Hannah Wilding's courgette + sardine agrodolce pasta

Hannah Wilding's courgette + sardine agrodolce pasta

Courgette + sardine agrodolce pasta!! Which basically means sweet n sour, where I used sultanas for sweetness and lemon juice for sourness. Plus some Kalamata olives for an extra bit of tang and pine nuts for crunch. Grab yourself a good quality tin of sardines for this and the rest is pretty simple.

The courgettes get nice and jammy and soak up all those delicious flavours. All tossed through my favourite Northern Pasta!

Ingredients (serves 2)


2 tbsp olive oil
1 large courgette, roughly chopped into bite-size chunks
1 fat garlic clove, roughly chopped
2 tsp fennel seeds
150g pasta of choice - I used gigli, but casserecce would also work well
1 tbsp Kalamata olives, de-stones and roughly chopped
A handful of raisins or sultanas
A handful of pine nuts
1 lemon
1 x 140g tin quality sardines
10g fresh parsley, roughly chopped

Method


Heat the olive oil in a pan over a medium heat. Add the courgettes with a good pinch of salt and cook until they start to brown, around 5 minutes, then reduce the heat slightly.

Add the garlic and fennel seeds and allow to cook some more until the courgettes start to soften and go a little jammy.
Cook your pasta as per packet instructions


Add the olives, raisins, pine nuts and the juice and zest of half a lemon and stir to combine. Flake in the sardines, keeping them fairly chunky still. Add the parsley and mix well.


Drain the pasta, reserving about half a ladleful of the water and add both of these to the pan. Toss well to coat the pasta in the flavours. Season well with cracked black pepper and salt to taste.


Plate up finished with a good drizzle of olive oil and more cracked black pepper.