Spring onions and tomato pasta

It’s fun. When spring fully comes I suddenly switch from “comfort recipe” mode into “light and healthy recipe” mode. Does it happen to you too??
Spring onions and fresh tomato pasta is a very easy recipe that I recently discovered thanks to my cousin Cristina: it’s one of her signature dishes. Extremely easy to prepare and incredibly tasty and delicate. Totally in the “light and healthy” mood I was talking about.
Thank you Cristina for sharing with me your recipe 😉

Let’s start from the ingredients:

Today I’ve chosen tagliolini, a long shape pasta (spaghetti style) that usually comes in a nest shape. Any other shape of pasta will be fine, follow your taste…and what you have in your pantry 🙂

Let’s fill a nice large pan with water and place it on the stove at medium/high.

While we wait for the water to boil, we can prepare our sauce. Wash the spring onions and cut them diagonally in thick slices 1/2 inch wide.

Add few tablespoons of Extra virgin oil of olives in a large skillet pan and two leaves of bay leaf. That’s the secret ingredient of this recipe. The bay leaf will give a delicate perfume to our sauce. Turn the heat on at low/medium and let the oil warm up for 1 minute.

Add the spring onions, season with salt, stir and reduce the heat at low. Cover with a lid and let the onions cook for 10 minutes slowly. You want them to nicely cook, get very tender but not dissolve in a puree’.

While the onions are cooking you can prepare the tomatoes. Finally fresh tomatoes are back at the farmer’s market (thanks to the Californian sun!!!) and I’m using two small heirlooms tomatoes, firm and sweet. I slice the tomatoes, take the seeds and the extra water out and cut them in small pieces.

One minute before the onions are ready I take the lid off, add the tomatoes, mix and let it cook for the remaining minute. The tomatoes will be softened by the heat, but will keep their texture.

The water is boiling. It’s time to add a good tablespoon of sea salt and the pasta. Cooking time on the package: 3 minutes!

Let’s drain the pasta and add it to the sauce. Mix, remove the bay leaves, add few tablespoons of cold Extra virgin oil of olives and a generous handful of grated Parmesan cheese. Mix and serve it immediately.

The recipe is really easy and doesn’t take a lot of time (20 min). It’s lovely, fresh and healthy!!! Enjoy!