Photo due: April 15, 2011
Bok Choy Linguini

If you’ve never used bok choy, you need to become friends with this lovely, mild, nutritious vegetable. Packed with iron and vitamins, you will come to think of bok choy as one of the staple vegetables for your grocery list. If you can’t find bok choy, you can use any leafy green you wish, either fresh or frozen: spinach, chard, those beet greens we visited earlier, rapini, even romaine or other crisp salad green.

½ pound dry linguini
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion peeled and sliced into rings
6 slices prosciutto sliced into thin strips (If you don’t have prosciutto, you can substitute just about any kind of smoky, intensely flavoured cured ham or sausage, even anchovies which are a regular part of my kitchen inventory.)
½ cup blanched whole almonds (or whatever type you choose)
2 cups mushrooms, whole or sliced, cremini preferred
1 chilli pepper crushed
1/4 teaspoons poudre fort or nutmeg (poudre fort recipe under Condiments and Spice Blends)
Salt and pepper to taste
1 head bok choy, washed and chopped into about 1” slices
½ cup white wine or vegetable or chicken stock

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil and cook linguini until al dente.

While the pasta is cooking, heat olive oil in a large skillet. Sauté onions and prosciutto until a bit of colour develops. Add almonds and mushrooms and let colour develop further. Season with poudre fort, chilli, salt and pepper. Add bok choy and sauté until bok choy is bright green and slightly limp. Add the wine.

Add linguini to the bok choy mixture, toss well. Serve into bowls and dress with a bit of olive oil.

I often eat the leftovers of this dish the next day as a cold pasta salad. Absolutely wonderful.

Serves 6 to 8