Tomato and Chorizo Pasta

So I'm slowly getting back into the cooking, I've used some faux meats here but at least there is some chopping involved!! This was inspired by a salad Jamie Oliver did on his Jamie Does... program. He was in Andalucia and made a tomato and chorizo salad which looked delicious, well, minus the fatty meat and excessive amount of olive oil used ;-) I remember seeing that Redwood foods made vegan chorizo chunks and decided to have a go. The recipe is not online anywhere that I can see but it was pretty straightforward: tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, sherry vinegar, parsley, chorizo and salt and pepper. I first made the salad and it was so, so good!! The vegan chorizo chunks when fried in olive oil release amazing spicy flavour and colour making an fantastic dressing with the vinegar. You simply pour the fried chorizo and garlic over a big bowl of roughly chopped tomatoes with some spring onion and parsley and toss. Served with crusty french bread you have a delicious lunch!

As you can see I didn't take a photo of the salad though, as the next day I got to thinking the same process would make an amazing pasta, and it does. This photo doesn't do the dish any justice, the deep red colour of the oil isn't showing and all my lovely tomatoes are hidden underneath there, but this was delicious! I will be making this again if I happen to have the chorizo chunks on hand, either the pasta or salad :-)

Tomato and Chorizo Pasta (or salad):

Serves 1:

150g good quality tomatoes, you want to splurge here!

40g vegan chorizo chunks, redwood foods make them

2 tsp olive oil (Jamie used WAY more, I wanted to cut back on that)

1 tsp red wine vinegar, he used sherry vinegar but this is what I had

1 clove garlic, thinly sliced

salt and pepper

For the salad:

spring onion

freshly chopped parsley

For the pasta:

75g pasta

25g sliced spinach

Roughly chop the tomatoes and place in a bowl. If making the salad add the spring onion and parsley and gently toss. If making the pasta start cooking the pasta. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan until fairly hot. Add the chorizo and fry until very fragrant and the oil changes colour, a couple of minutes. Add the sliced garlic and fry a couple minutes more, I like to get the garlic here just slightly golden as I love the flavour that way, and I do eat them with the dish, you could leave them out if you like and just use them to flavour the oil, but I recommend leaving them in. Now add the vinegar and fry about 1 minute more, it will sizzle up then calm down. Using a rubber spatula scrape it all over your tomatoes and toss, season well with salt and pepper. If making the pasta simply add the drained pasta to the chorizo and oil and gently fry with the tomatoes and spinach until it wilts. Lovely with a little grating of mature cheddar cheezly on top too!

♥

Nutritional Analysis: (based on the pasta dish)

Calories: 556 (290 calories for the salad)

Protein: 23.1g

Carbs: 67g

Sugars: 7.5g

Fibre: 5.2g

Sat Fat: 3.3g

Sodium: 468mg

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