Friday, May 17, 2013

Pesto pasta and Friday night dinner

It's been one of those unbelievably long weeks. As the years go on, it becomes more and more difficult to recover from a big weekend. Reality can be truly depressing. When I'm feeling a bit sluggish I turn to comfort food. I don't care what anyone says - we are all emotional eaters to a certain extent. For me, pasta is the ultimate comfort food - even after years of coming home drunk as a poor student and cooking up the biggest pot of tomato pasta you have ever seen, I still love it. I tend to cook slightly more healthy versions these days and more often than not it involves some sort of pesto. But not your ordinary store bought pesto - homemade pesto made with ingredients you generally wouldn't think to make pesto from. Broccoli pesto is my ultimate favourite. You steam the broccoli then put it in a food processor with lemon zest, lemon juice, olive oil, pine nuts, parmesan and garlic. So, so good. This week I made pumpkin seed pesto to have with my steamed broccoli and lemon spaghetti. You could get so creative with your pestos - for those in the southern hemisphere, try kale with almonds or walnuts for a lovely winter pesto.

So the pasta got me through to what is now Friday and I am so happy to be having a night in with Dave and a glass of red wine. Setting the tone for the rest of the weekend I hope. Tonight for dinner we had an aubergine, roasted beetroot, lentil and feta salad with yoghurt dressing. It's a variation on an earthy salad I make regularly with beetroot and lentils. Comforting but extremely good for you.

Here's to recovery weekends!


Pumpkin seed pesto

3/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1/3 cup water
1/2 cup olive oil
1 clove garlic
bunch of basil

Put pumpkin seeds, garlic, basil and water in a food processor and turn on. Gradually add the olive oil until you have the right consistency. Add more oil if need be.

Aubergine, beetroot, lentil and feta salad

2 aubergines sliced into rectangles
3 beetroot quartered
1/3 cup lentils
50 gm cherry tomatoes, halved
handful of baby spinach
zest and juice from half a lemon
3 tsp ground cumin
half packet of feta
1/4 cup natural yoghurt
mint
olive oil
s + p

Turn on oven to 180 degrees. Seal beetroot along with 1/4 cup water in tin foil and cook on a roasting tray for 45 mins. After half an hour, cook lentils in a pot of boiling water.
Coat aubergine with 2 tsp cumin and olive oil then cook in a frying pan.

Remove beets from foil and drain. Return to the roasting tray along with the aubergine and bake for a further 10 mins.

For the dressing, combine yoghurt, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, 1 teaspoon of cumin, lemon zest and juice. Add salt and pepper to taste.

In a large bowl combine all salad ingredients then pour over the dressing. Tear chunks of mint leaves and drop over the salad.

Serves 2 - 3

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