Everyday lunch is a challenge. Whilst I am perfectly happy to munch on a big salad every day, David gets a bit bored with the same textures so sometimes I try to whip up something different. For the past few months as most of you know, I've been dabbling around with the "raw food" trend so most stuff coming out of the kitchen is inspired by the raw, gluten-free, sugar-free, dairy-free, whole food philosophy. What happens is I read about some ingredient, then find it, buy it and then it sits in my fridge or cupboard winking at me and teasing me to try it out. So today, when the lunch time cravings started the organic spelt pasta cried out to be eaten.
Spelt is an ancient grain that offers a broader spectrum of nutrients compared to wheat. It is an excellent source of manganese, and a good source of protein, copper, and zinc.
Whilst I put the water on to boil, I started to invent the sauce. I wanted to try making a 'green" sauce. I knew I wanted to blend this sauce in the food processor until creamy and then toss it through the drained pasta. So I started with raw spinach leaves in the processor. Then added about half a tbspn of tahini, ran out to the tree and picked a lemon and squeezed all the juice ontop, added a huge fresh perfect avocado and a little water. I lightly sauted some fresh garlic in coconut oil and gently fried sliced portobello mushroom and then added this (not raw) to my already existing raw ingredients for the sauce.
I was happy with the taste and texture. So after draining the pasta I mixed the sauce through and serve topped with a few reserved slices of avocado.
The taste
test was pretty good but I instantly felt the carbs hit my gut, which was strange since I thought spelt was not meant to cause intolerances. I am not intolerant but since I rarely eat pasta I do find it very heavy and bloating and then it gave me wind :(
I think I can improve on the sauce a little more. It tasted better before I mixed it in with the spelt pasta so perhaps I need to increase the flavours a little more. Maybe more tahini and perhaps add some pine nuts to the blend mixture. I might try the sauce again but next time use the faux pasta favourite that we have found - zuchinni.
Anyway here are the pics!
The finished sauce
Before blending
The spelt pasta
About to mix the sauce with the drained pasta
The finished dish!
After mixing together
PS: I kept leftovers for the kids and they truly HATED IT. I think the problem as by dinner it had obviously gone cold (in the fridge) so I had to reheat it (which defeats the whole purpose of it being fresh and raw) and it lost its texture. I attempted to revive it with lashings of parmesan cheese, then cream but they still didn't like it. I tasted it and indeed it was not the same as it was at lunch - so my warning is eat it fresh! David still gobbled up the kids leftovers with no complaints though.