Staying Up Late, Partying with...Noodles?

Thanks to his exciting new Daycare Fatigue Schedule, Iain eats dinner at about 7pm. This is crazy, considering that his previous bedtime was 7. But whatevs. We're just rolling with the punches here.

What's the meal for which the Little Man arises from his bed? It's something I totally cribbed from Callie's mom.


You boil up a cup of small-ish noodles (here it's a mini version of lumache, which is Italian for "snail" and which is just a little shell-shaped thingy) in very salty water. Drain, then put them back in the hot pot with a bunch of butter (like 2 tablespoons). Swirl to melt the butter and coat the pasta. If necessary, add more butter. (Do not rinse your pasta. You want the starchy coating to hold the butter.)

Once the butter is melted, I toss in a half cup of minced veggies. Here, I'm using the last of a bag of frozen veggies my FIL bought while he was house-sitting. It's green beans, peas, lima beans, corn and carrots. I mince it so that avoiding the veg becomes impossible.

Stir the veggies in, then throw on a heaping handful of shredded cheese. I use a combination of mozzarella and parmesan, because we're being Italian here. Ciao, 'more.

The trick is that by this time the pasta is only warm. The cheese is not going to melt. That's fine, because the whole idea is that you put the noodles in a bowl, pop it in the fridge, and use it later. Little Monkey comes home tired, cranky and hungio? Throw half a cup in a bowl, microwave for 30 seconds (which melts the cheese!) and serve. It's tasty, it's relatively healthy, and you can add whatever you want (tomato sauce, shredded chicken, herbs...).

As you can see above, I added some butter-poached carrots. Iain did not eat them. But they looked nice on the rug. And yes, since you asked, we go through a lot of butter around here.