Sous vide spring garlic pesto pappardelle with pea shoots and pepitas
Sous vide green garlic confit with a pesto pappardelle from the latest edition of Sous Vide Magazine was the inspiration for this recipe, which celebrates everything about spring in the simplest way.
On my ideal kid-free afternoon, you can find me curled up on the couch with a hot cup of flowery tea, reading a food rag and salivating over every beautifully shot, perfectly crafted recipe. It might look like rest, but I call research.
I'm one of those people who actually likes reading recipes. Since I don't have time to cook everything I'd like these days, I love thinking through the process of cooking a dish in my mind. I imagine what it might smell like and how all the ingredients would come together.
People often ask me where I get my inspiration for new dishes. Friends, family, restaurants and Instagram are all significant sources, of course. But it’s the gorgeous glossies that really get me inspired and excited to cook up a dish — even if they sometimes oversell it.
Bon Appetit is great for practical recipes and seasonal inspiration, while Saveur’s more worldly take gets me interested in the stories behind the food. I get my local foodie fix with the Edible magazines, and when I’m at the doctor’s office or in line at the store, I love flipping through Martha Stewart to get that domestic goddess fix.
For the past couple weeks, however, I’ve been digging into a new, way more niche publication: Sous Vide Magazine.
Just launched and full of fascinating features written by seasoned industry pros, Sous Vide is latest glossy to enter the real of beautiful, inspired cooking magazine. It’s a total pleasure to read — and I don’t even sous vide that often. It has so much more beyond sous vide recipes, including food news, features on hot new restaurants, cool dining destinations and foodie events. A feature on how to cook with sous vide to make weeknight dinners more manageable saved me last week. And a write-up on obscure eggs making their way into culinary circles gave me some great fodder for dinner conversation with friends.
The lovely folks at Sous Vide Magazine sent me the latest issues to inspire a recipe and post. There was so much I wanted to write about and cook, but I settled on this simple seasonal pasta dish made a touch fancier with confit garlic to experiment with cooking a sauce sous vide. Because the cover of the latest magazine made jammy sous vide eggs look so damn good, I tried a few using a method I found in this video and added it to my pasta at the end.
The result? Delicious. The garlic confit was a breeze to make and really elevated the pesto. I don't have a vacuum sealer, and a food-safe plastic bag worked just fine. Once you get the hang of it, sous vide is super simple. Maybe next time I'll try a chocolate sauce sous vide. Is that a thing? I'll report back. In the meantime, here’s the original recipe, only slightly modified to include what I had in my kitchen at the time.
COOKING NOTES
When making the pesto, there’s a great tip tp blend an ice cube after adding the olive oil to keep it from browning. You can skip the blanching step for time, but it's what makes the pesto a bright green.
MAKES 2 SERVINGS
PREP TIME: 15 minutes COOK TIME: 20 minutes TOTAL TIME: 35 minutes
INGREDIENTS
Garlic Bulb Confit
1 pound whole spring garlic
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
¼ teaspoons fleur de sel
2 sprigs thyme
½ tablespoon olive oil
Spring garlic pesto
2 cups spring garlic stems
½ cup parsley
½ teaspoon salt
2 garlic cloves, sliced
½ cup pecorino cheese, grated
¼ cup walnuts
¼ cup pepitas
1 teaspoon lemon juice
½ olive oil
1 cup pea shoots
2 eggs, sous vide (optional)
INSTRUCTIONS
- Wash the spring garlic and trim the roots from the bulbs. Separate the stems from the bulbs and reserve. Place the trimmed bulbs, peppercorns, fleur de sel, thyme, and olive oil into a sous-vide pouch or food-safe plastic bag and seal. Cook for five hours at 181.4°F (83°C). Once done, remove from the water bath and set aside to cool at room temperature for 10 minutes.
- Meanwhile, make the pesto. Blanch the reserved stems and parsley in a pot of salted boiling water for 30 seconds to one minute, then chill in ice water for a few minutes. Pat stems and parsley, dry with a paper towel.
- Blend the stems, chervil, salt, garlic cloves, Pecorino, walnuts, pepitas and lemon juice. As you blend, slowly add the olive oil into the mixture until smooth. You may also blend in an ice cube to prevent pesto from darkening.
- Add salt and pepper to taste. Cook the pasta according to package directions. Serve with the garlic bulb confit and pesto sauce and toss with the pea shoots. Top with a sous vide egg, if you have one.