Butter
Brussels and Browned Butter Pasta
- Serves 1-3 (depending on how much pasta and Brussels you add)
Author Notes
This quick dinner option was partly inspired by Sprouted Kitchen's Roasted Cauliflower Capellini recipe. It was her great idea to add pasta water to the browned butter to loosen up the sauce a bit, and to mix browned butter with balsamic vinegar. The rest is my post-workout hunger induced creation. To create a more balanced dish, you could reduce the pasta and add chickpeas for protein.
Also, please excuse me for not adding a photo. This is my first recipe post, and I was so hungry that I ate it without thinking to snap a pic first! —Madeleine
What You'll Need
Ingredients
-
Spaghetti, or some other skinny noodle (whatever quantity you want, I usually grab a quarter sized bundle per person)
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Brussels sprouts (again, I'm not going to tell you how many Brussels you should eat, whatever looks right!)
-
2
cloves of garlic
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2 splashes
olive oil
-
2-3 splashes
balsamic vinegar
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2 tablespoons
butter
-
2 tablespoons
leftover pasta water
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1 pinch
sea salt
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Optional: extra balsamic vinegar and Parmesan cheese
Directions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees with the rack in the highest position.
- Cut the ends off your Brussels sprouts and peel off any brown or dirty leaves. Once they're clean, slice them in half lengthwise. Place Brussels in a pan lined with tin foil (makes clean up so much easier!) with a 2 splashes of olive oil and 2-3 splashes of balsamic vinegar. Make space on the pan for your 2 cloves of garlic, skins on. Put the pan in the oven, and let everything roast for 10 minutes. Flip your Brussels and garlic cloves, then roast for another 5-10 minutes, depending on the size of your Brussels. The garlic cloves should be soft.
- While you're roasting, start boiling water for the pasta. Add the noodles once you have a steady boil, and cook to your desired texture.
- When the Brussels and garlic are ready, put the Brussels aside in a bowl. Remove the garlic skins, and crush the garlic with a wide knife. Dice it a bit if necessary to break up the garlic even more.
- In a large frying pan, brown the butter. Let it simmer for 4-8 minutes (roughly). I usually just go by smell and colour. It will smell nutty once the butter is browned. Remove pan from heat immediately. Failure to remove the pan from the heat results in burnt butter very quickly, not what we want here! Stir the garlic and about 2 tablespoons of the pasta water into the browned butter.
- Finally, add the Brussels and strained pasta into the pan with the sauce. Toss with tongs to fully coat the pasta. Add salt and balsamic vinegar to taste. You may also wish to top your pasta with Parmesan cheese, although I didn't have any on hand and it still tasted pretty good :)
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