Cold ‘Rainbow’ Farfalle

Our little bat got hyped by the rainbow month, cos, who doesn’t like rainbows!? So we tried making some rainbow pasta, cos there are more than enough rainbow sweets so we wanted our first attempt to be a savory rather than a sweet dish. We tried and tried to find a blue savory food, our first attempt is using red cabbage to make blue-colored pasta. Still not a great result as a blue color, we’re sorry blue, we failed you, but here is our experiment.

Ingredients

• Red Cabbage
• All color Bell Peppers
• Zucchini
• Yogurt
• Lemon juice
• Coriander
• Mint
• Basil
• Oregano
• Tarragon
• Marjoram
• Garlic
• Salt
• Balsamic glaze

Method

First start by boiling some of the cabbage to get the purple water that we will use to dye our farfalle (apparently it works better if you add vinegar, however, we still need to do other attempts to try this). Let the cabbage simmer for around 30minutes, remove the cabbage and let the water cool down.

In a pan, stir fry lightly the zucchini and more of the red cabbage with some coriander and garlic. We will leave the green, yellow, orange, and red bell peppers raw, just slice them or chop them up in tiny square bites (square bites work better in my opinion).

Boil the farfalle in the cabbage water. Let the pasta a little more al dente (harder) than you would like it so you can let it rest in the water for a little longer giving it time to absorb more of the color. Remove the pot from the heat and let the pasta chill in the violet water. Just make sure you keep an eye on it, not to overcook and stir it every once in a while, the water will still be hot and so will keep cooking the pasta even with no heat source. If it is still not to your liking after the water cools down cook it again till it’s the way you like it.

In a blender blend the boiled cabbage and add the yogurt, lemon juice, and your favorite mix of herbs (here we used mint, basil, oregano, tarragon, and marjoram. We also added some more garlic to our ‘sauce’), mix well and add some salt to taste.

Let everything cool down, preferably refrigerate before you serve for at least an hour. Plate in a fun way or simply mix everything together, drizzle with some balsamic vinegar, and lunch is done! This is a great recipe to take out with you cos it’s actually better if it stays in the refrigerator overnight!!

Variations

Of course, this will work if you leave some of the colors out from the bell pepper range and you can also add more if you can find more in your country! If you really want blue pasta adding food coloring should work… however, we wanted a natural recipe for our site. Food colorings aren’t exactly healthy, however, as long as you’re not using them daily and if you want a rainbow party, you should add a drop or two even if you’re using red cabbage just to be sure your pasta IS blue (unlike our grey/violet version)! Hope you enjoyed this recipe and if you will try it out we hope to hear about your adventures too! 

Bon appetite!!