Super Food Family Classics
By Jamie Oliver
50 mins
Not Too Tricky
serves 4
About the recipe
Vibrant homemade pasta that's super-fun to make and packed with nutritious spinach.
Recipe From
Ingredients
200g baby spinach
300g Tipo 00 or plain flour, plus extra for dusting
olive oil
4 cloves of garlic
½ teaspoon dried red chilli flakes
200g baby courgettes
320g ripe cherry tomatoes, on the vine
50g pine nuts
½ a bunch of fresh basil (15g)
50g Parmesan cheese
extra virgin olive oil
Top Tip
Once you’ve mastered the pasta, why not try switching up the sauce you serve it with? A simple homemade pesto or 7-veg sauce would be delicious.
Method
- In a food processor, blitz the spinach and flour until a ball of dough forms, letting the machine do all the work. Touch the dough – it shouldn’t be sticky, you want a playdough consistency, so add a little more flour, if needed.
- To make the pici, simply tear off 2cm balls of dough and roll them out into long thin sausage shapes – think fine green beans – on a clean surface (the beauty is that they’re all different, so get little helpers involved, if you can).
- Cook the pici straight away, or leave them to dry out for a few hours, or even overnight.
- Put a large pan of salted water on to boil. Put a large frying pan on a medium heat with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Peel, finely slice and add the garlic, along with the chilli flakes.
- Finely slice and add the courgettes, then halve and add the tomatoes. Cook it all for 5 minutes, then stir in the pine nuts and add a ladleful of boiling water. Leave on the lowest heat while you cook the pasta.
- Add the pici to your pan of boiling salted water. If it’s freshly rolled it will only need about 5 minutes, but if you’ve let it dry give it 8 to 10 minutes, checking on it to make sure you get lovely al dente pasta.
- Drain, reserving a mugful of cooking water, then toss through the veg.
- Reserving the baby basil leaves, finely slice the bigger ones and stir into the pan with most of the finely grated Parmesan, loosening with a little reserved water, if needed.
- Divide between your warm plates and serve with a few drips of extra virgin olive oil, with the remaining Parmesan and the baby basil leaves sprinkled over.
Protein-rich pine nuts are super-high in the mineral manganese, which we need to protect our cells, and in heart-healthy unsaturated fats, which keep our blood cholesterol healthy.
You could also try this with a mixed bag of spinach, watercress and rocket, depending on what you can get hold of.
If you only have frozen spinach, let it defrost and squeeze out as much liquid as you can before blitzing with the flour. If the mixture is sticky, add more flour as needed.
Throw a handful of frozen peas or sweetcorn into the pan when you add the pine nuts for an extra veggie boost.
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