** Pasta cooked with mushrooms and gravy prepared from coconut milk and paste of coriander leaves.
This is a unique Pasta recipe in which I have used mushrooms and to prepare the sauce, I have used coconut milk and the paste of coriander leaves. It may sound somewhat quirky but trust me, it tastes divine. Try this out.
Food Innovation
Not many cooks and chefs have dared to innovate with pasta, most of them prefer to cook pasta the classic Italian way. However one can always be a little creative with pasta. Moving beyond the traditional method and instead adding a few twists to a pasta recipe can also work wonders. This innovative pasta recipe is not only addictive but also tastes delicious.
"Mamu, I am feeling hungry. Is there something in the fridge to eat?" a groggy-eyed Sonal, my 13 year old niece, asked me with a yawn as she turned towards the dining hall. She had just woken up after an afternoon nap. The seventeen hour flight journey from the US must have been exhausting for her. My sister, Purvi, who works for an I.T. company in California had come on an official visit to India last week and she had brought Sonal along.
"Ummm, sorry Sonal, I have been really busy with work these past few days and so wasn't able to go for the weekly grocery shopping. So except for a few bottles of chilled milk and bread, you won't find anything ready-to-eat in the fridge. I know you must be feeling really hungry. But give me thirty minutes and I will make you spicy vegetable upma. I am sure you will love it", I replied.
"Eeeks, veggies? Hell, no, mamu, I hate vegetables like anything. Mummy forcibly makes me eat those horrible things every other day and I am so fed up of them. A few days back, she had cooked a mushroom dish, I had literally ran away from the dining table and locked myself up in my room. In fact I refused to come out until she promised that she won't ask me to eat those mushrooms. Similarly the other day she had made something like green chutney that was made from the paste of cilantro and I found the taste so weird that I almost threw up. I can't stand the sight of vegetables. But why are we discussing about veggies? Hey Mamu, why don't you make me some noodles or pasta instead? I would love it if you could make either of the two for me", said Sonal with a twinkle in her eyes.
"Hmmm, so you love to eat pasta but you are not that fond of eating greens and vegetables, especially mushrooms and coriander leaves! Okay, give me half an hour and I will make your favourite pasta but on two conditions - one, that you will let me add my own twist to the pasta and two, that you won't come into the kitchen until I am done with my cooking and ask you to come", I said.
"A twist to the pasta recipe? Wait, what all are you going to add to the dish, mamu?", Sonal asked excitedly.
"Well, that's a surprise! You will have to wait", I replied with a wink.
It's a pretty common situation in every family, children can be very picky eaters and most kids shun vegetables. So sometimes parents have a very hard time. I too was very fussy about eating vegetables when I was a child but Mummy would always succeed in convincing me to eat them because she would keep on experimenting with the ingredients and would often sneak in vegetables too into my favourite dishes. So often I failed to know that my favourite dish had a certain vegetable which I didn't like much. Thus one can tweak a recipe and incorporate the greens and vegetables into their favourite food items. In fact the kids love eating such experimental dishes.
Have you ever tried making
Pasta with Mushrooms cooked in a sauce of coconut milk and paste of coriander leaves? Sounds quirky, eh? What if I say that I made this very same dish for Sonal that day and she absolutely loved it! Well, try out the recipe yourself. Believe me, you will be mighty surprised by its taste, just as my niece got. The recipe is fairly simple and should take no more than thirty minutes to prepare. The main ingredients that have been used in this pasta recipe are
coconut milk, coriander leaves and button mushrooms. Oh yes, of course Del Monte Chifferi Rigati Pasta as well.
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Del Monte Chifferi Rigati Pasta |
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Cooking: 20 minutes
Total Time needed: 30 minutes
Ingredients
(Servings - 3)
Del Monte Pasta ------------------------ 1 cup
Fresh Coriander leaves, finely chopped ------------------------ 1 cup
Garlic cloves ------------------------ 5-6
Green Chillies ------------------------ 2 nos
Fresh Coconut milk ------------------------ 1 cup
Minced Garlic ------------------------ 1 tbsp
Thinly sliced Ginger ------------------------ 1 tbsp
Tomatoes, finely chopped ------------------------ about 1 cup
Green Capsicum ------------------------ 1/2 piece, thinly sliced
Button Mushrooms ------------------------ 5-6 nos of medium size, sliced
Salt ------------------------ as per taste
Refined Sunflower oil ------------------------ about 2 tbsp
Basil ------------------------ 1/2 tsp
Oregano ------------------------ 1/2 tsp
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(Before grinding of Coriander leaves and extraction of Coconut Milk) |
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(After grinding of Coriander leaves and extraction of Coconut Milk) |
Procedure
1. The sauce that I used for the pasta was a green-white amalgamation - the paste of coriander leaves along with garlic cloves and green chillies, to go with coconut milk. I began by preparing the coconut milk -- I took about half a cup of freshly grated coconut in a blender and made a fine paste of it by gradually adding small amount of water, until I got a smooth and thickened white juice like solution. Then placing a thin muslin cloth over a strainer, I poured the coconut juice into it and using a spoon, I kept pressing the paste against the walls of the strainer so that the coconut milk could strain out into the bowl kept under the strainer.
