Here I am, I arrived in Nancy, France yesterday, my hometown…jet lagged as ever and since everyone is still sleeping at 4 am, I thought of finishing this post, that I had started over 6 months ago. It feels good to be home, that’s all I can say. Everything feels right. If I can find fregola in France, I will buy it and have my parents try it. Even though, they’re from Italy, but are not very familiar with Sardinian cuisine.

I love those tiny Sardinian pasta balls, they’re hearty, rustic and irregular, they remain al dente and are delicious in so many different ways. I love rustic pasta and ingredients that remind you of old traditions and cultures. You can find those in any Italian grocery store or at the Rainbow in San Francisco. They’re imported from Sardinia and are served in Sardinian restaurants. I have never seen those served in traditional Italian restaurants.

Fregola reminds me so much of my wonderful Sardinian friend Mauro (from Cagliari) who recently moved from San Francisco to London. He introduced me to Sardinian cuisine, and restaurants in San Francisco. Maurino, questo piatto di fregola l’ho fatto proprio per tè!

If you’re in San Francisco and interested in tasting the delicious cuisine of Sardinia, you have to try out La Ciccia, it’s a real Sardinian restaurant where the chef and owner is born and raised in Sardinia.

You cook fregola like you would cook pasta, in water then drain it and serve it with like you would serve pasta, with your favorite sauce. In Sardinia, they serve it with a lamb ragù. I cooked mine like a risotto, added scallops, then served it with a asparagus sauce, it was delicious and delicate. If you look at the pictures, you can see some crawfish in the fregola but do not really liked the quality of the crawfish so will not use it next time. I did not add parmesan cheese in the fregola, I am one of those who don’t add cheese in fish or seafood pasta dishes. If you’re interested, more fregola recipe here.

Ingredients for 2

For the fregola

• 1 shallot, diced
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 2 cups fregola
• broth1/2 cup white wine
• 1.5 cups small bay scallops
• 1 tbs panna or cream
• salt and pepper

for the cream of asparagus

• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1.5 tbs yellow onions, chopped
• 1/2 bunch asparagus, cut in 1 inch trunks
• 1/2 cup vegetable broth
• salt and pepper
• Lemon olive oil for drizzling

Preparation

First start preparing the fregola like a risotto. Heat olive oil in a pan, add shallots and let it brown and softens. Add fregola, stir well. Add broth and wine gradually and keep stirring. Cook that way until the fregola has become soft but still slightly hard on the bite and al dente. Adjust with salt and pepper, add cream and stir well. Keep hot.

Saute scallops in olive oil and add to the fregola.

In a small pan, heat olive oil, add onions and cook until soft. Add asparagus and broth and let cook until asparagus are tender. Adjust with salt and pepper. Let it cool and blend in a mixer. Pass it through a sieve to obtain a smooth cream.

Serve fregola in a plate, add cream of asparagus all around and drizzle with lemon oil and parsley and serve hot.

Nouille in French means noodle of course, but if you call someone a “nouille“it’s not really a compliment and means you are calling this person an idiot. So today, I do feel like a nouille, because I keep buying soba noodles and never eat them. Actually, I rarely think of preparing or eating soba noodles, probably due to my Italian upbringing…even though my pantry is filled with all kinds of soba.

I see them every day, but no… the idea of eating them, does not even cross my mind. I look at them and think, oh wow! I have so many soba in there. That’s it…the thought stops there. Isn’t that strange? It’s funny how we get stuck into habits. Well, today I decided to make a change, free some space in the cabinets = EAT SOBA. Of course, soba being Japanese, I didn’t want to prepare them the Italian way, and offend them. I tried to be faithful to their essence. For whatever reason, soba reminds me of Geisha, something delicate, and complex at the same time.

Since I have been cooking a lot of vegan meals lately, I can assure you that this dish would please any vegan out there. I combined some Eastern-Western flavors and everything made sense in this dish, from the textures, to the flavors, the colors. Yes, everything. The herbs make it fragrant, taste fresh, the lemon gives it a clean aftertaste, and all combined with the natural nuttiness and sweetness of the buckwheat make it a perfectly balanced and delightful dish. As we say in French “Essayer, c’est l’adopter“, to try it, is to adopt it…so just try it.

