August 2, 2018

Spaghetti with tomatoes, black olives and feta cheese

Some days you need pasta! This spaghetti with tomatoes, black olives, and feta cheese recipe, pulls all the stops. A healthy pasta recipe, it is delicious, easy to make and light.

SUSTAINABLE & LIGHT

It can be made with leftover tomatoes and leftover crumbled feta cheese, so in that respect it really easy to make. It is quick to prepare, and the sauce is only cooked for a few minutes making it easier to digest. The fresh vegetable ingredients like tomatoes, olives, capers, and herbs make the pasta really tasty and bring some extra fiber.

HOW TO COOK THE TOMATOES

In this recipe, I used leftover tomatoes that I had bought for my salad but became a bit too ripe for it. I cooked them only lightly and at low heat, so not to burn the precious extra-virgin olive oil. I roughly chopped them up, and then I cooked them in a non-stick pan, where I had already warmed up the peeled garlic ( not crushed, but cut in half) few chili flakes and some herbs ( in this case lashings of dried oregano).

I let them sweat on the pan for 6-8 min and that is enough to make their flavor blend with the oil and form a little sauce-like, but keep them tasty and light to digest, mostly because the oil is not overheated.

COOKING WITH OLIVE OIL

Extra-virgin olive oil is one of the healthiest oil, and one of the healthiest cooking fats. It has a medium smoking point, (which is the temperature at which the oil starts to produce toxic substances) but that is compensated by a great amount of polyphenols, compounds that are known to have great beneficial properties.

In this recipe, I used good quality extra-virgin olive oil, and used a low heat to avoid it burning.

FEW CONSIDERATIONS

I have used only a small amount of feta cheese, but enough to make it tasty and filling. When using feta cheese, make sure that you use the one made with sheep and goat milk, like it is traditionally made rather than the one made with cow’s milk. Both goat and sheep’s milk are easier to digest and less inflammatory.

If you are going for wheat, I would advise you to choose an organic brand, to minimize exposure to pesticides and GMO. If you are gluten or wheat intolerant, you can choose a gluten-free one and the recipe will work anyway.

CAN PASTA BE HEALTHY

As an Italian I mainly grew up on carbs, and as for many Italians, giving up pasta is hard. The short answer is yes, but only in a contest of a balanced diet that is right for you and your current lifestyle. I will share few tips on how to make pasta a bit healthier in one of my next blog posts, so that keep on following the blog, or subscribe to receive it straight into your inbox and start creating healthy pasta recipes for yourself and your loved ones!

INGREDIENTS

Serves 1 | Ready in 15 min

70 gr spaghetti
2 small tomatoes
5-6 olives cut in two
a teaspoon of capers
a small piece of crumbled feta
1 garlic clove
Extra-virgin olive oil
Sea salt
Black pepper

METHOD

Sprinkle some olive oil in a non-stick pan, add the garlic clove a dash of chili peppers flakes. Let it warm an release the flavor at low heat, then add the fresh tomatoes roughly chopped up.
Add the oregano, salt to taste and let it sweat for 3-4 min. At this point add the olives and capers and let it sweat for 5-6 min more.
In the meantime cook the spaghetti according to the instruction packet ( don’t forget to cook them “al dente”) and when ready, drain them and place them in the pan with the sauce.
Stir it for a few seconds to let the sauce mix well with the pasta, then add the crumbled feta. Add a another sprinkle of raw olive oil if needed.

I love this pasta, because you can use up all the leftovers typical of the summer, to make it a tasty, and sustainable meal. Buon appetito!