Lately, I have noticed that my writing does not read as smoothly as I would like, and since I don’t have regular access to an editor, it means I need more practice… and less social media (which has become my preferred time suck).
I prefer not to opine about the work of other people. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot going on, and opinions are things I have in seemingly unlimited supply. It goes back to being disappointed that most of the writing I did as an undergraduate was criticism. It’s a valuable skill, but it didn’t feel like I was making anything.
Also, I have no patience for the you’re-a-liar/debate-me/do-your-own-research crowd. I’m the first to admit that I make mistakes (often, sometimes big ones), and I try to be gracious about accepting both correction and criticism. But life is too complicated enough already, and too short, to respond to trolls.
So I guess I’ll stick more to slice-of-life, and pointing out the cool stuff I come across (because there’s plenty of that, too). And hoping that more noticing, and more writing about noticing, will bring with it some improvement.
And so we begin…
Warm food season is coming (for me, that’s the season when you can cook without feeling like you’re being cooked while you’re cooking), and I found a delightful recipe on Instagram — it’s easy, comes together fairly quickly, and uses mostly pantry ingredients (including beans, so it also has some fiber in it). We enjoyed it last night.
Pasta with a Chickpea Cream Sauce
from IG: cocolarkincooks
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
2 cloves smashed garlic (I used 5, because garlic)
small sprig of rosemary
piece of arbol chili
15 oz can of chickpeas
broth
vinegar or lemon juice
parmesan
Heat some olive oil. Sauté onions, garlic, and rosemary, on medium/medium low heat, with a pinch of salt, for 15 minutes (until vegetables are very soft).
Add one can of drained and rinsed chickpeas to the pot. Add enough broth to cover. Let simmer for another 15 minutes.
Remove rosemary sprig. Add a few drops of vinegar or lemon juice, and some parmesan* (measure with your heart). Add chickpea mixture to a blender and blend until smooth. Pour sauce back into the pan.
Prepare some small pasta. (She used quadratti, but I had ditalini so that’s what I used.) Reserve about 1/2c of pasta water. Drain pasta and add it to sauce. Add pasta water as needed to loosen the sauce.
Serve with chopped chives or parsley, and a drizzle of olive oil. Add parmesan* to taste.
* We can’t do dairy in our household, so I used a handful of nutritional yeast in the blending step, and a very small amount of non-dairy parmesan at the end.
Carmen Yount 