Pasta with zucchini, mushrooms and sun dried tomatoes

My mother-in-law arrived today to visit and cleaned up the kitchen after dinner 😁 leaving me with a bit of time before getting to bed to finish this blog post. This recipe was totally inspired by some vegetables that were lying around the house that had to be used up. My family insisted it be repeated! It is quite good and I'm really proud when I make something up all on my own and the family likes it. Makes me feel so good. I hope you enjoy it too.

Preparation time: 45 minutes; serves 6 - 8 (figure out how many it will serve based on your usual pasta consumption)

Ingredients:

600 g	Mushrooms
2	Zucchini, medium
500 g	Macaroni, dried
1/4 cup	Chopped dried tomatoes (around 4 large ones)
1/4 cup	Chopped cilantro
4 small sprigs	Oregano
50 g	Butter
250 ml	Whipping cream
2 tbsp.	Thyme infused oil (or oil plus a few sprigs of thyme)
2 tbsp.	Olive oil (if necessary)
1/4 cup	Grated parmesan
1 tsp.	Salt (to taste)

Method:
The first thing I did was to put the water to boil to make the macaroni. While waiting for the water to boil I took the opportunity to wash and chop my vegetables. Interrupting the washing in order to put the pasta in the pot and once again to take them out once cooked. I am horrible with cooking pasta so I always follow the directions on the packet. I always set my timer for the pasta once the water has returned to the boil, otherwise they seem so not done. Al dente is fine but crunchy is not happening. Although maybe Italians like their pasta crunchy! When we were in Rome this spring our host recommended a local restaurant to us. The pasta was so crunchy that we couldn't eat it. We were thankful that the portions were small (although the price was not) so we didn't have to waste too much.

Finely chopped sun-dried tomatoes with some oregano fresh from my garden 

When I made this I purposely cut the vegetables into large chunks so that we could actually taste the vegetables. The sun dried tomatoes were finely chopped since their taste is so intense. Likewise the cilantro and oregano.

I happened to have some thyme and lemon flavoured oil and I used this to fry the zucchini. Fried over high heat until golden. Once I run out of this oil I will just sprinkle the zucchini with fresh thyme. I have a large patch now in my garden.

I removed the zucchini from the pan and put them into a large bowl and threw in the mushrooms into the hot pan adding a bit of olive oil (you might not need any oil to fry the mushrooms and this is okay). This were also fried over high heat, continuously stirring. I think that the high heat helped seal the juices into the vegetables and by cooking them separately neither was was over cooked and each preserved their own flavour. A bit of caramelization just added to the taste.

Now that the mushrooms were cooked I turned them into the bowl with the zucchini and added the chopped tomatoes.

To complete the sauce melt the butter  over medium heat and once the butter has melted add the whipping cream. Keep stirring until the two ingredients are well combined. Make sure the sauce does not boil, simmering is okay. Then just add the vegetables, reheat . 

Add the macaroni or what ever pasta you are using. I like something tubular so that the sauce goes inside and gets stuck there!

Finally I took the pan off the heat and mixed in the salt, cilantro and oregano leaves. As always our kids have to have fresh Parmesan sprinkled on top. With them its usually the more the better (below is my plate!).