Food Blog: 5 Spring Pastas + 5 Spring Desserts

Monday, April 26, 2021

5 Spring Pastas + 5 Spring Desserts

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Monday, April 26, 2021

Good morning!

The Moka pot is back (Fortune) but for us, it never left because it's the best.
The freedom, and serenity, in using prepared artichokes (LA Times)
Will now tell people my sheet pans are in terrible condition on purpose (Thanks, America's Test Kitchen!)

Pasta is absolutely on our weekly or almost-weekly meal rotation; it's too easy not to be. But, I insist that this doesn't have to = heaviness. All five of the pastas here manage to employ enough spring vegetables that I don't immediately need a nap after (or, at least, the noodles aren't the cause), and I hope they make one of your weeknights more delicious, too. Plus, some spring desserts. We're not quite in rhubarb or berry season here in New York, but I'm impatient and nobody seems to mind around here. I hope you have an excellent week.

Cheers,
Deb

Fresh and New

classic shortbread

New: Classic, tender, buttery, perfect-every-time shortbread cookies with three ingredients and virtually no fuss are the weekend treat you didn't know you needed. [Unless you, too, have recently binged on a certain football coach show and have incessantly craved shortbread since, in which case, sit down, you're among friends.]

5 Pastas

crispy tortellini with peas and prosciutto

Did you know that you could cook frozen tortellini like potstickers and they get crispy and awesome? Me neither, but from there, I couldn't stop. This riff, with peas, prosciutto, mint, lemon and cream looks and tastes fancy and took about 12 minutes to make.

linguine with pea pesto

This is the dish that converted me to shelled peas, some blended with parmesan, garlic and pine nuts, some left whole, all tangled with linguine for an especially pretty weeknight meal.

spaghetti pie with pecorino and black pepper

Comfort food at its prettiest -- a tall, bronzed torte of a spaghetti pie, wound with an abundance of cheese, black pepper and, if you so desire, greens as well. Those edges are my happy place.

fresh spinach pasta

Homemade, handmade, old-school fresh pasta with deep green specks of real spinach is doable and delicious. Serve with absolutely nothing save a drizzle of olive oil and parmesan; this is total centerpiece material.

skillet ravioli with spinach

A 15-minute, 5-ingredient crispy-creamy pasta-and-greens dinner that wants to change the way we make ravioli forever, just in time to talk ourselves out of ordering pizza tonight.

Spring-y Sweets

rhubarb upside-down spice cake

Is it warm but not warm enough where you are? I have just the cake: lemony, pink and usually more spring-like than the weather on top, spiced and cozy underneath. Trust me, we want our kitchens to smell like this.

raspberry brown sugar gratin

Fact! The best recipes are often the ugliest, almost as if they're trying to warn you: this is going to be impossible not to make over and over again, forever, because you never knew three ingredients could combine so transcendently well.

blackberry cheesecake galette

One part cheese danish, one part berry pie, all in an easy galette, this is basically one scoop of ice cream short of making all of our warm weather dessert hopes and dreams come true.

rustic rhubarb tarts

Uneven sides, floppy edges, no rolling pins or special pans needed, these tarts are just rhubarb, vanilla, and brown sugar and they're impossible to mess up.

lemon pound cake

If, in some evil alternate universe, I had to choose only one cake to make for the rest of my life this lemon pound cake (or "lemon drizzle" in GBBO-ese), a triple-assault of citrus sunshine, would be a very strong contender.