Whole-Grain Spaghetti with Garlicky Kale and Tomatoes

Wow, what a colorful dish! This one was a great, healthy and fast meal! The recipe is from Real Simple.

We added some sun dried tomato sausage, though the original was veggie. You could also add some white beans or garbanzos instead. I think I would increase the garlic a bit. And the spaghetti was a bit hard to mix everything together…maybe a smaller noodle would work better with this.

Rotini with Butternut Squash

I adapted this recipe from this post at Former Chef’s blog, which was in turn adapted from Giuliano Hazan’s 30 Minute Pasta book. It’s a really fast, really good meal, especially if you cut up the squash in the morning so it’s ready to go a dinner time.

Rotini with Butternut Squash and Bacon
(Adapted from Former Chef and Giuliano Hazan’s Thirty Minute Pasta

1 yellow onion, diced
3 Tbsp. butter
3 oz Pancetta, cut into 1/4″ pieces (could use bacon)
1 medium butternut squash, diced into 1/2″ cubes
1 cup water
salt and pepper to taste
1 lb pasta
3 oz Grated parmesan cheese

Boil water for the pasta. Add the butter to a large saute pan and add the diced onion. Cook over medium heat until golden brown. Add the panceta and cook until it starts to crisp, about 2-3 minutes.

Add the squash and season with salt and pepper. Add the  water, stir and cover with a lid for 10 minutes until the squash is soft. Check after 5 minutes and add more water in 1/4 cup increments if it’s drying out, until the squash is soft enough to mash with the back of a spoon.

Cook pasta and reserve about 1/2 cup of pasta water before draining.

Add 1/4 cup of the reserved pasta water to the sauce, smashing the butternut squash with the back of a large spoon. If it seems too thick, add the other 1/4 cup. Toss the sauce with the cooked pasta and the grated cheese and serve.

 

Fettuccine with Chicken and bell pepper cream sauce

I found this recipe on FamilyOven.com. Seemed like a good use for some leftover chicken breasts, plus peppers and fettuccine are on sale this week. Came out quite good.

Since the chicken was already cooked, I just chopped it up and added it in the end. We also used real cream instead of the fat free stuff!

Pasta with Corn pesto

Tonight, dinner was pasta with corn pesto. We substituted frozen corn, and that made the recipe go a lot faster. Even though it’s the weekend, we needed a quick dinner. With the frozen corn, it took longer to boil the water and cook the pasta than get the pesto made! Dinner was ready in 30 minutes and it was delicious…our youngest threw a fit because he wanted more, luckily I had saved some from my plate.

Pork Shoulder Ragu

This appeared on Dinner A Love Story, one of my favorite sources these days. The original recipe called for braising in a dutch oven for 3-4 hours. Given that we don’t own a dutch over (why do they cost so much!?!) and it is much easier to put stuff in the crock pot and go off to work and come home to a tasty meal, I adapted it for the crock pot…or more truthfully, I just followed the recipe, it didn’t need any adaptation! YUM!

All I did was brown the pork shoulder in a skillet first as directed. After putting the pork in the crock pot I put the red wine in the skillet to deglaze and get all the browned bits scraped up. Add that and everything else to the crock pot and cook on low for a while, I did 9 hours because that’s how long it was until dinner time!

Came out yummy! Thanks for the recipe.