Pasta salad

Summer holidays have now started and I've arrived in Bordeaux ! 

The train was delayed and didn't start for an hour and a half and then it stopped along the way so all in all the ride took 5 hours and a half, plus i was stupidly wearing jeans and a jumper, so as soon as i got out of the train i almost suffocated from the heat ! However after a change of clothes and a glass of water,  it finally felt like the holidays ! I love Bordeaux and the sun so it's been great. 

We didn't have time to do any shopping, we could only buy a brocoli on the way to the house, so I made a salad from leftovers in the cupboard and it actually was delicious, I looooved it ! 

Here's what I put inside :

- 1 steamed broccoli 

- Cold pasta

- 1 tin of tuna

- 1 jar of roasted peppers

- 6 diced prunes ( it added a nice sweetness in the background that went really well with the salty tuna )

- Chopped mint and parsley

- Olive oil and salt & pepper.

A bowl full of minestrone.

What is the nicest thing to eat on a stormy night ?

Soup.

And what soup is the most flavorsome and comforting ?

Well it has to be minestrone !

What is minestrone ?

It is basically a lot of vegetables cooked together in water with small pasta and at the end you add tomatoes, basil, parmesan and olive oil.

Here's how I made it :

- chard (both stalks and leaves)

- leeks

- carrots

- celery

- mange tout

- green beans

- peppers

- potatoes

- alphabet pasta

- lardons

- basil

- tomatoes

- parmesan

- salt

- pepper

- olive oil

 Chop the celery.

 Chop chop chop.

And chop chop choperou.

 Fry in a casserole until lardons are cooked then add water and bring to the boil.

 Chop the peppers.

 And guess what you do to the potatoes ?!

Rince the beans (finally something that doesn't need any chopping).

 After 20 minutes add the potatoes and peppers for 30 minutes.

 Then add the beens for 10 minutes, and then the pasta for another 10.

 Prepare bowls with crushed tomatoes, CHOPPED basil and parmesan.

Serve the soup with a drizzle of olive oil, a pinch of salt and pepper.

















Basically if you're in the mood to do some chopping then this is the recipe for you !

Arriving in Bordeaux

Monday, July 14th i.e. the french national day, I travelled on the train to go to my father's house ( with said father) in a little town near Bordeaux. It's a very typical country house with a big garden, my favorite part is the "potager" which is the vegetable garden. We arrived and there were many courgettes ready to be eaten. But most importantly, there are 4 basil plants, and basil just happens to be my favorite  herb ;).
So for dinner, we hadn't done any shopping yet so I made pasta, it's sort of the tradition to eat pasta the first night because there's never anything else to eat.
I cooked the courgettes in a pan, and I made a "pesto" (not really because there was no parmesan or pine nuts in the fridge) by mixing basil leaves, garlic and olive oil.

 No one was ready to have dinner but the pasta was cooked, so I ran some cold water over it to stop it from cooking and saved some of the water the pasta had cooked in.
Then when dinner time arrived, I mixed together the courgettes, the pesto, the pasta and the cooking water all in a pan to heat it up a bit.

And it was ready to be taken down to the garden for dinner.

YUMSTERS

Afterwards we just had some nice mint and verbena infusion.

Then we left to go watch the fireworks ... :)

Quick "Bolognese" sauce

  Hi, it's been a while since I posted something, I guess my "I'm going to post what I cook every night, however boring it may be" didn't really go as planned !

  Anyway, in need for a nice easy meal using the sunday beef leftovers ( I did this last monday night, just to reassure you on the freshness of the meat) I decided to make it into a pasta sauce.
It started out with some chopped up onions cooking in the pan, to which I added the beef cut into small pieces. I then added a glass of wine, and some tomato concentrate, and I let it simmer while the pasta was cooking.
I prepared a little side salad, and voilà that was it! Easy peasy ... and delicious !

You should always add some of the water the pasta is cooking in to your sauce, it helps link all the ingredients together ;)

YUMSTERS !