Bloomed Saffron Walnut Pesto Pasta

I just like the feel of the words "bloomed saffron" in my mouth

Yay! I moved into a new apartment. It’s twice as big as my old place. For the first time in eight years, I have room to unpack all of my cook books, pots and pans, ceramics, and appliances.

So let’s get cooking!

How to enjoy your food and digest better

According to Ayurveda (and me), when we shop for food, prepare ingredients, and experience the qualities of a dish before we physically eat it, we are already enjoying and beginning the process of digestion.

Here are a few principles.

• Cook with your imagination as you stroll the aisles at the grocery store. Let yourself pre-combine ingredients in your mind, imagining how they will taste together. Then you can be creative and flexible, switching up recipes or inventing them on the spot.

• Activate all of your senses and “eat” the colors, shapes, textures, and smell of your ingredients before you taste them with your tongue

• Take the time while cooking to observe and wonder at the transformational processes of heat, emulsification, fermentation, proofing, pulverizing, slicing, and even simple mixing.

• Step back when a meal is finished and enjoy the uncanny experience of gazing from a distance at something beautiful and nourishing that you created.

• Before you dig in, gaze at your plate and take in the smells, sights, temperatures, colors, and forms. This supercharges your digestion and incites happiness.

Word cooking

Preparing food, creating in general, and getting more woke spiritually are all described as “cooking.”

For instance, if we are creating anything, we might say, “I”m cooking something up.” Spiritual practitioners in my traditions who are further along in the process of having their limitations destroyed are said to be “cooked.”

As a word cooker, I also taste the weight, texture, and vibrations of words in my mouth as I speak them aloud or in my mind.

Bloomed Saffron.

A former teacher of mind claimed that you couldn’t be a Tantrika if you didn’t enjoy cooking. Actual cooking helps us to notice and enjoy processes of transformation, of impermanence. Then we can better enjoy the moving banquet of life.

Blooming saffron

Bloom saffron by soaking it in a small amount of warm water before adding it to your recipe. Soaking brings out the full flavor of this delicate and expensive plant.

1. Gently crush 10 or so saffron threads using a mortar and pestle. You are just breaking them up a bit, not pulverizing them.

2. Place the crushed threads in a very small cup or jar.

3. Add 2 tablespoons of warm, not boiling water. Don’t add more water than this.

4. Soak the saffron for 15 minutes.

5. Pour the bloomed saffron and the water into the food processor or blender where you are going to grind your pesto.

Bloomed saffron pesto

Ingredients

• Bloomed saffron with its liquid

• ‘1 bunch italian parsley—just the leaves

• 1 cup walnuts

• 1/2 cup castelvetrano, picholine, or other mild, green olives, sliced

• 1 tablespoon capers

• Good quality olive oil

• Possibly salt, but taste before you add! Capers are very salty.

Instructions

1. Put all ingredients other than the olive oil into a food processor or blender. (You can also make this using a mortar and pestle if you have the time and energy.) Pulse grind until the chop is rough. You may need to remove the lid and scrape the sides once or twice.

2. Run the processor or blender on a low speed, or just continuously if it only has one speed. As it’s running, drizzle the olive oil in through the top chute or opening until you have the consistency you prefer. Most pesto is pretty thick. It shouldn’t be pourable.

3. Stop grinding, remove the lid, and taste. Add salt if needed.

4. Store in a tightly-lidded mason or other jar. It will last for a couple of weeks in the fridge if you don’t contaminate it with utensils that have food bits on them.

Making the pasta

Ingredients

• Pasta of your choice. I like to make some form of penne.

• Vegetables of your choosing. Broccoli, asparagus, green beans, sunchokes, radicchio, grilled squash, all good.

• Olive oil

• Shredded hard Italian cheese (romano, pecorino, parmesan, asiago, etc)

• Salt and pepper to taste

The amount of ingredients you use will depend on how many and what size servings you want.

Instructions

1. Boil salted water with a splurch of olive oil in a largish pot for the pasta. Cook pasta until al dente (a little chewy). Use a pot that’s a bit larger than what you need.

2. You can either steam or roast the vegetables separately, or you can add them to the pasta a few minutes before the pasta is done and boil everything in the same pot. Note: If you are using asparagus, it needs to be pan sautéed or grilled or broiled, not boiled.

3. Drain the pasta (and veg) and return to the pot. Coat with a small amount of olive oil.

4. Add the veggies to the pasta if they aren’t already in the pot. Add a healthy amount of the pesto. Stir until evenly coated.

5. Loosely stir in shredded cheese (optional).

6. Adjust salt and pepper.

Innovations

This pasta doesn’t lend itself to variations that include meat. I would suggest adding cubed, olive oil pan-fried paneer; crumbled, pan-fried, crispy tempeh; or toasted pumpkin seeds if you want more protein. Paneer especially is surprisingly delicious in pasta.

With infinite love,
Shambhavi

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