Spinach Pesto Pasta with Roasted Vegetables
2 cups fresh spinach
1/4 cup olive oil
1 clove garlic, chopped or crushed
1/4 cup walnuts
1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
salt and pepper, to taste
vegetables (I used golden beets, tomatoes, and asparagus)
pasta
pine nuts
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. For spinach pesto, blend spinach in a food processor with olive oil until fairly smooth. Add garlic, walnuts, yeast, salt, and pepper and blend until smooth, adding more olive oil if necessary.
2. Roast vegetables. If using asparagus, tomatoes, or similar veggies, add during last 15 minutes. Cook pasta according to package directions, drain, rinse with cold water, and toss with pesto. Let sit until needed. This will allow the pesto to soak into the pasta.
3. After all the veggies are done roasting, remove and cut into small pieces. After veggies are removed, roast pine nuts for 2-3 minutes. Assemble roasted veggies on top of pasta. Sprinkle roasted pine nuts on top.
This would be great with all sorts of roasted vegetables, I used what I had on hand: beets, asparagus, and tomatoes. Other good things would be red peppers, garlic cloves, red onion, broccoli, eggplant, fennel, or zucchini. Go wild! To be honest, the veggies were good, but the spinach pesto really stole the show!
Source of recipe: Dreamed this up while procrastinating at work.
SO HOW'D IT GO?
i was at work, and i had a craving for this again! I got home and made it ASAP. this time i used zucchini, eggplant and tomatoes for the roasted veggies. I LOVE ITTTTT. I feel so satisfied right now :)
This was delicious! I used a package of frozen spinach and it came out great! I threw in some yummy mushroom tomato sauce which gave it a sweeter taste. Yum!
this was sooo good! I was a bit worried at first because I used frozen spinach, and wasn't sure if it would work. But it worked perfectly! I used a blender and didn't have any trouble at all. For the veggies I used mushrooms, onions, tomatoes, and green peppers. YUM!! I want more!!! I am tempted to eat my lunch now..... mMMmmM Thank you! You are an amazing chef for being able to think of this during work :)
Do you think this would work with thawed frozen spinach?
hmm it may chop up more easily but you won't get the fresh taste and it might water it down a bit. but try it and let us know!
Do you think this would work with thawed frozen spinach?
This was delicious and really creative! I struggled a bit with the pesto b/c I used a blender (don't have a food processor) so the spinach and walnuts didn't grind down all the way but it was still good! For the vegetables I used asparagus, broccoli, and yellow squash. Mixed everything together in the pesto when it was done.
i have never had fresh beets, or golden ones. What do they taste like?
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