Cooking recipes: pasta

Showing posts with label pasta. Show all posts

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Chicken frittata with pasta

Chicken frittata with pasta

Ingredients

Chicken breasts 2
Finely chopped capsicum 1
Finely chopped onion 1
Finely chopped spring onions1
Finely chopped tomatoes 1
Egg 4
Spaghetti 1/2packet
Parmesan cheese 50g
Parsley 1/4bunch
Black pepper powder 1/2tsp
Butter 4tbsp
Salt as required

Method:-

Boil the spaghetti , drain and keep aside.Finely chop ¼ bunch pasrely,1 capsicum,1 onion,1 spring onion, and 1 tomato.Beat together 4 eggs in a bowl. Add all the chopped vegetables, boiled spaghetti,2 julienne cut breast fillet, salt as required,1/2tsp black pepper powder and 50g parmesan cheese. Mix well.Heat 2tbsp butter in a wok and pour in the egg mixture. Do not move the mixture just allow the base to fry.
After 3-4 minutes when the sides of the egg start shrinking away from the wok , flip the frittata over and cook the other side. When nice and golden brown, turn the flame off.The delicious chicken frittata with pasta is ready to serve.

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Walnut and Garlic Pesto Pasta Youre Nuts If You Think Theres Only One Kind of Pesto

While you may only be familiar with one kind, pesto is a very generic term that simply refers to any sauce that is made by pounding or grinding the ingredients, usually with a mortar and pestle. In fact, the word "pesto" comes from the Italian word for "pound." While the garlic and oil base is a constant, there are many variations using different combinations of herbs and nuts.

This extremely simple version uses fresh garden herbs, garlic and walnuts for a delicious, albeit plain looking bowl of pasta. As you hear me say in the video recipe, not everything has to be colorful, to be good. This is about as unimpressive looking plate of food as I have ever put to film, but it should be appreciated for what it is - a simple, rustic, nutty, garlicky, tangle of goodness. Enjoy!

12 oz dry spaghetti
1/2 cup mixed fresh Italian herbs - basil, oregano, mint, tarragon, parsley, etc.
6 cloves garlic
salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup grated parmesan
hot pepper flakes

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Pasta with Roasted Garlic and Eggplant Sauce

If you are a reader of this blog you know that when Steve isnt home for dinner I try to make something that I know I cant make when hes around. Steve is not a fan of eggplant andI had some from the farmers market along with some tomatoes from my parents garden. I remembered a recipe from Rachael Ray. She made a pasta sauce from pureed eggplant. She puts her eggplant in the oven whole and scoops it out but I wanted more caramelized flavor on the eggplant so I roasted it in cubes. I absolutely LOVED this recipe. Probably one of my favorite eggplant recipes of all time! I debated about posting this recipe because the picture was lacking some color. I posted it on my facebook page and I was assured the photo was good enough to post so hope you all think so too. The only problem is I dont have an exact recipe to follow here. I am going to have to make it again to perfect it and write down the measurements. So this recipe is an approximation. Give it a try and use your own judgement (more or less tomatoes, onion, etc) otherwise wait for me to try this once again. One thing I did realize is that it would be much better to roast the tomatoes on a seperate cookie sheet since they give off too much water and prevent the eggplant from browning well.

Pasta with Roasted Garlic and Eggplant Sauce

Ingredients:

2 eggplants, partially peeled (peel every other section so it looks striped), cut into large dice
4-5 tomatoes, cut into large dice
1 large vidalia onion, cut into large dice
1 head of garlic
Fresh basil
extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
pecorino romano cheese, grated

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Prepare 3 sheet pans with parchment paper (makes clean up a lot easier) and spread out eggplant and onion over 2 cookie sheets and put the tomatoes on the 3rd. Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper and toss to coat.

3. Slice top off of the head of garlic so garlic is exposed. Drizzle with oil, salt and pepper. Wrap well in foil and place in a small oven safe bowl or if you have space on your cookie sheet put it there. (Do not put it directly in oven as the oil make leak out and onto your oven.)

4. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes and toss and flip so all sides get color. Cook veggies until soft and browned. Tomatoes may come out sooner than the eggplant. Check on the garlic - when a knife can easily pierce the garlic it is ready. The garlic can easily over cook and become burnt and hard. Check every 5 mins afterward if its not yet ready. Remove everything from the oven and allow to cool.

5. Meanwhile bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. When garlic is cool enough to handle, squeeze out of the papery skin. It will come right out. When veggies have cooled down add them and garlic to a food processor (you may have to do this in batches and just add to a bowl to combine when its all blended). If its very thick drizzle in some oil while the food processor is on. Taste and adjust seasoning. Add torn basil.

6. Cook pasta until al dente and reserve some pasta water. Return pasta to pot and toss in eggplant mixture. If it looks like its too thick add a little bit of the pasta water. Toss with romano cheese and enjoy!

Click here for a printable version of this recipe.

Saturday, February 1, 2014

Pasta broccoli cauliflower salad

I made this last night, it was really yummy. My hubby is not a fan of pasta or broccoli, so I just enjoyed by my self. We had pav bahji in the evening so I wanna have lite dinner and I decided to have some salad. This salad tastes wonderful. You can make this non-vegetarian version or you can modify to your taste but the basic recipe is as follows.

