Cabbage Rolls in Sour Cream Sauce

Another variation for ukrainian cabbage rolls: meat staffed cabbage rolls with gentle sour cream and onion sauce.

Making these from scratch will take some time as any recipe for cabbage rolls even if you use ground beef and don’t need to prepare it yourself, you still need to separate cabbage, assemble rolls and then cook them.

But don’t let this to stop you - even though it is time consuming to cook cabbage rolls you will get enough rolls for later - just store left overs in fridge or freezer.

Stuffed Spaghetti Squash Recipe

My mom usually cooked big zucchini like this: stiffing it with ground beef and rice mince.

However I wasn’t able to find an “adult” zucchini in any shop here in US to cook it. It seems that they don’t survive long enough to grow big here (maybe green piece should look into that, I don’t know).

Anyway, I believe spaghetti squash is a good substitute for this recipe: it serves the purpose by being squash and providing a cavity to cook stuffing, and it also brings nice unique texture to the dish with its “spaghettiness”.

The taste here is similar to cabbage rolls (as if they were made of squash :) ), however the amount of work you need to put into this one is considerably smaller.

Minced Cutlets Stuffed with Mushrooms

This is a tasty tweak to original minced beef cutlets recipe. The mince is prepared exactly the same way and mushrooms and onions stuffing gives ground meat juiciness and extraordinary taste.

A bit of agility is required to put stuffing inside of minced meat cutlets, but once you get it - it seems easy: meat is sticky, so if you get some holes, they can be easily patched by adding a layer of mince on top of the hole.

To prevent meat from sticking to hands - rinse hands with cold water from time to time while assembling minced cutlets.

Lazy Cabbage Rolls

Lazy cabbage rolls, or “lenyvi golubtsi” how this dish is called in ukrainian, is an easier version of ukrainian cabbage rolls.

Since it doesn't require assembling of rolls it is much easier to prepare, and taste is very similar to cabbage rolls.

Lazy cabbage rolls taste great when seasoned with a bit of chopped garlic and a bit of mayo.

Meatballs with Carrot-Tomato Sauce

Russian meatballs (or “tefteli” how they are called in Russia) are prepared from ground beef and rice mix and cooked under some kind of sauce. They usually have big size (1 or 2 meatballs is enough for a serving).

This is a recipe for “tefteli” my mom uses: big meatballs, dipped into flour, then fried over in some oil and cooked with vegetable sauce (carrots, tomatoes, onions and dill) until ready.

I've modified recipe a bit to use freshly pureed tomatoes instead of tomato paste. However, if you don't have fresh tomatoes under your hands, you can use canned tomatoes or tomato paste diluted with water.

Boiled potatoes or mashed potatoes are usually the first choice of side dish for tefteli for me, boiled buckwheat or pasta work good too.

Lasagna with Beef and Vegetables

Several weekends ago, when I asked Yuriy what should we prepare for dinner, I got an answer – lasagna, and I was intimidated a bit - I never prepared lasagna before. So I spent some time in internet researching recipes and found several I liked. I've combined them, added some touch to my taste and prepared this lasagna.

This was my first attempt to make lasagna. And main challenge for me was to properly prepare noodles: according to the instructions on the pack they required boiling before using. I've added 2 tablespoons of oil to the boiling water and was boiling them layer by layer and it totally helped to prevent noodles from sticking while boiling.

This lasagna turned out perfectly: balanced combination of meat and vegetables (just how I like it), noodles were very tender, it was totally worth all the time I've spend boiling them, getting out of water and trying arrange them in the pan.

Macaroni with Ground Boiled Beef

Lots of recipes require using clear soup (meat broth, stock), however not all of them also require boiled meat which is often used to prepare meat broth. So the question is, are there any good recipes which actually require boiled meat and no broth?

This is one of them: russian pasta with ground boiled beef and fried onions (btw, it is called “makarony po-flotski” in Russia; I have no idea why, but we always called this dish so).

Any “al dente” kind of pasta will work here: I've used penne, just read instructions on the pack and cook them accordingly. You may also vary proportion of meat to pasta to taste.

Minced Beef Cutlets

This it a traditional russian recipe for minced meat cutlets which includes meat, white bread soaked in milk and a lot of onions. Some people prepare those cutlets from beef only, some add a bit of pork or pork fat in them. I prefer just beef.

You may grind or mince meat yourself or buy a ground one and simply add finely chopped or grated onions: whatever you prefer. Either way I am sure it will taste delicious!

I've served those cutlets with fried potatoes and greek salad, just in case you were curious.

Moussakas

In Greek cuisine, moussakas (moussaka, musakka) is a layered casserole made of vegetables (eggplant as a main ingredient) and minced meat.

It takes a bit of time and require some coordination in order to make it. But even if you spend a lot of time preparing moussakas, it totally worth it! It is great dish, and it tastes good served as hot as well as cold.

Tzatziki is good addition for Moussakas Casserole.

Stuffed Bell Peppers

My better half doesn't like fresh bell peppers, so I do stuff them with ground beef and rice and stew for a bit and here we go, it is his favorite meat dish.

Stuffed Bell Peppers are easy and fast to do. They are being served without side dish and are tasty!

Meatballs Soup

Eating soups is healthy, let's make it also tasty!

Homemade beef broth, a lot of vegetables and meatballs, sounds good for me, what about you?