Pasta

Pasta Experiment v.1.0

~ Hilary ~ 4 Comments

Lately, all I’ve been eating is soup and cupcakes.  Now a girl can only live off these two things for so long (luckily it takes far longer to get sick of the latter) before she needs to climb out of her winter-induced food rut.  In the end, both these foods failed to satisfy my number one craving… my insane desire for CARBS.  Hence the creation of this pasta dish.

UPDATE: This is a screenshot of the hilarious/devastatingly upsetting email I got from my mom shortly after she read this post.  My mom is a dietician and doesn’t 100 per cent approve of the cupcake quest aforementioned in this entry.

And yes, I said creation.  Alright, so maybe I was partially inspired by a Canadian Living recipe, but the only thing that was similar about the two recipes were the caramelized red onions and the walnuts.  Nonetheless, here is a 1/10 credit to them for this veggie loaded dish.

But I do feel like I should start making more of my own dishes.  I’ve apparently garnered some sort of reputation for being a foodie, and to live up to this title I need to start experimenting around more with my meals.  Through the creation of different dishes, I’ve discovered that I’m atrociously bad at naming said meals.  As a journalism student, I can’t write headlines, and as a foodie, I can’t name recipes.  Shame on me.  So for lack of any sort of naming talent, I decided to call this one Pasta Experiment v.1.0, in hopes that I can one day change the title to something that vaguely resembles a proper recipe name.

Now that I’m having a petite pity party, I also feel bad about the pictures.  As most of you are aware, the winter has made the days dreadfully short.  This, combined with the fact that I often cook these meals at 9 p.m. when I finally get home from school, all contribute to the re-heated wonder that occurs for almost all my photos.  What this means is that the day after I make this meal, I yank my leftovers out of the fridge and slop them down on a pretty plate during the bright morning hours.  I then photograph this delicious looking meal while drinking my orange pekoe tea, and send my stomach into a series of unhappy gurgling fits until it gets fed a proper lunch.  Such a first-world problem, I apologize.

But enough with my ranting, here are the pictures…

Also, you can find my recipe after this short photographic interlude.

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Greek-Style Macaroni and Cheese

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

Macaroni and cheese (better known in student terms as the beloved Kraft Dinner) is something that most people my age can’t live without.  I am no different, and sometimes experience cheesy pasta cravings so violent that I don’t know what to do with myself.  As much as I love good ol’ KD, I thought I’d expand on the classical student meal of choice and try Canadian Living’s most recent twist on the original.  I made an adaptation of the recipe, the original of which can be found in the January edition of the magazine.  The dish is appropriately located under the “hearty foods to go” section – the perfect section for a busy student who is always on the run and in dire need of a quick and delicious foodie fix.

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Spinach Alfredo con Pollo

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

I am currently sitting on a semi-comfortable metal bench at the Ottawa Greyhound Station waiting for the midnight bus home.  Little Iman is sitting next to me, watching My Fair Lady with a look pasted on her face that can only be described as sheer innocence.  At this point, I realize I have absolutely nothing better to do with my time than update this blog, so here we go.  Now that you know my exact location, the fun begins!  Oh, one more thing before I start: I love that my iPhone allows me to tether internet to my laptop.  The magic of technology, right?

In case some of you were thrown by the fancy name of this post, I apologize.  Since this was a recipe that I sort of partially invented myself, I didn’t have the standard copying-and-pasting of the Canadian Living recipe to rely upon.  This being said, I sat on our futon for about 10 minutes this evening, half watching Hells Kitchen (that guy Louis is kind of cute) and half trying to figure out what the formal name for white cream pasta sauce was.  Thank god my fabulous roommate Natalie came along.  She quickly fed me the words “alfredo” and “con pollo,” the second of which apparently means “with chicken.”  Who would have known?

Considering this was something I just whipped up quickly the other night, it was super delicious and filling.  I was dying for a major carb fix and knew that only spaghetti could satisfy this endless craving.  I also had lots of whipped cream leftover from Capital Cupcake Camp, so I decided to make and try my first white pasta sauce ever.  The sauce was adapted from Canadian Living’s Basic White Sauce recipe with a few tiny alternations made here and there to allow for the thickening properties of flour to kick some ass.

Inside the sauce was chopped red pepper, baby spinach, onion, garlic and chicken (hence the con pollo).  Overall, this pasta dish was really easy to make and produced some extremely satisfying leftovers (seriously, all I’ve eaten in the past 24 hours has been this pasta, it makes about four servings).

