Orecchiette with Broccoli Ricotta Puree

Aside from my salsa mishap, I had a wonderful weekend! I saw two different sets of friends on Friday that I hadn't seen in forever and Job came back in town for a fun visit. We all had a blast and enjoyed having our old crew together:

I was also completely excited because my sweet friend, Abbey, gave me my late birthday present! She got me 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking' by Julia Child and I'm just psyched to get into the meat of that book. The techniques are tough but I have no French cookbooks and there isn't a better one to begin with, in my opinion. I want to make cheese souffle immediately. 

It was sort of a deja vu weekend since Allison and I had another race (finished in 36 minutes this time!) on Sunday morning so I decided to have her over for dinner again on Saturday night. I was originally thinking of doing grilled pork tenderloin with homemade hoisin sauce but I failed to get the grill pan last week that I'd planned to buy. So, I decided to create my own recipe and break out the food processor since I don't use it as often as I'd like. I tossed some ideas around and decided on orecchiette with broccoli ricotta puree.

I blanched the broccoli in the pasta water while I sauteed plenty of onion and garlic in olive oil. I made my trusty garlic oil with lots of crushed red pepper but used half of it to cook my chicken in and the other half to coat the pasta, as usual. I tossed the broccoli and onions together in my food processor, added the ricotta cheese, and a generous amount of salt and cracked black pepper. I processed that all together with a light stream of olive oil:

I combined the mixture with the chicken and hot orecchiette, a little more black pepper, and it was such a springy and fresh looking dish:

Overall, it was super tasty but there was something a little off. It just wasn't a star like you need a "sauce" to be if it's going to be the main thing served over pasta. Allison had a terrific suggestion (that I think is completely right on) that it would be great as a crostini topping. I agree totally with some finely diced balsamic tomatoes on top perhaps. I'll certainly make this again and see if it works better that way. I love coming up with recipes though and I was happy with this one!

We both ended up having a terrific run on Sunday finishing faster than last week and we got to spend the day with our lovely friends, Kristine and Camille. I finished off the weekend with delicious Indian at Brick Lane with Job and Mailande and it was off to bed early for me. Now, I'm just counting down for Brant to get here this weekend, weeee!