Broccoli and Bow Ties – Presto Pasta Nights
June 1, 2007 | Filed Under Pasta, Presto Pasta Nights, Vegetables | 14 Comments
This is one of the very first recipes I tried by the popular T.V. chef, the Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten). Oh, the simplicity of it!
Broccoli is one of my favorite vegetables. I could eat it forever and a day and never get tired of it. And I like farfalle pasta, although I don’t eat it often.
My favorite part of this recipe is the combination of butter, oil, garlic, and lemon zest prepared and poured over the pasta and broccolli. The smell is delightful and the taste so delicious that I think it’ll appeal to all types of eaters — even picky ones. 
I’d like to contribute this recipe to the Presto Pasta Nights event that Ruth of Once Upon A Feast hosts weekly. If you have a favorite pasta recipe and would like to participate, here are the guidelines. Ruth posts a roundup of the recipes contritubed every Friday on her site.
Continue to have a good week!
Paz
BROCCOLI AND BOW TIES
Kosher salt
8 cups broccoli florets (4 heads)
1/2 pound farfalle (bow tie) pasta
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons good olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 lemon, zested
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/4 cup toasted pignoli (pine) nuts
Freshly grated Parmesan, optional
Cook the broccoli for 3 minutes in a large pot of boiling salted water. Remove the broccoli from the water with a slotted spoon or sieve. Place in a large bowl and set aside.
In the same water, cook the bow-tie pasta according to the package directions, about 12 minutes. Drain well and add to the broccoli.
Meanwhile, in a small saute pan, heat the butter and oil and cook the garlic and lemon zest over medium-low heat for 1 minute. Off the heat, add 2 teaspoons salt, the pepper, and lemon juice and pour this over the broccoli and pasta. Toss well. Season to taste, sprinkle with the pignolis and cheese, if using, and serve.
To toast pignolis, place them in a dry saute pan over medium-low heat and cook, tossing often, for about 5 minutes, until light brown.
Mushrooms & Egg Noodles
December 6, 2006 | Filed Under Foods I Never Liked Before Until I Started to Cook, Mushrooms, Pasta | Leave a Comment
I’ve mentioned that I’ve discovered I like mushrooms! A lot!
Here’s another easy and tasty recipe with mushrooms from Coconut and Lime. LOVE it! Thanks, Rachel!
Paz
Mushrooms & Egg Noodles
Coconut and Lime
Ingredients:
½ lb egg noodles
â…†cup fresh parsley, chopped
6 oz mushrooms, sliced
1 large clove garlic, minced
1 shallot, minced
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
Juice of ½ lemon
salt
Directions:
Bring a large pot of water to boil. Then add egg noodles and cook about 6 minutes or until tender. Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, heat the butter and oil. Add the shallot and garlic, sauté until soft and translucent but not browned, about 8 minutes. Add mushrooms and sauté, stirring occasionally, until coated and cooked through. Drain the egg noodles and toss with parsley and lemon juice. Add the mushroom mixture and a sprinkle of salt and toss again. Serve immediately.
Baked Fish and Angel Hair Pasta
April 4, 2006 | Filed Under Angel Hair, Codfish, Pasta, Seafood | Leave a Comment
Rachael Ray made a Baked Fish and Angel Hair Pasta recipe on her show, and it caught my interest. Why? Guess? Because it’s simple! 
The main ingredients are the fish (cod fish although haddock may be substituted), stewed tomatoes, garlic and parsley. I think the most energy I exerted making this meal occurred as I opened a wine bottle for the stew to go with the fish. I have a small corkscrew in the shape of the Mannekin Pis, which was given to me as a gift in Belgium. I think it’s more for show instead of function, but I use it when the need arises. This time I had quite a bit of challenge using it.
Oh, another important ingredient: Angel hair pasta. Let’s not forget that. After I made the baked fish, I mixed the pasta in the juices of the baked fish, giving it flavor. I recommend this recipe.
Paz
Mannekin Pis corkscrew
Baked Fish and Angel Hair Pasta
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, twice-around-the-pan
1 small onion, finely chopped, about 1/3 cup
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 cup dry white wine
1 (15-ounce) can stewed tomatoes
3 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
2 pounds cod or haddock, rinsed and dried
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 pound angel hair, cooked just shy of al dente, about 4 or 5 minutes
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
To a small skillet preheated over medium heat, add extra-virgin olive oil, onion and garlic.
Cook onions 5 minutes, until translucent.
Add wine to the pan and reduce for 30 seconds.
Add tomatoes and break up the sliced stewed tomatoes with a wooden spoon as they heat through. When the sauce comes to a boil (2 or 3 minutes) remove it from the heat and stir in the parsley.
Season the fish with salt and pepper. Pour a few spoonfuls of sauce into the bottom of a shallow baking dish. Add fish to the dish in a single layer. Add remaining sauce and bake 15 to 17 minutes until fish is firm and opaque.
Remove fish to serving plate or dinner plates. Spoon a few bits of tomato and sauce over the fish.
To the remaining sauce in the baking dish add 2 tablespoons butter cut into small pieces.
Add hot pasta to butter and sauce and turn pasta in dish to coat evenly and to allow pasta to absorb juices.
Pile pasta alongside fish and serve.
If you are entertaining, try bundling portions of pasta around a large, 2-pronged meat fork, by twisting the fork in the pasta allowing it to curl up the fork. Shimmy the twisted pasta off the fork on to a plate you will create pasta “nests.” This simple “twist” adds a lot to the plate presentation.
Macarrones con Pollo
October 17, 2005 | Filed Under Pasta, Poultry | 4 Comments
My new authentic paella pan from Spain!
