In the Kitchen: White Wine, Olive Oil, and Garlic Capellini, with Tomatoes and Basil, and Bruschetta

White Wine, Olive Oil and Garlic. Magic Combo!

Bruschetta. Mmmm.

Pasta is a lazy cook’s best friend. And as a lazy cook and an avid eater, I love pasta. Especially the combination of thin, long strand pasta with white wine, olive oil and garlic. Really delicious and hard to screw up, in other words, perfect. Over the weekend, Ben and I decided to make a permutation of this magical mixture, tossing in tomatoes, basil with some capellini pasta. I had also been craving Bruschetta all day, and it made the perfect side dish to our pasta.

We started having absolutely no idea what to cook for dinner, and went to Market Hall for inspiration. Being right around 6 on a Friday evening, it was crowded and the amount of cheeses in that place was completely overwhelming for people who love cheese as much as we do. So, we had to step outside for a little bit to decide and strategize our dinner plans. Melon and prosciutto sounded good, but it seemed like more of a snack than a meal, and in my mind, it didn’t mesh well with my stubborn bruschetta craving. So, we decided to keep it simple and go with pasta, and once we settled on something with the all-powerful combo of white wine, olive oil and garlic, the rest fell into place. We went to Market Hall Produce and got the best-smelling tomatoes and basil I’ve encountered yet, and also picked up an Acme Bread Co. Long Italian Baguette for the Bruschetta at the Pasta Shop.

After a successful shopping trip/decision-making process, we went back to Ben’s place to cook. (He has such a nice kitchen, I must admit, I’m jealous. It’s much bigger than mine, with a brand new stove/oven. Sure, it doesn’t have the same appeal as my cute and ancient stove/oven in terms of character, but trumps my kitchen any day in terms of cooking.) Anyways, it was a pretty quick and easy meal to cook, although we were so hungry by the time we got back that we fumbled with the timing a bit. After prepping the tomatoes, basil and garlic for both the pasta and the bruschetta, all the other steps were last minute, and famished, we had a hard time with it. Eventually, we got everything together, albeit with the pasta slightly cold and the bread slightly overdone (not burnt, but super crunchy), and it was delicious. Despite the problems, it was a yummy meal, with my favorite part of the meal being the Bruschetta I had craved all day, made with olive oil, garlic, basil and tomatoes. To accompany the meal, we had some of the Chardonnay that we used for the pasta sauce, which obviously went well with dinner.

Chardonnay, s'il vous plaît?

Overall, it was a meal that highlighted all the good things about the pasta, white wine, olive oil combo, especially the inability to mess it up, which is particularly good for the lazy (or hungry, in our case) cook.