Pasta with Zucchini Potatoes A Simple Meal We Cook at Home in Sicily Food That Looks After You

Today's recipe is quite special to me, as it combines the power of simplicity with the balance which simple and affordable ingredients can give you. I'm cooking a very simple pasta, again one of those that you will only find in a Sicilian or Southern Italian family, not in a restaurant, and this will comprise of zucchini, onions, potatoes and tomatoes. Very simple ingredients which balance each other out and maybe that is one of the things I like most about this sort of recipes, simple and humble ingredients which take me back to my Sicilian roots and they look after me. This is a one pot meal by the way, so you will not be missing an awful lot in your kitchen and I'm getting all of my ingredients ready. I've already chopped my zucchini about half a centimeter and sliced and also chopped an onion. I'm not dealing with the potato and you can see that I'm slicing it in little cubes. This is because I want everything to cook at the same time. By the way, you can see that I am retaining the skin in my potatoes. I tend to do that more often than not because food looks after you and the skin actually is very good for you, has got a high degree of fiber. I'm cooking for two people today and I'm making sure that I adjust the quantities accordingly but for example if you like more tomatoes just put more tomatoes or if you like more zucchini add more zucchini. I will give you the quantities and the cooking method in the description as always. However, the only guide that I want to give you as a principle is the amount of water you use and I'll explain that as and when we get there but I'm using 250 grams of plum tomatoes, one medium onion, one medium zucchini and two medium-sized potatoes. That is the extent of vegetables and I'll start by adding a little olive oil in a saucepan first and I'll turn this on and I'll leave it to gently warm up. Medium-sized clove of garlic. I'll remove the peel and I'll give it a gentle crush and I'll add it alongside the chopped onions. There you go. Of course, you can peel the potatoes if you want to. You don't have to leave the peeling and I'm adding them now. I've left the onions and the garlic to gently cook for a couple of minutes on their own and here comes the potatoes. I'll mix them together. However, you will find that they've got this tendency of getting stuck to the pan so I'll just give it a couple of minutes and I'll mix them and I'll add a little water and that is perfect. Just enough for them to absorb a little bit of the flavor. At this point, I'm going to add just a tiny little amount of water so that I can mix them in and that will definitely ensure that they won't get stuck to the bottom of my pan. Here I've got the lid and I will leave them now on a medium temperature for about 10 minutes, enough for the potatoes to soften up. A lot depends by how small you chop your potatoes, by the way. The objective here initially is to get my potatoes in a state where I can go in and just crush a few. See, I'm going in with my fork. It will give me a creamier finish at the end. So just go along and using a fork do what I'm doing. I'll do for about a third of the potatoes and if like me you get a little bit of a brown bottom over here, don't worry. That is perfectly normal. It will be solved in a moment. So next job is to add the remaining vegetables first. So I'm going ahead and add my tomatoes first, followed by the zucchini. There we go. So if you want to mash the potatoes, be sure that you do that before you add your tomatoes and your zucchini. Otherwise, it will become very difficult. So I'm going to mix this together and I'll leave it again on a medium temperature for about a couple of minutes, enough to give the zucchini and the tomatoes the opportunity to blend with all of the other ingredients. And while I wait a couple of minutes, I just wanted to say thank you very much for all of you who have subscribed to the channel. I'm really pleased with the progress made and the comments I received are amazing. Thank you ever so much. That is exactly the sort of community that I'm looking to create. Before I forget, I'll add some salt and pepper. Quantity is to taste, but bearing in mind that I will be cooking the pasta here. Be sure that you put enough salt so that there is plenty there also for the pasta. I'm getting older. I can't see very well. Here, 600. I mentioned at the beginning that the level of water or broth, if you're using broth, is the only thing to bear in mind, depending on how many people you're cooking for. So, I'm cooking for Julia and I, two people, and I'll be using 600 milliliters of water, hot water, and I'm going to add that now to my pan. That is because I will be balancing it with 120 grams of pasta in a moment. However, if you're cooking for more people, the water amount is the only one that you need to change it, not proportionally. So, four people, you will need two zucchini. But if you were to cook for, say, four people, increase the amount of water by 200 milliliters per person. So, in this particular case, four people, you will need a liter of water, not 1.2 liters. So, that's the only little thing to mention. And an awful lot depends on how creamy you like your pasta at the end. So, I'll turn the temperature up and I'll bring this to the boil. Here I've got a bay leaf. And only now that I've added some water, that can go in. And I'll wait until this reaches the boil first. In the meantime, I'll show you a little tip. And you might be already aware of this. This is almost the end of a wedge of Grana Padano. And I just want the little rind. So, I'm going to go along with the knife. I will use this later for