Ingredients for 2

• 220 g buckwheat soba
• 1 cup edamame, frozen
• 2 zucchini, sliced
• 4 Chinese cabbage leaves, thinly chopped
• zest of 1 lemon
• 1.5 cups basil leaves
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

In a blender mix garlic, basil, salt and pepper. Blend to a fine consistency. Add lemon zest. Set aside.

Grill zucchini on both sides using a grill pan. Cut in 4 pieces. Boil edamame in boiling water for a few minutes or place in microwave to defrost. Saute cabbage in 1 tsp olive oil.

Cook soba for about 5 minutes in a slightly salted boiling water. Rinse in cold water. Combine all ingredients together in a mixing bowl. Add pesto and toss well. Eat cold or at room temperature.

I have been quite excited today, I managed to prepare this colorful pasta dish and my parents really liked it. I was not expecting such a reaction from two traditional Italians eating a pasta dish that has nothing to do with Italian flavors. I went shopping to La Vie Saine which is a healthy and organic supermarket with lots of unusual products, and I just wanted to see what those green tagliatelle tasted like. Their color comes from the Spirulina which, in the US is mainly a seaweed used as a dietary tablet supplement. Spirulina is very high in protein much more than any type of legume.

In addition to the spirulina tagliatelle, I used a specific seaweed, mainly found in Brittany coast (Roscoff area) called Himanthalia Elongata and has a very high vitamin C content. Unlike most other seaweed, it’s not produced in Japan. It’s basically a brown seaweed that has the form of  big button where long stems start their ramification.

I really loved this pasta, it’s colorful and absolutely delicious. Now I am curious to see if it’s available in the US. Upon my return, I will start my spirulina pasta hunting! I am always excited to see the new trends in France, even though you still have a traditional cuisine, new trends are arising and I noticed that la cuisine aux algues (seaweed cooking) is getting quite popular. Of course, not among the traditional eaters, but among adventurous eaters, interested in a new and healthy cuisine.

Ingredients for 4

• 1 tsp ginger, grated
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 tbs olive oil
• 350 g spirulina tagliatelle
• 2 carrots, sliced lengthwise in a ribbon
• 1 zucchini, sliced lengthwise in ribbons
• 1 cup shiitake mushrooms, diced
• Sea spaghetti seaweed
• 1/3 cup vegetable broth
• 1 cup shrimps
• salt and pepper

Preparation

In a pan, heat olive oil. Add garlic and ginger. Stir and add shiitake, cook for about minutes, then add the rest of vegetables. Let the zucchini soften but do not overcook or they’ll break.

Soak sea spaghetti in cold water for about 15 minutes, then boil them in water for another 15 minutes or until they get soft. Drain and set aside.

Add sea spaghetti to the vegetables and stir. Add shrimps and broth, salt and pepper.

Cook pasta in salted boiling water until al dente. Drain and add to the pan of vegetables. Stir well and serve.

You can really tell someone is Italian by the quantity of pasta they eat…my family eats pasta almost every day…unlike me…I eat it once in a while, which can be a good reason to question my Italian nationality, let’s hope they don’t come and take away my Italian passport!! Oh well, I guess I am not much of a habit type of a person and that habits somehow disturb me and can give me anxiety. Some people find comfort in habits, in my case it’s the opposite.

Everyone knows pesto which a famous paste made out with raw ingredients, that traveled beyond many borders. Of course there are many recipes for pesto using different ingredients and herbs. This particular pesto is called alla Trapanese, meaning Trapano style, after Trapano, a city in Sicily. This pesto is made with almonds and raw tomatoes ; you get a very fresh and light sauce which makes it so delicious.

To transform the pasta and make it into a fun and original mixture, I love to flavor the dough with vegetables or herbs. You can add anything you want, saffron, mushrooms, tomato paste, broccoli, etc…and  color your plate and pleasure your eyes and palate!

If you want to keep this dish vegan don’t add the yolk in the pasta, it will turn out fine, and don’t add pecorino, and you’ll get an absolutely delicious vegan pasta dish.

Ingredients for 2

For the pasta

• 100 g semolina flour
• 100 g farro flour
• 100 g spinach, cooked (about one bunch spinach raw)
• 1 egg yolk

For the pesto

• 3 well ripe tomatoes, peeled and seedless
• about 20 basil leaves
• 2 garlic cloves
• 4 tbs almonds
• 6 tbs olive oil
• 4 tbs pecorino
• salt and pepper

Preparation

For the pesto

Pat dry peeled and seedless tomatoes to remove excess water. Using a mortar, blend all together together (except for pecorino) into a fine paste. Set aside. You can use a mixer but make sure not to blend the mixture into extra fine paste, you want some texture.

