indian summer zucchini pasta

It’s been forever and a day since I last posted about food. Oddly enough, the last post was at the beginning of the season, (discussing summer salads), so it seems fitting to share another meal at the beginning of the next. I made this meal several weeks back at the end of summer; the ingredients can still be found at our local farmer’s markets even though we’re into autumn. I hope you can find farm fresh vegetables as well, as this tastes incredible with super fresh food!

This meal was eaten al fresco and it was to die for delicious. Seriously. When I realized how mouth-watering good this was, I grabbed my camera and furiously scribbled down everything I could remember about what I did. Because let’s face it, the vast majority of my cooking is simply throwing things into pots and pans, sprinkling in a bit of this or that, and voila! Dinner is made. But this one is crazy delicious so I hope you make it and love it as well.

Indian Summer Zucchini Pasta

Ingredients:

• Two zucchinis, peeled into ribbons
• 1/4 red onion, minced
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 pint Sungold tomatoes
• 1 ripe Brandywine tomato, halved and quartered
• Stalks from six stems red chard, sliced in 1/4″ pieces; tear leaves and set aside
• 1/4 cup butter
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Directions: Prepare all vegetables as indicated above. To make zucchini ribbons, use a mandolin or vegetable peeler in long stokes to create pasta-like strands. Boil a small pot of lightly salted water. In a cast iron skillet over medium-high heat, melt butter and lightly saute onions, garlic and stalks from chard. Turn down heat and add tomatoes. Prepare an ice water bath for the “pasta.” When the water in the heated pot reaches a boil, add zucchini ribbons and cook for one minute. Do not over cook! Immediately drain and add zucchini ribbons to ice water bath; alternatively, you could just run cold water over the zucchini to stop the cooking process. Drain well and add to skillet. Cook until warm and serve immediately.

Steamed Beet Greens with Flax Seeds

I served the zucchini ribbon alongside steamed beet greens which I lightly sprinkled with apple cider vinegar and flax seeds. I meant to use the leaves from the swiss chard as well, but they were left in the refrigerator. So use those up as well!

And you may have noticed that so far this meal has consisted of only vegetables! And I continued that trend with yet another side.

Roasted Carrots and Beets

I tossed washed carrots (freshly plucked from my garden!) and halved or quartered (depending on size) red beets in olive oil and sea salt and then roasted them in a small pan in my toaster oven for about 35 minutes, tossing half way through. Holy crap these were good. Like dessert good.

This meal came together very quickly and easily. It was light and delicious and super flavorful and was a great way to use up our farmer’s market haul. The butter in the zuchhini pasta, flax seeds sprinkled on the greens and the olive oil coated on the roasted root vegetables gave the meal enough protein and fat to make it a meal. Mangia!