Spring Saturday Pasta Romanesco

For a few weeks LCBF and I have been seeing the crazy looking vegetable above in grocery stores. We had no idea what this latest German alien vegetable was until it turned up in our farm box yesterday: Romanesco Broccoli! Related to broccoli and cauliflower, romanesco is usually interchangeable with either in recipes, but we thought it tasted "like pointy broccoli," as LCBF noted. It's true; it did. The main difference seemed to be a grainier texture. Romanesco's appearance is mesmerizing. This is no doubt because it is a fractal vegetable and an example of the Fibonacci number sequence in nature. Since I am not much of a math person, the prospect of eating all those fractals and making them disappear forever made me very happy.

It took a couple days to figure out what I wanted to make with this thing. At first I thought I would bake it and do a variation on cauliflower cheese. After walking around in the early spring weather today, however, I changed my mind and decided I wanted something lighter--a fresh-tasting pasta dish. Recipe for Spring Saturday Pasta Romanesco after the jump.


Spring Saturday Pasta Romanesco   
Serves 2

1 small head Romanesco Broccoli (I used about 1/2 of the head in the picture)
2 cups dried pasta (I used farfalle)
1 large clove garlic, diced
3-4 tbl. olive oil + extra if needed
juice of half a lemon (~1 tbl.)
~1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese + extra for serving
salt and fresh black pepper

Put two pots of water on the stove to boil--one salted for the pasta and one to steam the romanesco. Wash romanesco and cut into florets.

Steam romanesco until tender--about 7 minutes. Set aside. Cook pasta until al dente. Drain, reserving pasta water, and set aside. In a large sauce pan, heat 3-4 tbl. of olive oil over med heat. Add garlic and cook for 45 seconds. Add steamed romanesco and salt & pepper. Saute for a few minutes, coating the romanesco with the oil. Add the cooked pasta, a bit of reserved pasta water, lemon juice, and grated parmesan and stir to combine. Salt and pepper to taste and serve with extra parm on top (if desired).

Light, easy, delicious!