For the pasta

Combine all flours together in a mixing container. Add purée spinach and yolk, and start kneading the dough thoroughly for about 20-30 minutes. At this point, the dough will be elastic and smooth.

On a large wooden board (spianatoia), with a pasta rolling pin, make a thin sheet. You can use a pasta machine if you have one and not used to rolling pasta sheets.

Cook pasta in boiling water for a few minutes, drain and toss with pesto. Add pecorino and serve hot.

I am going back to my roots with this dish. Once in a while, it feels good to go back to old and traditional ways of cooking even if it it can be time consuming. Cooking being therapeutic for me (like for most people who love cooking), when I am stressed, I cook, and the longer, the better. Sundays are perfect for these rituals.

I am in love with my new pasta cutting tool called chitarra. Eventhough it produces a different kind of music, it’s just wonderful lyrics to my ears. Due to its shape and strings it has the same name as the musical instrument guitar (chitarra in Italian means guitar) due it its strings. Spaghetti alla chitarra is my favorite pasta, anytime I am in Italy I buy it and eat them during a whole week. Those are a specialty from Abruzzi and the neighboring regions further South. Basically the strings of the chitarra are the cutting tool. You can either use the rolling pin or your hands to press the pasta sheet on the strings. The two particularities of this pasta is first, you need to have a pasta thickness, similar to the width of the guitar strings, second it’s an egg based pasta.

When using a chitarra, the texture of the pasta is really different, more rugged and thicker since the width of spaghetti is supposed to be the same size as the depth, basically you get square spaghetti.

Chitarra is available in the US at Sur La Table, so for those who are passionate about pasta and want to experiment old ways of making and cutting it, I suggest you try it out.

The dough has 80% farro (or spelt) that’s why you get a darker and golden color and the sauce is vegetarian. The traditional spaghetti alla chitarra from Abruzzi region is made out of a lamb ragù. Of course, you can use your creativity and taste as far as the sauce is concerned. I am still on some vegetarian funk lately, so this worked beautifully for me.

Ingredients for 4

For the pasta dough

• 100 g white flour
• 200 g farro flour
• 3 eggs
• water

For the sauce

• 6 medium size tomatoes on the vine, well ripe, peeled, seedless and chopped
• 1 carrot, peeled and sliced
• 2 zucchini, diced
• 1 small eggplant, diced
• 1/2 red bell pepper, diced
• 1/2 small yellow onion
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 2 tbs olive oil
• hot chili pepper (peperoncino)
• basil or oregano
• 4 tbs ricotta
• 1 tbs chopped olives (optional)
• salt and pepper

Preparation

For the pasta

In a working surface mix flours together, add eggs, and gradually incorporate flour. Add a little water if necessary (if dough is too hard) and knead for about 15-20 min to obtain a round and smooth ball. Wrap in a plastic film and let it rest for about 30 min.

In a flat surface (preferably wood, such as a spianatoia, the Italian flat wooden board to roll the pasta dough), using a large and not tapered rolling pin, roll dough to obtain a thin sheet. You can use a pasta machine if you have not mastered the art of rolling dough. The sheet should be thin but not overly thin, something like 2 mm thick.

When the sheet is ready, take chitarra to cut strings. Place sheet on top of strings and using the rolling pin, roll it from top to bottom of the pasta sheet. The spaghetti will fall into the chitarra, and you just have to remove them. Proceed until you have finished with the sheets.

For the sauce

In a pan, heat olive oil. Add onions and brown them. Add the rest of the vegetables, salt and pepper. Cover with lid and let cook until tender but still firm.

In another pot, heat olive oil. Add garlic and stir to get flavors out. Add oregano (or basil) and tomatoes, and cook until the tomatoes are starting to form a thick sauce (about 10-15 minutes). Add chili peppers, salt and pepper.

When the vegetables are cooked, add to the tomato sauce and mix well. If you decide to add olives, add at this point. Add extra olive oil.

Bring a pot of salted boiling water to a boil, add spaghetti. Cook for a few minutes, or until spaghetti come at the surface. Remove from stove and drain.

Place spaghetti in a large pasta dish, pour sauce on top. Serve in dishes with ricotta on top and sprinkle with either oregano or basil. Serve hot.

