Pasta with Pea Pesto

On Sunday, Heather and I tried a new recipe. I found this one through Tastespotting, and followed the recipe almost exactly.

Pasta with Pea Pesto

From the Sunny Vegan.

Ingredients:

1 pound linguine **I used Deboles Gluten Free Penne**
1/4 cup walnuts plus more for garnish
1 cup peas **I used frozen peas, that were slightly warmed in the microwave**
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbs fresh basil plus more to garnish
3 tbs fresh parsley
salt and pepper

Method:

boil a large pot of generously salted water and cook pasta according to package directions.
in a food processor, finely grind walnuts then add peas. scraping the sides as needed. add the olive oil 1 tablespoon at a time and continue to blend until smooth. add basil and parsley and blend again, then add salt and pepper to taste. place finished pesto in a large bowl and add drained pasta, toss until blended and top with walnuts and fresh basil.

Weekend's Worth of Dinners

Linked to Slightly Indulgent Tuesday at Simply Sugar and Gluten Free.

I've been pretty impressed with myself this weekend. My grandparents were visiting, and after completely panicking about what to feed them, I think I have done pretty well. I managed to feed them well -- hopefully well enough that they didn't realize everything that was missing -- and stick to my diet and get my gut healing.

Dinner 1: Stir Fry
At first my plan was to do fried rice. But that didn't pan out because I didn't have time to cook the rice beforehand. This was actually fine. I stir fried a huge pan of vegetables, added shrimp, and had some good sushi rice.

Veggies:
Snow peas
Broccoli
Leeks
Celery
Carrots
Zucchini
All veggies were chopped and sauteed in a little canola oil. At the end of the cooking time I added a dash of gluten-free tamari.

Shrimp: pre-cooked, frozen shrimp. Thawed in cold running water (per package directions) and then tossed in with the veggies at the very end. Just to get a little warmer.

Sushi rice: cooked according to directions. What made this good was a hearty dash of rice vinegar after cooking.

Dinner 2: Pasta two ways
This time I tried the Deboles gluten-free multigrain spaghetti. I am NOT recommending this. I really liked the penne style and the taste is good. But somehow, in the process of cooking, the spaghetti-style broke into a million tiny pieces. Definitely not spaghetti.

Sauces: Parsley pesto and a tweaked tomato

Parsley Pesto
fill the bowl of the food processor at least half full of parsley. (I thought this was a fantastic use for my slightly wilted parsley).
1 clove garlic
2 handfuls of toasted pinenuts
1 tsp salt
olive oil
Just drizzle in the olive oil and pulse until everything blends and starts getting smooth.

Tweaked Tomato Sauce
I make good tomato sauce. I lived in Italy. I learned. However on my current diet, I can't have most of the things that you put in tomato sauce (I can't eat the tomatoes either). So when I planned this meal, I thought I had a jar of tomato sauce in my pantry. Turns out it is salsa.

Since I can't eat many of the "normal" things, like onions. I simply don't have them in my house any more. So here are the on-the-fly changes I made.

1 can diced tomatoes
1 carrot, sliced
1/2 rib of celery, sliced
1/4 leek, sliced
olive oil
basil
salt and pepper
Sautee the carrot, celery and leek in the olive oil. Add the tomatoes and seasoning. Bring to a boil and then simmer.

This dinner was served with a large salad.

Dinner 3: Salmon
For Sunday dinner, I got a little fancier. I made Salmon with cucumber relish, green beans, and brown rice.

The salmon. Hmmm... now that I look back at that original recipe, I realize that I cut my cucumber much larger. Perhaps next time I will try it smaller.

Green beans
Wash and trim the green beans. Fill a large frying pan with a little water, just enough to coat the bottom. Bring the water to a boil and add the zest of a lemon. Add the beans and steam until bright green.
This time I didn't bother zesting the lemon. I just used my peeler to slice off pieces of the peel. I added those and a little juice.


All in all it was a good and tasty weekend.

Fried Egg with Cilantro Pesto and Avocado

I modified the menu plan and came up with this lovely concoction. I was told to eat more avocados (yeah, twist my arm, I love avocados) and fortunately for me avocados were on sale for 88 cents at Walmart last week.

Fried Egg with Cilantro Pesto and Avocado

2 eggs

1 bunch cilantro

1 tbs lime juice

1 tbs olive oil

dash of salt

sliced avocado

Fry the two eggs (I prefer mine hard but cook them to your taste).

In a food processor, chop the cilantro and add the lime juice, olive oil and salt, combining into a pesto consistency.

Plate the eggs, spread the pesto on top, and then layer a few slices of avocado on top.

A modification could be to put this on a slice of gluten-free bread.

Pesto, Peppers, and Stir Fry

Good food weekend. I kept thinking I'd treat myself to dinner out, but then I kept realizing that I have a ton of food in the fridge. So I enjoyed it.

Meal #1: Cilantro Pesto over Rice
Bunch of cilantro
Lime juice
1 green onion
Olive oil
A dash of salt
A dash of ground ginger

I pulsed everything in the food processor and then put it over rice.

Meal #2: Stuffed green peppers
I got 4 green peppers on the cheap, so I decided to stuff them.

1 cup of rice (or so)
1/2 can of black beans
2 chipotle peppers (canned)
2-3 tbs adobo sauce (the sauce the chipotles are canned in)
1 diced tomato
3 tbs chopped onions
lime juice
cilantro

I realized afterward that I could have added corn as well.

I just mixed everything together, until it looked like the blend I wanted, then cored the green peppers, stuffed them, covered with a sprinkle of cheese and baked at 350 for 20 minutes.

Since I had so many peppers, I froze some of them (before I cooked them).

Meal #3: Curried Apple Chicken Stir Fry
I'm editing to add a note about this stir fry. First, it has curry in it, so I expected it to be spicy, and was kind of disappointed that it is sweet. So next time I will add more curry paste, and I'm adjusting the leftovers with salt, pepper, cumin, and probably chili powder too.

Also, next time I will make either the stir fry, or the rice, not both. I don't need a fancy dressed-up rice when I am covering it with stir fry.

Everything has tasted really good.

Food Processor

Last night was a food processor night.

First I used it to make fresh pesto. A friend at work brought in a huge bag of basil from her garden. It looks way better than mine, so she shared a bit with me.

Pesto
Fill the bowl of the food processor with fresh basil leaves.
Add a handful or two of grated Parmesan cheese.
Add a 1/4 teaspoon of garlic.
Add a teaspoon of salt.
Start pulsing the food processor. Drizzle in olive oil.
You need enough olive oil to make it a liquid-ish/saucy consistency.

I served the pesto over pasta, then added a few pieces of chopped tomato from my garden and a sprinkle of parmesan cheese.

Secondly I used the food processor to make hummus. I found this recipe. At first I was doubtful about actually making hummus cheaper than buying it, because the tahini costs about $6 per jar. But I decided to try it.

Following the recipe exactly made enough hummus to fill one of my rectangular gladware containers really really full. That is at least twice as much hummus as I get when I buy it at the grocery store for $3.69 per container. So I decided it is cheaper to make it. And it tastes good.

But the next time I make it, I will do a half batch, because it was a little overwhelming for my little food processor.