PASTA perfect for weeknight dinner (plant-based) 🍝

This is the key to creating flavorful pasta. I've set up a little experiment to show you why the temperature of the water matters. Today we're whipping up not just one, but two stunning pasta dishes that are gonna become your new weeknight favorites. And we're gonna start off first with making a plant-based twist on the classic Italian spaghetti carbonara. Usually when you think of plant-based meals, carbonara is not a dish that comes to mind. Traditionally, it uses guanciale, which is a cured pork cheek, but we're gonna be making our own homemade smoky tofu bacon. If you are pressed for time, you can, of course, buy a store-bought vegan bacon, but this is really easy to whip together. First, let's make our marinade. I like that when you said pork cheek, you went for your own cheek. Do, do, do, do, do, do, do. To a bowl, we're gonna add some soy sauce for an umami punch, a splash of dark soy sauce too. This offers more depth in flavor than regular soy sauce. We'll add a small drizzle of maple syrup to balance out any bitterness, a glug of neutral vegetable oil, then season with a crack of black pepper, a sprinkle of dried thyme and garlic powder, and finally, the secret ingredient, a dash of liquid smoke. This is what gives the tofu its distinct bacon flavor. Then just give it all a mix and set it aside. Then we're gonna grab our tofu and make sure it's well-pressed. You can do this either with a tofu press or just place the tofu on a flat surface and put a heavy object like a skillet on top. You can think of tofu as a sponge. It has all of these porous holes, and when we press it, we're helping to release a lot of that water, which then frees up space in its structure for the tofu to soak up that marinade that we've just made. Now we can cut up our tofu into small little pieces and then transfer it to the bowl with the marinade. Give it a toss to coat it all super well, and then we can spread it out over a lined baking tray and then pop this into the oven to bake at 390 Fahrenheit or 200 Celsius for about 30 to 40 minutes. You're gonna wanna stop to stir it a couple of times in that time. All right, while the tofu bacon is transforming, we're gonna tackle cooking our pasta. We've got a large pot of boiling water here, and you're gonna wanna salt it like the sea. This is the key to creating flavorful pasta. Then we'll just cook up the spaghetti until it's al dente. All right, so while that pasta is bubbling away, let's dive into the alchemy of making the sauce using cornstarch, and I've set up a little experiment to show you why the temperature of the water matters. I'm gonna fill two jars with water. One of them has cold water in it. The other one has boiling water. You'll see that when I whisk the cornstarch into the cold water, it dissolves smoothly, and that's gonna give us a lump-free and smooth sauce, but it forms lumps when it's mixed into the hot water. This happens because heat causes the starch molecules to expand quickly and stick together before they've had the time to evenly disperse throughout the liquid. So the takeaway message here, always add cornstarch to cold liquids before you turn on the heat. So grab a saute pan, add in some cold water and some cornstarch, give it a good whisk until you've got a slurry, then we can transfer it over to the stove and heat it up. While it is heating up, we're gonna add in some nutritional yeast for cheesiness, a touch of vegan butter for richness, some salt, garlic powder, and some optional turmeric powder. It's just to give it that lightly golden carbonara hue that would traditionally come from eggs. We're gonna cook this at a gentle simmer for a few minutes, just continuing to whisk it until it thickens into our dreamy carbonara sauce, thanks to the magic of cornstarch. Next, let's talk about two seasonings that are non-negotiable for this recipe. The first is black pepper. The second is kalamak, also known as black salt. Now, when it comes to black pepper, much of the heat and the intensity, the flavor of this dish is supposed to come from black pepper. So I'd recommend grinding it yourself, either using a mortar and a pestle or just using a pepper grinder. If you're using pre-ground pepper, it works all right, but it just loses its flavor and intensity over time. So we're gonna add a beautiful little pile of ground pepper to the pan, along with that indispensable kalamak. This is what's gonna give the dish its characteristic eggy flavor. Then we're gonna add in the pasta and toss everything until the pasta is beautifully coated. Now it's time to plate this beauty. We're gonna heap it generously onto some plates and then crown it with those smoky tofu bits that have just come out of the oven. We're gonna add a light sprinkle of vegan Parmesan, an additional pinch of kalamak, and some black pepper, just as a finishing touch. And there you have it, a plant-based carbonara that gracefully captures the spirit of the traditional recipe. As a little bonus recipe, let's make a homemade vegan Parmesan. It's super easy to make. All you need are either raw or I actually prefer lightly roasted cashews. So we're gonna add some of this to a small food processor, along with some nutritional yeast, some garlic powder, optional onion powder, and salt. Then we're just gonna pop a lid onto it, blitz it up, and that's it. It's perfect for sprinkling over salads or pastas. For the next recipe, let's dive into making a tomato red pesto gnocchi that comes together with under 10 ingredients. We're gonna kick things off with finely chopping a shallot and mincing two cloves of garlic. This is all the chopping we need to do. Let's head over to the stove. We'll heat a splash of oil in a saucepan and saute the shallot and garlic until they become lightly golden. Then to it, we're gonna add some canned whole tomato and some red pesto, giving it a stir and letting it simmer for a few minutes until it becomes a rich and flavorful sauce. While that's cooking away, we're gonna give the gnocchi a brief swim in a large pot of salted boiling water. You'll know it's ready when it starts to float to the surface. And then this is an optional step, but you can heat up some oil in a saute pan and toss the cooked gnocchi in the pan, frying them until they're beautifully golden on the outside. If you find that when you make gnocchi otherwise, if it's kind of too soggy, it sticks together, frying it up like this is the remedy to that. Now returning to our sauce, we're gonna add in some plain vegan cream cheese, along with a dash of salt and a little bit of black pepper. And then we're gonna give it a blitz with an immersion blender until it's smooth. No, don't show it. I have a proper apron. I'm just lazy to go get it. It's all the way over there. This is gonna create a creamy, dreamy tomato pesto sauce that perfectly coats our gnocchi. At the very end, we're gonna add a squeeze of lemon juice to bring a bright finish to the dish. And all that's left is to plate this one up. Whenever you're ready, just garnish it with some of that vegan Parmesan and some sliced fresh basil. And there you have it, a dish that's as delicious as it is beautiful. I hope you enjoy these recipes if you give them a try. The full breakdown to all of the recipes as always are in the links that are in the description box below. And if you're hungry for even more, we have a plant-based recipe and nutrition app that has over 1,000 recipes and a whole bunch of other cool features. If you want to try out one week for free, the link for that is in the description box below. Thanks for hanging with me today, friends. I really appreciate it. Pick Up Lime signing off, and I'll see you in the next video. We're gonna start off first with making this... Just record, and then you'll see. Yeah? Okay, here we go. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. It's starting off with a star wall, so it means it's only gonna get easier from here on out, right? Did you see that? I totally... I missed that completely. That was a struggle. Again. As a little bonus... As a little bonus recipe, let's make a ho... As a little... One of those... It's like malfunction. And then there's a part right now where I have to talk to the camera. I wish you'd have done it the other way around. This is all the cutting you need to do. Wasn't that easy?