Pasta with Feta & Spinach

This is basically one of my favourite recipes (see Spanikopita) turned into a pasta sauce! Whenever I have dill and mint ready for harvesting at the same time, this is where my taste buds take me…

Serve 2 (hungry people)

200g pasta
garlic clove (or garlic scape), finely chopped or crushed
2 scallions, (or 1 small leek or babington leek), finely sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil
small bunch of spinach (or chard)
small bunch of mint
small bunch of dill
100g feta
squeeze of lemon juice (or a couple of teaspoons of apple cider vinegar)
small grating of fresh nutmeg

1) Cook the pasta according to the instructions. While it’s cooking, make the sauce

2) Put the garlic and scallions into a pan with a good glug of olive oil and a little salt and a good bit of black pepper. Cook over a low heat with the lid on for a few minutes.

3) Meanwhile, prep the spinach. If you’re using chard (rather than annual spinach) then it will have thick stems. Cut these stems off the leaf, and then finely chop the stems and add to the hot pan of garlic and scallions. Give them a stir and allow them to cook in the pan for a while. You don’t need to do this if you’re using spinach.

4) Wash and chop the herbs and spinach leaves. Add these to the pan and stir. Chard leaves will take longer to wilt down and cook than spinach leaves, but either way, I just leave the pan cooking away until your pasta is ready.

5) Drain the pasta but keep some of the cooking water to one side (you can use it to heat up a couple of pasta bowls if you want!).

6) Crumble half a block of feta into the pan of spinach. Stir so the feta starts to melt. Add the lemon juice and nutmeg into the pan. Taste to check the seasoning - add more lemon, nutmeg, salt or pepper as required,

7) Then stir in the hot pasta. Add in some of the pasta cooking water to loosen the sauce. I find it takes quite a lot of water (but add it slowly so you don’t end up with a wet mess!).

8) Serve with a green salad and garnish with Herb Robert flowers (optional!)