Kale Pesto Pasta: An Ode to Weeknight Cooks

There is a quiet ingenuity to making a meal on a weeknight, which can easily go unnoticed to those who surface just as the pasta is placed on the table.  Even when one likes to cook, dinner on a Tuesday is more about survival than the faraway pleasures of a leisurely Sunday cassoulet.

There is also a lot of labor involved, it just isn’t usually apparent. It starts with a working knowledge of the pantry status quo. This information gets filtered through preferences of the eaters and includes, perhaps, a quick viability scan for lunch leftovers.  Nutritional merit can award or subtract stars depending on who is at the table.

The menu may become altered after factoring in the affairs of one’s bank account or the time available to procure necessary ingredients and execute before the eaters get restless and the cook starts to fantasize about drinking a cold glass of gin.  All of this eventually, miraculously, gets extracted into a singular meal that slips into the parameters of the evening, all the while treating the brain like it is a card catalogue for 30-minute meals.  Unless one is awarded the luxury of being able to stay at home, this mental jujitsu is done at work. And it has to be done every day.

This does not even address the skills required to actually cook something edible.  It is not a glamorous job, nor it is one for weaklings.

I mention all of this as a testament to how underappreciated this labor—traditionally defined as women’s work—tends to be. I do not mean to suggest that men do not partake.  There are certainly heteronormative households wherein the man is in charge of most of the cooking.  But given that it is my job, more or less, to conduct daily ethnographies on household cooking responsibilities I find more often than not, women are still responsible for the majority of meals. I think this contributes to the lack of prestige. 

It can be a thankless job for even passionate cooks.  These are not meals that most sane individuals would describe as fun to commandeer, when it is one out of one million responsibilities for the day. 

Despite all the calculating, the weeknight cook can still feel bad about the results.  The broccoli was too firm, or not firm enough, or too salty, or not appropriately seasoned. Yet, when responsibility defaults to the deputy cook, these meals may get subcontracted to outside businesses or factory processing—and tend to include little to no broccoli.

Broccoli is more work.

Which is where this recipe comes in.  It does not feature broccoli or, worse, a side salad—which to me is like attempting to debone a chicken on a Tuesday night.  Too much effort for too little reward when work looms in the morning.  But it does include kale, which only takes a minute or two to clean the leaves and cut out their sturdy middle ribs. 

The protein content is fairly low and if that is irksome add some chickpeas or pair the sauce with one of those legume-based pastas, which I tried one night (featured in the photo).  The result was edible, but eating pasta made from beans and pea protein made me feel a little out of place, like I was wearing a fedora in the kitchen.  I will stick to gluten moving forward.

Anyway, this is really a sneaky salad recipe for those who are not above vegetable bribery.  In exchange for the pleasure of eating pasta, one is also awarded a scant half pound of kale. It can easily be made on a weeknight, which is also a joy for fellow cooks who bristle at the thought of having to squat and fish out the salad spinner from a bottom cabinet. 

It ensures vegetables make an appearance at dinner and does not award extra dirty dishes in the process.  The recipe produces a creamy, slightly vegetal sauce that is a brilliant shade of moss green.  I am happy to report that it is unique enough from regular pesto to be its own enjoyable thing. 

I don’t have an answer to how we, as a society, can elevate the importance of weeknight cooking, but I do have a response for dinner.  And it ends with eating kale in quick and quiet pleasure.

Kale Pesto Pasta

Adapted from The New York Times Magazine courtesy of Tejal Rao and Joshua McFadden

Ingredients:

• ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, slightly smashed and then peeled
• 1 to 2 bunches of lacinato kale (about 12 ounces)
• ½ pound uncooked pasta
• ⅛ teaspoon chili flakes (I use a smoked variety, see notes)
• freshly ground black pepper plus salt, to taste
• ¾ cup Pecorino Romano, plus more for garnish (to taste)

Instructions:

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil over high heat.

In a small skillet over medium-low heat, add the olive oil and garlic cloves.  Cook until the garlic starts to smell fragrant and turn light golden, about 3 or 4 minutes.  (You will need to watch carefully to ensure the garlic does not burn.)  Remove from heat and set aside.  (If the garlic continues to cook and threatens to get dark brown and burn, remove it from the oil to stop its cooking.)

Wash the kale leaves and run a knife down both sides of the thick stem on each leaf to remove the rib; discard all ribs. 

When the water is boiling, add the kale leaves and cook until they turn dark green and are just tender, about 4 to 5 minutes.  Using tongs, pull the kale leaves out of the pot and into a blender.  They will be dripping with water and that is okay—the small amount of hot water will help create the sauce.  Add the pasta to the still boiling water.

Add the garlic and oil to the blender with the kale.  Add the chili flakes plus a few cranks of black pepper and a couple generous pinches of salt.  Blend until the mixture is thick and fully pureed.  Taste and adjust seasoning, adding more salt and pepper as needed, and then blend again. (If the mixture is too thick and won’t fully puree, add a little hot water from the pot. Take care not to add too much, I found it can mute the flavor.)

