What's Cooking Tonight: Sesame Noodles and Grilled Fish

After work today I decided to do a little experimenting. I have been craving this Asian-inspired pasta salad for a couple of days. They used to make a version of it at Civilization (a restaurant in Gainesville I used to work for), theirs wasn't always my favorite but it definitely had some shining qualities. I wanted a quick way to get that rich sesame flavor, the light creamy sauce and lots of crunchy veggies without buying a store full of ingredients. All I had to buy for this was the salad dressing, green onions, carrots and sesame oil. I'm sure there is a much more gourmet recipe out there, but this seemed to work out pretty darn well and will now be a part of my regular rotation of recipes :)

Spicy Chilled Sesame Noodles

1/2 box Whole Wheat Linguine
1/4 c. Marzetti All-Natural Asian Ginger Dressing
1/2 c. Sour Cream (low fat)
1/2 tsp. Sesame Oil
1-2 Tbs. Sriracha *to taste
1-2 tsp. Kosher Salt*to taste
1/2 Tbs. Red Pepper Flake *to taste
1 Tbs. Toasted Sesame Seeds
1/4 c. Toasted Slivered Almonds (optional)
1/2 c. Frozen Green Peas
1/2 c. Shredded Carrots (raw)
1/4 c. Green Onions (thinly sliced)

Cook pasta in large salted pot of boiling water 10-11 minutes until al dente. Drain and set aside.
Wisk together the salad dressing, sour cream and sesame oil. Adjust to taste. Add in siracha to taste. In a medium bowl pour dressing mixture over pasta and stir. Toss in frozen peas and carrot shreds. The heat from the pasta makes the peas defrost pretty quickly. Stir in red pepper flake, salt, sesame seeds and almonds. At this point taste it to see if you need to add anything else. Chill in the fridge. Add the green onions just before you serve it. Can be made a couple hours ahead of time. However this gives the noodles more time to soak up the dressing, so if you do make it ahead of time be ready to add 2-4 more Tbs. of salad dressing and red pepper flake to taste.

*Notes: Sriracha is found sometimes at Publix, definitely at Asian supermarkets. Its really good red spicy sauce and has a rooster on the front of the bottle.

ps- if you don't like spicy, the dressing is good without the sriacha and red pepper flake. just not as good in my opinion :)

Enjoy~