Sarah's Attempt #1: Linguine with Tomatoes, Baby Zucchini, and Herbs from Food & Wine

http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/linguine-with-tomatoes-baby-zucchini-and-herbs

As I am living at home this summer before starting grad school in the fall, it usually falls to me to find something to scrounge up for supper or at least find a recipe that we have the ingredients for at the time (this is harder than it sounds).  Now as I'm sure many of you find, Pinterest recipes oftentimes call for a lot of ingredients you don't have lying around without making a special trip to the grocery store, which is rather difficult if you live in the middle of nowhere like we do. So--this recipe seemed to be rather simple and would incorporate items we had available, however we did make some small changes to suit our family and I have to say, we did GOOD!

Here's the recipe and then I'll elaborate on what we found:

1 pound tomatoes, cored and finely chopped

1 tablespoon chopped basil

1 tablespoon chopped parsley
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 small red chile, seeded and minced
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
12 ounces linguine
3 baby zucchini, thinly sliced
1/4 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, plus more for serving

Directions:
- In a large bowl, toss the tomatoes with the basil, parsley, garlic, salt, chile and olive oil.
- In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook the linguine until al dente; drain well. Add the linguine to the bowl along with the sliced zucchini and toss. Add the 1/4 cup of grated cheese, toss again and serve in bowls, passing more cheese at the table.


It's summer--that means most of our ingredients come from our garden, which means that this recipe with zucchini and tomatoes was perfect to try. We used tommytoe tomatoes (grape tomatoes) instead of regular ones, which worked perfectly since you really only needed to chop them in half.  We also decided to saute the sliced zucchini (which were regular sized) slightly in some olive oil before we added it to the linguine--I'm not really a fan of zucchini unless its a little soft, but hey whatever floats your boat. Make sure you use fresh basil and parsley too--it really adds the flavor. Now here comes the zinger: we added TUNA. If you do not like tuna, just prepare the dish as written, however, with my brother away on a mission trip and three people in the house that love tuna, we thought we'd add it for some protein. And it turned out FABULOUS--gave the dish a little more  moisture and a little tuna taste, but it was not overpowering, the herbs and veggies still carried the dish. Between my parents and I, we barely had leftovers. This is a GREAT summertime dish--light, healthy, simple, and delicious!


Result: PIN!!!