Mangia Monday!

Whenever I hear someone say “mangia” I’m instantly transported back to sitting around a big farmhouse style table with my entire extended family. There were seemingly endless dishes being passed around while the same old stories were told – always with an added embellishment – and everyone listened and laughed as if they had never heard it before.

Guaranteed, over all the laughter my Italian great-grandmother would be shouting “MANGIA” (= eat) to anyone who looked like they were moving their fork too slowly or hesitating to take seconds. On reflection, that wouldn’t seem to breed a healthy relationship with food, but it made me love dinner time because it was such an event.

While I would love to keep that tradition going, the problem is TIME! So, welcome to Mangia Monday! Where tasty meals are simplified so you have more time for embellished story-telling.

Now, get ready for the simplest and tastiest dish.

This started as a creation from whatever I could scavenge in my home. It has now become a crowd-pleasing comfort food dish of freshness. And pasta. I love pasta and do not categorize it as a “bad food”. Just like anything else, it’s to be enjoyed in moderation. Also, you only dirty TWO THINGS to make this!

Just a heads-up…a lot of what I cook is to taste, I kind of adjust things as I go. That means amounts of things are not super precise. Thankfully, that also means my dishes are reeeeeeaaally easy to make.

Ingredients and Supplies

1 baking sheet

1 pot to boil water

1 lb of pasta

2 cans of chickpeas, rinsed well

2 pints containers of cherry tomatoes

1 jar of marinated artichokes, drained with some liquid reserved

1 jar pitted kalamata olives

1 lemon (for zest and juice)

Bunch of basil

Olive oil

Salt + Pepper to taste

½ tsp Paprika

Now, onto the fun part…

Preheat oven to 400*. Get water boiling.

Combine chickpeas, tomatoes, marinated artichokes, and olives on baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and paprika. Bake for 15 minutes, then stir up the mixture and put it back in for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, cook pasta.

Combine everything, then stir in 2 tablespoons of the reserved artichokes marinade, lemon zest and juice from half of the lemon. Add salt and pepper as needed and top with fresh basil.

* This recipe is vegan-friendly, but carnivores will love it too! If you must have meat in your dish just saute some chicken to mix up along with everything else. It’s also suuuuuuuuper tasty with some fresh arugula stirred in at the end while everything is still hot enough to melt it down a bit.

MANGIA!!