2. For the green sauce, I took a cup of fresh coriander leaves (along with the stalks), 5-6 cloves of garlic along with 2 green chillies and made a smooth paste out of them.
3. The next step involved the mushrooms -- cleaning and cutting them. Before starting to cook the mushrooms, they needed to be cleaned properly. So using a clean, damp cloth, I wiped them nicely to remove any dirt from the outer surface. It also helped in removing the outer thin skin of the mushrooms. After cleaning them, I cut them into slices, which were neither too thin nor were too thick.
4. Now coming to the cooking part, to begin with, I heated about 2 tablespoons of refined sunflower oil in a wok and added about 1 table spoon of minced garlic and sauteed them for a minute or two, so that their raw smell went away. Care should be taken though, as to not fry the garlic too much or else that will burn it up and the sauce will taste bitter.
5. When they turned slightly brown, I added the thinly sliced ginger pieces and sauteed them too for a minute or so.
6. Now it was the turn of the chopped mushrooms to be added and so I did and sauteed them for 2-3 minutes over medium heat, tossing them every now and then.
7. When the mushrooms started getting softer, I then stirred in the chopped tomatoes and so also the sliced capsicum pieces and tossed them up all together.
8. In the mean time, I took about 5 cups of water in a vessel and adding some salt to it, I brought it to boil. When the water started boiling, I added the Del Monte pasta into it after lowering the flame and kept stirring continuously for the first few minutes, so that they didn't stick to each other. The pasta should be cooked until they were soft enough ("al dente") and were just tender to the bite but one should be careful about not over-cooking them or else they will become soggy and will break up.
9. Meanwhile as the mushroom pieces became slightly tender, I added the prepared coriander-garlic-green chilli paste to it along with salt (about half teaspoon) and mixed them up nicely so that the the flavour of the coriander paste got into the mushroom pieces.
10. After cooking for about 3 minutes or so, when the raw smell of the coriander paste was gone, I then poured the coconut milk to the sauce and let it to simmer, stirring every now and then, until the sauce became thick and attained a homogeneous colour.
11. I then added about half teaspoon of oregano and so also basil leaves and mixed them nicely into the mushroom sauce.
12. Then covering the wok with its lid, I let the mushroom sauce cook for another minute or so.
13. By now, the pasta pieces too had been cooked al dente (it usually takes about 7-8 minutes). After taking them out from the salted water solution, I put them into a colander and ran cold water over them to cool them off. All excess water would easily drain out through the colander.
14. The mushroom-coriander-coconut sauce too was almost done and so it was time to add the pasta pieces into the sauce and gently mix all of them nicely, so that the pasta got coated with the sauce. One has to be careful though while mixing as the pasta pieces may break.
15. After mixing, I covered the wok with its lid and let the pasta pieces to cook in the mushroom sauce for two more minutes, so that the flavours of the sauce got absorbed by the pasta. (But mind you, they shouldn't be cooked for more than 2 minutes or else the over-cooked pasta will turn limp and gummy. They should be slightly firm and yet be tender).
Thus my greeny pasta was done and was now ready to be served. Before serving, I also sprinkled a pinch of coarsely ground black peppercorns over the pasta. Now the only thing left was getting Sonal's approval. Tentatively she took a forkful of pasta into her mouth and the very next second, her eyes grew wide as she slowly chewed and swallowed her first bite, "umm, this tastes really good, mamu! How did you make this? What all have you added?" It was only after she finished her portion did I tell her that I had used her bete noire vegetables in the dish. She couldn't actually believe her ears when I told her that mushrooms, coconut milk and the paste of coriander leaves were used for preparing the sauce. She absolutely loved the pasta dish and even asked for more! I felt like a winner, my experimentation had worked.
However I must admit that even though I was very eager to experiment and try out this unique sauce (the combination of coriander paste, coconut milk and mushrooms) for the pasta, the moment this idea struck me, but I was also quite nervous about how the taste would be because I had never tried this combination before. Thankfully all my fears were put to rest and my greeny pasta came out superbly well.
The nutritional information for the dish is as below: