greg cooks

nourishing the body

pasta

Spring Green

Yes, spring is arriving here in the frozen north. I can’t wait to get digging into the dirt and get my garden planted for the season. One thing I grow in abundance every year is basil. I love pesto and can’t wait for the height of summer when the basil comes into my kitchen by the bushel. I can eat pesto on anything from pizza to sandwiches to, of course, pasta. In anticipation of the coming gardening season I made a pesto pasta dish. This is not my usual pesto as the little containers of basil I find at the grocery are way too expensive to make a big batch. So I kicked this one up by combining the basil with baby spinach leaves. So, I guess it’s a basil and spinach pesto. It was nicely flavored with the basil but the spinach tamed it down so it was not so over the top as I usually do it. I also added some chicken, mushrooms, onions and garlic to this dish along with some fresh tomato at the end. Here are more details of the recipe I whipped up for this dish. Oh, I didn’t realize I was out of pine nuts and walnuts so I used almonds instead. Turned out pretty good.

BASIL SPINACH PESTO

1 package of fresh basil leaves (about 1/2 cup loosely packed leaves)
2 cups fresh baby spinach leaves
2 cloves garlic
1/3 cup grated parmigiano reggiano
1/4 cup slivered almonds (walnuts or pine nuts are better)
juice of one lemon
pinch of salt
pinch of black pepper
extra virgin olive oil, about 1/2 cup (I didn’t measure)

All the ingredients except the oil were added to a blender. The ingredients were processed while drizzling in the olive oil to make a loose sauce or paste. You could add a bit of water too if you want to cut down on the oil. A wooden spoon was carefully used to stir the leaves in the blender while processing. The pesto sauce was set aside until needed.

OTHER SAUCE INGREDIENTS

1 pound of sliced boneless skinless chicken breast
1 onion, sliced
3 cloves of garlic chopped
5 large button mushrooms, sliced
salt and pepper to taste
2 chopped fresh tomato

To a hot large pan (I used a wok, actually) was added about a tablespoon of olive oil. The onions and mushrooms were added along with a bit of salt and pepper and sautéed until fully cooked. The garlic was added toward the end of the cooking. The onion and mushroom mixture was removed from the pan and the chicken slices, seasoned with salt and pepper, were added. Once the chicken was cooked through the onion mixture was added back to the pan.

Meanwhile in a large pot of boiling water a 1 pound package of thin whole wheat spaghetti was cooking. Once it was cooked to al dente the paste was drained and added to the chicken and onion mixture. A splash of the pasta water was added to prevent burning in the pan. The pesto sauce and fresh tomatoes were added and the paste was tossed to mix everything well. This was turned out into a serving bowl.

More Pasta

My pasta love affair is not over yet. With the same dough I made for the orrechiette, I rolled out another favorite pasta shape of mine, pappardelle. This is like a big wide fettucine noodle. I rolled them out into sheets using my pasta roller and then cut them into wide strips by hand. Another mushroom based sauce was perfect for this. I sautéed garlic, onion and mushrooms in olive oil, added bit of non-fat half and half for richness and tossed in some fresh grated parmigiano reggiano. This was garnished with a bit of fresh parsley. Another satisfying pasta meal.

Tasty Little Ears

Ok, ok. I know the title of this post is scary. Especially after my post about chicken feet which probably has you really worried that I am now cooking up pig ears or something. Don’t worry! I promise you’ll like this. I’m talking about the little ear shaped pasta known as orechiette. I’ve made them for the first time and they turned out pretty good. I threw together some pasta dough using flour, water, salt and egg. This was cut into small pieces and then pressed with my thumb in the palm of my hand to shape the dough into little ears. They are thicker than your typical orrechiette but I like my pasta thick and chewy.


Most orechiette recipes you see are made with broccoli rabe. I made mine with chicken and spinach. It had lots of garlic, of course. A splash of cream and some parmigiano reggiano and that’s all you need for a wholesome, delicious, filling meal.

