I have various tricks for making my pasta seem like more than it is. What I would really like is to eat half a pound of pasta at a time but I know that is not in the cards if I want to maintain my weight loss. So I have come up with a variety of ways to stretch my portion and make it seem larger than it is.

The number one thing that I do with strand pasta is break it in half. I know that this is not a thing you are supposed to do but it doubles the amount of strands and takes longer to eat. Secondly I add vegetables that are not traditionally in the dish. Pasta puttanesca does not usually have mushrooms and kale stems in it. But I like them and it is more food for me. Lastly I serve pasta over raw hearty greens, in this case the leafy bits of kale (I put the stems in the sauce.) Having done all these things, John and I end up finishing at about the same time even though he eats a larger quantity of pasta than I do.

We buy whole grain Barilla pasta. Tonight’s linguine was great with the highly flavored sauce. In addition to my dietary adds listed above, the sauce contained petite diced tomatoes, olives, capers, onions, garlic, red pepper flakes, and oregano. I finished the plate with some cut up basil leaves. My bowlful was delicious and filling!