Quick Bite Dinners

Or, how to make dinner in 20 minutes.

The other night I got home late, and had to be out the door again in 40 minutes for an appointment. I was (characteristically) ready to eat my own arm off, and in need of something filling and delicious (and maybe just a bit spicy?) but most more importantly I needed it fast. I threw a 'take and bake' frozen baguette in the oven and opened the fridge. Enter spicy pork sausages, conveniently thawed in my fridge (and intended for a different meal).

In our pantry, there are about ten different varieties of canned or dried beans, french lentils, rice noodles, wheat pasta and enough vinegars and sauce bottles to make your brain explode. Come over and look in our fridge, nine times out of ten, its very nearly empty (except for the crisper drawers) but the door is completely fulll of condiments, we have a mustard addiction. On this particular evening I reached for some cannellini beans, remembering some sort of stew recipe I had read from about thirty different sources. In fact, you see incarnations of this stew all over the internet, mostly with chicken sausage and escarole to make it 'South Beach Diet' friendly, but the only chicken sausages that our grocery store sells are heavily processed, par-boiled and give off a slightly chemical aroma. I'll take the pork fat over that any day, thankyouverymuch.  So this is my short-cut version of the same idea, I got it on the table in 20 minutes, from fridge door to plate, including chopping a shallot and half a bell pepper. These veggies cook down, so if its not your most beautiful, regular dice, noone will notice...and if they do, and have the audacity to say anythng, then why are you feeding them?

This was delicious with a hunk of bread, a big salad (extra points if you can get the man to chop the salad while you make the stew,) and a grating of Romano. In the end I was full, and I had time to spare. We don't really have a rotation of regular meals in our house, (except of course for Melissa Clark's shrimp with broccoli, making a regular appearance), but I'm sure this is a dinner that we'll build on or return to a few times this winter.

Super Fast Spicy Sausage & Cannelini 'Stew'

Serves four, or two for dinner with lunches left over

3 hot sausages, removed from their casing

1 can of cannellini beans

1 pint jar of tomato sauce (i used some leftover sauce in our fridge,)

1 medium shallot, diced

1/2 bell pepper, diced

2 plum tomatoes, seeded and diced

1 Tablespoon dried Italian herbs

2 Tablespoons of olive oil

fresh basil and grated Romano cheese to taste

Heat a medium skillet over medium heat and add oil. Add the sausage and stir to break up to a medium 'crumble' brown the pieces ligtly and remove from the pan. Add the shallot and pepper and cook, stirring frequently until the onion is softened. add the tomato and return the sausage to the pan, add the tomato sauce, and dried herbs, check for seasoning and add salt and pepper if desired. If you find it gets too sticky, reduce the heat slightly and add some chicken stock, veggie broth, or water.

Serve with a genrous garnish of basil and Romano, alongside a green salad and some warm
bread.