I recently snagged three new cookbooks, Carla Lalli’s Food is a Feeling, Ottolenghi’s Simple Too, and Samin Nosrat’s Good Things. Reading the first several pages of Lalli’s Food is a Feeling, made my eyes well up with all of the empathy that is mourning of the ideas we held in our heads of who we were and what our plans were for life.
Curried Butter Lentils
Last night we made Ottolenghi’s Curried Butter Lentils from Simple Too. It was good, but felt like it was missing a crunchy textural element like a crouton. I’d also be more reserved in adding water to the green sauce next time, considerate of any water hanging onto the washed cilantro effectively diluting the condiment. Also, I must remind myself to never buy red lentils again for this sort of dish. They just end up falling apart texturally much quicker than the French lentils that hold their shape and keep a firmer texture.
Gnocchi with Peas and Cheese
There was less success with this recipe. The instructions said to boil cook the frozen peas for 15 minutes before adding the gnocchi, and then cook for an additional 15 minutes. The poor peas were dead and brown and mushy and looked nothing like the gorgeous vibrant peas from the book. I would try this recipe again, but next time I would definitely just let the peas defrost in the pan before adding the gnocchi. This also was missing something texturally. Some toasted breadcrumbs would have been nice, but I understand that the whole premise of this cookbook is to keep things “simple.”
Saturday Night Alfredo
I can only blame myself for the failure of this recipe. First of all, I made it on a Sunday night. We grabbed some pasta that we’d bought on “sale” and realized that it was only 3/4 of a pound. Love the shrinkflation! I’m not sure if the fact that it was tri-color that contributed to the sauce never coming together or if I was too impatient and added the cheese too quickly, but we did properly scale the recipe down. Unfortunately, the parmesan stuck to itself and formed gloopy sticky messes instead of a smooth sauce. I eventually cheated and made a cornstarch gel in the microwave that I used to help emulsify the cheese, but by that time the pasta had been murdered twice over from the frantic stirring. I’m not sure I can muster trying this one again when I have cheater alfredo recipes that work much more consistently. I took no photos of this one, with it starting to look more like soup than pasta by the time I was finished trying to emulsify the sauce. That said, I’m loving reading Carla Lalli’s book, and will need to find some other recipes to try. One of her recipes from her other cookbooks was one that helped sustain us through the pandemic, and I know there is bound to be one to put on repeat in this book as well.
