Rethink pasta primavera to make it taste like spring
Spring vegetable pasta
You’d never know that pasta primavera, a pseudoItalian dish that appears on virtually every chain restaurant menu, actually has roots in French haute cuisine.
The usual reproduction — a random jumble of produce tossed with noodles in a heavy, flavordeadening cream sauce — tastes nothing like spring. Surprisingly, when we dug Servings: Start to finish: up the original recipe from New York’s famed Le Cirque restaurant, our colleagues found it wasn’t all that inspiring either, despite taking about two hours to prepare and dirtying five pans.
First, the vegetables (which had been painstakingly blanched one by one) were bland.
Second, the cream-, butter- and cheese-enriched sauce dulled flavor and didn’t really unify the 3. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in Dutch oven over medium heat until shimmering. Add leeks and pinch salt and cook, covered, stirring occasionally, until leeks begin to brown, about 5 minutes. Add asparagus spears and cook until asparagus is crisp-tender, 4 to 6 minutes. Add pepper flakes and remaining garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add remaining 1 cup peas and continue to cook for 1 minute longer. Transfer vegetables to bowl and set aside. Wipe out pot with paper towels.
4. Heat dish.
If we wanted a true spring-vegetable pasta — with a few thoughtfully chosen vegetables and a light but full-bodied sauce that clung well to the noodles and brought the dish together — we’d have to start from the beginning.