Summer will be here soon] and that means all my plants will probably die soon. I usually let them die and then start again in the fall. My pumpkin leaves have done really well, we have been able to enjoy them at least once every week. Right now these are the only vegetables that Leo does not spit up.
I have only ate pumpkin leaves with sadza and peanut butter rice. Well that is up until now. I based this recipe off the creamed muboora with caramelised onions and mushrooms. I used this as a creamy sauce for the pasta and OMG it is so good!
The difference in these two meals is that I used more milk and cream.
The thing about this meal is that my grandmother could make this meal for less than $2 excluding the cheese that is. Sure the cheese makes the pasta taste great but you could do without it. The only thing that she would have to buy is the pasta, oil and salt, everything else she would get from her garden and cows.
First I caramelised the onions. These were two onions that I slow cooked for about 40 minutes.
I then added the pumpkin leaves.
And then the milk, cream and parmesan cheese.
Then the spagheti.
Then I tossed everything together.
Creamy spaghetti with caramelised onions and pumpkin leaves(muboora)
Ingredients
Caramelised onions
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 3 onions sliced
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Pumpkin leaves
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- pinch of salt
- 3 cups pumpkin leaves
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
Cream sauce
- 1/3 cup heavy cream
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
Instructions
Pumpkin leaves
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Boil half a cup of water in saucepan. Remove the bark from the pumpkin leaves and chop roughly. Add the baking soda to the water and add the pumpkin leaves, reduce heat to medium and cook for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and drain.
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Cook pasta according to package instructions. Drain.
Caramelized onions
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Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil on high heat in a large skillet, when oil is heated, add sliced onions and cook on high heat for about 10 minutes, constantly stirring with spatula. The onions should start to brown, but without burning (a couple of onions may be burnt here and there, but overall they should not be charred).
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Reduce heat to medium and continue cooking onions for 10 more minutes, continuing to stir, as onions brown even more without burning. At this point add just a pinch of salt over onions.
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Continue cooking for 10 more minutes on medium or low heat, stirring occasionally to make sure onions don’t stick to the bottom of the pan or burn. Total you should have cooked onions for 30 minutes.
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Remove from heat and sprinkle onions with a small amount of balsamic vinegar to deglaze the pan. Using spatula, mix the onions, scraping the bottom of the pan and coating onions with a pinch of balsamic vinegar you just added.
Cream sauce
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Add heavy cream, milk, Parmesan cheese and 1/4 teaspoon salt to the onions-pumpkin leaves mixture on medium-low heat and mix. Add pasta to the creamy sauce, stir to coat on low heat for about 5-10 minutes until Parmesan cheese melts and starts to coat pasta as well.
