orecchiette | Annie's Kitchen Therapy

Hubby is away so I am going crazy with putting cheese in everything!

Last night was a quick orecchiette, with sautéed spinach, tons of crushed garlic cloves and red Argentinian shrimp from Trader Joes (sometimes I just don’t feel like going to the fish monger, and these tasty, frozen shrimp are a great Plan B). First get your salted water boiling for the pasta. While this is happening sauté fresh crushed garlic and the shrimp in a little EVOO until shrimp are mostly cooked, then add spinach until cook until wilted (use a large sauté pan as you’ll add the pasta when it’s cooked). When water is rapidly boiling add your pasta cook for 9-10 minutes (or until it’s cooked al dente). Save about a cup of the starchy water and strain the pasta. Add pasta to sauté pan with shrimp, garlic and spinach adding the water if you need to loosen up the mixture. Keep heat on low and mix until well incorporated.

After plating this ‘beaut I topped with red pepper flakes and as much grated cheese as I could get on the plate.

Pro-tip: Did you know that Orecchiette means “little ear” in Italian? Think about that next time you cook it – notice the shape.

Life is chaos right now so I needed comfort food dish that would not be stressful to make. Orecchiette, sausage, shrimp and broccoli rabe was just that dish last night.

Start by blanching coarsely chopped broccoli rabe (add a bullion cube to the boiling water to take the bitterness away). Then sauté de-cased sausage, shrimp, a little crushed red pepper and of course a little (or a lot) of crushed garlic. Once the sausage and shrimp are cooked through add the cooked (al dente!) orecchiette and mixed it all together. Add a few ladle fulls of the pasta water to create a bit of a broth.

Voila! Super flavorful, satisfying and easy to do. You can totally switch out the proteins here (think chicken, lobster, cod…)

Pro-tip: Add a touch of cream or mascarpone to thicken up the broth and deepen the flavor.