Pea Pesto and Spaghetti

Do you ever see a fictional character eating food on TV and think "I need that in my face right now." It's always noodles that do it to me - spaghetti specifically. And the thing is... I don't even like spaghetti. I've even gone as far as to say it's my least favorite food. But yesterday when I was at my local Sunday market (Urban Agrarian) they had some homemade whole wheat spaghetti noodles and I thought about the most recent episode of The Big C where Laura Linney has a fork full of noodles and that was enough for me to add my least favorite food ever to my bag.

That evening I had an idea to combine two recipes together (lemon yogurt pasta & pea pesto) to make some tasty noodles. Here's what I did:

Lemon & Garlic Pea Pesto Spaghetti
2-3 cloves of garlic
1 cup of pecans
2 tbs. olive oil
1 cup of peas (I used purple hull peas)
3/4 cup greek yogurt
zest of 1 lemon
salt & pepper
whole wheat noodles
pasta water
ingredients in green are local

Bring water to a boil in a medium sauce pan and shell your peas - add the peas to the boiling water for two minutes - drain and add to an ice bath to cool. Chop and toast pecans in a cast iron pan. Add garlic, peas and toasted pecans to the bowl of a food processor and blend - add 2 tbs. of olive oil. Then add the yogurt & lemon zest. Blend until smooth.

Meanwhile, boil and cook your pasta. Once pasta is complete add about 1/2 a cup of the pasta water to the pesto and blend to thin it out a little. Drain and shock your pasta. Fold the pesto into the pasta in a large bowl. Salt, pepper and voila.

Jeremy and I ate these noodles paired with a glass of Raw Power shiraz while watching the season premiers of Dexter and Homeland. I was never once jealous of what anyone on TV was eating.