My sweet husband grew up in Wisconsin and, in our four and a half years of smooching and hanging out, he’s brought me on board the Green Bay Packers train - almost. I’ll root for them in any game unless they’re playing the Patriots, in which case this born and bred New England girl gets wicked Masshole awn yah.

The Pack is playing the Minnesota Vikings tonight (hey K!) so I figured today would be as good as any to share a recent casserole concoction I whipped up in honor of J’s team. Loosely inspired by this pasta bake, this green and gold casserole is made with - what else? - Wisconsin cheddar.

I mean, come on. Never give a sorority girl a theme if you don’t want her to run with it.

Hey, food processor? Bless you. The ingredients of this masterpiece are:

1/2 box (7 ish ounces) whole wheat farfalle (or your preferred pasta but bow ties are sexy let's be honest)
3 leeks (light green and white parts only, sliced in half moons)
1 bunch of broccoli, cut into florets (you could certainly use frozen florets FYI)
1 yellow squash, diced
3/4 lb cheese, a mix of white and yellow Wisconsin cheddar, shredded
12 ounces low fat milk
one tablespoon or so of flour
one tablespoon Dijon mustard
cayenne pepper (optional)
salt and pepper

There are two main cooking components - boiling the pasta and cooking the veggies. I did all of this in one pot, but you could separate into two if you want to save time and don’t care about that one additional pot to wash. I hate dishes so tacked 20 minutes onto overall prep time so I could do the boiling stage first. You do you.

Ok so you start with heavily salted water. I made this once without salting the water and the end result was Blandy McFlavorless. Get your Giada on and SALT. THE. GD. WATER. Aggressively. Then, bring the extremely salty water to a boil, cook your pasta until it has just a little bite left, and then add in the broccoli for maximum two minutes to the boiling water. Drain and set aside.

In the same pan (see above note if you want to use two), heat oil or butter and add the leeks. Season with salt and pepper as they start to cook. Once they start to soften, add in the flour and toss around to coat the leeks.

Slowly pour in the milk and stir. Add the Dijon mustard at this stage so it dissolves into the milk. Once the milk is incorporated, add in the cheese a bit at a time, ensuring it melts and is well incorporated into the sauce. Then, season again with salt and pepper and a shake or two of cayenne if you opt for it. I love either nutmeg or cayenne in cheese sauces, but again, you do you - it's totally option. The mustard, by the way, is not optional. Add it. It’s magical.

Add in the squash. Yes, you add it in raw. It’s sweet and tender enough to cook fully just from baking with everything else. Also add in the pasta and broccoli. Stir until everything is coated.

Turn everything into a casserole dish and bake at 350 degrees for 25 - 30 minutes.

So pretty, isn't it? For the meat, I went Wisconsin-inspired, too. I took six bratwursts out of their casing and reshaped them into patties. Six brats turned into five patties.

I know, that's three patties. I promise you I can count. I cooked them in batches in a nonstick skillet - do not touch them! let that gorgeous brown crust appear! it appears when you do not touch them!

Oh and yes, the casserole comes out of the oven right around the time that the patties are done.

The cheese sauce is still bubbling. The broccoli smells rich and the squash smells sweet and a few farfalle edges have browned and crisped up in the oven and you do not go near the silverware drawer because you know you'll burn your mouth if you dig in at this moment.

After it cooled for five excruciatingly long minutes, I served everything up with a side of homemade horseradish pickles.

The patties were the biggest no brainer - Schaller and Weber in our neighborhood is an institution of German meats and everything they make is legendary. I could certainly have left them in their cased state but was really feeling like burgers that night. So, here's proof you can do it, if nothing else.

The casserole itself? Holy hell. The Packers won both times I've made this so that's really all that matters, right? If you like broccoli and cheddar together, this is for you. The sauce is cheesy and creamy but there are still big vegetable jewels amidst the carbs and dairy. The leeks add that oniony touch without being too strong and they kind of melt into the background, texture-wise. The bitterness of the broccoli and the sweet fresh bite of the squash and the rich cheddar is simply a match made in heaven.

Also a match made in heaven? My imaginary dinner party where I serve this masterpiece to Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady and J. Three sexy football-lovin' men around my dinner table. Ahhh. A girl can dream, can't she?

Meatless Monday: Spinach Artichoke Dip Tortellini

What else is there to do when you have cream in your fridge than make a pasta cream sauce? While meatless and containing spinach, please do not trick yourself into thinking this is a healthy dinner. All in all, this is spinach artichoke dip on top of cheese-filled pasta. You're effectively looking at the foods behind my Freshman 15.

The general recipe here is pretty basic.

- 1 box spinach tortellini
- 10 marinated artichoke hearts (quartered)
- 1/2 box baby spinach
- 1 cup light cream
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 tablespoon flour

First, I made the tortellini - boil water, cook the pasta, drain the pasta. In the same pan, I started by making a roux - cooking the flour in the butter. Then, I added the cheese and cream, whisking to incorporate the two. Then I added the spinach to begin to wilt and, about two minutes later, the artichoke hearts. I poured in the wine for a little added flavor - salt and pepper at this step for flavor. Finally, I dumped all of the hot pasta back into the pot, stirring well to combine with all of the sauce and vegetables. I made a final aggressive move with the pepper grinder after I dished myself a bowl.

Ok, fine... these really only made up 10 of the Freshman 15. The other five were all Natty Light.

