What a fabulous weekend it has been. I had family visiting and it was a long weekend so it couldn’t have been more perfect. It was Holi this weekend – which is my least favourite festival by the way. I am sucker for all festivals but this particular one I absolutely detest.
Maybe it’s got something to do from when I was a little kid and there is actually a small story to this- I was looking down from my bedroom window, on to a street where a bunch of teenagers were playing holi. They were about 6-7 of them and 1 of the girls was not the most enthusiastic about playing. She kept to herself but the others kept putting colour and water on her even though she persistently refused. It was at that moment that I developed a strong dislike for this festival because I felt like what’s to celebrate if the ones you are playing with don’t respect your wishes? We see a lot of articles that talk about respecting the word ‘No’ but this was something I realised and felt very strongly about when I was aged 5 years old. I am glad for some reason the hubs doesn’t enjoy this festival either so I don’t have to put up with this at all.
Anyhow, so we had the day off on Monday so my grandma and aunty were here – finally! I kept whining about how it has been 3 years since I got married and they had not visited us even once. So they finally made it and I had to make it fabulous. Though they have both been to Delhi before, it had been a while so I had to take them around and refresh their memory. So I took them old school sightseeing which of course also included eating. Lots of it. I took them to the Qutub Minar, Gurudwara Bangla Sahib, Connaught Place and Haldirams for Dilli chaat.
Speaking of eating, I knew I would have no time to cook for the blog, or rather setup and take pictures et al so this week’s recipe was something I whipped up earlier last week. It is this amazing amazing amazing shrimp and arugula pasta which is quick, super easy and downright delicious. Just one thing you need to be mindful of, is to get good quality shrimp. Frozen shrimp or seafood that is not fresh will just make this dish, well let’s just say.. not nice at all. Arugula is basically rocket leaves which you should be able to find in any supermarket. I found it in my backyard, haha. You know about my husband’s gardening skills by now 😉 Anyhow, in case you are unable to find any arugula then baby spinach works great too!
Shrimp & Arugula Pasta
Serves 2| Prep time: 5 min | Cook time: 15 min
Ingredients:
Angel Hair pasta – 100 gm
Shrimp- 250 gm
Arugula – 1 bowl
Dry white wine – 1 glass
Garlic – 4 cloves
Tomatoes – 2, large, chopped
Parmesan cheese – 1/2 cup, grated
Red Chili flakes – 2 tsp (You can add more if you like)
Parmesan cheese – 1/2 cup, grated
Directions:
Get the oil heated up in a pan and add the chopped garlic. Once the garlic is fragrant, add the chili flakes. You will see the oil turn red as the chili flavour and colour infuses into the oil.
Now, add the shrimp and let it cook for about 2 minutes on each side. Once the prawn curls up and turns pinkish to orange, it’s time to turn the heat off and get the prawn out into another bowl.
In the same pan, add the chopped tomatoes and let them cook and reduce down to a sauce. Now is a good time to add the wine.
Separately, in a large vessel, add your angel hair pasta to boiling water. Ensure the water has enough salt. For cooking pasta, the level of saltiness in the cooking water has to be like seawater. So yeah. Lots of salt. About 4 tbsp for 100 gms of pasta is good. Make sure you leave a little bit of this cooking water for the sauce. The starchiness in this pasta water helps thicken our sauce.
Add half a cup of the pasta water to the pan of cooked tomatoes and wine which should now look like a saucy sauce.. Also put in the cooked shrimp.
Now add the pasta which should be cooked al dente. Toss all of this together. Fold in the rocket leaves and top with grated parmesan. Check and adjust seasoning.
Eat. NOW. (Don’t forget a glass of vino. Makes this so much better)
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