kaleeeeee!!! and pasta.

we love pasta in my family.  we love pasta in my house.  even the dog will eat uncooked pasta (yes, its true!).  yes, i really love pasta.  i probably eat too much pasta, but hey its cheap annnd easy!  i also love veggies and fruits, you know the stuff in the grocery store called PRODUCE.  seriously, i can eat some mixed greens w/o dressing as a snack, no prob.

however, the same old penne with tomato basil sauce (or what we call "red" sauce in my house) can get boring after like 25 years.  so can pesto (the "green" sauce).  so obvi i need to get a little fancier with my pasta.  so i consulted gojee.  i've been craving kale lately, typed in "kale" in "i crave" and added a bunch of stuff that i already had and found this lovely recipe (my inspiration if you will).  got home to start cooking and realized i didn't have enough spagetti, so i improvised.

btw: i didn't really follow the measurements in the recipe linked above, i just did what i thought looked like enough.  it was.

whole wheat penne with kale & onions

makes 2 about 2 servings. 

ingridents:

penne - 2 1/2 cups or so

kale - like 2 big handfuls or more.  use the pre-washed & chopped from trader joes!

3 cloves of garlic

half an onion

olive oil

salt

butter - this wasn't on the inspiration, and adds fat but also FLAVOR.

crushed red pepper

step 1: gather your ingridents.  duh.  boil a big ol' pot of water.  i skip salting the water.

step 2: while the water boils, slice the onion.  chop your garlic cloves.  if you are lucky you have a handy gadget like i do for the garlic:

so awesome!  totally avoid garlic fingers.

smash your garlic with the side of your chef's knife to remove the skin.  place in gadget.

roll it around on the floor or counter or whatever.  this seems like it might be a fun thing for kids to do in the kitchen.  but i don't have any so don't take my word for it.  there is a blade involved.

step 3: water is boiling, throw in the pasta!  heat oil in a large saute pan, i did about 1 table spoon.  add onions, chile pepper and some salt.  then throw a tablespoon of butter in there.  cook, stirring occasionally, till the onions look like this (like 5-7 mins):

step 4: pasta is probably ready, so drain it.  add the kale to the onions. cook, stirring and tossing till the kale is wilted, like this (about 3 mins):

step 5: add the garlic and a pinch of salt.  cook for a bit longer, stirring so the garlic doesn't burn till it looks like this (approx. 2 mins):

step 6: dump pasta into pan with kale & onions.  mix it up.  if the kale/onion mixture is sticking you can add some water, but i didn't have this problem.

step 7: plate (or bowl) it.  top with parmesan cheese. 

step 8: eat.  yummmmm.

ummm so i'm totally hungry again after doing this post!   seriously though, its a great meal for weeknights when you don't want to spend hours making dinner after work.  the TJ's kale really made it easy!