Dinner Plate #7

 

Still trying to soak up all the fall goodness! Here we have vegan Florentine chickpea pasta (recipe from Zardy Plants), roasted grape and cherry tomatoes, and maple roasted delicata squash with brussels sprouts.

This pasta recipe intrigued me because it used cashew butter instead of cashew cream. I would have liked to have had all one pasta shape here, but I used the ends of two boxes, not having enough in my grocery budget this month to buy more pasta at the end of the month. (Looking forward to November!) They were both some kind of swirly pasta (rotini and cellentani), so it seemed like it would work. I blame my tendency to go wild in the produce section, honestly; I have priorities. I could have bought more pasta but then I would not have had roasted tomatoes, and what kind of trade off would that be? Anyway, back on topic: This was a relatively easy, creamy pasta and it tasted pretty good, but I think I probably would have enjoyed a cashew cream-based sauce more than the cashew butter sauce version. I also wished it had more spinach. But it made for a great main dish under the use-what's-there-so-you-can-buy-tomatoes circumstances.

Tomatoes, okay, aren't really fall foods, though locally they're still growing and will until frost happens. but they're delicious and I thought they'd go well with this--they definitely do; the liquid that you end up with from the roasted tomatoes is so flavorful and it made the pasta even better.

Delicata squash is still too new to regular supermarkets to have many recipes for it other than sliced and roasted, and I'd love to see some other possibilities--let me know if you know any--but this is still so satisfying. I added brussels sprouts for good measure.

And maybe it doesn't make sense to splurge on vegetables and skimp on pasta, but I regret nothing.