A protein-rich Green Goddess pasta
Chef Chetna Chopra calls it a joke recipe. We call it a flavour bomb!
There’s a version of this gorgeous, green sauce that Chetna served at an Ayurvedic aperitivo pop-up in Delhi a couple of years ago, drizzled over paneer. Before that, she was using it in Italy, thinned with olive oil over quinoa. Clearly, it’s a recipe that travels well and widely. The logic is simple: build a sofrito carefully, add greens, blend smoothly, and you have something that works on almost anything. Today it’s on pasta.
She uses Mille’s gluten-free pasta, and she’s straightforward about liking it, having cooked with a lot of GF pasta over the years. This one holds up.
A few things worth knowing
On the garlic. The onion always goes in first because garlic cooks faster and burns easily in a hot pan. Use low heat and stay close.
On pasta water. Reserve it and don’t be stingy with it: it’s starchy, slightly salty, and warm, which means it loosens a thick sauce without diluting it.
On the cashews. Overnight soaking is what gives you a genuinely smooth sauce. If you’ve forgotten, cashew butter works as a substitute, or feta if you want something sharper and saltier.
On the avocado. It’s there for texture more than flavour, giving the sauce a richness that carries everything else. If yours is underripe, a little more olive oil does the same job.
On GF pasta. It cooks more slowly, so start tasting a couple of minutes before the packet says it’s done, and toss it into the sauce off the heat rather than on it to stop it from going sticky.
On making ahead. The sauce is the part worth batching: make more than you need, keep it in the fridge for up to three days, and use it on wraps, as a dip, or over proteins or grains. (The pasta, naturally, is always better fresh.)
Read the full feature: At the Table with Chetna Chopra here.
Plus, a protein-rich and delicious Boost and Restore Smoothie Bowl recipe here.
1,000 Ways to Live Well is a Mille publication. Mille is a modern nutrition brand built around everyday rituals, starting with protein that doesn't ask you to compromise on taste. millesupergrain.com