Broccoli Rabe Pesto Pasta with Heirloom Grape Tomatoes

Pesto made with broccoli rabe is pretty popular and it is also super nutritious. You can serve the pesto as a dip or spread for bread instead of as a sauce for pasta. I followed a recipe from Mario Batali’s Molto Gusto. If you follow the link, you will not only find the recipe, but a clip of Mario demonstrating its preparation along with that of two other pasta recipes (pasta with pureed red peppers and goat cheese and pasta with Swiss chard).

The original recipe called for orecchiette pasta, but I substituted farfalle and added in some heirloom grape tomatoes. Later, I served leftovers as a salad, with the addition of more blanched broccoli rabe and some cannellini beans.

The pesto is exceptionally good. I made twice as much pesto as I needed for the pasta, and I have been enjoying leftovers spread onto challah along with lemon chummus.

Garlicy Cashew Green Beans or Broccoli

There is a popular recipe for Spicy, Garlicy Cashew Chicken that appeared in the NYT.  Basically, the recipe calls for marinating and then grilling chicken in a paste of cashews, lime, jalapeno pepper, oil, garlic, soy sauce and brown sugar. I made the recipe (using boneless dark meat chicken), and the cashew paste very much reminded me of coated kale chips.

I got the idea of using the sauce to make vegetable skewers using broccoli and red pepper. I parboiled broccoli, tossed it with olive oil and salt and pepper and then coated it with the cashew paste. The broccoli was then grilled (I used a George Foreman grill). The results were fantastic. The nut mixture got crisp in spots and remained soft in spots. It added the kind of varied texture and savory intensity to the broccoli that a cheese topping usually does.

Anyway . . . . fast forward to this week. I ask my husband if he would like the cashew sauce on grilled green beans and he said “YES!” before I could even finish my sentence. This cashew sauce inspires that kind of enthusiasm.

Note: I grilled the green beans, but I think roasting the green beans would also work.

Char-Grilled Broccoli with Red Pepper, Garlic and Almonds

This broccoli salad/side dish is a signature dish at Ottolenghi. It comes to Ottolenghi from a Tel Aviv restaurant where Sami Tamimi used to work. The original recipe called for mild chili peppers, which I couldn’t find, so I used red bell peppers and sprinkled over a little hot sauce.

Tomato Broccoli Pesto Salad

Roasted broccoli and grape tomatoes, tossed with pesto and toasted almonds: easy, colorful and healthy.

Asian Roasted Broccoli

I was having a little trouble getting my family to eat roasted broccoli, and then I tried a recipe over at Overtime Cook. Miriam’s recipe calls for tossing frozen broccoli florets with a lemon Dijon dressing and then throwing then in  hot oven. It was a big hit.

Initially, I was a little dubious about the recipe. The only frozen vegetables that I really like are corn, peas and spinach. I thought the broccoli was going to have an unpleasant waterlogged texture. Fortunately, roasting the frozen broccoli seems to drive off excess water. While the resulting texture is not crisp it isn’t flabby either, and the flavor is excellent.

Another reason the recipe works is the use of a vinaigrette.  Usually, when I roast vegetables, I use oil plus spices. I don’t add anything acid like lemon juice or Dijon mustard. It turns out that these ingredients add tremendous flavor. Obvious in retrospect, I know, but I didn’t think of it before.

After making the Dijon broccoli for a few weeks in a row, I decided to branch out a little and I came up with an Asian style twist on the recipe. Instead of a lemon Dijon dressing, I made a dressing with olive oil, soy sauce, rice vinegar, garlic, ginger and chili flakes. Also a big hit. This week I added in some sliced shallots and some smoked almonds (made from scratch with salt and smoked paprika).

You can, of course, make this with fresh broccoli.