After this weekend ordeal, I needed to eat something to soothe my mind…Pasta especially pasta in bianco (with burro e parmigiano, butter and parmesan) is a dish that always remind me of when I was a child and sick, my mom would cook this dish for me who supposedly helped to cure whatever sickness one may have. It did not but, it’s sometimes good to believe it.

You cannot tell an Italian how to cook pasta, it’s ingrained in their DNA…Like the Swiss and skying, it seems like they’re born with skies on.

There are indeed many ways to cook pasta, one less known method is called “risottata“, meaning like a risotto where broth is added gradually. I did not come up with it, it’s a very old Italian method of cooking pasta! so, no pasta is not always boiled in salted water, drained and served topped with sauce. There is an interesting and funny article in English about the different cooking methods and cooking time of pasta on Identità Golose.

My father loves pasta overcooked…well at least well cooked, my mom and I, if it’s not VERY al dente, we don’t eat it, so usually the al dente eaters, take the pasta out of the pot first while the other ones can wait a while longer. He always looks at us horrified, mà come potate mangiare la pasta così cruda???? (how can you eat pasta that raw), well we can.

Pasta risottata being cooked a long time, takes longer than the usual way of boiling it in water. The risottata method allows it to keep its starch, therefore develop a particular creaminess (I wanted to show that creaminess on that second photo even it’s a screaming, right in your face type of a picture!)…can you just imagine the deliciousness of the pasta while having absorbed all that flavorful broth? It’s really my favorite way to cook and eat pasta. You need to try to believe it. For this cooking method, you need short pasta (pasta corta) such as small penne, or anything that size.

The recipe is quite simple, the greatness of the pasta comes first from the risottata method, then the combination of the ingredients make it a real treat.

Ingredients for 2

• 160 g short pasta
• 100 g fresh fava bean, pod removed
• 2 zucchini, diced in small cubes
• 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, cut in halves
• vegetable broth
• 1 shallot
• 1 garlic clove
• Parmigiano Reggiano, freshly grated
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Heat olive oil in a pan and add garlic, stir for a few minutes, then add zucchini, cover and let cook until the zucchini start to be cooked but firm, then add tomatoes, salt and pepper. Let cook until the tomatoes start to soften. Set aside.

In the meantime, blanch fava bean grains in boiling water for about 2 minutes depending on the size of the grains. IF the grains are small and tender, one minute is enough. Drain and peel beans. Add to the pan with the other vegetables.

In a pot, heat olive oil, add shallots and brown them. Add pasta and proceed like you would for a risotto, adding gradually broth to cook it. When the pasta has reached the desired consistency (it will need to be slightly creamy), add vegetables and parmesan. Stir well and serve hot.

One of the greatest gentleman in the food blogsphere, Lazaro Bernal form Lazaro Cooks kindly requested me if I could guest post on his blog. Of course, I accepted with great enthusiasm and excitement. I think it’s an honor to be a guest post on someone’s blog. Usually, it doesn’t take me forever to find a recipe to post, but this time I wanted to find the perfect recipe that would fit Lazaro Cooks and that would be a combination of creativity, flavors, colors and that represents exactly what I love, and what Lazaro’s blog is all about.

I love all kinds of cuisines but I tend to go towards light and flavorful tastes with a Mediterranean flair. Here they’re combined with Asian flavors (because I do love Asian cuisine too, did not have the time to become an expert in it, but I do love to combine Asian ingredients to more Western ones) and the result is a perfectly balanced soba dish with amazing flavors and textures.

For this dish, I got inspired by one of Alain Ducasse‘s recipe, people who have been reading my blog, must know that I am a huge Ducasse fan. I changed a few items and twisted it around but the theme of combining Eastern and Western flavors is there and since Lazaro is a huge “connaisseur” of French cuisine, I knew he would approve my choice.

Go check out his blog for the recipe!

I love to play with pasta colors, and I love colorful food, so today everything is pink. Don’t you like pink? I love to wear pink and eat it too! pink, pink, pink and more pink! such a calming and happy color.

Here is a dish that really makes me see la vie en rose, because no matter how careful I was, everything I touched in the kitchen turned pink, the flour paper bag, the oven buttons, and kitchen cabinets. After my pink tagliatelle with red beets, I wanted to make pink gnocchi just for the gorgeous color. It has been such a long time I haven’t made gnocchi, not that I don’t like them, but I think they tend to be too fulfilling for me.

