Roasted Broccoli and Almond Pesto Fettuccine

{Fit Recipe Friday}

I wanted to give pesto a try without its traditional river of olive oil. Please do not knock it until you try it!  I have wanted to try oil-less pesto for a while now.  Because of its flavor and glutinous nature I thought that pasta water might just be the ticket.  I see people use it in pasta sauces all the time on the Food Network.  I believe that my attempt turned out amazing! The Parmesan helped stick it together as well. I will, without a doubt, revisit this concept again and again!

Think about it.  Olive oil has about 120 calories per 1 Tbsp. And ½ c. contains roughly 8 Tablespoons.  That translates to roughly 960 calories saved!

In this revised dish, most of your calories are coming from the pasta. I really adore pasta so this fact makes me sad.  Whenever I used to see "Lean Cuisine type" meals, containing pasta, for less than 300 calories I would always buy them.  I would get so excited about having a pasta dinner for less than 300 calories!  Then I would open the frozen dinner up to heat it and it would have like 5 noodles in it.  Oh, so that’s how they do it! They don’t have a magic way to extract the calories out of one of my most cherished and coveted foods. So with pasta I just have to take it as it is and if it is not a cheat day, and I want to eat it, I just have to control my portion and take the hit. And if it is a cheat day, LOOK OUT!!!

Roasted Broccoli and Almond Pesto Fettuccine

Ingredients:

-12 oz. broccoli Florets

-4 oz. fettuccine noodles (boiled to al dente in heavily salted water)

-1 to 1.5 oz. dry roasted almonds

-1 Tbsp. fresh squeezed lemon juice

-1 oz. shaved Parmesan (+ ½ oz. for garnish, optional)

- ¼ to ½ c. reserved pasta water

-S & P (to taste)

-cooking spray

Preheat oven to 350° F. Spread broccoli florets over a cookie sheet covered in foil and coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle broccoli with S & P.  Roast broccoli for 30 to 40 minutes (until it forms a nice brown color on its ends and softens just a little). Cook pasta according to package directions minus 1 minute (that usually equals al dente when I boil most pasta). Drain and rinse pasta (reserving ½ cup of the water), set aside.

In a food processor combine roasted broccoli, almonds, Parmesan. Turn processor on and drizzle in lemon juice and pasta water until desired consistency is achieved. Pesto will be coarse and a little dry, but I promise it will stick to the pasta!  In a large bowl combine pasta and pesto and toss to coat.  Divide pasta into serving bowls, top with a little more Parmesan, if desired, and EAT!!!

This makes roughly two main dish servings or four sparse side servings.

Total Calories (Just in case you like it so much you want to eat the entire mess of it.): ~860 (1 serving = ~430 calories)

Compelling Calorie Clue:

~ 100 calories worth of fettuccine noodles.  It works out to be only about 15 noodles (1 oz.).

Oh the inhumanity of it all!  Dear Santa, next year for Christmas, all I want is 1000 lbs. of semolina pasta which is completely void of any and all calories!

A thousand pounds should last me at least a year.  Then maybe I will get tired of it and never want to eat it again!

I never wonder why macaroni and cheese is, and probably always will be, both of my children’s favorite food.  In fact, I would be willing to bet that it is a favorite of the majority of American children.