How To Disguise Vegetables | Round 2

Although not official, Round 1 would have been that awesome soup I made up the other day in my effort to use up the farm share vegetables.

Round 2 is just as simple as the soup but involves noodles and sauce instead. Actually, when you think about it, soup is kinda like noodles and sauce, too, since I put noodles in my soup. I guess you could call this Really Thick Soup. Really thick. Or pasta if you want to be like that.

Here goes:

• 1 bunch Red Russian kale, chopped up just a bit so you can fit it in the pan without dropping it all over the floor and having to wipe up the resulting slobber from the dogs who thought they were getting something good and then realized they were eating KALE

• 2 leeks, sliced (most of green tops removed and discarded; a little green is OK, though) - remember to wash those babies thoroughly lest you end up with gritty pasta... EW.

• some leftover breakfast sausage (flesh-free pasta would be fine, but I had like 1/4 lb. left in the freezer and I'm reeeeally trying to not let food go unused. I'll probably get fat because of this.)

• a handful of nuts (I used both walnuts and slivered almonds because I didn't have enough of one kind)

• garlic, minced

• some butter

• some olive oil

• some grated Parmesan

• a sturdy type of noodle (I used linguine)

• salt and pepper, to taste

• lemon juice, optional

Put a pot of water on to boil for the pasta. Make yourself a cocktail.

Meanwhile, in a medium-sized pan over medium heat, saute up the sausage until cooked through. Transfer to a plate and set aside.

Don't forget to add your noodles to your boiling water. Sucks when you make crazy good sauce and it's all ready to slather on your noodles and then you realize that you forgot to cook them.

Using the same pan but over medium-low heat, toss some butter in there and add the leeks. Let them sizzle around for a bit until they start to brown and get creamy.

Add the kale and stir it around until it starts to cook down. Ignore Hub's That Looks Gross face and continue with your dinner plan unfazed.

This would not pass for dinner as is.

Add your garlic and finish sauteing for just a few minutes, then remove from heat and transfer mixture to a food processor. Add some olive oil, Parmesan, and nuts a little at a time and puree until you think it looks like pesto. Observe Hub's look of relief now that he realizes you're making pesto and he likes pesto and thank goodness you're not making him eat those nasty greens in any recognizable form.

Pesto. For reals.

Season the pesto with salt and pepper. Add some lemon juice if you have it on hand. Of course, add lots of Tabasco. People who don't like Tabasco are un-American.

Drain your pasta and combine it with the kale mixture and sausage. Stare at Hub in disbelief when he exclaims that this is one of your better dishes. Polish off the rest of your cocktail to celebrate.

Not that I care, but I'm pretty sure you could get kids to eat this, too.

Looks safe, tastes delicious.