Pasta Puttanesca (à la Sophie Dahl)

This is a great, easy pasta dish. Just to pre warn, if you don't like fish, then this is not for you! The dish contains anchovies, which I think give a lovely salty taste and it just kind of makes me think I'm in Italy, having dinner in a lovely seaside town, eating delicious fishy tomato chilli pasta. This (as the title may give away!) is from Sophie Dahl's Miss Dahl's Voluptous Delights, a book I have mentioned numerous times (mainly for the amazing banana bread!). The recipes in the book are so fresh and for the majority of the time, healthy as well. Of course, this is a pasta dish, so it's not terribly nutritious but it's a great tasting sauce and really spruces up some plain penne!


Serves 2 people (but just double up these portions for family sized!)

Ingredients

200g of penne (I used rigatoni but any kind of pasta should work!)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove garlic, peeled and chopped
1 fresh red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped
400g tin of chopped tomatoes, drained
4 anchovy fillets
1/2 teaspoon of soft brown sugar
150g black olives, pitted
2 large tablespoons of fresh chopped parsley (I used dried to sprinkle over the top which still gave a lovely fragrant taste. Fresh would however be better here in my opinion!)

Ok, this recipe is in 2 easy steps!

Step 1, is the saucy sauce! In a pan, heat the olive oil and fry the garlic and chilli until mildly browned.


Add the tin of chopped tomatoes.



Sophie recommends using a pestle and mortar here to grind the anchovies, which would be the most sensible choice. I just used the back of a fork and squished them in their tin, then added them to the tomato sauce mix.


Let the sauce simmer for a further 20 minutes. Add the sugar.

Step 2, cook the pasta as directed in some salted water. Once the pasta is cooked and drained, add it to the tomato sauce with a spoonful of the salty pasta water. Add the black olives and coat the pasta well with the sauce.




Serve with a generous grating of parmesan and parsley. Buon appetito!

Tuna Steak WITH Gino D'Acampo's Cherry tomato and Anchovy Sauce and French Bean Salad with Mint, Goat Cheese and Pine Nuts

It's been a few days since my mad bout of posting lots. But it's the weekend and I'm a student therefore I'm either going out or in the library! Although I should be studying now I think I might update with a few of the meals I've had. This Friday night I cooked tuna steak for me and my housemate along with Gino D'Acampo's Cherry tomato and Anchovy Sauce and French Bean Salad with Mint, Goat Cheese and Pine Nuts.

I saw him make this on This Morning whilst I was bumming about at home, probably before a lecture. (Life of a student eh?!) Also during his cooking segment, there were other people all cooking the same thing at home at the same time as Gino, they had a wall of telly screens so he could watch them and tell them if they're doing the right thing. Thought that was pretty cool and also showed that what these TV chefs make on the telly isn't that hard!

So Gino cooked it with a crispy salmon fillet - whereas I had tuna steak in the freezer and I'm not a massive fan of salmon. The meal again, like Rosie's wasn't too difficult.

This is Gino's recipe - I am copying and pasting it from the website, so in no way am I claiming it is mine!

I am separating the recipe into 3 parts, since there are kind of 3 stages to it although done at the same time.

For 2 people.

Sauce:

200ml olive oil
1⁄2 red onion, finely sliced
4 anchovy fillets in oil, drained
400g tinned cherry tomatoes
3 tablespoons finely chopped
flat-leaf parsley
Salt and pepper

Preparation:

Heat 4 tablespoons of the olive oil in a medium saucepan and fry the onion until golden. Add the anchovies, cherry tomatoes and parsley, season with salt and pepper and cook, uncovered, over a medium heat for 10 minutes.

French bean salad with mint, goat cheese and pine kernels:

100g French beans (topped)
3 fresh mint leaves
½ garlic clove
1 tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
70g goat cheese
2 tablespoons of dry toasted pine kernels
Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation:
In a medium size saucepan, cook the beans in salted boiling water until al dente.

In the meantime finely chop the garlic and the mint together and place in a large bowl. Pour in the oil and lemon juice and mix until well combined.

Drain well the beans and add into the bowl with the dressing.

Season with salt and pepper and toss all together until evenly coated. Place on a serving plate.

Crumble over the goat cheese and scatter with the cooled pine kernels.

2 tuna fillet steaks.

For the timing of the meal overall, I would:

- Fill up a kettle to boil the water for the green beans.

- Place the green beans in a saucepan.

- Chop up the onion for the sauce, open the can of cherry tomatoes, open the tin of anchovies.

- Once the kettle is boiled, pour into the saucepan with the green beans and let them cook.

- Start frying the onion for the sauce.

- Get the grill very hot for the tuna steaks.

- Once the green beans have been cooking for a couple of minutes and the red onion has sweated and you have started adding the other ingredients to the sauce. Then place the tuna steaks under the grill, cooking for 5 minutes either side - or until it's cooked how you want it, here's a good guide for cooking tuna steak.

- Then follow the rest of the directions from Gino's instructions for the sauce and the green bean salad.

Plating up:

- Place the sauce onto a plate, place the tuna steak on top. Arrange the beans next to it.

Enjoy!

Love FF x