Tuesday: Veggies veggies veggies!

Tonight was one of those "oh crap, there are loads of vegetables left and we get a new biokiste the day after tomorrow" nights.

We had penne topped with caramelized vegetables and toasted-almond pesto and cauliflower mashed with bacon. That worked through a lot of the remaining items from the box. :-)

For the pasta sauce I diced some carrots and onions very small (brunoise size), chopped up a fennel bulb into small bits and sauteed the whole thing with a pinch of salt in olive oil and butter until it started to brown. I then added a ladle of pasta-cooking water and another knob of butter to get a sauce.

The pesto is similar to one I made the other night, but I skipped the garlic and added some piri piri peppers and sbrinz cheese. The combination of toasted almonds, cumin, and basil is really, really nice.

The cauliflower was a model of simplicity: I cooked the whole head in acidulated water until tender, rinsed it well, and the separated the florets. I browned some diced bacon in a bit of olive oil, then added the cauliflower and cooked until it started to brown a bit and was heated through. After transferring this to a heated bowl, I mashed it using a potato masher.

Of course we had a green salad too.

Idea: There's a pesto is a sauce for grilled meat just waiting to happen: I bet putting the garlic back in along with a shot of sherry vinegar (maybe leaving the cheese out?) will produce something fantastic.