Sasha's Kitchen: Angel Hair Pasta With Grape Tomatoes, Garlic & Pine Nuts

Last night's dinner was a simple recipe adapted from one of my mother's classic fresh pasta dishes.  This dish is fresh and delicious, and is quite simply all about the quality of the tomatoes used in the recipe.  I used fresh organic grape tomatoes that would have been delicious on their own, but were heavenly with a mix of diced garlic, olive oil and pine nuts.  In addition, I flavored the dish with a couple of tablespoons of Round Pond Estate's Blood Orange Olive Oil, a favorite from our last trip to Napa Valley.  The blood orange flavor was a lovely complement to the other flavors.  It makes the dish feel very light and enjoyable.  My husband likes to add a bit of parmesan cheese, as well.

Sasha's Simple Angel Hair Pasta With Grape Tomatoes, Garlic & Pine Nuts
2/3 box of angel hair pasta
2 pints of organic grape tomatoes
1/3 cup of pine nuts
4-5 tsp of diced garlic

To prepare this dish, preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Cut each of the grape tomatoes in half and roast in the oven at 400 degrees for about twenty to thirty minutes.  In the meantime, toast the pine nuts until lightly browned.  Cook the pasta and mix with the other ingredients.  Before serving, mix in two tablespoons of the Blood Orange Olive Oil.  This is  short post and an easy recipe to make during the week after work, but makes for a fresh, satisfying meal.

Sasha's Kitchen: Angel Hair Pasta With Grape Tomatoes, Garlic & Pine Nuts

Michelle's Kitchen in Toronto - Hearts of Palm and Heirloom Tomato Salad with Feta

As spring - and all the gorgeous produce that starts to emerge with it - begins to unfurl, I'm starting to find some of my favorite ingredients at my local mega mart again. I had two joyous discoveries last year; the first was the amazing heirloom tomatoes at the Granville Island Farmer's Market in Vancouver and the other was a product I had heard of, but never sampled myself - hearts of palm; which are derived from the inner core of the growing bud from some palm trees and has a vaguely asparagus or artichoke heart-like taste to it.

Hearts of Palm and Heirloom Tomato Salad

1/2 - 1 can hearts of palm sliced into rounds

2-3 cups sliced heirloom tomatoes (or the freshest tomatoes you can find)
1/3 cup Light Feta Cheese, crumbled (I used shredded store-bought)
1/4 - 1/3 cup good quality balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup good quality olive oil
salt to taste

Put hearts of palm and tomatoes on your serving platter. Drizzle over the oil and vinegar and sprinkle with feta and salt.

Yields 4-6 servings

I had a version of this wonderful salad at a family dinner once, so I was inspired by some beautiful heirloom tomatoes I found at the market and the can of hearts of palm I was saving for just such an experiment. I left the proportions fairly loose in case you like more of one thing and not the other or if you are not as big on vinegar as I am!

Michelle's Kitchen in Toronto - Hearts of Palm and Heirloom Tomato Salad with Feta

Sasha's Kitchen: Discussion Of Homemade Pizza Variations

I did not cook tonight. We ordered in sandwiches from a local sandwich shop in Park Slope. However, tomorrow, I will be preparing a pasta dish. However, I figured that tonight would be a good time to discuss some of the homemade pizza variations I have tried over the summer and fall.

You can really put anything on pizza. I love pizza with different and interesting variations. There are a lot of great pizza places here in New York. Some of my favorites are: Grimaldi's, Keste and Otto Enoteca.

The first step in making pizza is making a tasty crust. I have not experimented with a lot of crust variations, but have simply been working with a very basic crust formula. I have, however, experimented with different types of flours - including regular all-purpose flour and a mixture of all-purpose flour with whole white flour to make a whole white pizza crust. In addition, pizza crust preparation, like most bread preparation, requires using dry active yeast, so you should plan on allowing an extra hour for your crust to rise.

Pizza Crust

1 1/2 cups warm water
2 packets (1/4 oz each) active dry yeast
1/4 cups canola oil
2 T sugar
1 tsp salt
4 cups flour (either use 4 cups all-purpose or 2 cups all-purpose and 2 cups whole wheat)

To prepare the crust, add the warm water, dry active yeast, oil, sugar and salt to a bowl and whisk together. Allow to sit for about 10 minutes, until the yeast foams and is "activated."

Add flour and mix. Transfer to a bowl coated in canola oil and allow to sit, covered with either plastic wrap or a warm dishtowel for 1 hour, until the dough doubles in size.

After the dough doubles, prepare your crusts. You can divide into 4 pieces and stretch with your hands and flatten until you have 4 smaller pizzas, or you can make 1 or 2 larger ones. You can freeze the extra crusts until you are ready to use them.

If you are ready to use the pizzas, then it's time to prepare a topping. Here are some variations I have tried:

Grape Tomatoes, mozzarella, arugula, balsamic and pecorino

Cut up grape tomatoes and use to top the pizza. You can use as many or as few as you like. I then used freshly made mozzarella from M&S prime meats in Park Slope, where they make fresh mozzarella daily.

The I baked the pies at 450 F for about 15-20 minutes until done. While the pies cooked, I mixed the arugula with some pecorino cheese and 2 T of balsamic vinegar. Then, I topped the pies with this mixture and baked for about 1 minute, just enough for the arugula to wilt.


Grape tomatoes, Goat cheese and red onion

First top with the tomatoes and goat cheese, Add some sliced and sauteed red onions and bake at 450 F for 15-20 minutes.

Third variation - simple pizza

Same as variation 1, but use a can of tomato sauce instead of grape tomatoes.

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Sasha's Kitchen: Discussion Of Homemade Pizza Variations