Four courses

First I must apologize for being awol for a while. Life and work have been getting in the way lately of my blogging efforts. Although I have been cooking here and there and have several dishes to catch up on. I wanted to share a meal I made a couple weeks ago. This was a four course meal starting with a light Greek salad. The foundation of the salad is a bed of romaine and red leaf lettuce. That was tossed with a rather simple but flavorful lemon and olive oil dressing. The salad is topped with sliced red onions. I like to soak them first in ice water after slicing to tame down their heat. There’s also some greek salad peppers, kalamata olives and, of course, feta cheese. The whole thing was garnished with a bit of sumac powder.

I have been on a real pasta kick lately and it started with this fettucine al fungi. Homemade pasta is so simple to make that I can’t understand why I don’t do it every day. I never really measure for my pasta. Sometimes I’ll use egg, sometimes not. Just mix some flour, egg, water and salt, knead it until elastic, and let it rest for a bit before rolling out. I have a pasta roller that makes easy work of it. Nothing can beat the taste and texture of fresh pasta. This evening I made a mushroom, cream and cheese sauce for it. It has three kinds of mushrooms – dried shitakes (soaked), fresh shitakes, and fresh baby portabellos. These were sautéed in a pan with good olive oil and of course lots of garlic. A splash of cream and a splash of truffle oil were added and the fresh cooked pasta was tossed in. A handful of grated parmigiano reggiano was added and the pasta was plated up.

Beef was on the menu for the main course. As a unifying theme I went with beef and mushrooms but I moved from the Mediterranean to Asia with this sesame, garlic and soy marinated beef. It was a pretty simple stir fry but had plenty of flavor. I served it with polenta that had been cooked with the retained liquid from soaking the mushrooms. I also served up some baby bok choy seasoned with soy and sesame oil.

For dessert a rather simple chocolate mousse. Nothing fancy here. I just melted some good chocolate and folded it in to some whipped cream. That’s it! Easy as mousse.

Buckwheat Fettucine

I adore pasta. A simple food but one that is so satisfying. Fresh pasta is so much better than the dried kind too, and it’s really not hard to make. It is especially easy if you have a pasta rolling/cutting machine to help you out (which I do). I had in mind to make a pasta last night and when I was rummaging through my pantry I saw a package of buckwheat flour that I had forgotten about. Perfect! Buckwheat pasta. I love Japanese soba noodles and thought I could use the flour in a more Italian inspired pasta. So, I made some fettucine. I made a rather soft dough using 1 cup of unbleached all purpose flour, 1/2 cup of buckwheat flour, 1 tsp of salt and about 3/4 cup of water. This was kneaded in my kitchenaid for about 5 minutes until it was nice and stretchy. I wrapped it in plastic wrap and let it sit for about an hour. I rolled it out using my pasta machine then ran it through the fettucine cutter to make long strands. I needed to use quite a bit of flour along the way as this was a pretty wet dough. I let this hang to dry for a while so it would be easier to handle. I have had problems before just piling up my pasta and coming back a few minutes later to find my nicely cut ribbons all stuck together in a big mass of dough. Hanging them helps to keep them from clumping together.

My fettucine was flavored with a creamy chicken, rosemary and pea sauce. I started by sautéing cut up boneless chicken breast. This was removed and set aside to be added back at the end. I caramelized some onion in a pan and near the end added chopped garlic. The peas went in along with a few tbsp of chopped fresh rosemary and this was cooked for just a minute. About a cup of milk with 2 tbsp of flour whisked in was added to make a thickening cream sauce. It actually thickened too much. I used way too much flour I think. I’ll have to really cut it down next time. I did thin it out a bit with some of the pasta water, but it was still a little too thick and pasty in the end. Lessons learned! I threw in the chicken to reheat with the sauce. In went the freshly cooked pasta and a half cup of parmigiano reggiano. Overall it had a pretty good flavor. The texture of the pasta was very nice. Next time I have to make this the right way with cream and cheese to avoid the bland pasty sauce.