Ingredients:
1 cup pasta boiled in little salt water

1 cup broccoli florets
1 small onion finely chopped
1 cup cauliflower florets
1/2 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise
2 tablespoons fat-free milk/yogurt
1 envelope reduced-fat ranch salad dressing mix
1/2 teaspoon table salt/ seasoning salt

Directions:

Take a large bowl, combine the cauliflower, pasta, broccoli and onion. In a small bowl, combine mayonnaise, milk/yogurt, salad dressing mix and salt. Add to pasta mixture. Toss to coat evenly. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour. (If you are using bacon or any other meat cook and crumble them and add at final step).

Sending it to ramyas Fusion food:Pasta

Hope you like my recipe :)

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Merluzzo Pasta Puttanesca Pimp My Cod!

Merluzzo is Codfish in Italian, and I just thought it would look cooler in the title. In case youve never heard of a "Puttanesca" sauce before, its Italian for "in the style of the whore." I know, it sounds appetizing doesn’t it? But, it really is a fantastic and fast pasta sauce that can be prepared and tossed on plain pasta, or used as a base for a more complex recipe as I have done here. Ive taken the basic Puttanesca sauce and added fresh codfish and Arugula to create a very nice, and quite healthy seafood pasta. By the way, it tastes much better than it looks! The black olive tapenade I added makes for a sort of grey and muddy looking sauce, but when you dress it up with a little parmesan on top and more red pepper flakes, it suddenly becomes much more attractive (insert your own prostitute joke here).

Now, as far as the story behind the Puttanesca sauces origins, there are many stories, some more "colorful" than others. It is pretty much agreed upon that Naples was the birthplace, but thats about all that people dont argue about. What follows are the most common explanations of this delicious sauce; the ladies of the night made this pasta sauce because the irresistible aroma would help draw in customers. It was created as a quick and cheap meal the ladies could eat in between customers. It is hot, spicy, and fast, as are the woman for whom its named.

Regardless of the true origin, its a great sauce, and one that should be part of your regular pasta rotation, no matter what your own personal level of virtue happens to be. Ive made this version much lower calorie by reducing the usual amount of olive oil and replaced it with stock and wine. Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1 pound fresh cod
2 cups chicken or fish stock (or water)
1 pound pasta
1 cup white wine
2 tbl anchovy paste
2 tbl red pepper flakes
6 cloves garlic
2 tbl olive tapenade or chopped olives
1/4 cup capers
1 bunch Arugula (about 2-3 cups)
2 tbl olive oil
1/2 cup parmesan

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Penne Upma Pasta Indian Style

Each morning, I wonder what do I make for breakfast. Oats / Cereal gets too boring at times. It just so happened that I had some left over boiled Penne pasta and Upma being one of the staple breakfasts at home- i decided to put the two together.

Its just like regular upma, where rawa is substituted by pasta. This recipe would serve two people and taken under 15 minutes to get done.

Ingredients :
Over 1 cup boiled / leftover pasta (Penne/ Fucilli / Macaroni )
1 medium sized carrot-finely chopped
1 small onion finely chopped
2-3 springs-spring onions-finely chopped
10-12 French beans-finely chopped
Pinch of turmeric
8-10 Cashewnuts / Handful peanuts ( Optional)
For tempering: 1 tsp Udad dal, 1/2 tsp Mustard seeds (Rai), 1 tsp green chillies-finely chopped , 1/2 tsp ginger-finely chopped, Few curry leaves
1 tbsp Cilantro / coriander-finely chopped
1 tsp oil
Salt to taste

Directions:
1. Heat oil in non-stick pan. Add mustard seeds-once they pop, add udad dal,curry leaves, cashews, ginger, green chillies.
2.Once udad dal and cashews turn golden, add the vegetables, turmeric, salt. Sprinkle some water, and keep a lid on the pan so that the vegetables cook fast. This will take around 4-5 min.
3.Once the vegetables are cooked, add the boiled pasta, and toss around so that all the spices are evenly coated.
4. Take the pan off flame, garnish with coriander and serve piping hot.

A cup of filter coffee will give good company to this Penne Upma!

Friday, December 27, 2013

Twisty Pasta Delight

This dish tasted fantastic. It is a great vegetarian dish and if you want to be extra healthy you could use wholewheat pasta and a little less cheese, either way it is yummy! Cooking your vegetables on a low flame all the way through in a small pan gives the carrots and peppers the juicy and sweet flavour that is so very delicious.

Ingredients
1 Yellow Capsicum/Pepper(sliced)
Half Onion(sliced)
2 Small Carrots(sliced thin)
Hand Full Mushrooms(sliced)
3 Cloves Garlic(crushed)
2 Tbsp Grated Parmesan Cheese
Small Chunk Edam Cheese(grated)
Large Pinch Black Pepper
3 Drops Lemon Juice
Olive Oil

3 Hand fulls of spiral shaped Pasta(or pasta shape of your liking)

Fry your carrots and onions together in a small pan for 4-5 minutes. If you use a frying pan it will cook too quickly.