Eggplant Lasagna

I'm a big fan of silver linings. In my early twenties, I worked for a really dreadful company, but I turned many coworker relationships into true friendships. On a business visit to the company's Hong Kong office, I finally put a face to Katie's name - she's one of the most positive, intelligent, and earnest people I've ever met. She and some of the other American girls in the office snuck me out for a long lunch, embracing the pure humidity that is Hong Kong and laughing over soup dumplings.

Mmm. Soup dumplings.

This post isn't about soup dumplings.

Now a resident of London, Katie tweeted awhile ago looking for an "aubergine" lasagna. I directed her initially to the ultra delicious Skinnytaste eggplant rollatini recipe that I adore, but I got inspired to create one for her.

The rollatini are thinly sliced eggplant filled with a spinach ricotta mix. I'm a lasagna traditionalist at heart and love plain ol' pasta sheets with fresh red sauce and mozzarella. This lasagna? It mixes both.

For the layers, I used 4 sheets of no boil lasagna noodles and one eggplant sliced thin on a mandoline (about 12 - 15 slices total). I started off heavily salting the eggplant to draw out some of the bitterness - rinse them really well before you actually start cooking!

I'm going to get this out of the way now and cop to the fact that I skipped a crucial step - I didn't pre-roast the eggplant. Doing this again, I'd pop them in the oven for 10 - 15 minutes to start cooking. Tant pis.

On to the fillings!

Filling #1: ricotta, spinach, Italian sausage, an egg. I cooked down a box of fresh baby spinach since I prefer it to frozen spinach, but go with what makes you happy. I took two Italian sausages out of the casings, browned them, and drained off the excess grease. Mix everything after the sausage cools down a bit and season with salt and pepper.

Filling #2: tomato sauce from scratch. I mince fresh garlic, dice an onion, soften both in oil with whatever spices you want (basil and oregano are excellent choices), pour in a can of crushed tomatoes, and simmer on low until some of the liquid evaporates.

Then, as with all lasagnas, you start to layer all the deliciousness.

I did eggplant slices on the bottom and the top and nestled the pasta sheets in the middle. No Boil lasagna noodles are my least favorite lasagna noodle option, but they were in the pantry. The thing to know about them is that they really need liquid around them in order to soften, thus why I put them them smack dab in the middle of the action.

I topped it with slices of fresh mozzarella, then baked it for 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

It is not pretty. But it is DELICIOUS.

It's cheesy, it's full of veggies, and it has all of the lasagna flavor and texture you want. You could make any number of tweaks to this. Don't like eggplant? Swap it with zucchini, or embrace the carbs and use pasta. Don't eat meat? Leave out the sausage. Relatively speaking, this was light on meat and light on carbs and even after a second helping, I felt full and satisfied but not overstuffed.

The number one this recipe was missing was the ability to clink drinks with Katie before we dug in! I hope the recipe she inspired lives up to her extremely well-traveled taste buds!

Grown Up Mac & Cheese

I love so many recipes from our Newlywed cookbook and was waiting for an opportunity to make this dish. It is very grown up and I guarantee you that none of the kids in my family would eat this. No hate to the blue box, but here the fresh cheeses and addition of mustard elevate it to a very flavorful and fancy mac. One of my best friends has never met a mac and cheese she didn't immediately befriend, and I made this for her and her family after suffering a loss about a month ago. I'm looking forward to a happier occasion when I can make this again because it is top notch cheesy tastiness.

The recipe from the book calls for:

10 oz pasta
4 tablespoons (half a stick) butter
2 tsp flour
1 1/2 tsp dry mustard *
1 tsp warm water (* I combined these two into a teaspoon of Dijon mustard)
1 1/2 cups milk (NOT skim)
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 1/2 cups grated cheddar
1 1/2 cups grated Gruyère
3 slices Muenster cheese (I left this out)
Freshly ground black pepper

Cook the pasta until it is just al dente and drain. I use cavatappi pasta because it's pretty and it also holds onto hearty sauces really well.

In the same pot, make a roux to start the cheese sauce. A roux is butter and flour cooked together and helps thicken a sauce.

The recipe calls for the water + dry mustard to be added here, but instead I added a teaspoon of Dijon mustard along with the milk. Just like when I added this to caramelized onion pie, I find that this was the critical component. Whisk until it's smooth, then cover until it thickens slightly. Whisk in the eggs, a pinch of salt, and cayenne and stir consistently (but slowly) until the sauce thickens. I also grated some fresh nutmeg into the sauce because I absolutely love nutmeg in creamy sauces. It doesn't taste Christmas-y but just adds another dimension of flavor - it was fantastic with the cayenne and mustard.

Stir in the shredded cheeses over low heat. Remove from heat after the cheese is half melted and continue stirring until all the cheese is melted.

I poured all of the pasta directly into the pot and stirred to cover with the sauce. Then I transferred the cheesy macaroni to an oven safe dish. The recipe calls for you to lay the sliced Muenster over the top but again, I skipped this part. I used disposable foil dish with a cover - I never bring food in a Give Back dish. At this point, I just covered the dish and brought it with me to their apartment. Once there, people scooped it into bowls and would heat in the microwave and it was perfect.

Ok, I tasted a bit before I brought it over.

Getting cornichons out of jars, whisking one egg at a time, stealing stealth bites of Grown Up Mac - these mini forks are super handy.