the pasta. Here I've got my cheese grater. And a way to clean this, the external part of the rind, is to just put it through, maybe here, the finer part of the cheese grater, so that you remove any impurity. And that is perfect. And my water is beginning to boil. So, I'll turn this down. And I'll place my rind of Parmesan cheese or Grana Padano, whatever you might have in there. And then I will leave now this covered up on a medium temperature for 10 minutes. During this time, the zucchini will partly cook. They will not be totally cooked. And the tomatoes will release the flavor. And the little rind of Grana Padano will do its magic. But obviously, if you are or you do not have the Parmigiano, don't worry. It's just a little extra add-on. So, I'll see you in 10 minutes. My choice of pasta today is spaghetti, by the way. You might be wondering, oh, that is an odd choice. But I'm not going to put them in as they are. I'm going to break them. And this is very, very typical of Cucina Povera, by the way. Spaghetti stands for strings, little strings, like a guitar string, if you like. And you might or might not be aware, but in the old days, it was very affordable, more affordable than different type of pasta shapes that you might have in the cupboard today. And especially in the south of Italy, which has always been poorer than Italy, Northern Italy and so on, they didn't have much different type of pasta in the cabins. And spaghetti would have been the go-to type of pasta. And if they were doing soups, they would have broken it or just eaten it as they are. So, in terms of authenticity, if you want to replicate this recipe, use spaghetti, just like I have. Just chop them in about two centimeters an inch and add them in. But if you are not keen on spaghetti, because sometimes people have given a comment, broken spaghetti, what are you doing? That is why, because actually I am retaining that tradition. So, you can see that my liquid is already kind of creamy because of the effect that the potatoes had. And that will become even creamier now. I'll turn this down slightly. And it's going to take a little bit longer to cook than what pasta would normally take because I've got it on a low temperature. And that is on purpose, because I want everything to infuse with flavors, including the pasta. And this will take about 10 minutes. So, just take your time. Keep an eye on the liquidity. In my case, I think I'm going to be okay because I've done this before and it should be fine. But if you find that it's a little bit thick and you want it a little bit more liquidy, just add a little bit more hot water. A bit like if you were making risotto, for example. But if you follow the directions and quantities I've given you, you will find that you'll be fine. So, I'll see you in about 10 minutes. By the way, do not be tempted to add more pasta because you think 120 grams to people, whatever, is not enough because you've got the potatoes in there. The difference is obviously covered by the potatoes as you've got the carbohydrates from the potatoes. And look, this is what you should be getting. You can see they've got that beautiful creamy sauce at the bottom. And in terms of texture, I'll just taste one of the zucchini. They're perfect because they're slightly al dente. They've got a little bite, but if you want them really, really soft, just cook it for longer and place the lid on so that you don't end up with too much of the water evaporating. So, this is ready. Just a few Sicilian final touches next. First of all, of course, remove the bay leaf. It'll be an unpleasant surprise for some. I'm looking to see if I can find the rind of my grana padano, in case you're wondering. But I think, as it was fairly thin, it has disintegrated, which is a perfect object achieved. But you might find that if you've got a chunkier one, it's there. That's perfectly okay. You can leave it. It's delicious. So, olive oil goes in next, now that it's off the hob. A little cheese to start with on top of all of it. This is, by the way, when you need to taste it for salt and pepper. Bearing in mind that I'm adding cheese, of course, that will make it a little bit saltier. So, be slightly careful. I'm adding some parsley now. You can also substitute parsley with basil, if you like. And I'll mix it in, and this will start combining everything together, and it's ready to be served. Oh, here he is. Hasn't disintegrated. Here it is. This will go to me. Julie's not too keen. And as I'm dishing my portion, I'll make sure that I get my rind in there. As I often say, by the way, when you're cooking and serving brothy dishes like this, ensure that you go for the solids first, and then you can complement with some of the broth after, so that you get a good balance. And that is pretty much perfect. Look at this. A little bit more broth. And if you were a guest at my mother's house, this is inevitable. She will come with a bottle of olive oil afterwards, and she will add just a little bit more. It's just a thing, so I'm not deviating from that. And if you like, you can also add a little bit more parsley. I want to make sure that I get a little pasta as well as a little zucchini, and I'll tell you what it's like. But generally, the smell coming up because of the oil, it's very, very Sicilian. Very, very hot though. And the taste is perfect, because of that balance I mentioned at the beginning. There isn't a single ingredient that overpowers the whole dish, and you get a beautiful balance. And also, it's so good for you. It's healthier. Genuinely, it's one of those dishes that doesn't take long to cook, and that you will feel a lot better afterwards. Try and let me know what you think. Thank you, and buon appetito, as always.