When the pasta is fully cooked, scoop it out of the pot using a slotted spoon and into a serving bowl.  (I found this method carried enough water to help meld the sauce and the pasta, so it didn’t require reserving more pasta water to add.  Alternatively, you could reserve a little water before draining the pasta into a colander.)

Toss the pasta with the sauce (adding the reserved pasta water, if necessary).  Add the Pecorino.  Top with extra cheese, if desired.

Makes enough for two or three people as a main course

Notes:

1. The original recipe calls for one pound of kale, but I found that my grocery store reduced the size of their bunches and buying two bunches of kale for one dinner, which was twelve ounces all said and done, felt like enough
2. You will need to taste and season at least a few times.  The recipe will be bland until you add enough salt.
3. I usually reserve about ¼ cup of extra sauce that the pasta doesn’t need and use it as a spread for sandwiches—it could easily be blended with mayo too.
4. I love these smoked chili flakes from Daphnis and Chloe, they add an almost meaty quality to otherwise vegetarian dishes.

Vegan Queso for Non-Vegan Friends

I had one of the worst meals of my life on a recent Tuesday.  It started with the promise of dairy-free queso, which I acknowledge is already problematic as far as names go.  But I have been testing out more vegan recipes lately for work, both for people who choose the arduous path of animal-free living as well the poor souls medically forced into avoidance. Anyway, thinking about the prospect of cheese-less lasagna gave me instant empathy.

In my search, I came across a vegan queso recipe that suggested eggplant as its base.  It sounded reasonable enough, given the vegetable’s attendance in naturally plant-based dips like baba ghanoush.  This “queso” was a particularly desirable kitchen experiment because it was also free of nuts, as so few dairy-free comfort food substitutes are.  So I got to work.

As a result, I will now share some red flags for fellow eaters when it comes to vegan cookery. One should abort if a recipe calls for a suspicious amount of nutritional yeast—or cornstarch. Or if the writer mentions that a jettison of nuts was done intentionally to reduce calories. Or asserts that a husband or boyfriend or some otherwise gendered male example can vouch for its deliciousness, which is problematic for a whole host of reasons that I don’t have the time or patience to get into today.

In my case what resulted was a swamp-textured dip that tasted like a combination of rancid corn and homemade playdough, which I remember eating as a child in the eighties and would absolutely prefer should I ever have to make that choice. Even with the threat of E.coli.

Brett was kind and said the starchy swamp puree wasn’t that bad, which I suspect was mostly because when two people cook in a household, it can be a thrilling experience to be freed of the responsibly of putting dinner together after a long workday.  

Plus we had tortilla chips.

The whole experience could have been enough to throw me off dairy-constrained recipes completely, except we had previously eaten a very good vegan queso that called for cashews and a shit ton of vegetable shortening, plus half of a russet potato. I am pretty sure the same people who may be evangelically opposed to shortening might feel similarly about potatoes, so this is a recipe for the rest of us.

I was all out of vegetable shortening and thus coconut oil was substituted as a source of saturated fat, which I suspect is probably important for structure.  I assure the swap was not meant to be righteous.  (As a general rule I would advise against self-righteousness when making queso.) It was what we had.  I feel very strongly that coconut does not deserve the moral value it has been awarded on the internet. 

The result was a gooey, stretchy sauce the color and texture of ballpark nacho dip. Its slightly smoky subtle heat has proven to be particularly excellent on split baked potatoes and with broccoli.  Eaters can also be assured it makes no promises about your next trip to the cardiologist and this is what one should expect from queso—cheese or no cheese.

The whole experiment has only reinforced my theory that the best way to ensure a good-tasting substitute for a not-so-good-for-you food is to make it when health is not the point. This is not the time to employ slimy vegetables or fiber just for kicks.  Nor is it the time to consider your gallbladder or your next cleanse. That would be a crime against cheese.  I like to think anyone could agree with that. Even a vegan.

Vegan Queso

Adapted from J. Kenji López-Alt of Serious Eats

Ingredients:

• 5 tablespoons coconut oil or vegetable shortening
• 1 small onion, diced
• ½ jalapeño, seeded and diced
• 2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
• ½ teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• ½ teaspoon garlic powder
• 2 tablespoons chopped chipotle with adobo sauce (the kind from a can)
• ½ medium russet potato (4 ounces), peeled and thinly sliced
• 1 cup unsalted cashews
• 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon hot sauce (such as Frank’s RedHot)
• 2 teaspoons liquid from a can of pickled jalapeños
• Kosher salt (to taste)

Instructions:

In a medium saucepan, melt the coconut oil over medium heat.  Add the onions, jalapeño, and sliced garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened but not browned (less than 5 minutes).

Stir in the cumin, paprika, garlic powder, and chipotle and cook a minute or two until the mixture becomes fragrant.

Add the potato and cashews and cook, stirring occasionally, for 2 to 3 minutes.  Add the water and bring to a boil then reduce the heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally.  Cook until the potatoes are cooked through and completely tender (about 10 minutes).

