Serves 4-6
Husband-Tested
Recipe from Alice Wootton
This is one of those
clean-out-the-fridge recipes I made one day that turned out quite good. I used
the vegetables that I had in my refrigerator at the time, but you could
certainly use other vegetables and even add some cooked chicken. Pesto is packed with summery flavor. It’s quite easy to make homemade pesto if you
have a food processor. Pesto can be made in advance and put in the freezer.
This makes a lovely side dish or a lunchbox main dish. (I served it as a side
for dinner along with Turkey Meatloaf.)
4-6 cups
whole-wheat pasta (I used a half package of whole-wheat fusilli pasta.)
2 carrots,
scrubbed and chopped
½ cucumber,
peeled, seeded and chopped
3-4
scallions, sliced thin
Handful of
baby spinach, chopped
6 cherry
tomatoes
½ cup cubed
cheese (I used a hard cheese infused with
herbs.)
Kosher
salt, to taste
Freshly
ground pepper, to taste
Bring a
large pot of water to a boil. Add 1
Tablespoon of Kosher salt to the boiling water.
Add the pasta and cook according to package directions. (Set a timer. You will add the carrots to the pasta water
when the pasta is almost done.) Meanwhile,
scoop the pesto into a large bowl. Prepare the vegetables by slicing or
chopping. Set aside the chopped carrots (or other dense vegetables you wish to
add to the salad.) Put the scallions,
tomatoes, cheese, spinach and cucumbers in the large bowl with the pesto. When there is 4 minutes left on the timer for
the pasta, add the carrots to the pasta pot. This will cook the carrots a bit
so that they are tender. When the pasta
is done, drain the pasta/carrot mix in a colander. Immediately add the hot pasta/carrot mix to
the large bowl. Allow the pasta to soften/melt the pesto a bit (just about a
minute) and then toss the salad well so that the pasta and vegetables are well
coated. Add Kosher salt and freshly ground
pepper to taste. Serve as a main dish or
as a side.
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