Here’s a real easy dinner that is quick and rather delicious.  It’s not exactly good for the thighs, what with all the cheese etc, but it’s good for the smile factor which is of course very important for a mid-week dinner after a hectic Bank Holiday weekend.

What you need for a very easy pasta dinner for 2

A good few cherry tomatoes or other little ones of your fancy

Half a block of the almighty halloumi cheese

1 clove of garlic, sliced

About a tablespoon of nice red pesto

Parmesan cheese (optional, unless you’re a cheese fiend like me)

Linguine for two

Olive oil

Salt n Peppa

This dinner is super quick, and the trick to getting the tomatoes nice is starting them first.  Give them a wash and put them in a frying pan with a glug of olive oil.  You can put some salt over them too.  Heat them over a medium to low heat, giving them a swirl from time to time.  If you heat them up slowly like this, they’ll cook really nicely, going nice and soft on the inside without getting overcooked on the outside.  Overall, I’d about 15 minutes is good for them to cook through in a nice, squishy way.

As your tomatoes are cooking, get your water for the pasta on the boil with some salt and olive oil thrown in for good measure.  Linguine usually takes around 11 minutes to cook.

You can chop up your halloumi now and put it under the grill.  It’s lovely when it gets browned on the outside.  It does take a good time to brown up like that, but just be sure to keep an eye on it, so it doesn’t get burnt.

Chop up your garlic clove and add it to the tomatoes.  You don’t want them to be overcooked but you do want to give them time for their lovely flavour to seep into the toms.

Drain your pasta and mix in a big bowl with the pesto.  Then add your toms and give it all a big stirring.  Plate up and place your nicely grilled halloumi on the top.  Scrumptious.

I also grated some parmesan into the pasta but that could be a bit overkill for you.  Like I said, I’m a cheese fiend.

You could add a few toasted pine nuts to this for added loveliness.  You could also make this with green pesto, add the pine nuts and throw in some smoked chicken breast.  Awesome.

Video

I’m going to post this video of my favourite live act OF ALL TIME, Dan Deacon, who is, to my absolute delight, playing in Dublin tomorrow night and Thursday night in Vicar Street.  We’re heading down on Thurdsay night and it will be our fourth time seeing the Baltimore native.  You can read about my first experience of the man over here.  This time round, he’s playing with a band but I imagine he will still be as spectacular as ever.  It’s like being at a big kids’ playground.  Oh, the glee.

I think there are still a few tickets available for the Thursday night gig.  If you’ve never seen him….well, have a look at the video below of his performance at a Pitchfork festival in 2007 and you’ll see what you’ve been missing.  Absolutely incredible.

Categories: Dinner