Micki Eats (mostly gluten and dairy free)

Ingredients

• 1 bunch collard greens, chiffonade
• juice from 1/2 lime
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 pint of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
• 12 basil leaves, chiffonade
• 4 oz of your favorite box of dried pasta
• kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of salted water with 1 tbsp of olive to a boil, cook your spaghetti, drain, and set aside.
2. Meanwhile, remove the stems from the collard greens, chop, and set aside.
3. To chiffonade the collard leaves, stack 3-4 leaves and roll them like a cigar. Slice strips off of the roll at 1/4″ intervals. This produces strips of collard greens that, when unrolled, are roughly the same size as your pasta noodles.
4. Heat 1tbsp of olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat.
5. Add the stems of the collard greens, a pinch of salt, and sauté for 2 minutes.
6. Add the garlic, the collard leaves, the cherry tomatoes, and lime juice. Sauté for 3 minutes.
7. In a large bowl, toss the collard green-tomato sauté with the basil and pasta. Top with freshly ground black pepper and serve.

How to Not Screw It Up

1. A note about cooking pasta: it is important that you generously salt the water in which you boil your pasta. The reason for this is that some of the salt will impart itself into the noodles as they soften and cook. This is the best way to instill flavor.
2. A second note about cooking pasta: I would like to dispel a common myth. You do not add olive oil to the water to prevent the noodles from sticking. That’s horse puckey. The purpose of adding oil to the water is that it break the surface tension of the water and as starch leeches from the noodles, the oil prevents the water from boiling over.
3. Don’t overcook the collard greens. If you cook those leaves more than 3 minutes, they’ll get mushy. We’re really just heating them here. If they get mushy, they will not act as noodles. They’ll act like a mushy green added to your noodles.