Penne with Olives, Fennel, and Kale from The Conscious Cook
January 1, 2011
When we started cooking vegan food last year, we actually ate a lot less pasta than we did before. Mostly we were experimenting with lots of new grains and beans and it seemed boring to make pasta as it was a staple in our previous diet (we used to eat lot of pasta with marinara and cheese because it was fast and easy, but we really don’t miss this dish at all!).
We found this recipe in a really lovely vegan cookbook called The Conscious Cook. It was written by Tal Ronnen, a chef who decided to apply traditional French culinary techniques to plant-based cuisine (with great success!). The recipes in this book produce the kind of food you would expect to find in a fancy restaurant. All the photos in the book look like works of art. We plan to try a few more of his recipes for sure, though ours probably won’t have the beautiful presentation that his recipes do in the book.
We should note that in the book this is called “Whole Wheat Penne with San Marzano Tomatoes”. We changed it here for a few reasons, the main one being that we didn’t use San Marzano tomatoes! The other being that we wanted to highlight the more interesting ingredients – kale, olives and fennel that give this a really unique taste.
Here’s the recipe as we made it, varied slightly from the book:
Sea Salt
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 onions, quartered and sliced
2 fennel bulbs, halved and sliced
1 28 oz. can of whole or diced tomatoes, drained
4 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup water (he uses vegetable stock)
1/2 cup cooking sherry (he uses white wine)
4 cups chopped kale (he uses chard)
freshly ground black pepper
juice of 1 lemon
3/4 cup of chopped green olives (Manzanilla)
1 tablespoon minced fresh tarragon*
1 tablespoon minced fresh thyme*
1 tablespoon minced fresh parsley*
8 ounces of whole wheat penne, cooked al dente
*NOTE: Dry herbs are fine if you don’t have fresh handy!
Place large saute pan over medium-high heat. Sprinkle bottom with a pinch of sea salt and heat for 1 minute. Add the oil and heat for 30 more seconds, being careful not to let it smoke. This should create a non-stick effect.
Add the onions and fennel and cook for 3 to 4 minutes, stirring occassionally. Add the tomatoes, crushing each with your hand (or chop them on a board if they were whole), along with the garlic, water, sherry and kale. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Reduce heat to medium and cook for 5 minutes.
Add the lemon juice and olives and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes, until the olives are tender. Fold in the tarragon, thyme, and parsley, along with the hot pasta. Serve immediately. Enjoy this unique pasta dish, packed with veggies and nutrition!
2 Comments to “Penne with Olives, Fennel, and Kale from The Conscious Cook”
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January 1st, 2011
mmmmm Sharon – this looks delicious! Thanks for sharing!
January 1st, 2011
Thanks Angie! Alas, it is not gluten free, but I’m sure it would be tasty with brown rice pasta too! Plus, I do think it has a “grown-up” flavor with the fennel and the olives…let me know if your kids like it, but I can see it maybe being better for adults.