It did take some time to work up to eating sardines, these healthy little fish, with fabulous health benefits were not immediately appealing. I can understand your hesitation if you have not yet cultivated a taste for them. On my path to eating more of my Omega 3's in food, rather than swallowing them in capsules, I found this particular recipe to be very helpful. Try it out and let me know what you think – for me, this was certainly a gateway recipe.
Recipe for Parsley, Lemon and Garlic Sardine Pasta
I found this recipe here by Melissa Joulwan and added extra parsley and lemon (as below). Thanks, Melissa this recipe has become something of a favourite!
INGREDIENTS:
- a pile of raw zucchini noodles or cooked pasta of your choice (I like making long strips of zucchini in place of pasta from time to time)
- 1 large clove garlic, crushed
- 1 generous bunch of fresh parsley, chopped
- 1 can sardines packed in olive oil (the King Oscar brand is accessible in Australian supermarkets are preferred ) — Melissa suggests you do not drain the oil!
- lemon juice and zest of 1 lemon
- salt, pepper, crushed red pepper flakes, to taste
DIRECTIONS:
- Heat a large sauté pan over medium-high heat until it’s hot. Add the vegie pasta and toss with two wooden spoons until the pasta is hot, but not mushy. You want them al dente. This takes, maybe, 2-3 minutes.
- When the pasta is hot, turn the heat to medium-low, push the noodles to the side, and pour about 1 tablespoon of the oil from the sardines into the pan. Drop the crushed garlic right into the oil, and when it’s fragrant, toss the noodles with the wooden spoons again to coat them with the oil. Throw in the parsley, salt, pepper, and the sardines, breaking them up into chunks with the wooden spoon. Toss, toss, toss.
- Pour onto a plate and sprinkle with crushed red pepper flakes. Twirl on a fork and shove into your well-deserving mouth.
Extra health benefits are found in raw garlic so, for bonus points, if you can manage it, omit the garlic from the cooking and add in just before serving. This is amazing for your circulation, and ticks another box in the Microcirculation Diet I have been loving, since seeing Kerry Bone present his research on the results at a Naturopathic seminar series recently. I'll write more about this next time! PS Kerry's diet presentation also included a prescribed 20g of dark chocolate (85% cacao) every day. Things are definitely looking up!
