Thursday, July 22, 2010

Warm Pasta Salad

After a visit to the downtown Farmer's Market during my lunch hour, I was much more inspired for tonight's dinner. Since I'm trying new things, one of the best places to challenge myself with fresh foods is at the market. Today's new ingredients were cherry tomatoes. I only have had them a handful of times ever and I have never cooked with them. Since I still had pasta in mind, I decided to do a colorful warm pasta salad.

Here's how I did it:

Cook your favorite pasta. (Hint: adding a pinch or two of kosher salt in the water before you start cooking to make your pasta even MORE delicious!)

Meanwhile, boil water in another pot. Cut green beans into 1-2" pieces. Add to boiling water and cook until they are done to your liking.

Thinly slice an onion. Add to a large pan (with about 1T of your favorite olive oil) and cook the onion. Slice your cherry tomatoes in half. Chop a few leaves of fresh basil. When the onion is done cooking, add some cooked chicken. Add about a cup of extra virgin olive oil (read your labels carefully!!!) and stir over low heat. Add your cooked green beans, cherry tomatoes, and basil and stir. Add some goat cheese on top. Eat!

This was really, really good. There is such an exciting combination of flavor and texture to this meal, in addition knowing just how healthy something like this is: pasta, veggies, poultry, and (lactose free) cheese! I'm excited to have this for lunch tomorrow as well! I really like making pasta salad in this style, I just don't like all the dishes it can generate because my kitchen lacks a dishwasher...

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