Receta Pasta with Red Peppers and Basil
Tags
garlic, lemon zest, red bell peppers, vegetarian
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We consume a lot of pasta in our house. It’s such a great, blank canvas for other flavors and it’s quick, simple, and inexpensive! Sometimes you want something simple to accompany a nice meal, but the sound of pasta with butter and cheese isn’t that appealing. This pasta dish goes great with some grilled shrimp or chicken. I love this pasta cold with some thinly sliced steak the next day. Yum!
The recipe amounts are a bit odd, 1/8 cup anyone? Just eyeball from a 1/4 cup! The original recipes serves 6 to 8 and that just wont work for us during the week! You always have to do a double look when you see a recipe calls for 10 cloves of garlic and check your serving sizes! You can play around with it and add a little more of this and a little less of that if you’d like. We also omit the pine nuts since my daughter has a peanut allergy and I’m not ready to take any chances!
Nutritional yeast is a cheesy and nutty-tasting yeast prized for its nutritional attributes. Vegans often use this ingredient as a substitute for dairy cheese. Others may use Parmesan in its place.
Pasta with Red Peppers and Basil
Ingredients
- 1 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling
- 3 cloves garlic, sliced
- 1/8 tsp red pepper flakes
- 1 lb red bell peppers, thinly sliced
- 1/2 Tbsp low-sodium vegetable broth
- 1/4 lb pasta (gemelli, farfalle, rotini, or penne)
- 1/8 cup chopped fresh basil
- Zest of half a lemon
- 1/8 cup pine nuts, toasted
- Salt and pepper to taste
- Nutritional yeast for topping, optional
Bring a large pot of salted water to boil for the pasta.
In a large, high sided pan, heat oil over medium-low heat. Add garlic and red pepper flakes and saute very slowly, taking extra care not to burn the garlic, until the garlic is very soft, about 10 minutes. The idea here is to infuse the oil with the heat from the garlic and pepper.
Add sliced red peppers. Turn heat to medium and saute, stirring every few minutes. The peppers will exude liquid; this is fine, keep stirring. When the liquid is reabsorbed, add the vegetable broth. If you are using a non-stick pan, adding broth may not be necessary. Continue stirring and cooking the peppers very slowly, until they are quite soft and flavorful, about 20 minutes. Start cooking the pasta about halfway through.
Drain the pasta very well, shaking the colander to remove excess water. Add basil and lemon zest to pasta and toss.
Toss pasta with pepper mixture. Top with pine nuts and drizzle with extra oil, if desired. Adjust seasonings with salt and pepper and top with nutritional yeast, if using, or Parmesan cheese.
Source: Celebrate Vegan by Dynise Balcavage