Since this is my own creation, here are the instructions!

Recipe:
Use the Canadian Living recipe listed above to make the basic white sauce, stirring in an additional tablespoon of flour when sauce is simmering, to allow for a thicker consistency.  After sauce has simmered for 15 minutes, add it to:

– 2 cooked chicken breasts, sliced
– 1 onion, chopped
– 2 cloves of garlic
– 1 thinly sliced red pepper
– 1 cup of baby spinach, whole

(all of these things should be fried on a non-stick pan in the order listed above with 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil prior to sauce-adding, about 15 minutes)

While the sauce and vegetables are cooking, add 200 g. of spaghetti (about two big handfulls) to a pot of boiling water.

Mix spaghetti and sauce mixture together to combine awesome tastes.

Final step?  ENJOY!

Wish me luck on the bus!

Gruyere and Ham Pasta (Gruyere = the king of all cheese)

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

The insanity of what is my third year of university has finally begun in full force.  Rushing home from class and work today, Brittany (roomie) and I trekked down to the Byward Market in hunt of leather bracelets (Britt wants to be a rock star) and gruyere cheese.  Unable to find either of these two items (well this is a bit of a lie…the gruyere cheese at the International House of Cheese was, what I thought, super overpriced = not good), we sped off in Britt’s little hatchback and over to the trusty neighbourhood grocery store.

It was at this location that I found out buying a brick of gruyere cheese is nearly as expensive as buying a brick of solid gold.  Apparently the price of gruyere in the Market was actually reasonably priced, and I found myself paying $7.99 for a 195 gram piece of gruyere at the grocery store.  Refusing to accept any sort of cheese alternative for this recipe (although my iPhone tells me a cheaper alternative is emmental), I charged forth with my golden purchase, being sure to appreciate every delicious morsel of that damned cheese brick.

Preparing this Gruyere and Ham Pasta, I was faced with my largest “oh my god I need to cook so quickly” challenge to date.  THANK GOD this recipe was in the “make it in 30 minutes or less” section of my Canadian Living Make it Tonight cookbook.  If I had taken a minute longer to cook this meal, I would have made myself and all of my roommates late fora movie we were seeing.  As is I was forced to pack up my steaming dinner into a tupperware (post-food photographs, obviously) and charge off to the theatre, plastic Ikea fork in hand.  So everyone around me in the theatre could smell onions.. no big deal.

Also, this recipe called for chopped spinach, something I completely forgot to to add in at the last minute.  This being said, everything still tasted great (add lots of pepper though).  Thanks to my forgetful and rushed mind, I can look forward to a delicious baby spinach salad sometime later this week.  Perhaps it will involve strawberries.

Oooo, also this recipe made use of these fun little “Scoobi-doo” noodles, which I was disappointed to see did not resemble the cartoon character whatsoever.  Oh well, life goes on for those of us who are eternally young at heart.

PS: In case you are still rattled by how much I paid for the cheese (yes mom, I’m thinking you), this recipe actually made four servings, making the price for each serving be about $2.50.  Not the best, but not too shabby either.

Broccoli Mozzarella Pasta Toss

~ Hilary ~ Leave a comment

Prior to this meal, I was absolutely petrified of broccoli.  After frequent verbal prodding by my roommate Natalie, I finally decided that I could avoid this vegetable no longer, and had to include it in one of my upcoming meals.  When I was young, I used to refuse to eat the flower of the broccoli, forcing my mom to chop off the top in favour of me eating only the stalk.  Since I’m a tad older now, I have decided to embrace (or at least try) the things I disliked when I was younger, and carefully cut florets out of my broccoli, leaving only the flower to be eaten.

Like the salad in my last post, this meal was only partially inspired by a Canadian Living recipe.  The inspiring recipe, which was called Orecchiette with Broccoli and Garlic, was the basis for this meal.  I couldn’t find any orecchiette (a cute little pasta that resembles a small ear) in the grocery store, and settled for another cutesy alternative, lumache.  I personally thought the pasta resembled snails, which I thought was absolutely adorable.  Also, I added a diced red pepper, a cup and a half of grated mozzarella cheese and bacon bits (yum!) to the mix to make the dish my own.

The final verdict on the broccoli?  The chewy tops tasted like delicious little cheese balls.  Absolutely glorious.  My 10-year-old self would be shocked at how far I’ve come.