What To Do With All That Lettuce, #2

In the search for innovative things to do with lettuce, I have found one other great cooked lettuce recipe -- a real star.  It's not freezable or preservable, which would be ideal when facing an overabundance of any particular food, but it is different, interesting, very quick, and very good.  I think this may become a mainstay in the house.

This one is from The Top One Hundred Pasta Sauces by Diane Seed, another one of my favorite cookbooks, and the kind of book that is particularly useful when faced with such a task as Lisa and I are facing, trying to come up with different ways to use the same foods.

Tagliolini con Gamberi e Radicchio
(Tagliolini with shrimp and radicchio)

1 lb tagliolini (as usual, I just used linguine)
5 Tbs butter
1.25 lbs cooked shrimp (I used the frozen ones that I always keep in the freezer because they're so handy to have available, but big ol' prawns would be lovely here)
10 oz radicchio
10 oz lettuce
1 small glass brandy
2/3 cup heavy cream
salt and pepper

Heat the butter and add the shrimp and the radicchio and lettuce leaves cut into fine strips.  Cook gently for 5 minutes.  Add the brandy and when it has evaporatedadd the cream, salt and pepper.  Cook the pasta.  Drain and stir into the pan containing the shrimp.  Stir well and serve at once.

Butternut -squash ravioli

We received butternut squash a few weeks ago, and I tried out a great recipe from Giada's Kitchen: New Italian Favorites by Giada De Laurentiis which was a butternut squash sauce with shrimp and basil, which I served over linguini.  I thought it was fantastic, but my husband said it was a little too sweet for his tastes.  So I decided to try the sauce again as a ravioli filling.  Now this isn't nearly so intensively Martha Steward obsessive as it sounds -- I certainly didn't make my own pasta.  I just used wonton wrappers. . .  which now that I think of it, may have been where I went wrong.  I have always sworn off making bread products of any kind, and the few times I have tried to make pasta by hand have been a disaster.  But the wonton wrappers, pretty much ended up tasting like wonton wrappers, and half of the fillings leaked out when boiled. 

So, I'm going to keep working on that recipe, and I'll let you know how it goes.  In the meantime -- here's the original from Giada:

Rigatoni with Squash and Prawns 

Serves 4 to 6

6 Tbs Olive Oil 

1 lb butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1-in cubes

2 garlic cloves, minced

2 tsp salt

3/4 tsp pepper

1 cup vegetable broth (I used chicken)

1 pound rigatoni pasta (I used linguine)

1 lb prawns or large shrimp

3/4 c whole milk

1/2 c chopped fresh basil

1/4 c grated Parmesan

Warm 3 Tbs of the oil in a large heavy skillet over medium-high heat.  Add the butternut squash, garlic, 1 tsp of salt and 1/4 tsp of pepper.  Saute the squahs until golden and tender, 5- 7 minutes.  Add the broth, bring to a simmer, cover, and cook until the squash is very soft, another 5-7 minutes.   Transfer to a blender or food processor and puree. 

Cook the pasta and drain. 

Meanwhile, warm the remaining 3 Tbs of olive oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium high heat.  Sprinkle the shrimp with the remaining salt and pepper and add them to the pan to cook, turning once until just cooked -- about 3 minutes. 

In a large pot over low heat combine the cooked pasta, the squash and 3/4 cup milk.  Stir to combine.  Add the remaining milk if needed.  Add the shrimp, the basil and the cheese.  Stir until warm, and serve!