Kids love play dough. Kids love pasta. What if I told you that I have a recipe that combines these two loves and packs a healthy punch? This is a fun hands on recipe that make another one of our awesome meatless recipes for kids.
Chef Jamie Oliver shares this deliciously simple recipe for spinach pici pasta in his newest cookbook “Super Food Family Classics”. This recipe will have you making pasta, from scratch with help from your kids. Why is it a super food recipe? Because the pasta is made from two ingredients flour and a whole whack of spinach. If you have kids who aren’t keen on eating salads and green vegetables then this recipe is for you.
We whipped up this dish one evening last week and we were amazed at how simple, and fun, it was to make.
Spinach Pici Pasta with Cherry Tomatoes
(adapted from Chef Jamie Oliver’s Spinach Pici Pasta)
10 oz baby spinach
2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tbsp water
3 tbsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, sliced in half
1 pint cherry tomatoes
parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
To make the pasta, dump the flour into a food processor with half the spinach. Process until the spinach is grated. Add the remaining spinach and process. Now, we found that the dough needed a little bit of extra moisture at this point, so we added 1 tbsp of water at a time, until the dough formed.
Once the dough forms, turn it out onto a clean surface and it’s time to make the pasta. Let the kids pinch off about 1 tbsp of dough and roll it out in their hands. Every kids loves making play dough snakes…that’s exactly what you need to do to make this pasta. Create lots and lots of spinach pasta snakes.
Place the pasta snakes on a clean tea towel until you are ready to boil the pasta. You can boil the pasta right away or let it sit out and dry. I love the flexibility of this recipe.
Now, it’s time to make the sauce. You can use whatever sauce you like, however we decided to make a light cherry tomato sauce. Start by heating the olive oil over medium high heat. Add the sliced garlic clove and the sliced cherry tomatoes.
Once the tomatoes start to breakdown, a sauce will start to take shape. Remove the clove of garlic. I like to leave the garlic large and remove it from the sauce, when I am making the sauce for kids. This way the sauce doesn’t have an overwhelming garlic flavour.
In the meantime, cook the pasta in a pot of salted boiling water. Now, the amount of time you have to cook the pasta will really depend on how thick your pasta snakes end up being. Our thicker snakes required about 8 minutes to cook nicely.
Once the pasta is cooked, transfer the pasta to the sauce along with a couple tablespoons of pasta water and toss to coat the pasta.
Serve the pasta dusted with parmesan cheese. Enjoy.
Spinach Pici Pasta with Cherry Tomatoes
Ingredients
- 10 oz baby spinach
- 2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
- 1 tbsp water
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 clove garlic sliced in half
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes
- parmesan cheese
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- To make the pasta, dump the flour into a food processor with half the spinach. Process until the spinach is grated. Add the remaining spinach and process. Now, we found that the dough needed a little bit of extra moisture at this point, so we added 1 tbsp of water at a time, until the dough formed.
- Once the dough forms, turn it out onto a clean surface and it’s time to make the pasta. Let the kids pinch off about 1 tbsp of dough and roll it out in their hands. Every kids loves making play dough snakes…that’s exactly what you need to do to make this pasta. Create lots and lots of spinach pasta snakes.
- Place the pasta snakes on a clean tea towel until you are ready to boil the pasta. You can boil the pasta right away or let it sit out and dry. I love the flexibility of this recipe.
- Now, it’s time to make the sauce. You can use whatever sauce you like, however we decided to make a light cherry tomato sauce. Start by heating the olive oil over medium high heat. Add the sliced garlic clove and the sliced cherry tomatoes.
- Once the tomatoes start to breakdown, a sauce will start to take shape. Remove the clove of garlic. I like to leave the garlic large and remove it from the sauce, when I am making the sauce for kids. This way the sauce doesn’t have an overwhelming garlic flavour.
- In the meantime, cook the pasta in a pot of salted boiling water. Now, the amount of time you have to cook the pasta will really depend on how thick your pasta snakes end up being. Our thicker snakes required about 8 minutes to cook nicely.
- Once the pasta is cooked, transfer the pasta to the sauce along with a couple tablespoons of pasta water and toss to coat the pasta.
- Serve the pasta dusted with parmesan cheese. Enjoy.
Notes
Nutrition
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