Simple and easy pasta

Here is a simple, quick and easy pasta for those weekdays when you are very tired after work and want to make something quick but healthy at the same time. I make this often after a tired day's work and it can be a very wholesome meal for the entire family.

Cooking time: 30-40 minutes
Serves: 4 people

Ingredients:

• Pasta - Rainbow rotini 3 -4 cups or spaghetti (3/4 lb - 1 lb). Whole wheat is preferable. I think pasta varieties are available in India also. I will check for those when I visit India next time.
• Hot boiling water - 2 litres
• Olive oil - 3 to 4 tablespoons
• Italian seasoning - 2 tablespoons (this usually comprises of Oregano, basil, thyme).
• Olives -1 small cup (optional)
• Capsicum or bell pepper - 1 chopped into big chunks and seeds removed.
• Carrots - 2, cut into medium sized pieces
• Red pepper flakes - 1 - 2 tsp
  
• Salt to taste.
  
• Coriander leaves - to garnish

Method:

• Add the pasta into boiling hot water and add salt to it. Adding salt while boiling ensures that it gets absorbed while getting cooked. Cook it for 15 minutes or so until it gets cooked.
  
• In the meanwhile, in a separate pan, add olive oil and saute red pepper flakes and Italian seasoning.
  
• After about 1 minute, add the bell pepper, carrots and salt and cook them for 5 -10 minutes. Next add the olives and cook for a minute or two.
• Once pasta is cooked, drain water and add it to the vegetables and mix them together and cook for 2 minutes.
• Garnish with coriander leaves.
• Offer it to the Lord and then serve.

As you can see here, since we are using whole wheat pasta and vegetables and other herbs, this forms a meal by itself.

Tip 1: For those wanting to improve cholesterol, pour 1-2 tsp of flax seed oil on top of the pasta and serve. Dont cook this oil to get the full benefit of omega 3 fatty acids.

Tip 2: If you want to serve pasta with ratatouille, you can just skip adding the cooked vegetables to the pasta. Instead just saute cooked pasta with olive oil/herbs/red pepper flakes and serve them together.

Hope you will try and post your comments on the blog!!
Enjoy and happy cooking!!

Ratatouille - French side dish

Hello all,
Back again with a new recipe I tried a couple of times. And my family loved it.... So, here I am sharing this easy to make recipe. Please note that I am writing this on a weekday as I was able to make it in 45 minutes this evening and I am excited to share it due to the multiple compliments I got from my 4 year old!! Looks like this is a very famous French recipe that originated in Nice, France according to Wikipedia. This is a side dish and it needs to be served with pasta, bread or rice. I will post a pic the next time I make it!!

Cooking time - 20 minutes in the oven, 20 minutes in the stove
Makes for 4-5 people.

Ingredients:

• Zucchini - 2-3 (substitute with cucumber if you dont find zucchini) - cut it into large chunks
  
• Eggplant (brinjal) - 2-3 medium sized - cut into large chunks, longitudinally if it's Indian brinjal
  
• Celery - 2 stalks (optional)
• Bell pepper (capsicum) - 1 (yellow or red color preferred) - cored, seeds removed and sliced longitudinally
• Carrot - 1, grated.
• Tomatoes - 3 large, chopped
• Tomato paste - 1 tsp (optional)
• olive oil - 6-8 tbl spoons
• Italian seasoning - 2 or 3 tsp (Or if Thyme or basil is available, those can be used)
• Black pepper - 1 -2 tsp
• Salt - to taste
• Coriander leaves - to garnish
  

Method:

• Preheat oven to 400F.
• Add 2-3 tbl spoons of olive oil to a baking pan and transfer the cut zucchini (cucumber) and brinjals to the baking pan. Brush it with olive oil so that these get cooked in the oven. Sprinkle salt and black pepper to taste and bake in the oven until cooked for 15-20 minutes. Please set your baking timer and watch it after 15 minutes to see whether these appear cooked.
• If oven is not available, you can just cook them in an open pot with oil for 15 minutes or so until they are cooked.
  
• Next, in a separate pot, add 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil and add the celery. Cook it for 5 minutes.
  
• Next add the longitudinally sliced bell peppers (capsicums) and cook until soft. These usually become soft in 5 minutes also.
• Once these are soft, add in chopped tomatoes, tomato paste, grated carrot, herbs, salt and mix all of these. Cook for 5-8 minutes until the tomatoes get cooked.
• Now, remove the pan from the oven and add these cooked vegetables to the pan.
• Garnish with coriander leaves.
  

Offer to the Lord and serve within a few minutes. This needs to be served with pasta or rice or bread. More on making simple and elegant pasta in my next post!!

Try it and let me know how it turns out!! Thank you for the comments and your feedback. It gives me enthusiasm to try out new dishes and share with my friends.