So far the plans for using up all my Farmer’s Market bounty are going well. Friday night – broccoli fusilli. Check. Use up some broccoli and spinach. Check. Abe gets some treats (broccoli stalks and spinach stems). Check.
I really liked the dish, but Colin wasn’t as impressed. He couldn’t (wouldn’t?) really articulate why. I added an extra clove of garlic which gave it quite a bite, maybe that’s why. I liked it though, and it was great again for lunch today (it reheats pretty well). And makes lots of extra pesto, which means it’s one more thing for me to use up. I also have some tomatoes to use (I forgot to include them in the last post). Maybe a nice pesto, tomato, and goat cheese sandwich will appear for lunch this week.
The recipe is from 101 cookbooks (again), with my adjustments shown here.
Broccoli Fusilli
~3 cups broccoli, cut into small florets
1/2 cup walnuts
1/3 cup grated Parmesan
2 cloves of garlic
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
~1/2 pound dried whole wheat fusilli
~15 spinach leaves, cut into slices crosswise then crosswise again into “squares”
Bring a pot of water to boil for the pasta.
Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add broccoli florets and a pinch of salt and saute about one minute, just till the raw edge comes off. Remove from the heat and set aside for a minute to cool slightly. Reserve skillet.
In a food processor, puree the broccoli, walnuts, garlic, parmesan cheese, salt, and lemon juice. With the food processor running, drizzle in the olive oil. Blend till smooth and season to taste with salt and lemon juice.
Add some salt to the pasta pot and then the pasta. Cook to desired doneness. Reserve about 1/3 cup of the pasta water (once pasta is done cooking). Add cooked pasta back to the broccoli skillet and add the chopped spinach. Toss them together so the spinach wilts from the hot pasta. Add about half the pesto and toss to coat all the pasta. Add some of the reserved pasta water, if needed. Add a little more pesto if desired. Serve immediately.
Serves 3-4 as main dish
1 Comment
October 28, 2008 at 12:18 pm
This sounds delicious! I’m adding a link to my “Fall in Love With Broccoli” site. Thank you!!