Last week, I received a special surprise gift when Tattum sent me an authentic, gigantic paella pan from Spain! I couldn’t believe my eyes! It’s so large that it takes up two burners on my stove and I can cook for a whole army on it. Perfect to make food for family and friends!
Not long ago, I’d made paella and realized that the pan is also an important part of the cooking process. My paella turned out fine, but I knew that it would turn out even better when prepared in the proper pan.
Now, I have the chance to make the best paella dishes that I can with my new pan.
Shortly before I received the pan, I’d seen two recipes demonstrated by T.V. chef Daisy, which called for the use of a paella pan. They weren’t the normal paella recipes that I’d become accustomed to seeing because instead of rice, pasta was used. Tattum later explained that one of the recipes is called a fideua. I plan on preparing that next.
I christened my new pan by making Macarrones con Pollo (Maccaroni with chicken). It’s basically pasta, chicken, and a spicy tomato sauce. What fun I had cooking in my new paella pan!
Unfortunately, Daisy’s site does not have the recipe listed, so I had to estimate on some of the measurements.
The recipe basically calls for putting salt and pepper on chicken. You can use a whole chicken cut into pieces. I used separate pieces (dark meat – legs and thighs); brown the chicken in olive oil on a medium flame in the paella pan. When the chicken is brown, add cut chorizo pieces (sausage) in the middle of the pan. Remove the chicken and place aside. Add about ½ Cup sofrito (the special base used a lot in Latino cooking, which I first mentioned here – I made it from scratch or you can use a store-bought version); roughly chop and add about ¼ Cup Alcaparrado (pimento stuffed olives and capers). If you can’t find the Alcaparrado, simply take about 6 pimento stuffed olives and 3 Tablespoons of capers, mix and roughly chop them. Add about 3 – 4 ajicito dulces (peppers) If you can’t find them, you can substitute them with a handful of chopped cilantro. Add it to the pan. Add 1 tsp cumin, ½ Cup White wine, 28oz. can tomatoes (whole or crushed); tuck 2 bay leaves (preferably fresh) into the sauce. Add the chicken back to the pan and top the sauce with a generous handful of chopped fresh cilantro. Add freshly ground black pepper. Let it simmer for about 30 minutes. In the meantime, boil Macarrones #28 (pasta) in separate pot. When the sauce is ready, the chicken should be falling off the bone. Put it in a platter. Put the pasta in another platter and spoon a little sauce over it. It’s ready to serve. To make a plate, take some pasta, then place chicken over it. Spoon the sauce over the pasta and chicken. Totally delicious! I served this dish with garlic bread.
In addition to the pan, Tattum also sent me a paella cookbook, with 180 recipes from the Andalusian region of Spain – Secretos de los fogones del Sur (Secrets of the Stoves of the South) by Esperanza Peláez. I look forward to making the different types of paella in the book. So stay tuned to my paella dishes here. Thank you Tattum!
Besos,
Paz
Maccarones con Pollo ready to eat!
Spaghetti with Seafood Tunisian Style
October 8, 2005 | Filed Under African Recipes, Pasta, Seafood | Leave a Comment
Ya Rayi Our Rai is a blog by Farid Zadi with different contributors. It, along with his second blog Algerian Cuisine features enticing North African recipes.
Recently, I tried a recipe for Spaghetti with Seafood Tunisian Style by Anis Toumis. I’m happy to write that I did a decent job.
The ingredients include spaghetti, shrimp, cuttle fish, clams, tomatoes, green chilis, tomato paste, saffron, onions, garlic and a choice of parsley or cilantro.
I once made the comment about not being able to cook until I had all the ingredients that the recipe called for and Anis replied, “Think like a North African when you’re preparing North African dishes. We do not worry about [what] we do not have. We take care with what we do have.”
Well, this was the perfect time for me to follow Anis’ advice, as I didn’t have all the ingredients. With the Spaghetti with Seafood Tunisian Style recipe, I made a few ingredient substitutions and in some cases, omissions.
I don’t know what cuttle fish is and couldn’t find it. I meant to substitute it with another type of fish, but forgot to buy the fish and ended up leaving it out of my recipe, altogether. In any event, I was satisfied to include shrimp and clams alone in the meal.
I couldn’t find green chilis and ended up using cayenne pepper. I didn’t have anymore saffron because I’d used it, earlier, for my paella recipe. As a result, I substituted it with tumeric, instead.
The ingredients also include tabil spice mix – a blend of coriander, caraway, garlic and cayenne pepper. I couldn’t find caraway in the store. So, I left it out. What is caraway, anyway? I have to look it up and see what it looks like.
Following the instructions, I made my spaghetti (Angel Hair pasta) in a separate pot, and made the sauce in another. I sautéed the onions, which took a shorter time than the instructions to turn golden, and added the tomato paste, tomatoes, and spices. Then I added the shrimp and clams. In a short time my meal was prepared.
Angel Hair pasta
Onions, garlic, tomato paste, spices
My only problem was that none of the clams opened, indicating that they weren’t good. I ended up discarding them, unfortunately. As a result, my seafood ingredient was reduced to a list of one – the shrimps.
Fresh tomatoes, shrimp and clams (which never opened)
However, this did not take away from the success of my dish. I garnished it with cilantro and it tasted delicious. Best of all, I liked the spices, which I think made the difference in the recipe.
This is a meal that I plan on making again. Perhaps, the next time around, I’ll find all the ingredients and my clams will open up. If not, that’s okay, too. It’s good to think like a North African when preparing North African dishes.
Paz
