Gizzi's healthy pasta (with some adaptations)

 I am a big fan of Gizzi, she takes regular recipes and reinvents them in a healthier less fatterning way.

This is the second time I have cooked her Chicken, Courgette and Lemon Pasta Bake and I did make a couple of adaptions but I will highlight these as I write.

Here's the recipe:

Serves 4

Preparation time 10 minutes

Cooking time 35 minutes

Nutritional Breakdown

Chicken, Courgette and Lemon Pasta Bake – 596kcals and 18.1g of fat per serving



Ingredients

• 4 large portabella mushrooms (or whatever mushrooms you have)

• 350g dried linguine (or whatever pasta you have)

• 300g courgette, grated

• 300ml low fat crème fraiche

• 200ml low fat Greek yoghurt

• 1 large free-range egg yolk

• 35g Parmesan cheese

• zest of 1 unwaxed lemon

• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

• 200g cold roast chicken, shredded (or a couple of pre-cooked chicken breasts)

• A small bunch of fresh chives, snipped (a handful of fresh rocket works very well here too)

Method

If you are pre-cooking chicken breasts as an alternative to using left over roast meat then do this in a small frying pan on a high heat with a couple of spritzs of olive oil and some garlic (nb. doesn't matter if the meat isn't cooked all the way through at this point because you will cut it and then add it to the rest of the ingredients to cook again in the main pan later in the recipe).


Heat the oven to 200C. Heat a pan and spritz in a few spritzes of olive oil. Fry the mushrooms then remove from the pan and set aside. Fry the grated courgette for a couple of minutes. Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil and cook the pasta according to the instructions on the packet, but cook it for a minute or two less so it’s a little underdone.

Meanwhile mix together the crème fraiche, yoghurt, egg yolk, Parmesan, lemon zest, salt and pepper.

Drain the cooked pasta, leaving a few tablespoons of water in the bottom of the pan. Return the pan to a low heat and pour in the sauce.

Toss the pasta in the sauce, then add the roast chicken and chives, giving it all a good mix round until it’s evenly incorporated.