Chocolate Cherry Smoothie.

Delicious and also a lovely color.

Lemon Spinach Pasta

With Bacon, Parmesan and Almonds

A truly ad-lib meal. But one bursting with flavor.

Simply cook your Pasta of choice* according to package directions.  Make sure to leave your noodles a bit on the al dente side. And reserve about 1 cup of the Pasta cooking water before you drain.

In a large saute pan cook 4 to 5 slices of diced Bacon. Preferably thick cut. Remove from pan when crispy. But do not drain the fat.

Add 3 cloves of Garlic, minced or sliced, to the Bacon fat. Cook until just golden.

Add in al dente Pasta and some of it's cooking water. Just enough to create a loose sauce with the Bacon fat and to help finish cooking the Pasta. But not so much you have a soup. 

Stir in about 2 Tbs butter, 3 generous handfuls of washed and dried baby Spinach, the zest and juice of 1 small lemon and 1/3 cup shaved Parmesan cheese.

Toss over very low heat until most of the liquid has been cooked out, the cheese is melted and the Spinach, wilted and tender.

Top with cracked black pepper, toasted blanched almonds, salt to taste, a few more uncooked Spinach leaves and a squeeze or two of fresh lemon juice for extra brightness.

* For our family I used the Jovial brand brown rice spaghetti. Which was a hit.

Beautiful Vignettes.

Courtesy of

http://www.monchesfarm.com