7 December 2017
The nights are getting longer and the mercury’s starting to drop – winter is well and truly here so it’s time for some filling, wholesome comfort food.
One of our favourite go-to comfort foods here at Knidos Cookery Club is pumpkin as it’s so easy to cook and adds depth to a range of soups and bakes.
We’ve combined pumpkin with red lentils, pasta and ricotta cheese, along with some heady spices to create a filling bake to help you get through the long cold nights of winter.
Ingredients (serves 3-4)
75 g red lentils
150 g pumpkin
150 g dried pasta (penne, macaroni or fusilli work well here)
100 g ricotta or similar cheese
375 ml vegetable stock
25 ml olive oil
25 g pumpkin seeds
1 cm fresh ginger peeled and minced
one small onion
one garlic clove
one teaspoon cumin
one teaspoon cider vinegar
one teaspoon turmeric
one teaspoon chilli flakes
Method
Cook the pasta according to instructions minus one minute. Drain and set aside. While the pasta is cooking, fry the finely chopped onion and garlic in the olive oil until transparent.
Add the ground cumin, turmeric, ginger and pumpkin, cut into 1 cm cubes, and stir while cooking over a medium heat for a few minutes. Then add the lentils, stir and pour on the vegetable stock. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 20 minutes or so over a low heat until the pumpkin and lentils are going mushy and most of the liquid has been absorbed.
Remove from the heat and stir in the ricotta cheese, apple vinegar and chilli flakes. Fold in the pasta, pour into an oven dish, sprinkle over the pumpkin seeds and bake in a pre=heated oven at 180 c for 30 minutes or so until the top starts to brown.
Allow to cool for ten minutes or so before serving with a green salad.
Knidos Cookery Club 