and sit under an infared light for 20 minutes. To say the least, I was a bit dissappointed. Regardless, I bought the Groupon, so I started my week last Wednesday. I went into the spa and made a promise to myself that I would get my moneys worth. I decided to try every single service--except for the "UV Therapy" aka tanning beds. They have a bed that you lie on and a heated "jade roller" moves up and down your back. They also have a bed where warm water shoots up and provides a massage. They also have a little sauna box and also this other thing called the Hydration Station. It's basically a capsule you lie in and it fills with hot steam to make you sweat. I'm down with that, open your pores, super. But then you can add these different colored light that are supposed to stimulate certain aspects of your body--red is for cellulite reduction, yellow is to stimulate lymphatics, blue is to target acne, purple is to prolong your tan. That seemed a bit hokey to me. Either way, I went back for my third visit today (like I said, I am going to get my moneys worth). I spent the afternoon getting an aqua massage and sitting in the sauna. To be honest, I don't know how I feel about Planet Beach. Getting a massage by a robotic chair is very different from getting a massage from a real person.

On to the food. After my "spa" day, I came home and wanted to make a nice hearty meal that would warm me up (it's freezing outside!). I decided to experiment with the rapini we received this week. I've never had the veggie before, but wikipedia told me it is similar to Chinese gailan. Normally the branches have flowers on them, but I think ours were harvested early in the season, so I just had a bunch of leaves. I did a little searching on tastespotting and saw there were a lot of recipes for rapini and sausage pasta. That was just what I was in the mood for and it seemed so simple.

I basically made up this recipe by throwing in whatever I had available at home. I bought turkey sausage and every time I do that I regret it. I always feel guilty getting the grease loaded pork sausage, so I give in a get turkey. I just can't do it anymore. The drippings from the pork sausage make a dish so much better! After cooking the turkey sausage, there was slim to no oil drippings at all so you don't get that yummy sausage flavor coating the pasta and rapini. I'm over my pork guilt trip. Sorry turkey, I'm going with the pork.

I decided to use orecchiette pasta because I thought it looked really cute with the sausage and rapini. The little cups are perfect to scoop up a little bit of meat and a little bit of veg. It doesn't really matter what kind of pasta you use, but I would suggest either a penne or shell. Really, whatever you have in your cabinet will be a-ok.

Enjoy this dish on a busy weeknight, it literally take 20 minutes to make. It's so easy and you don't need many ingredients. The dish has the bitter flavor of the rapini which is mellowed out by the savory fatty sausage.

Rapini and Sausage Orecchiette

• 1 lb orecchiette pasta, cooked
• 1 lb spicy Italian PORK sausage
• 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• Splash of chicken broth
• Splash of white wine
• 1 bunch rapini, coarsely chopped into 1 inch pieces
• 1 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 1/4 c. Parmesan cheese
• Fresh cracked pepper and kosher salt to taste

Cook the pasta in a pot of boiling salted water.

While the pasta is cooking, brown the sausage in a pan. After the sausage is done cooking, toss it with the cooked pasta and leave the drippings in the pan. Add the olive oil, onion, and garlic to the pan and saute until the onions are soft. Add the chicken broth and white wine and cook for a few minutes. Add the rapini and cook until wilted.

Add the veggie mixture to the pasta and sausage mix. Toss in the butter and cheese and stir until completely mixed. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Top with a sprinkle of cheese and eat piping hot.

Sick Day = Soup Day

I haven't posted in forever. I apologize. The beginning of last week I was at the Nutrition & Health Conference in Atlanta, Georgia. It was amazing and so interesting. It was hosted by the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine and was right up my alley. Dr. Weil talked about an anti-inflammatory diet and we learned about healthy eating that can also be super tasty. I totally overdosed on salmon because everyone is so up on omega-3 fatty acids. We had at least two servings of salmon every day, plus they had these tasty little gummy worm omega-3 vitamins. I also had the chance to meet James Beard Award Winning Chef Scott Peacock and a dual Chef/MD Dr. Wendy Kohatsu. She finished her MD and during her clinicals went to culinary school so she could better consult her patients on the importance of diet and healthy cooking. I am obsessed. This is my new dream in life. The conference was an overall success. I hope I will be able to attend the next one in San Francisco.

Only downside, I came back with a cold. I have completely lost my voice and I feel like I'm coughing up a lung. Solution: make soup. The bf and I had decided on a yummy, hearty potato kale soup last week with our CSA but never got around to making it. So this was the perfect opportunity. It reminded me of the Olive Garden Toscana soup, but without the cream, and much more healthy. Unfortunately, I couldn't taste the soup (that's what happens when your nose is completely plugged) but I can say the texture was really nice, if that counts for anything. The kale gave a nice crunch that reminded me of Japanese wakame seaweed. The potatoes were nice and soft and made the soup hearty and filling. I had frozen the sausage and thawed it out yesterday, so they became a little mushy. When we cut them, they just squished and the casing didn't hold up around them. They turned out like spicy mini meatballs in the soup which I was totally fine with. I think the recipe would also be great with some carrots to give it a little more body. We also added some garlic and used our wonderful torpedo onions from the CSA. The look like giant green onions and really mild. We simply took the white bulbs and sliced them. You could easily substitute any other kind of onion. Super quick and easy and so wonderful when lying in bed sick.

(I think I need to take a food photography class because my pictures really do not do the food justice)

Sausage, Kale, and Potato Soup

• 1 package spicy sausage, sliced into rounds or with casing removed shaped into meatballs
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 torpedo onion bulbs, sliced
• 5 1/2 c. low-salt chicken broth
• 6 small red lasoda potatoes, thinly sliced
• 2 c. dry white wine
• 5 c. thinly sliced trimmed kale leaves
• 1/4 tsp. caraway seeds, lightly crushed

Saute sausage, garlic, and onion in heavy medium saucepan over medium-high heat until beginning to brown, about 3 minutes. Add chicken broth, sliced potatoes, and white wine and bring mixture to boil. Reduce heat to medium, cover, and simmer until potatoes are almost tender, about 10 minutes.

Add kale and caraway seeds to soup. Simmer soup uncovered until potatoes and kale are very tender, about 10 minutes longer. Season soup to taste with salt and pepper. Ladle soup into bowls and serve immediately.