Recipe: Pasta with Asparagus and Cherry Tomatoes

pasta with asparagus and cherry tomatoes

What started out as a “hmm – I have 2 vegetables in the fridge what ever shall I make for dinner” moment, turned out to be potentially the yummiest, freshest tasting dinner I’ve made in a long time. Being a bit of the arty type, color is a big deal to me. There MUST be color on my plate. I think the nutritional value of white is…zero. Particularly I seem to judge how healthy a meal is based on how much green there is. Then how much red there is. And it really is true, the most naturally deeply colored foods are the ones with the highest antioxidants. Think of any of the superfoods you’ve heard of: blueberries, acai berries, broccoli, pomegranates – all deeply colored. Simplest health rule ever: if your plate has color(umm food dye doesn’t count), you’re doing ok!

If you need something colorful and delicious for the easiest supper ever, give this a try!

Pasta with Asparagus and Cherry Tomatoes

serves about 4

pasta – use whatever you like for as many people as you like. We usually eat brown rice pasta.

1 bunch asparagus, ends trimmed and discarded, chopped into 2 inch pieces

1 container of cherry tomatoes

4 tbs extra virgin olive oil, divided

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

juice of 1/2 a lemon

sea salt, to taste

feta (or romano) to garnish

Directions: Boil pasta. In a large pan, heat 2 tbs of olive oil over medium heat and saute garlic, sea salt, asparagus and tomatoes, until asparagus is soft and browning, and tomatoes have released their juices. Remove from heat and add lemon juice and remaining olive oil. Toss with pasta and garnish with feta. Enjoy!

Recipe: Tomato Feta Confit

tomato feta confit

Confession: I don’t really get that excited about the slow cooker. I know…gasp…right? I use the slow cooker for the odd meal, most frequently to cook beans, but I think I associate the slow cooker with meaty dishes. You know, stick a roast and some potatoes in, and by the end of the day…dinner! And definitely the slow cooker comes in handy for this, but I make so few meat dishes that usually I choose other methods to prepare it when I do. I also probably don’t use it that often because meals for me are not about how quickly and conveniently I can make something. I like to cook, and usually have or make the time to do it. However, slow cookers are great for a number of reasons, including the convenience piece. They use a FRACTION of the energy that heating an oven requires. To have the slow cooker on all day is still significantly more green than using the oven at all! Slow cookers also seem to represent those recipes we all want when we are cold or tired or needing to be comforted. It seems fallish doesn’t it?

Kristy-Anne is away for a couple of weeks(sniff…sob) but she left me a huge bag of tomatoes from her aunt’s garden. They are so red and so delicious and I’ve enjoyed cooking some tomato based meals this week. Today I whipped up this little recipe and it is so easy, about 5 ingredients, slow cooker friendly, and perfect fall comfort food. I hope you enjoy it! The potatoes and tomatoes combine to be perfectly falling apart but not too liquidy. The feta makes it a bit creamy, and the greek oregano makes the house smell too delicious for words.

Tomato Feta Confit

Serves about 4

approx 2 lbs new potatoes, quartered

approx 6 medium tomatoes, quartered

4 garlic cloves, peeled

1/2 cup crumbled feta

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup water

1/2 tsp oregano(or a greek spice mix)

sea salt to taste

Directions: In a slow cooker, combine all ingredients. Heat on high until bubbling (approx 1 hour) and then low until you’re ready to eat (or low all day). Serve with a salad for a vegetarian entree, or as a side dish!

Confession: I scooped some out to take a picture(above) and promptly ate the whole bowl. Random afternoon snack!

Recipe: Roasted Purple Potatoes with Kale and Lemon

pretty purple potatoes

Poor Sexy Husband has been under the weather. It’s never fun to be sick. After a few days of not eating much, his appetite was slowly returning for easy-on-the-stomach kinds of things. We made soup, we made fresh bread. The usual. Then yesterday IronSister invited me to pillage her garden, which she is harvesting because here in Calgary it has become winter already. So the girls and I went with our buckets and puddle boots and picked all sorts of yummy things. We decided to make a purple supper! It is honestly nothing short of a miracle that something in nature grows to be the miraculous color of the purple in these potatoes. They were so pretty I would have accessorized with them if that wasn’t…weird. I enjoyed the opportunity to show Picky Princess the miracle it is that food grows in the ground, that it is beautiful and amazing. Even Foodie Baby oooo’d dramatically when we cut into the potatoes. And kale is one of my favorite snack foods. We often roast it in the oven until it’s dry and crispy and oh so slightly seaweed-y in taste. This very simple and delicious recipe came out of this adventure. I hope you enjoy it!

In other fig & fennel news…thanks to my fabulous graphic designer, Mark, we are getting a nice little makeover. The new and improved look will be up sometime later this week. I’ve also got some upcoming features on cool local places doing cool local things, pretty things I love and think you may too, more inspiring info on how to live healthy from IronSister, and some people who are inspiring and who are changing the world, starting with their own little circle. It’s amazing how the more engaged you become with your world, living in the moment, remembering what is important, breathing a little deeper, the more you see inspiration all around you.

Roasted Purple Potatoes with Kale and Lemon

Serves 4

5 lbs of purple potatoes (ok this is a total estimation because they came dirty from the garden. You can use as many or as few as you like. I filled a 9 x 13 glass baking dish with quartered small potatoes), cut into quarters

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 large head of purple curly kale, rinsed, spines removed, and coarsely chopped

1 large lemon, juiced and then sliced

5 garlic cloves, peeled

sea salt to taste

Directions: Preheat oven to 375. Bring a large pot of water to boil. Boil quartered potatoes until they are just tender. Drain. Take a fork and smash them around a bit, not to fully mash them, just to scuff them up a bit. Put potatoes, olive oil, kale, lemon juice, lemon wedges, peeled garlic cloves and sea salt into a baking dish. Bake until kale and potatoes are turning brown, stirring at least once, approximately 45 mins. Serves and enjoy!

before being roasted