Stuffed Leeks

#‎weirdvegwednesday‬ was a pretty tasty creation this week.  I’ll admit that we don’t love every new vegetable that we try…but when we started this, our goal was to step outside what we were comfortable with when it came to trying to new food.

This week we made Stuffed Leeks. It was a play on manicotti but without the pasta and it was DELICIOUS. I took the tubes from the leeks and stuffed it with a chicken sausage.  The sauce is lemon, caper, tomato, leek sauce. Garnished it with some parmesan and parsley.

“You can learn a lot about a person by the food that they eat. Are they willing to take chances? Will you try new things and step outside of your comfort zone?”  ~ An excerpt from Dan’s ebook that he hasn’t written yet ~

Chicken Sausage

Ingredients

1 lb boneless chicken thighs
4 strips of bacon
1 tbsp oregano
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp red chili flakes
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground pepper
1 egg

Directions

1. Cut chicken and bacon into medium chunks that will fit into your grinder.   Try to use chilled meats as they will grind better.
2. Run the chunks of meat through your grinder, collecting in a large bowl.
3. Add remaining ingredients, and mix together.
4. Or you can buy your own sausage, but that is just boring and too easy.

Tomato, Leek, Lemon, Caper  Sauce

Ingredients

1 cup leeks, chopped
1 cup tomatoes, diced or 1 15 oz can
2 garlic cloves, diced
2 tbsp capers, diced
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
Juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup heavy cream
Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions

1. Heat a pan to medium high, add olive oil.   Add leeks and cook for 3 minutes.
2. Add garlic and capers, cook for 1 minute.
3. Add lemon juice and white wine vinegar, cook and let it reduce for 2 minutes.
4. Add tomato and cream, cook for 5 minutes over medium heat.

Assembling Stuffed Leeks

So when you get your leeks you will want to cut the a 4 inch section from the bottom.  In order to get the leek “tubes” push in the middle of the leek.  Make sure you push towards the green side of the leek as it is the wider side and it will come apart easier.

You should be able to get 8-10 tubes from 3 large leeks.  Once you have separated, clean the tubes by rinsing.  Make sure you set aside the interior of the leek, as you will use that with the sauce.  Make sure you clean this part of the leek also as leeks tend to be very sandy.  Once you have your leek tubes, fill each with your sausage mixture.  You should have enough sausage for 8 or so stuffed leeks.

Arrange all of your stuffed leeks into a baking dish and top with your sauce.  Bake for 35-45 minutes until sausage is cooked through.  Garnish with some paremesan and chopped parsley.