Play All Day Till Dinnertime and Still Eat Well with Spaghettini with Checca Sauce

Longer days and warm weather give me much more time to wear my sons out, so they’re more likely to fall asleep in the vicinity of bedtime. That I love. But sometimes it feels unfair to have to either cut all our time outdoors short, or just cut my time with the gang short, so that I can go and get dinner started. I want to stay out till the last possible minute, too. But if I do that, then I’m so exhausted (an obvious byproduct of working exhaustively to exhaust little ones) that I can’t bear to think of myself as responsible for everyone’s dinner. The whining starts in my head. Why me? Why do I always have to cook for you people? Can’t we just have cereal again? Etc. Well thank you, thank you, thank you to Giada De Laurentiis for “Spaghettini with Checca Sauce.” This little recipe is so easy that we can all go out and stay as long as we want, and I’ll have it ready before my whiny thoughts clog my brain. If you have other Summer recipes like this one with minimal prep time (this one is 8 minutes) I’d love to hear about them.

I don’t know which, if any, of Giada’s cookbooks has this recipe. I got this recipe on the Food Network site, and they have little “tagged” words that, when moused over, give you the option to print coupons for certain grocery items. Sweet! But the cookbook pictured above has some pretty awesome recipes in it, too. Click it. Read the customer reviews.

–Sweet B

Spaghettini with Checca Sauce

Ingredients:
8 ounces spaghettini or angel hair pasta
4 scallions (white and pale green parts only), coarsely chopped
3 garlic cloves, crushed
12-ounce container cherry tomatoes, halved
1-ounce piece Parmesan, coarsely chopped
8 to 10 fresh basil leaves
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
3 tablespoons olive oil
4 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, cut into 1/2-inch cubes

Directions:
1. Cook the pasta in a large ot of boiling salted water until al dente, tender but still firm to the bite, stirring often, about 8 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, combine the next 7 ingredients in a food processor. Pulse just until the tomatoes are coarsely chopped (do not puree).

3. Drain the pasta, reserving some of the pasta water. Toss the pasta with the tomato mixture and fresh mozzarella in a large bowl. Add some of the reserved pasta water (about 1/4 cup) if the sauce looks dry. Serve immediately.