Last night I made an amazingly delicious dish. Banana Spaghetti. I have had a dish called Banana Spaghetti before made by my culinary talented brother-in-law Terence. But when I decided I wanted to put bananas in my pasta last night, it was a bit different than what I remembered eating for an Independence Day Dinner a few years ago. From what I remember of Terence's it had bell peppers, roasted bananas and no red sauce (probably had other stuff too, I just can't remember, but it WAS good.) Mine had peas, corn, carrots, peppers, onions, garlic and cayenne pepper all sauteed along with bananas (which got mushy with the frying and only lent flavour and no actual banana chunks) and since I knew my husband would balk if there was no sauce, I put a can of tomato sauce in there too. And it was gooooood. Sweet, spicy, flavourful. Both John and I really enjoyed it (and the leftovers were fantastic too.)
So I thought I'd share a bit of a recipe with you. Mind, I didn't measure anything and you can mix and match with vegetables and spices. This is how I normally cook, think of what I have, think of a basic dish and make it up as I go. So be creative and I hope it works for anyone who wants to try.
As a side note, prepared pasta will be a given in this recipe, so I guess its really more of a sauce recipe.
Banana Spaghetti
Onions, chopped
red, green, yellow bell peppers, chopped
a carrot, chopped
a handful of frozen peas
a handful of frozen corn
one or two sliced bananas
sea salt
cayenne pepper
crushed garlic
a pinch of rosemary (I like to grind rosemary in my mortar, so it's less pine-needle-y)
a pinch of sage
a dash of cinnamon (in hindsight, I don't know that the scanzy amount of cinnamon I added did anything for the overall dish, I couldn't taste it, but it may have done it's part, I don't know.)
dash of allspice (I believe a little more allspice would have been nice. I like allspice in tropical-like savoury dishes.)
one can of tomato sauce (if I wasn't compromising for my husband's sake, I would have put a can of diced tomatoes instead, or better, chopped fresh tomatoes, of which I had none, so therefore, could not add)
But while we're on the wish list-I bet fresh basil would have done wonders to this dish.
Annny way, I basically sauteed all this together in my cast iron pan until the onions were translucent, the carrots tender and the banana good and mashed up and then mixed it into my prepared pasta. It was tasty and rather different.
Funny thing, on the banana theme, I woke up today and made banana pancakes (sorry, no recipe) and then after dinner tonight, I made a delicious banana chocolate pudding/mousse.
Basic recipe is as follows (I'm trying for some measurements here, but bear with me as I'm estimating, feel free to tweak if needed):
Banana Chocolate pudding/mousse/pie filling (frosting?)
3Tbs coconut oil
4 tbs cocoa powder
1 or two bananas mashed with a fork
4-5 tbs honey
Combine all in a shallow pan and turn heat to low (just enough to melt the coconut oil and dissolve the honey, basically) Once the oil is basically softened, turn the heat off and whisk with a fork (or if you have one of those awesome tiny whisks, I'm majorly jealous.) You can eat it while warm, if you like your pudding warm and slightly runny, or let cool to room temp for a nice thick pudding. I ate it at room temp, but I imagine if you put it into the fridge, you'd get a nice solid silk-pie texture. This was good, and incredibly easy, and not too unhealthy (it seems to me). Plus, I usually have these ingredients!
As an awesome close to this post, John just asked me on a date. Heck yes. :D
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