Weekend Update April 7, 2014

“True education is a kind of never ending story —

 a matter of continual beginnings, of habitual fresh starts,

 of persistent newness.” 

J.R.R. Tolkien

A moment of reflection is was all it took.  No, maybe it was a rereading of a few pages of archived quotes that did it. Or maybe it was while I was trying yet another unfamiliar recipe. No matter the road it traveled, the realization struck, well

like a one of these, carrying a

one of these.

"It could be", I pondered to myself, after pondering a preponderance of menus prompted by new leaves and new starts and fresh beginnings and new places, "that I may possibly be a little restlessly addicted to change." 

But then I changed my mind.

Because there are those of us (and I think I may be one) who turn over a new leaf because we're really curious about what's under the leaf.

There are those of us who like trying new things, not because we dislike the familiar, but because we love learning something new.

Like that time I signed up for a class in stylish firing
squad facing, and wound up in a blind typing class instead.
 I learned a lot that day.

There are those of us who cherish the known, and yet pursue new knowledge, no matter how apparently inconsequential. Oh, we may seem like flighty dilettantes, but we can slay all comers with a razor sharp katana when trivial pursuit is on the line, and

you just might want to leave this on the closet
shelf until you can play it with people who don't
like new leaves.

Of course, curiosity has been known to kill a few cats, and a new knowledge junkie runs the risk of becoming a walking sack of intellectual fertilizer, as one new leaf of information turns over on top of another, and another, until what was once known is forgotten. But even that can turn out alright, if one is willing to every now and then turn over the mental compost heap, and find what new old thing

may have sprouted in the dark

This week, there were a few new leaves worth turning over. And most of them look like wonton wrappers. No, really. The recipe for mini asparagus and mushroom lasagnas uses wonton wrappers as sheets of super thin pasta in muffin cup lasagnas. Which seemed weird, until I read the ingredients listed on the package of wonton wrappers: flour, water, eggs, and a few other things.

So, these wonton wrappers (and their bigger cousin the egg roll wrapper):

have the same ingredients as fresh pasta:

but the wonton wrappers are cuter, thinner, easier to find and, oh yeah, A LOT CHEAPER.
Just to find out if really truly egg roll and wonton wrappers could be used as pasta, a stack of them were sliced and thrown into boiling salted water. And guess what?

super thin, super tender, super delicious pasta.
This just may be my favorite discovery since no-knead bread.

As if that's not enough magic, if you slice those wonton skins and dunk them in hot oil instead of hot water, you get this:

those deliciously addictive
crispy noodle things that come
with Chinese takeaway. YUM!

Here the little wonder wonton squares are,
layered with cheese, pesto, mushrooms and asparagus.
(I forgot to buy ricotta, so the ricotta layer was a no-show.)

They were really good, and it's a sure bet that those angelically light pasta squares are going to wrap up many more lasagnas. Not just mini ones either. 
On the downright forgettable side, and as a downright forgettable side, I give you Basil Pesto Zucchini Mint Pasta:

I felt so stupid! I bought pine nuts (crazy expensive!) parmesan, fresh basil, only to realize as I stepped through the recipe that the crazy people at Real Simple wanted me to make Pesto! There was a jar of nice pesto in the fridge! Why didn't they tell me to use that?! Despite the very fancy sounding 10 syllables of the name, this is pasta with sliced zucchini and mint with some pesto stirred in. And it's okay, and maybe even great, if you've got a garden full of zucchini you don't know what to do with.
If you've got leftover chicken you don't know what to do with, try this:

Noodle salad with Chicken

But, as with the Real Simple Recipe, save yourself some time by using a nice store bought chili oil or a sriracha sauce. You are, after all, using leftover chicken in order to save a little time, right? 

And here's a nice idea: 

shrimp, avocado and grapefruit salad

The dressing of the salad is stirred up from the juice of the peeled and sectioned grapefruit- a very frugal trick that makes a very nice dressing on a terrific salad.
If you're thinking that a little goat cheese would be nice on that, you're right.


I hope that this week
we all take a chance on a new leaf or two
and run the risk of learning something
we don't need to know.
I hope that you never tire of the new,
that you greet the unfamiliar as a friend 
you haven't met yet,
and not a stranger to be feared.
And I hope those new leaves
keep turning up, and turning over.
because you never can tell
which one of them 
may be the one

that floats you all the way home.