Pasta with Broccoli and Pesto

When I was a Sophomore in college, I had a huge crush on a boy who was vegan. We often worked late together in the lithography studio, and most nights we'd take a dinner break and head to one of our apartments to cook. And almost every one of those nights, we made pasta with some sort of green vegetable (broccoli, green beans, zucchini, spinach) thrown into the pot halfway through, and then tossed with olive oil, sliced almonds, and salt and pepper. It was an easy meal to make and tonight, home sick with a cold, I decided easy was a good idea. I added in some homemade pesto (I always keep it in the freezer, ready to defrost), and voila: a relatively healthy meal in less than 10 minutes!

Another Green Couscous

This one comes from Jamie Magazine and is a little bit quicker to prepare than the Ottolenghi recipe (due to the lack of caramelized onions)- I think it took me about 15 minutes altogether, and I've made it twice this week already! Full of broccoli, greens (Jamie uses spinach but I had kale), toasted sunflower and pumpkin seeds, and seasoned with harissa, I found this to be very satisfying and quite healthy.

Cheater Mac and Cheese

Every now and then I find myself desperately craving mac and cheese, but don't have the time or patience to wait for it to bake. This version tastes just as good and uses so much less cheese that it's a healthy option, too, and it only takes about 10 minutes to put together. Here's how: boil pasta, drain and toss with a little butter, shaved Parmesan cheese to taste, salt and pepper, and top with toasted breadcrumbs. You'd be surprised how little cheese you need to get the full effect- you can use something other than Parmesan, but I recommend something equally strong-flavored.

Fettucine with Purple Sprouting Broccoli, Anchovy, Garlic, Chili, and Breadcrumbs

This weekend ended up being a lot more taxing than I expected, so I decided to postpone my cleanse for another, sunnier week. In the meantime, I've been enjoying solid, cooked food, and this simple dish really hit the spot tonight when another friend who's been under the weather stopped by.

Couscous with Basil Pesto and Cherry Tomatoes

(Pesto recipe here.)

Green Couscous

Another one from Plenty; I guess if it weren't for the sections on eggplant and mushrooms, I would just give in and say I'm doing one of those "work your way through the cookbook" projects. But it's hard not to keep going back to the book, when every recipe I've tried has been a winner, including this one. It's couscous with lots of herbs (dill, mint, parsely, cilantro, tarragon), caramelized onion, toasted pistachios, chillies, and arugula.

Tomato Party!

Erik came over and we made this dish from Plenty, which is actually called "Tomato Party." It consists of: couscous, fregola, roasted and fresh tomatoes, garlic, tarragon, mint, and oregano. It was good warm but I think it would be even better as a cold salad for a picnic or barbeque. Also, it made me think of this song.

Farro Pasta with Baby Broccoli, Anchovy, Garlic, Capers and Hot Chillies

Rigatoni with Roasted Tomatoes and Goat Cheese

I freeze lots and lots of roasted tomatoes every summer so I can eat them year round. This is one of my favorite ways to use them. It's so easy- I just chop up the tomatoes and let them thaw, and toss them with the hot pasta when it's cooked. The tangy goat cheese crumbled on top is the perfect compliment to the sweet tomatoes.

Penne with Olives, Capers, and Breadcrumbs

Tagliatelle with Roasted Tomatoes, Olives, Capers, and Arugla

Inspired by River Cafe, as always...

Tagliatelle Carbonara with Zucchini

Spaghetti with Smashed Cherry Tomatoes, Sweet Corn and Basil

Spaghetti with Quick Tomato Sauce and Garlic Bread

Erik's been craving spaghetti, and the heatwave earlier this week made my tomato plants explode with fruit, so I decided to make sauce. I just sauteed some onion with marjoram and dried chilies, threw in a couple of whole garlic cloves, and then added the tomatoes and let them caramelize. The result was amazingly sweet, and perfect with bread smeared with salted butter and roasted garlic.

Hand-Rolled Fennel Pollen Pici in Fennel-Tomato Sauce

Inspired by this amazing blog post, and Hank's recipes, Erik and I went foraging for fennel pollen last week. After about a half hour of gently shaking fennel flowers into a tupperware container, we had about a tablespoon of pollen and at least as many bugs. Newly convinced that the price of imported, dried pollen was worth it, we gave up and bought a jar. Making the hand-rolled pasta (which has the pollen in it) was surprisingly easy and fun- I think it would be a great meal to make with kids if you have them.

Spaghetti with Tuna, Capers, Onions and Chili

This is my go-to meal when I don't have anything else in mind. I always have the ingredients in the pantry, so it's quick and easy.

Buccatini with Oregano

When Erik picked this recipe out of one of our River Cafe cookbooks, the first thing I thought of was "Veronica, I made your favorite- spaghetti with lots of oregano!", so of course we watched Heathers while we ate. I must say that this recipe- which calls for 1/2 cup of dried oregano plus "two generous handfuls" of fresh oregano, tossed into the pasta with a bit of olive oil- was a bit much for me. This is only the second River Cafe recipe we've tried and disliked (I know, I really should change this blog's title to "Recipes from River Cafe and Jamie Oliver")... really it was just too much oregano. The pasta was bitter and woody (why did it need the dried oregano?), and desperately needed something to balance it out like some ground pine nuts or walnuts maybe, or even some cream or butter. The fresh cherry tomatoes from my garden were a nice, sweet reprieve, but I definitely did not go back for seconds. Oh, well...

ADDENDUM: We figured out that the problem arose from using Mexican dried oregano instead of Italian! The Italian variety comes in big, leafy bunches, whereas the Mexican is ground up and includes lots of stem pieces.

Penne with Tuscan Sausage Sauce

From the River Cafe "Italian Country" cookbook. I made this with some delicious fennel sausage from Cafe Rouge, and tomatoes from my garden.

Gemelli with Homemade Ricotta and Tomatoes From the Garden

Made with Samin's amazing pasta.

Linguine with Crab and Fennel

I'm repostng this because I finally got a good picture of it. The original post was March 24, and we've made this dish a couple of times since then. It's always delicious!

We found a copy of the second River Cafe cookbook on sale today, and were drooling over this recipe (which originally called for linguine, but we had spaghetti and it worked just fine) when we passed by our local fish market and saw fresh crabs in the window. It was fate! We bought the crabs pre-cooked and cracked and then pulled the meat out ourselves.

1 lb Spaghetti
Crab meat
1 Fennel bulb
1 Garlic clove
1 tbspFennel seeds
2 Dried chillies
1 Lemon
Extra-virgin olive oil

Remove the tough outer part and stalk of the fennel. Slice the bulb as finely as you can across the grain. Keep any of the green tops. Peel and finely chop the garlic. Crush the fennel seeds and crumble the chilli. Grate the zest of the lemon, and squeeze the juice.

Heat two tablespoons of oil in a thick-bottomed pan, add the garlic, fennel seeds and chilli, and cook to soften. Add the crab, lemon juice and zest, and season. Stir through, just to heat up the crab.

Cook the linguine in boiling, salted water for five minutes, then add the fennel slices and cook together until al dente. Drain the pasta, keeping a little of the water, and add to the crab mixture. Stir thoroughly to combine, adding a little of the reserved water to loosen the sauce if necessary. Serve with olive oil.

If cooking crab yourself, buy them live and choose one or two large crabs - it will be much easier to pick the meat out from them than from many small ones. Cock crabs (males) have larger claws and a higher proportion of white meat. Spider crabs are very sweet and good for this recipe, though it takes longer to pick out the meat than from the common crab, as the meat-to-shell ratio is lower.