Presto!!! Pasta and Pesto!

Pasta and pesto is one of my favorite "go to" meals.  Not only does it taste great, it's quick and easy! It's REALLY quick and easy if you have some pesto on hand - which I normally do thanks to my garden:)

The formula?   Cook pasta, add pesto, top with cheese.  

Now because I really can't do anything simple, (story of my life!) I added a little to this one today.  I knew I had some frozen pesto in the freezer, but I also had some spinach I wanted to use up so I knew what I wanted to do.

Let me talk just a minute about the pesto.  Making your own pesto is really easy (I'll save this for another day) but the best thing - it freezes great.  I have my own garden and patio and I always have 2-3 basil plants for this express purpose.  Throughout the summer I pick basil and make small batches of pesto and then freeze them in sandwich bags.  Then whenever I need some pesto, I've got it on hand.

OK back to the pasta.  Provided you have your pesto pre-made, go ahead and get your pasta water going on the stove and cook your pasta.  As with almost all my recipes it seems, I started with diced onion and garlic in some olive oil.  Cook these over a medium low heat until translucent.  I added just a few red pepper flakes. At this point, you could easily skip to adding the pesto but today I decided to add some anchovy paste.  Anchovies add a great saltiness to the dish and unlike what you may think...it doesn't make your dish taste like fish:)  As mentioned, you can easily leave this step out.  I added about 1 tsp of anchovy paste and stirred it about with my onion for a minute or so.  At this point, I would taste it to determine if you need salt and pepper.  The anchovy paste is pretty salty, so I wouldn't add it unless your personal taste requires it:)

Tip:  Anchovy paste may not be the easiest thing to find so 2 small anchovy filets = 1/2 teaspoon.

Once the onion mixture was ready I added my pesto.  Today, it was probably 2/3 cup.  But it again, it's a matter of preference.  Sometimes I want A LOT of pesto...other days I want just enough to lightly coat my pasta.  Today I didn't go with to much because I knew I had a lot of other things going on in the pasta - my onion mixture and my spinach primarily.  Make sure the pesto is incorporated well with the onion mixture and then add the spinach.  I'd start with about 2 cups of coarsely chopped spinach.  Stir this well and cook for about 30 seconds to a minute.  It really depends on how you like your spinach.  In the above recipe, you can see I didn't cook my spinach too long because it's still holding its shape pretty good.  However, if you like more wilted spinach (some days I do!!) cook the pesto/spinach mixture just a bit longer.

Once my pasta was ready I ladled it out of the pasta water and directly into my skillet.  Don't drain it, ladle it into the skillet.  (With a pasta ladle mind, you....not the regular kind...thought I better mention that!! :)The starch from the pasta and the little bit of water will enhance your pasta.  To top if off - I grated some Parmesan cheese and topped it with some lemon zest.  The lemon zest just gives it a little pop of freshness when you take a bite.

The great thing about this recipe is that you can easily tweak it to suit your personal taste preference.  Want more onions?  Add them.  More spinach? Add it! No chili flakes? Fine!  There's no hard line recipe to follow here, which is what I love about it.

And there it is...Presto!  Pasta and Pesto!