Roasted Red Pepper Short Cut Pasta
I was craving roasted red pepper pasta, but I wanted a way to short cut my previous Melrose Red Pepper Pasta. While I really enjoyed it, I found it contained too many steps. One of the extras was removing the skin from the red pepper, I found that if you don’t burn them but lightly char them the red peppers taste just the same and you save the steaming and peeling the skin step. I also eliminated the sauteing of the onion step from this recipe. I find that once the mixture is blended the flavor of the onion is no different than if you sauté the onion first. By using certain short cuts, it can be pulled together in less than 30 minutes, and the flavor is the same. Why work harder in the kitchen if you don’t have to? Fresh and great tasting food doesn’t have to mean slaving over the stove and oven for hours.
What Pasta to Use: A long flat pasta is preferred. Fettuccine works best as it is designed to hold richer and heavier cream sauces. I also like the thickness of
bucatini pasta. They pair well with the butter and half and half of this sauce. In a pinch you can use linguine if that is all you have on hand.
Ingredients
- 3 large red peppers
- 1/4 large red onion (sliced into large chunks)
- 1 cup cool water
- 1/2 cup Half and Half
- 2 teaspoons minced garlic or 2 cloves garlic
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 teaspoon chicken Better Than Bullion
- 1/4 teaspoon salt and pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 6 ounces Fettuccine (if using boxed pasta this is 1/2 of the box)
- 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese (for topping)
- For: 3 servings
- Preparation: 10 min
- Cooking: 20 min
- Ready in: 30 min
Instructions
- Place top rack in oven one level down from the top (about 5-6 inches from broiler). Turn oven on broil.
- Meanwhile wash the red peppers, core them and remove the seeds, cut into quarters and place on foil lined baking sheet skin side up.
- Brush them lightly with the olive oil.
- Place baking sheet in oven for 3 minutes then rotate the sheet and allow red peppers to broil for another 3 minutes under the broiler. The red peppers should have a lite char on them. Remove from oven and allow it to cool.
- Cook pasta according to package directions in salted water to al dente (what I consider a toothy when you bite it). When done drain and set aside.
- Place roasted red peppers, onions and garlic in stand blender and puree.
- Add half and half, chicken bouillon, black pepper, salt, red pepper flakes and water to blender and pulse a few more times to combine completely.
- Place Braiser back over medium heat and melt butter.
- Once it is melted add the red pepper puree to Braiser
- Once warm add the al dente pasta to the Braiser pot and finish cooking for 5 more minutes to reduce the sauce a little and finish cooking the pasta.
- Remove the pan from heat.
- To serve plate pasta and top with grated Parmesan cheese.
- Per serving
- Energy: 456 kcal / 1906 kJ
- Fat: 61 g
- Protein: 17 g
- Carbs: 57 g