Beets are often used in salads, and I think they can be used in so many ways, like to color pasta and doughs, since beets are often used as a food coloring.

I have been using quite a lot of goat cheese these days, I figured I would use parmesan instead, but since beets and goat cheese are too great of a match, I had no other choice than use it.

My mom’s gnocchi are very traditional made with a tomato base with rabbit and mushroom sauce, like they make in Romagna, so last time I was home and made her those crazy pink gnocchi, she got so excited and curious, non avrei mai pensato fare gli gnocchi colle barabietole! The great thing about my parents is that they taste everything I make even the most unconventional and nontraditional dishes (which is very rare for Italians in their 60s), and they are willing to try new things. Last time I went home, I brought some meat substitute made with soy, and that was the only thing they didn’t like, they tasted a bite and stopped there…but that is understandable, it looks like dog food!

The tricky part (yes there is one…maybe two) is the mashing of the beets, they need to be reduced in purée, so I mixed the potatoes and beets all together, then used a potato masher to crush them well and not leave any chunks of beets. Then when everthing was almost perfectly fine, I used a hand mixer to reduce everything into a smooth purée.

The other tricky part in these gnocchi making process is the flour quantity, I have added gradually flour to my mixture, so I won’t be able to give an exact amount, you will have to determine for yourself when to stop adding flour. Basically, the dough remains sticky, while rolling the strips, it’s ok add flour, but do not add too much flour to the dough mixture, or the gnocchi will be too hard.

Ingredients for 3-4

For the gnocchi dough

• 350 g potatoes (or 3 medium), cooked
• 200 g red beets, cooked
• 1 egg
• flour (1 cup or more)

For the sauce

• 5 medium sized artichokes
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1/2 cup of dry white wine
• 4 tbs goat cheese
• 2 tbs chives
• 2 tbs olive oil
• juice of one lemon
• salt and pepper

Preparation

In a mixing container, mash potatoes and red beets with a potato masher like mentioned above. You will get a smooth purée. Add one egg and flour. Mix well to combine all ingredients together and obtain a homogeneous dough. The dough needs to be slightly sticky but not too much, then while rolling the strips, you will add extra flour to prevent them from sticking to your working surface. Roll strips, and cut in small 1 inch nuggets. Then using the fork tines or a rigagnocchi (that tool used to curl the gnocchi), “curl” each of them.

Trim your artichokes, by removing the hard leaves around, and the trimming the top leaves. Cut in quarters and place in a large bowl of water with lemon juice (to prevent them from staining).

In a pan, heat olive oil, add garlic, then add artichokes, mix well, then add wine, salt and pepper. Cover and cook at medium heat until artichokes are tender.

In a large pot, bring salted water to a boil, then add gnocchi. When the gnocchi come out on the surface, they’re cooked. Drain them and add to the artichokes pan. Place in a large pasta dish, mix well. Add goat cheese, chives and extra olive oil. Mix carefully not to break the goat cheese. You can substitute parmesan or pecorino to fresh goat cheese.

Lately, I have been too busy and hundred things to take care of, which in my world means no sleep and no time for anything including cooking and of course, deep under eye circles. Those cernes how we call them in French make me look like a zombie, it’s amazing how lack of sleep can make you look like ten years older. Even make up doesn’t seem to work. Quelle horreur!!

When I have no time to cook, pasta is always my favorite number one solution, and the one that comes into my mind. It’s fast, nutritious and delicious.  It certainly will not make my cernes go away, but at least, my other part of the body will feel rested and happy.

Pesto is a very versatile and can be made with many vegetables. Of course, the original pesto is from Liguria region and made with pine nuts, basil parmesan, olive oil and garlic. When I think of pesto, I think of Genoa, therefore of Cristoforo Colombo, our dear explorer who somehow “discovered” America. He might have not “discovered” anything but his statue is erected at Coit Tower in San Francisco. The first time my parents came visit, I had to take my dad see Cristoforo statue and the jail cell of Al Capone in Alcatraz and I could see my dad’s excitement, 12 years later he still talks about this.

This pesto has everything Pesto alla Genovese has except for cheese, then broccoli rabe is the main ingredient. I don’t like to mix cheese and shrimps in general in pasta dishes so I omitted the cheese because parmesan being quite strong and shrimps being quite strong too, the mixture of both can be too overwhelming. The broccoli rabe is not really cooked just boiled for 30 seconds so you get a beautiful greenish color and fragrant fresh flavor.

