Fresh Beet Pasta + Beet Pesto

Well, 2017 is shaping up to be quite a year so far. I had originally intended for this post to be in support of Planned Parenthood because the color of this pasta screams girl power! But in light of the events of this past weekend, I'm going to cast a wider net. To be frank, the efforts our new president and congress have been making to defund Planned Parenthood, to repeal the Affordable Care Act, to ban people from entering this country based on national origin regardless of immigration status—those efforts cut my heart to the core.

As a woman who believes in her own bodily autonomy, who believes that affordable healthcare is a right and not a privilege, it baffles me that these people who think abortion is a horrible sin are the same ones who want to take away our access to affordable birth control. As an immigrant and former green card holder who only recently (a short 9 months ago) finally gained citizenship after 23 years of living in this country, I cannot fundamentally believe that barring permanent residents who were on vacation from returning home or turning away refugees who are the very victims of terrorism and war is supposed to be good for our "national security".

We cannot sit idly by while they strip away our rights one by one, so if these are issues close to your heart, please join me in donating to Planned Parenthood or the ACLU today. To offer you a little more incentive (in case you can't donate as much as you would like or you just need a little nudge) if you send me a receipt of your donation to summer(at)oandoeats.com I will match your donations dollar for dollar up to a maximum of $500 per organization. Now is the time to fight for what we believe in, so whether you donate, protest, or call your representatives, just know that I'm with you. We are in this together.

I realize that posting a recipe seems kind of hollow at a time like this, but our bodies still need nourishment to fight, and alas this is a food blog first and foremost. I hope you enjoy this bold pink, girl power, immigrant power pasta.

Garlic Scape Garganelli

Many of you probably already know the story of where the O&O portion of this blog name comes from. They are my two kitties, and they are the queens who preside over this kingdom in which I humbly live. The kitchen is a part of their (cough totalitarian cough) domain, and they will eat anything and everything that isn't stored somewhere you need functional thumbs to open. One of them will bite through plastic to get at brioche buns (did I mention they have high class taste?), and the other...the other will eat my homemade garlic scape garganelli as they are drying on the counter. I will scream, she will run away, and I will mope over the state of the gnawed-on pasta which I spent so many hours making.

Which leads me to a question for you guys. How much time do you have this week? At least four uninterrupted hours? Gooood, that means you can make this pasta. I'm not joking. I know that sounds a little absurd, but when you're savoring each delicious, garlicky bite, it's so much more satisfying knowing you painstakingly rolled every individual garganelli by hand. And to make things even more interesting, there are garlic scapes in the dough itself, adding another layer of complexity and uniqueness to the flavor, which is something you won't find in the pasta aisle of your local store.

My Favorite Pasta Salad

You know in life, when things happen, they all happen at the same time. And though it's really exciting and wonderful, a little part of you wishes they were spaced out a teeny bit better. It has been over two weeks since my last post, and I promise I didn't just abandon this space right after my exciting announcement. As some of you know, the exact same day the Saveur finalists were announced, I started school. A full time 9-am-to-6-pm-plus-homework kind of school with the hopes of having a better, brighter, and more fulfilling career at the end of it. Thankfully it only lasts 12 weeks, but never have I had to actively use my brain for such an extended period of time each and every day—not in my previous jobs, not in college, not in high school. There is no such thing as "zoning out", or "free time" here (besides the hour we get for lunch), it's exhilarating, my classmates are amazing, I'm never bored, but goddamn, I am tired. I come home exhausted, and can barely muster up the strength to make dinner each day, so for the first two weekends after school started, I didn't blog. I felt awful because I had been given such a great honor of being a Saveur finalist, and I wanted so badly to give back and make more recipes, take more photos, and reach out to all of you, but I needed that time to decompress (and catch up on homework!). Now that we're starting our fourth week of school, there is finally a rhythm to the madness, and yesterday I managed to pull together a recipe I have been making and packing for lunch quite frequently as of late.

But before we move on to the recipe, if you haven't voted in the Saveur awards yet, I would really appreciate your vote in the Best New Voice category <3. Click the link here or in the sidebar, and make sure to cast a vote in the other categories as well so we can recognize all the wonderfully talented finalists.

Tagliatelle with Roasted Cauliflower

We managed to wade our way through the entire month of January without touching any kind of pork product. Why you ask, would we undertake such an endeavor? The simple answer is because I wanted to and by extension Phillip had to. The complicated answer has something to do with animal welfare, environmental sustainability, and the fact that pigs are just so god damn cute, but I won't bore you with a long winded explanation.

Then, on February 1st we promptly went to my neighborhood diner and ordered french toast, over easy eggs, homefries, and three sausage links. It was glorious. It was euphoric. But I felt awful. Not only about the poor pig that died in order for me to get my preservative laden breakfast sausage, but also for my obvious lack of willpower. It got me thinking. Though it might be unrealistic to say that I'll stop eating pork for good (just put a slice of prosciutto in front of me, I dare you, I will probably bite your hand off in my fervor to eat it), as long as it has helped me be more aware of the food choices I make on a daily basis, no-pork-January has done its job.