Saturday, July 2, 2011

Chard-Tomato Peasant Pasta

It really doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this one out, but somehow adding tomatoes to the chard was a revelation for me! I added some parmesan cheese at the end. I copied this directly from a website. I have no idea what Erbette Chard is. I just used whatever kind of chard I had. And regular old dried pasta.

1 bunch Erbette Chard, cleaned, stems removed, and very roughly chopped (can be in fairly large pieces)
olive oil
garlic cloves, peeled and chopped (3?)
4-5 medium sized ripe tomatoes, chopped
fresh pasta, we used Cafferata's fresh spaghetti or dried spaghetti
splash of white wine or squeeze of lemon
S & P

**note: have tongs or other utensil to fish cooked chard out of the water so you can boil the pasta in the same water. another note: save a little pasta water for the final dish....

Bring one large pot of water to boil, then add a couple of teaspoons of salt. Add chard pieces to the water and cook until blanched, 2 minutes or so. Fish out the chard with tongs or strainer. Add pasta to water to cook if using dried pasta...

Meantime, cook the garlic in the oil in a large saute pan for 1 minute over medium or medium high heat until softening a little, make sure it doesn't burn. Add blanched chard & chopped tomatoes. Cook for 5-7 minutes. Cook up the pasta now if you're using fresh pasta.

Now the fun part: toss everything together, with a splash of white wine or lemon juice, and add a little of the pasta water to make everything a tad soupy. Adjust seasoning (add S & P to taste) and EAT.