Recipe: Kale / Garlic / Carrots / Zucchini / Rotini & Marconi Pasta w/ lemon

Very healthy, very easy, lemony-fresh pasta for dinner tonight!

Kids approved :)
Yahooooooooooooooo!!!!!

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

-About 5 stem-full of Kale, ripped in bite size pieces, well rinsed
-One medium sized carrot grated
-One medium sized zucchini cut into cubes
-About 1/4 cup of parsley finely chopped
-About 1/4 cup of fresh basil roughly chopped
-About 4 cloves of garlic roughly chopped
-Olive oil
-Salt and black pepper
- Dash of sesame oil (when I say "dash", I mean about 1/2 teaspoon :)
-Half a lemon juice squeezed

-Blend of regular rotini and whole wheat macaroni for 4 people, boiled aldente, set aside

HOW TO:

- In a large sauce pan, heat olive oil and garlic in medium heat
- Once garlic starts to sizzle, let the aroma of garlic blend with the olive oil about 1 minute.  Do not burn the garlic :)

- Toss in kale and stir about 1 minute
- Toss in zucchini and stir about 1 minute
- Little bit of salt and pepper to soften kale
- Reduce heat to low
- Toss in grated carrots, half of parsley, half of basil and stir for about 1 minute

- Toss in the boiled  rotini / macaroni blend and toss all together
- At this point you can turn off the heat.  Remove from burner.
- Key to a healthy meal is to never OVERCOOK the vegetables.  Keep 'em crunchy!
- Toss in lemon juice; add a little bit more salt and pepper to taste to your liking
- Add the remaining parsley and basil
- Dash of sesame oil
- Toss all together with love :)
- OPTION:  add a handful of hemp seed for some extra protein :)

- Place in a bowl and grate some real parmesan cheese over and serve!


Not a heavy meal, very refreshing flavour thanks to the lemon, and that dash of sesame oil adds such a nice asian flavour to the whole thing.
And you would think..."parmesan cheese"??... with lemon and sesame oil???
Well yes! I say!
They actually blend well together!
Lemony zest with earthy sesame oil and the salty cheese blends so well even on salad and rice; not just on pasta :)
Give it a try!

Kids were happy and enjoyed this super healthy meal!
That's all that counts for a mommy :)
xo