brown pasta

pasta is my ultimate comfort, happy mood food. i love the texture, versatility, and ease with which dry noodles, water, and a few ingredients can produce delicious, mouth watering delights. while it's true that i could subsist for days and months on end on nothing but pasta + marinara, i also like to play with tasty combos. this pasta may have a boring name - one that my brother made ample fun of - but its simplicity belies the complexity of flavors that burst in every mouthful. plus, i like the mystery that 'brown pasta' implies...

so, the other day, inspired by an appetizer i shared with a friend at pipa, i picked up some figs at the grocery store to marry with the portobello mushrooms and red onions i already had at home. figs and mushrooms - why had i never thought of that before?!

so, to start things off, i boiled some water for my brown rice penne - from trader joe's. if you've never tried brown rice pasta, whether or not you have gluten issues, i highly recommend the trader joe's brand. it keeps its shape for a perfect al dente consistency and absorbs the flavors of the sauce with enthusiasm!

next i let a couple of tablespoons of olive oil heat up in my large saute pan while i sliced up half a medium sized red onion into thin, half moon slices. once the oil was hot, i threw in the onions and let them cook over medium heat.

water boiling, so in goes the pasta - about 1/2 of the bag (approx 8 oz). since i use the pasta water to finish off the sauce, it was important that the pasta cook alongside the sauce so the water would be ready in time.

to the onions i added two medium sized portobello mushroom caps, thinly sliced, and then cut into thirds - so that every piece was approximately 1" long and 1/2" wide. i sauteed them together with the onions for another few minutes until the mushrooms began to develop that gorgeous goldeny carmelization - so good! while they goldened themselves up, i quarted about a dozen fresh figs (approx 1.5" in diameter) - and yes, i stole a couple of pieces to 'test' them. yum!

i tossed the fig pieces into the saute pan and let them brown for just a minute or two, and then to the pan i added some balsamic vinegar - roughly one turn of the pan, so i'm guessing maybe an 1/8 cup? at the same time the pasta was boiling and some of the starches had risen to the top, so i skimmed water off the top and added it to my sautee pan - around a ladle full.

i wanted the fig & portobello mixture to reduce down and thicken up, so i turned the burner down to simmer while i drained the pasta. i reserved the liquid in case i needed more to finish off the dish (i did).

to the simmering 'brown' sauce i added about 3 or 4 leaves of finely chopped basil (clipped from the basil plant i've been growing this summer!), a few turns of my pepper mill, and a small pinch of salt. less than i normally add to pasta b/c of the strong flavors in the balsamic vinegar and the salted pasta water. when the sauce was a nice consistency - not to thick, not watery - i added in the pasta directly to the pan and let the sauce coat and penetrate the pasta for a few minutes while i continued to turn the pasta with tongs. i added another ladle of the pasta water to pan for more moisture.

i served it warm and could imagine that goat cheese crumbled on top would have been fantastic. next time...

ingredients:
olive oil
1/2 medium red onion
2 medium portobello caps
~dozen fresh figs
1/8 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 pound brown rice pasta (i like trader joe's brand, but i'm sure it'll work with non-gluten free pasta, too)
fresh basil
pinch of salt
pepper

start to finish, about 15 minutes. made 2 healthy servings, or 3-4 small servings, with a nice bit left over for the next day :)

happy eating!

provencal pasta sauce

i had a hankering for pasta tonight, but what would accompany the long strings of whole wheat yumminess? in my fridge were the following:
2/3 eggplant
1 red pepper
2/3 zucchini

i went to my local market and picked up:
1 red onion
fresh basil
4 plum tomatoes
garlic

and the evening went a little something like this:
heat a large sautee pan sprayed with olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan
sautee 1/2 red onion (chopped)
add 1 clove of garlic (smashed & minced)
add diced red pepper - by now the onions and garlic have sweated a bit and are getting translucent
add a sprinkling of salt - i'm guessing 1 teaspoon
eggplant time! that is, time to add cubed eggplant. mix things up so that the eggplant finds its way to the bottom of the pan and close to the heat
add diced zucchini
roughly chop the tomatoes and throw them onto the now-steaming sauce

ok, here's the provencal-ization:
add a couple of generous tablespoons herbs de provence (wonder herb)
a splash - aka teaspoon - of dried oregano
and finally, the thing that gives this layered sauce its depth: cumin - just a teaspoon!

cover for about 7 minutes - this will sweat the veggies and draw out the moisture, which you then reincorporate by mixing it all together.

add some shredded/chopped fresh basil.

i added this to a cup of whole wheat spaghetti and topped it off with some shredded rice cheese.

and for dessert:
microwave 1/2 of unsweetened frozen strawberries and 2 packets of splenda for 2 minutes at 50%
to the heated fruit, add two teaspoons of unsweetened cocoa powder
mix until you get a chocolatey, strawberry soup
i could have eaten it just like this. but i added the 1/3 container of vanilla flavored silk soy yogurt that i had left over from breakfast and mixed. this added texture to the soup and cooled it down to make it more of a summer dessert.

in sum: simply deeelicious!