Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Spinach Linguine With Basil-Cilantro Pesto And Artichokes


I love pesto. I love spinach fettuccine. I love artichoke hearts. I liked this dish.

I figured a dish that combined so many things I loved would be something I loved, but I came away thinking of this as just a good dish.

I have my own pesto recipe, which I partially used to make the pesto for this dish. I followed their recipe, except I replaced parsley for basil and didn't use cilantro (don't make me say how much I hate cilantro again). But it was the lemon juice that I think, at least for me, took this from a great dish to a good dish. I actually sometimes use a little lemon juice in my pesto recipe, but this one has two tablespoons, which took it from a background flavor to the foreground. I like my pesto to taste garlicky, but I could barely taste the garlic here.

The red onions were a great addition, adding some nice sweetness and crunch. I may even try that in my own pesto sometime. And I will say that the next day leftovers were better. The tanginess had faded and the garlic flavor was allowed to come forth.

Oh, a couple of additions I made: the toasted almonds on top and some sauteed rainbow chard. You can't ever go wrong with toasted almonds. I also wanted an extra nutrition boost, so I added the chard, which I had never made before. That was the best surprise of the night, as it was a perfect balance between soggier spinach and tougher kale.

In the end, I won't be craving this, as the authors said, but I think it's a dish that should at least be tried once. You may have a different reaction to it than I did.

Price-wise, this was about $8. Not bad at all.

This recipe is on page 191 of Veganomicon.

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