Place the mixture in a blender and add the hot sauce, jalapeño liquid, and a generous pinch of salt.  Start the blender on low speed and slowly increase to high speed.  Blend until completely smooth (this will take a few minutes).  During this time, you can add water a tablespoon at a time to thin to desired consistency.  Season to taste with additional salt.

Makes about 2 cups

Notes:

1. According to my kitchen scribble, I used about a teaspoon of salt.  Be advised, you will likely need a few extra pinches when adjusting the seasoning at the end.
2. It is recommended to use a high-powered blender, such as a Vitamix, and then press the mixture through a chinois, but I did not need to do this—it was completely smooth using just my Kitchen Aid blender.
3. The sauce can be reheated on the stove top in a saucepan with a little water added.

Lentil Sloppy Joes for All

If I were to offer the majority of the people in these United States a lentil sloppy joe, I suspect I might get, at best, a polite “no thank you.” Somewhere along the way, a line was drawn on American dinner plates.  Plants things—especially anything with a suspicious lima bean hue—were deemed a form of punishment.

History shows consuming plant pods meant you were poor.  Which might be where things initially went wrong.  But there is an odd self-righteous quality that some align with vegetables these days too.  It should not be considered ethical territory to consume something that has benefits for both you and the world.

It is just good sense.

I am not going to belabor these perks today. They are commonly known.

It really comes down to this.  When I get home on a Tuesday night, I typically do not want to handle something slippery that has the potential of giving me hemorrhagic colitis.  Perhaps eating a dead animal after an exhausting workday just cuts too close these days.

And I now think about the probability of death more than I should, thanks to our White House Clown. I do not know how much of a warning one gets when a looney tune from North Korea decides to hurl something atomic.  But in the off chance that humans have the potential to outrun a nuclear bomb, Brett and I do not own a car.  We are probably goners.

Anyway, after work I do not want to go grocery shopping just to pick up a somewhat freshly killed creature.  Entering a crowded store at 5 PM on a weekday would have surely been described in a circle from Dante’s Inferno if they had supermarkets in the 14th century. 

Lentils, on the other hand, are quietly waiting at home.  They do not easily decay, if left to their own devices, nor do they require much advanced planning to prepare. There are no videos circulating of sinister legume slaughterhouses. Plus they are cheap. 

This recipe is a take on sloppy joes, which is really all about the seasoning anyway. No one eats the sandwich for its association with high quality cattle.

So can we stop pretending a plant substitution is such a grave departure?  In almost every way it is better.

Using orange lentils is helpful, because they mash together and will look the part, but if you want the disheveled effect of a sloppy joe, you could try a more loosely formed version with a brown or French lentil. You will need some cumin and chili powder, plus another smoky spice like smoked paprika.  I found some chili powder that smells as if it was previously left in a grill for about twelve hours, which kills two birds with one stone.

A hot pepper of some sort is important too.  I like serranos because I was once told their level of heat is predictable.  I do not know if this is true, but to this day I still defer to them, as humans occasionally do even when supporting facts are slim.  You will also add more ketchup than you are probably comfortable with—it will seem like an awful lot, but it is crucial so dig deep and do it.

My favorite toppings are pickled onions and some blue cheese dressing, because I am not a monster.  But if you forgo animal products entirely, dairy can certainly be left off without judgment.  The recipe you see below is entirely vegan, pending your choice of bun, which is mainly a coincidence. Personally, I believe the enclosure of a good brioche bun is best, but any soft and squishy bread product will do.  

This is what I make when ancillary kitchen supplies are low. Sometimes I am not organized for dinner. I bet some days you are not organized for dinner, as well. The lentils can help with this.

There are serious matters that divide us. Sloppy joes should not be one of them.

Lentil Sloppy Joes

Ingredients:

• 1 cup orange lentils
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 1 shallot, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 serrano pepper, minced
• ¾ tsp kosher salt
• 1½ tsp cumin
• ½ tsp smoked chili powder
• ½ cup ketchup
• handful of cilantro, chopped (for garnish)
• 4 sandwich buns

Instructions:

In a medium saucepan, add the lentils and 3 to 4 cups of water (there should be about an inch of water above the lentils).  Cook uncovered on medium high heat for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the lentils are tender.

Heat a medium sauté pan and add the olive oil.  Add the shallot, garlic, and pepper and sauté until they soften.  Season with salt, cumin, and chili powder. Set aside.

Once the lentils are done add them to the pan, along with the ketchup, and stir to combine. Cook on medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the mixture thickens enough to hold its shape when tossed on a bun (which should take about 10 to 15 minutes).

Makes enough for four sandwiches

Notes:

1. Sometimes I also add a dash of Worcestershire, though be advised some versions have anchovies. (It will also add a bit more salt.)
2. Sandwich buns of any type can easily be frozen.  I find ones with higher fat content, like brioche, tend to defrost faster and make for a very quick supper.
3. If you are using smoked paprika and chili powder I would start with a ¼ teaspoon of each, but I suspect you may need to add a bit more chili powder to get the spice right.