End-of-the-week pasta

Aneela Mirchandani Californian food, Italian food, Pasta and pasta sauces Tags: , , , , ,
End-of-the-week pasta

End-of-the-week pasta

Friday night and the fridge is empty. Dinner needs to be made. The kid is hanging around the kitchen wanting to ‘help’, while the husband wants something simple and non-fussy. But good, of course — it has to be good. What to do? What to do?

Tucked away in a corner of the fridge, there is that radicchio left over from that salad I made, and some green garlic I picked up for a forgotten project. And of course there are some indestructibles hidden in the pantry, the dried mushrooms, the sundried tomatoes. The recipe invents itself! It’s time for the: ‘End-of-the-week Pasta’! Otherwise known as the: ‘Kitchen-sink Pasta’, or perhaps the ‘What-is-that?-throw-it-in Pasta’. Or maybe I want to call it the ‘Fresh Linguini with Radicchio and Slivered Almonds in a Porcini and Green Garlic Sauce’. What do you think?

Fresh Linguini with Radicchio and Slivered Almonds in a Porcini and Green Garlic Sauce

Curtain of linguini

Curtain of linguini

This recipe does not demand fresh homemade pasta, but it does politely ask for it. The delicacy of fresh pasta allows you to individually taste the many — um, disparate ingredients. My daughter loves helping with cranking the pasta machine, and loves the curtain of pasta strands that get extruded, so that’s a plus (no homework on Friday evenings, need to keep her busy). For the fresh pasta look here — It’s nice to be kneaded.

I also used cheddar cubes to finish, which formed nice gooey cheesiness around the strands.

A note about salt. I didn’t add any except to the pasta water, because I had the anchovies. If you leave those out, please do add salt to taste.

Here are some pictures to show the process.

Radicchio gets sliced

Radicchio gets sliced

Porcini reconstituting

Porcini reconstituting

Green garlic sliced

Green garlic sliced

Stuff cooking

Stuff cooking

Stuff cooked

Stuff cooked

Radicchio wilting

Radicchio wilting

Cheddar enters

Cheddar enters

Rapidly disappearing

Rapidly disappearing

Linguini with Radicchio and Slivered Almonds in a Porcini and Green Garlic Sauce

Ingredients:
  • Pasta strands from half a portion of pasta dough from this recipe
  • About a third of a bulb of radicchio
  • Big pinch of dried porcini mushrooms, reconstituted in hot water, or fistful of fresh
  • 3 green garlic stems, green and white parts (substitute with few cloves of garlic)
  • 2 – 3 anchovies
  • Big pinch of sundried tomatoes
  • Big pinch of slivered almonds
  • 2 inch block of great cheddar cheese, cubed
  • 1/4 cup good olive oil
Method:

Slice the radicchio, the mushrooms, and the green garlic. Set salted water to boil for cooking the pasta (about 1/2 gallon). While the water is coming to a boil, prepare the sauce. Heat the olive oil in a wide pan on medium. Put in the green garlic and anchovies. The anchovies can be left whole because they will simply merge into the surroundings. When they start to sizzle, put in the sliced porcini, the slivered almonds, and the sundried tomatoes. After a few minutes of cooking these, the radicchio can go in, just to wilt, it doesn’t need to cook long. Cover to keep warm and turn it off to wait for the pasta.

Meanwhile the water will have come to a boil. The pasta will take only a few minutes if you used the fresh ones, otherwise follow directions on the box. Fish the pasta out and put into the prepared sauce with the addition of a few ladles of pasta water. Toss to combine. Put the cubes of cheddar on top and stir that in to melt incompletely. Yes, incompletely.

 

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