Not least of all is that earlier in the year we had virtually a whole month of visitors, one lot after the other, plus a couple of hasty visits back to the UK for various crisis management issues. The thing about visitors that I find most difficult is the catering. Thinking of, shopping for and providing three meals a day at normal times, including impromptu meals out, requires brain effort that no longer comes easily and our usual eating pattern is generally much more ad hoc. Hence there tends to be over purchasing, a freezer crammed with unused items and a scramble to use up perishables when they've all gone home.
So, this dish is a result of realising it's lunchtime, looking in the fridge to see what there is and coming up with something edible. It was surprisingly good and I would even do it again on purpose rather than by accident.
One of the ingredients was some home roasted tomatoes. As always home grown veg are ready all at once and earlier in the year we lost most of our broad beans simply because we were so busy that we didn't get round to picking them. When my tomatoes began to ripen I was determined not to waste those so found the time to roast and bottle them. You can see how I did it here.
I confess that the idea for this pasta actually came from a ready meal we had not long ago. I spotted a couple of packs of something called creamy salmon pasta in the "anti gaspi" or yellow sticker section in the nearby branch of Aldi. They were remarkably good and I thought I would make something similar when we needed a light meal and I had spinach in the house, although obviously I used chicken, not salmon.
Ingredients
About 3/4 of a pint of pasta. I used penne and usually measure pasta using my old Pyrex one pint jug. I find that a full jug or about a pint is a generous serving for two people.
2-3 slices of cooked chicken, torn into small pieces. I happened to use smoked chicken because we had the remains of a ready cooked smoked chicken in the fridge.
2 tblsp crème fraiche
About 1/3 of a bag of fresh spinach, washed
6-8 roasted tomatoes in olive oil (or you could use sundried tomatoes or cherry tomatoes)
Method
Cook the pasta in a large pan of boiling water according to the packet instructions. When cooked to your liking (either soft or al dente) drain off most of the water and put the spinach in a single layer on top. Put the lid on and return to the heat for a couple of minutes until the spinach is wilted.
Remove from the heat, stir in the chicken, crème fraiche and tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper and serve immediately, sprinkled with grated parmesan cheese if you like.
Serves 2.
I generally have a meal plan for dinner, but lunch is usually 'stuff on a plate'. So this week's meal plan includes: Korean pickled radish; rhubarb and peach cobbler; tomato soup; chicken stew; and ham and cheese spirals. Just in case you need some inspiration...
ReplyDeleteI always thought that once we'd retired we'd have a more ordered way of feeding ourselves but in fact it's become even more random.
DeleteWhen working we had cereal or toast for breakfast, sandwiches or a home made salad for lunch and something cooked when we got home from work, often something picked up at the supermarket on the way to pick Nick up from the station. The other difference here is that all shops are a good distance from where we live and often don't have everything we planned to buy. When we were working there were several different supermarkets plus other shops I could get to during my one hour lunch break or on the way home. Having said that, it's not a major issue and certainly wouldn't be a good reason to go back to living full time in the UK!
Our cooking becomes more like the TV programme "Ready, steady, cook" as time goes by!
Looks delicious. My DIL had their second baby last week and I've been thinking of something easy to take over there for them. I'll definitely be giving it a shot!
ReplyDeleteThank you, I hope you enjoy it!
DeleteNick suggested that the pasta should be kept on the heat for a minute or two once the chicken etc were added, because they were all from the fridge, to make sure the dish is still hot when you eat it.
I really liked the look of your bottled toms when you first posted them and I think I like them even more now. You're so right about retired eating being much less ordered and I certainly understand the ready-steady-cook style of cooking, but fortunately I really enjoy that way of cooking. When I was a guest of various friends in France, I often ended up doing quite a bit of cooking for everyone. On one occasion this turned out to be a surprise (surprise to me, that is) party for 30 people including the mayor. I complained a lot, but actually I loved it. These days, if we have guests, I send them out to forage at the local Waitrose, deli or sushi bar. Or I just pretend I'm not in and don't open the door.
ReplyDelete