Last weekend when Alison and I stayed at the Lark Hotels property in Narragansett, RI — The Break Hotel — we got the opportunity to meet their Chef Basil Yu at Chair 5 and partake in a little cooking class. We walked in not knowing what we were making, but were greeted by Basil and some fresh Narragansett Lobsters chilling out in the kitchen. He let us know we were going to be making their creamy Narragansett Lobster Fettucini with homemade pasta, and my eyes lit up. Give me all the cheesy, creamy pasta and top it off with some buttery fresh lobster plucked right out of the water down the street and I am a happy girl. Basil was awesome, he walked us through making the pasta by hand, we learned how to break down the lobsters (I’m going to be so much more confident ripping into a lobster this summer!) and went step by step through the recipe to create this gorgeous dish. It was ah-mazing, like I couldn’t stop eating it. And lucky us, he gave us the recipe to share with you so you can make it at home!
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The theme of this weekend can be wrapped up in one word: Carbs. My mom and sister visited for the weekend, and let’s just say we’re a bit of bad influence on each other in the eating department (and I will admit, I’m the ring-leader of the tasty indulgence brigade). We had so much fun and stuffed ourselves to the brim with delicious homemade pasta in the North End, sweet strawberry butter on piping hot popovers, and we rounded out the weekend with a donut tasting from my favorite donut shop – Union Square Donuts. You can go ahead and roll me straight to the gym after work tonight! But it was so very worth it!
Guys, it’s hump day — and no one likes hump day — let alone the first one after the holidays, so I saved this recipe from a few weeks ago that’s completely focused on butter to make you feel better. One of the nicest presents I received for Christmas this year was from my grandparents and uncle; they got me a bunch of artisanal pasta and olive oils from a local pasta shop in my hometown. Clearly my family knows me well, carbs are my first love.
When it came time to test out one of those pastas I wanted to make it a super special dinner, so in addition to working on a nice sauce and some homemade meatballs, I got a fresh loaf of Italian bread and decided to whip up a special herbed butter to go with it. I roasted a whole head of garlic for about an hour in a small dish with some olive oil, salt, and pepper. Then once the garlic was cooked and soft, I used the food processor to combine the cloves with a 3 tablespoons of butter, a tablespoon of fresh grated parmesan cheese, a teaspoon of chopped rosemary, and a teaspoon of chopped thyme, plus a little more salt and pepper. The result was a sweet roasted garlic and herb-y butter spread that went perfectly with the little Italian feast I prepared!
This weekend, I let the Farmer’s Market be the inspiration for Sunday dinner and decided to make whatever looked good — and a pretty little container of colorful tomatoes caught my eye. We scooped some up and then hit the fresh pasta tent for some lemon basil linguine and we were on our way to making a tasty meal. While the water was heating for the pasta, I cooked the tomatoes over high heat with a little EVOO and a tablespoon of butter, salt, and pepper. After the tomatoes cooked down and started to burst, I lowered the temperature and sauteed in three cloves of chopped garlic and a handful of pine nuts. Then after a minute, I added in a quarter of a cup of white wine, and three tablespoons of pesto, plus a few spoonfuls of the pasta water. Then I drained the pasta when it was just about cooked and finished cooking it in the pan with the tomato mixture. We served it with freshly chopped basil leaves and a little Parmesan cheese — perfection!
