Quick pesto'd pasta with oysters

Pre-cooked farfalle

Sometimes at lunch, I just want something quick and easy. Okay, that's not true. Every day at lunch I want something quick and easy. If it isn't, I often skip lunch, which is bad for me on so many levels. Skipping breakfast is horrid but skipping lunch causes me to over-eat at dinner in a huge way. Now, I occasionally eat leftovers, but often, instead I will take parts of the leftovers and make something new.

Oysters and pesto

This recipe is a great example. I made bowtie (farfalle) pasta for dinner the night before, and there was pasta that didn't get eaten. It was shoved into the fridge in a plastic container and promptly forgotten. On Friday, I pulled it out and made a completely new recipe, something delicious and quick and relatively nutritious. I've made this particular blend before, but it can be switched up. You can make it with leftover chicken, pork, beef or seafood. I've made it with canned crab. I've tossed in shrimp. Most often, though, I want it made with oysters because I love them and they're so yummy!

Adding oysters

The cupboard revealed a can of oysters in water, and the fridge yielded some leftover pesto from a previous meal. I tossed the pasta in a cast iron pan along with some EVOO and sautéed it until it was warm. I added in the pesto a tablespoon at a time until the pasta was covered in those lovely, fragrant green specks. The oysters went on the top at the last minute, and were gently stirred into the pasta and pesto. When working with canned oysters, you want to make sure you use very gentle movements, because otherwise they break apart and become a sort of mush in the bottom of your pan. The taste is the same but it loses its aesthetic appeal.

I served this meal up with a light sprinkle of salt and a topping of fresh grated parmesan cheese. It was filling and quite tasty! The whole meal took me about five minutes, start to finish. It's very flexible, too, because you can add whatever you like to the mix. If you want onions, throw them in. You have some leftover corn? Toss it in as well! Kitchen sink cooking is an art form, one I've practiced and perfected.

Topped with parmesan cheese!

Shared at the Old Fashioned Recipe Exchange 2/26. Thank you to everyone who made my bread recipe the most clicked last week!

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