Creamy chicken and leek penne

METHOD

1. Boil the kettle while you chop the onions and thoroughly washed leeks as small as you can.
Put the boiling water in a large pan and add the pasta, cook according to the packet instructions and once al dente drain reserving a cupful of the cooking water.

2. Gently heat up the butter in a saucepan big enough to hold the cooked pasta later and add the leeks and onion and sauté for 10 min until soft. Meanwhile wash and chop the broccoli into bite size pieces and add to the soft onions together with the cream. Cook for 5 minutes until the broccoli is cooked but still al dente.
While the broccoli is cooking, toast the pine nuts in a dry pan on a very low heat as they tend to burn incredibly easily. Once golden and fragrant, add to the sauce together with the cooked pasta and mix gently to avoid breaking the penne.

3. Add as much of the cooking water as you need to loosen up the sauce. Use the pan you toasted the pine nuts in to brown the breadcrumbs. – again, watch them because they burn in a flash. Serve the penne in shallow bowls with the toasted breadcrumbs sprinkled on top.

4. For babies, you can easily blend this pasta or blend the sauce and add well cooked small pasta shapes.

INFORMATION

For babies, you can easily blend this pasta or blend the sauce and add well cooked small pasta shapes. Do not use pine nuts.

VARIANTS

Penne with chicken and mushrooms: use mushrooms instead of broccoli and follow the same process as above.
A particularly good variation includes a handful of dried porcini added to the mushrooms; just remember to soak them for a few minutes in boiling water before adding them to the sauce together with the soaking juices, avoiding any grit that may have sunk to the bottom of the bowl.

For a VEGAN option:
You can avoid the cream all together, just add a teaspoonful of flour just before you add the wine and fry for 30 seconds, add the wine, cook off the alcohol and then add 100mls of the pasta cooking water.