Trofie con Noci e Parmigiano (Trofie with Walnuts and Parmesan)

I was leafing through one of my favorite Italian cookbooks when I came across a recipe for pasta that looked so delicious and up my alley that I decided to prepare it for dinner. As I completed the recipe and glanced down at my newest creation with pride, I experienced deja vu. I had a sudden sneaking suspicion that I may have prepared the dish several years back. Well, after taking a whole 15 seconds to "research" my sneaking suspicion, guess what? I did a blog search and found that I prepared this recipe shortly after I started my blog in January of 2011. Yep, there it was. An entry for Spaghetti or Trofie con Noci e Parmigiano on February 12th, 2011. In my defense, I have prepared over 200 recipes for the blog since January of of 2011 so unknowingly repeating a recipe was bound to happen.

I had a good chuckle and then got excited because when I first prepared this recipe, I wasn't including photographs with my posts. Although this makes my life a little too easy for this write-up, I have included the recipe below as well as a link to my initial 2011 entry (click on the link in the paragraph above). It contains a detailed description of the ingredients and especially of Trofie pasta.

Ingredients:

14 oz trofie
4 to 6 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
4 oz chopped walnuts
4 oz freshly grated parmesan
3 to 5 garlic cloves, finely chopped
salt and freshly ground pepper
1 tsp crushed thyme or marjoram leaves

Cook pasta in large pan of rapidly boiling salted water until al dente. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine olive oil with walnuts, cheese, garlic, salt and pepper to taste, and thyme or marjoram. Mix well. Drain pasta and toss with sauce, then serve in warmed shallow bowls before it cools.

For tonight's preparation, instead of searching high and low for the perfect pasta as I did with my first preparation, I went with an organic Casarecce pasta that I already had on hand by a company called Garofalo. It is an Italian pasta, made from 100% organic durum wheat semolina. This particular pasta worked just great but after reading my entry from 2011, I am convinced that the Rustichella D' Abruzzo Casarecce that I used for my initial preparation was the way to do it right. Whatever type of pasta you decide to use, enjoy this dish! It is fairly easy but yields a sophisticated final product for a weeknight pasta dish. 

As information, the only changes I would make is to use 2 1/2 to 3 ounces of walnuts instead of 4 ounces and to keep the olive oil to 4 Tbsp, which is on the lower end of the recommended amount.

Recipe Source:
"Pasta" by Marlena Spieler, Page 142