pasta (v)

Posted by trish on Apr 12, 2011 in Eat | 0 comments

This is a recipe that I have cobbled together out of ingredients in the fridge, but it was inspired by a recipe from one of my favourite Australian chefs – Jill Dupleix.

Jill Dupleix invented Crash Hot Potatoes. I love her.

(By the way, I’m not going to give my recipes titles that are just a long list of their ingredients.  I’m going to pick the main ingredient – maybe two – and that will be the title.  So this dish is not going to be called roast pumpkin, goat’s cheese feta, pine nuts, cream and spinach pasta. But you might be able to track it down later by putting “pumpkin” or “pasta” in the Search box, because I’ve added tags to the post.  OK? Thank you.)

ROAST PUMPKIN PASTA (SERVES 4)

One butternut pumpkin, peeled, cut into chunks (about the size of matchboxes)

300ml cream

1 cup chicken stock

100g  baby spinach leaves

1 leek, thinly sliced

20g butter

200g soft goat’s cheese fetta (I use Meredith Dairy – it’s divine.)

2 Tbsp pine nuts, lightly toasted in a dry frying pan over medium heat.

salt and pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 180C.  Place the pumpkin on a baking tray.  Drizzle or spray with olive oil then roast for about an hour, or until done.  (The pumpkin in the picture above is cooked but I would have left it in for another ten or fifteen minutes to go brown and start to caramelise but I had to take it out of the oven while I went to pick the kids up from some place.)

Use a food processor or blender to mix the pumpkin and chicken stock.

Pour the pumpkin into a large saucepan, add the cream and heat over a low flame.  (Jill Dupleix’s recipe calls for 3 red chillis, seeded and chopped, plus two teaspoons of horseradish cream to be added at this point… it’s delicious, but I’m out of horseradish.  If you’re going to do it her way, drizzle the pumpkin with honey before you put it in the oven.)

Add salt and pepper to taste.  You should end up with a thick sauce.

Boil pasta (Jill recommends shells) and drain when done.  Using the pot you just cooked the pasta in, melt the butter over medium heat and add the leeks.  Stir for about five minutes, then add the spinach and toss until wilted.  Put the pasta back into that pot and mix it all around, then either tip it into the pot with the pumpkin, or pour the pumpkin over the pasta.

Divide into bowls and sprinkle some pine nuts and a generous amount of crumbled fetta over the top.  If you don’t have fetta, use parmesan cheese.