Hi... not many recipes from my kitchen for the past two months..... my mom was here.....so she was the cook and I concentrated on eating :) She cooked traditional balanced vegetarian Indian meals and I worked out a lot. Lost 3 kgs in past 2 months.... :) Can't seem to stop smiling about that....!!! Cooking by myself again is tiring, yet my kids are happy.... they love eating non-vegetarian food, which I didn't cook out of sheer boredom !! Here is a recipe, which brought a smile to my older kid's face. I had italian and thai basil in my pantry and my kid wanted to eat chicken, and I wanted to experiment for my blog... so this was the result.... I checked out few basil, chicken and pasta recipes ...however, many of them called for butter and cream, which I did not want to use !!! This is what I made, and it was delicious.
Ingredients:
- about 250 gm chicken (boneless cut to strips or chicken mince)
- 350 gms penne pasta
- 1 cup of thai basil leaves
- 1 cup of italian basil leaves ( you can use different varieties or 2 cups of a kind)
- 1 whole garlic (about 10-12 cloves)
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- salt and pepper
- olives about 15 nos (I used the pitted ones in brine)
- 100 gms of baby corn
- 1/3 cup of frozen sweet corn
- Parmesan cheese and more basil leaves (to garnish)
- 1 tsp of dried red chili flakes
- 1 dried red chili
Recipe:
- Boil the penne according to instructions on the pack with enough water and salt. Drain, after reserving about 1/2 cup of salted water. Rinse the penne with cold water.
- Wash and clean chicken. Dry it with paper towels or in a strainer and cut to small strips. (You can also mince it, in a food processor)
- Wash and clean the basil leaves and leave it in a strainer to drain most of the water.
- Add salt and pepper to the chicken.
- Grind about 5-6 cloves of garlic with a cup of thai basil leaves and add it to the chicken.
- Rub the marinade on the chicken well and leave it for about 1/2 hour.
- Chop the remaining basil leaves roughly,grate rest of the garlic, drain the olives from the brine,and chop the baby corn.
- Heat 3 tbsps olive oil in a pan. Add grated garlic and red chili and saute for 1-2 minutes.
- Once the garlic is browned a little, add the chicken with the marinade.
- Saute the chicken, till it is cooked.
- Add olives, and chopped baby corn.
- Cook for 2-3 minutes, till everything is well mixed.
- Add frozen corn and chopped basil leaves.
- Add the boiled penne. Toss to mix.
- Add the reserved salted water. I added the reserved salted water to the container in which I had used to grind the basil, kinda rinsed it with salted water and then added it to the pasta.
- Add the chili flakes.
- Serve hot, garnished with fresh basil leaves and grated parmesan cheese.
Quantity:
- 4-5 servings
Notes:
- You can grind the basil leaves instead of chopping them, while adding to the pasta.
- You can add more or even less olive oil according to your taste, or garnish with more olive oil, while serving.
- Omit chicken for vegetarian version, and substitute with other vegetables.
Nice post!
ReplyDeleteSuch a simple and yummy pasta..wish I could have a plate now..
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