Rainy Days

It’s been raining for a week now and it’s starting to feel like it’s never going to stop. I usually don’t mind rain, but I have to say this is not what I hoped summer would be like. At least the lousy weather allows me to spend most of my day in the kitchen, which leads to delicious treats such as these:

Homemade stuffed pasta! I’d planned on making ravioli, but I think the shapes I made are technically called agnolotti? In any case, they were quite a success. I made the pasta dough recipe from Nonna’s Italian Kitchen, which was surprisingly simple to assemble and easy to work with, and I used the cashew ricotta from Veganomicon for the filling. We had these with a very simple tomato sauce, which was actually perfect; they’re already so tasty on their own that they don’t need much become a lovely meal. It’s a little sad that the dish took me a few hours to make yet it took us mere minutes to scarf it all down, but these little pasta pillows are definitely worth the trouble! I imagine making fresh pasta also gets easier once you get used to it, so I’d love to use the recipe again in the future.

Today’s dinner is a bit too brown to make for a pretty food picture, but it sure was tasty: a chickpea cutlet from Veganomicon (I made a double batch), the fennel breakfast risotto from Vegan Brunch, and the herb-roasted cauliflower and bread crumbs from Appetite for Reduction. All of these recipes are excellent! My boyfriend wasn’t too keen on the roasted cauliflower, though – he prefers to have this vegetable boiled and mashed into potatoes. I guess I’ll make him the Caulipots from AFR next time!

We’ve been cooking from our pantry a lot lately, mainly because we don’t feel like going out in the rain to get groceries and also because it’s a good way to save money. Pizzas are especially pantry-friendly, since you can top them with whatever you have on hand:

This pizza has cashew ricotta, thinly sliced potatoes, rosemary, and olive oil. Perfectly crispy and flavourful!

Hopefully my next post will be about breakfast on the balcony and picnics on the beach… but it looks as though the rain isn’t going away anytime soon. I guess I’ll go make myself another cup of tea!