One-pot pasta with mushrooms and leeks

Another NYT recipe, another one-pot recipe

Time saver: I saw that Trader Joe's has now sells peeled garlic cloves, so I got those.

The lemon juice did what it was supposed to do (deglaze the pan, or rather Dutch oven), but it also added a sour note I could have done without.

4 cups of liquid was just enough to cook the pasta. 

Here's the finished dish, it looked pretty, and the ricotta made it creamy and less sour.

Alas, for once, this was a recipe that looked better than it tasted. Perhaps it was the broth I used, perhaps it was the lemon juice, but I'm not sure I tasted 'umami,' rather, it tasted a little sour (but the ricotta, once mixed with the pasta, balanced it out nicely). 

7/10

The NYT Cooking Site

...is great. A couple of things I've made over the past couple of weeks:

Pasta with chicken and mushrooms, risotto-style

It was fine, but I thought the somewhat cumbersome risotto method didn't add all that much to the flavor.

Fettuccine with asparagus and smoked salmon

Very good and I liked the fact that I didn't have to cook the salmon.

(Deconstructed) Lasagna with asparagus and chives

Fine. Not sure I got the lasagna part right -- other pasta would have worked as well. I did like the use of ricotta!

Mushroom risotto with peas

Fine. Not six servings, though. The parsley matters!

Onwards!

Random recipe: Deconstructed lasagna with asparagus and chives

Deconstructed Lasagna with Asparagus and Chives

This recipe, from the NYT's new Cooking website, was a hit on a warm and humid night in May. Easy to prepare (not many ingredients, no complicated chopping or peeling or sauteeing), not too heavy (thanks to the use of ricotta -- of the whole milk kind -- rather than cream), not too pasta-y (thanks to a lb. of asparagus). My family loved it. Five out of five.