The Mushroom Asparagus Tarts

If this recipe looks familiar, it's because you read Epicurious and it was a featured spring recipe this week. Far be it from me to ignore what the marketing team of a web site I like tells me to do. Originally I picked this to serve ahead of The Pasta Primavera, but I had a lot of food already that night in the main course and didn't feel like going through the making of this. 

Instead I invited Ali over for dinner with me and the Thrifty Sifter the other night and we got to eating. Ali reports that her leftover tarts that I gave her made an excellent breakfast, whilst mine made an excellent lunch.

Flattened puff pastry shells. My grocery didn't have the sheets the day I went. 

This here is a makeshift rolling pin. 

Mostly square pastries. 

Mushrooms they are a satuéing. 

Everyone's ready to bake!

Some pretty awesome salad. This had red lollo, cucumber, apple, tomato, carrot, endive, and celery. The dressing used three tablespoons of Coleman's dry mustard, white wine vinegar, fresh thyme (about a tablespoon), salt, pepper, and olive oil.
 

Ms. Yum Veggie Burger and Ms. Thrifty Sifter. 

Mr. Cooks Dinner

Mr. Cooks Dinner cooks dinner. 

Tartlets complete!

We ate this all up!

A nice, Spring snowy view. 

Ali's dessert fondue!

Your soundtrack for this entry: The Birthday Massacre - In the Dark

The Pappardelle with Lamb, Sausage, and Porcini Ragu

This was my first attempt at a ragu and everyone involved fell in love with it. The guestlist included most of the folks from The Night of Julia Child and we had both copious food and copious drink. The evening was rather impromptu; in fact I only asked if anyone wanted to come over around 3 PM and had folks over by 8.

I adapted this recipe from Epicurious, so won't go into much detail except to say that you should prepare all the ingredients beforehand. It will make your life so much easier.

Your soundtrack for this entry: The Halo Friendlies - Run Away.

The Pasta Primavera

You know what's great? Being able to ring a few friends last minute for dinner and have them show up. This is a rarity in New York City, much like the fabled "dropping by to visit without planning a week ahead." Incidentally that happened successfully yesterday, too.

At any rate, I hit up a handful of people and my now-stalwart crew of Sal and Laura were happy to oblige. For dinner I planned to make mushroom asparagus tarts and pasta primavera, but kinda ran out of puff after doing prep work and decided to just cover the pasta. The tarts will be featured in a future entry.

Ingredients
10 ounces farfalle pasta
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/2 thin green beans
1/2 cup asparagus sliced into 1-inch pieces
1 cup brussels sprouts, trimmed and quartered
1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced
salt
fresh pepper
1 cup half and half
1/2 cup grated parmesan
4 plum tomatoes seeded and diced
2 tablespoons chopped chives

Much like me, these mushrooms are fun guys. 

Prepping the veggies. 

Prep for the mushroom pastries I didn't end up making. 

This is a fairly simple recipe. First, prepare your pasta. I cook about 8 minutes in salted, boiling water, then drain.

When the pasta's about half done, melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat. Once melted, bring the heat to high and sauté all of the vegetables until tender. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Next add half and half and cook until thickened (6-7 minutes). Add more pepper. At least if you're me.

Add the drained pasta and parmesan, then mix. Loosely mix in chives and tomatoes and you're done.

Laura and Sal gave it each a thumb up and a mouth full. 

Your soundtrack for this entry: RainbowDragonEyes - Fortune's Dividend.