Ingredients for 4

• 11.28 oz (or 320 g) penne
• 1 bunch broccoli rabe
• 1 large garlic clove, crushed
• 1/2 bunch basil leaves
• 6 tbs olive oil
• 3 tbs sliced almond
• about 10 shrimps, deveined
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Boil 2 cups of water, when the water boil, add broccoli rabe and let cook for about 30 seconds, remove from stove and drain.

In a mixer proceed like you would for regular pesto, combining all ingredients together, and blend until a semi-thin consistency, not like a smooth paste.

Remove shells and devein shrimps. Cut them in 3 small pieces. Saute in olive oil until cooked.

Cook pasta al dente, drain and place in a mixing pasta bowl. Add pesto and shrimps, mix well and serve.

]]> http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/pasta/more-pesto-stories-penne-with-broccoli-rabe-almond-pesto-and-shrimps/feed/ 6 http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/fishseafood/surprise-surprise-farfalline-haute-couture-with-shrimps-scallops-and-leek-sauce/ http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/fishseafood/surprise-surprise-farfalline-haute-couture-with-shrimps-scallops-and-leek-sauce/#comments Sat, 26 Dec 2009 22:59:29 +0000 silvia http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/?p=5923 Che sorpresa! – Farfalline “Hautes Couture” con gamberi, capesante e crema ai porri

I finally received my mom’s package, it only took six days which is really not much. I was expecting it and was wondering if they would open it at the customs but it arrived intact.

I was not sure of what she put in there! lots of my favorite goodies. She even included my dry soup sticks, the Maggie Sveltesse (my sinful soup sticks but with 50 calories per soup, let’s not be too tough on them), Lavazza Espresso to get me even more wired than I actually am, chocolates, chocolates and more chocolates, cosmetics to make sure life in the US does not give me wrinkles…and of course some foie gras, thing that I don’t eat, she doesn’t really care, she just will send foie gras every year, even though I asked her to NOT include it, she included it any way. I can always serve it when my friends come over for dinner, since I believe it’s no longer allowed in California…I am not going to develop further the fois gras production topic and people are free to eat whatever they want. I just have a tough time with cruelty towards animals for whatever purpose it is. So yes, fois gras is a delicacy and part of French gastronomy, I think it’s just so cruel to stuff those poor geese, make them sick and eat their liver. Sorry to be a little crude, but basically, it comes down to that.

I decided to slow down on carbs, but I got those Farfalline Haute Couture, so I had no other choice than cook them. Yes, you can change your mind sometimes. They’re too pretty…I had some shrimps and a bunch of beautiful leeks which were perfect for those little butterflies. In Italian, they’re called “farfalle” and in French “papillon” which mean “butterflies” not “bow tie”, which would be way too long “noeud papillon” (= butterfly nod). Le papillon ne s’est pas envolé, il a juste atterri dans mon assiette!

I adore this pasta dish, the leek cream with seafood is absolutely fantastic. It’s creamy but yet not the kind of “Creamy” you get when you add cream to a dish, but very flavorful and velvety creamy without the heaviness of a cream.

Ingredients for 2

• 5.30 oz (or 150 g) farfalline or other squid ink pasta
• 2 leeks
• 1/3 cup broth
• 6 large scallops cut in 4 or 24 small scallops
• 8 large shrimps, cut in 3
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• cayenne pepper
• 1 tbs olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Cut leeks in small slices crosswise, wash well. In a pan, add 1 tsp olive oil, add 1 garlic clove, stir for one minute or so, then add leeks, cook for a few minutes, then add broth, salt and pepper. Cover and let it cook until the leeks are tender. Leave about 1 tbs of leeks aside to add at the end. Mix the remaining leeks in a blender to obtain a creamy consistency. If the leeks are too think, add extra broth.

In a pan, heat 1 tsp olive oil, then add diced seafood, cayenne, salt and pepper. Cook for a few minutes, then add 1 garlic clove. At that point, you’ll have some liquid in the pan. Add the liquid to the leeks. Continue sauteing the seafood until cooked, but not over cook it, or the scallops will turn rubbery.

Cook pasta in salted boiling water until al dente. Drain, place in a mixing bowl, add half of the leek sauce, mix well.

Serve in a plate, spoon extra leek sauce around the pasta, top it with seafood and extra leeks. Sprinkle with a little extra olive oil and serve hot.

Heat up leeks to keep it warm.

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