Corn Pesto Pasta

Last night I ended up making a really amazing dish that I just threw together with ingredients I had on hand.  In my CSA share this week I got 3 ears of corn and a giant zucchini.  I really wanted to use the corn quickly because I was worried it wouldn't last, but I didn't have any proteins I could serve it with on the cob.

I thought about making a pesto with the zucchini, but the pictures I saw online didn't appeal to me.  Then I realized I could probably do the same thing with the corn!  It turned out really well, and was very easy.  This recipe is a little higher in points than most that I post, but you could serve a smaller serving of pasta and bulk it up with more vegetables and it would still be excellent.

This is really not a very attractive
dish, but it was so good!

Corn Pesto Pasta
Serves 2 - 14 WW Points Plus Per Serving

4 ounces pasta, cooked al dente and drained
3 ears of corn, kernels removed from the cob
1 small zucchini or 1/2 a large zucchini, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, diced
1/8 cup olive oil
10 hazelnuts
lime
salt
Parmesan (optional, and not calculated into the points)

While your pasta (use a short pasta with nooks and crannies to catch the sauce) is cooking, heat about 1/2 a tablespoon from your olive oil in a nonstick pan.  Saute 2/3 of the corn you removed from the cob and the garlic for 3-4 minutes, or until just fragrant.  Put in a small food processor or cup that you can use a hand held blender in.

Pour in almost all of the rest of the olive oil, but reserve 1/2 a tablespoon. Put in the hazelnuts and squeeze the lime juice in with the corn/garlic mixture, season with salt and puree until almost smooth.

In the same pan you cooked the corn in, put the remaining 1/2 tablespoon olive oil, and once hot saute the zucchini for about 5 minutes.  Put in the remaining corn to cook.

When your pasta is finished cooking, drain and stir into the pan with the zucchini and corn.

To serve, split the pasta/zucchini/corn mixture into two bowls, then top with 1/2 the corn pesto on each serving.  Sprinkle with a little Parmesan if you wan.

Recipe: Buffalo Cupcakes

 Back in January, I wrote about pastrami cupcakes, a recipe that was inspired by a great cooking blog called Emily Bites. For this week, I needed to make something for lunch.  Usually I make extra of something I am making for dinner, but none of the recipes I chose for this week worked well with making extra, so I decided to make some kind of "cupcake".  Scott originally suggested Thai-inspired cupcakes, but I couldn't really think of anything that would work.  Then I remembered that Emily Bites has made buffalo cupcakes in the past. She uses chicken, and I try to eat vegetarian at lunch, and Laughing Cow blue cheese wedges, which to be honest, kind of gross me out.  I would rather have a little good blue cheese then use something that might not be great.  Plus, a little blue cheese goes a long way flavor-wise.

Buffalo wings are great, but they are not particularly healthy, so this is a great way to get that buffalo flavor fix without the points!

Vegetarian Buffalo Cupcakes
Makes 20 cupcakes, each serving is 2.
8 points for 2 cupcakes

40 wonton wrappers
16 ounces mushrooms
2 bags Gardein chipotle lime "crispy fingers"
6 ounces blue cheese, crumbled
12 tablespoons buffalo sauce

Prepare the faux chicken according the the package directions.  When cooked, chop into small pieces.  Saute mushrooms in non-stick pan until cooked, then process in a food processor until well chopped.  Mix faux chicken and mushrooms in a large bowl, pour in buffalo sauce and toss to coat.

A perfect, easily portable, lunch

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Spray a muffin tin with olive oil spray.  My muffin tin makes 12 muffins, so I did this in two batches.  Push 10 wonton wrappers into the bottom of the muffin tin.  Top with about a tablespoon of mushroom/faux chicken mixture (this will take some estimating.  Just make sure you have enough to do 2 layers in 20 cupcakes.  It may help to separate mixture into quarters.)

Put another wonton wrapper on top of the mixture, then another layer of mushroom/faux chicken.  Top each cupcake with about a half a tablespoon of blue cheese.  Spray the top with more olive oil spray (this helps the wonton parts that are sticking up to brown).  Bake for 8-10 minutes.

Let the first batch cool, then do the same thing for the second batch.

This is such a great dish because it reheats and travels well.  This size recipe made enough lunches for two people for the whole work week.