Pasta e fagioli à la neko style

Of course I made changes to the EDC recipe. I changed only portions of content and so of course it can't be called a pasta e fagioli any more.

Ingredient differences, I:

• used Cannellini beans and Butter beans instead.
• used a can of Roma tomatoes instead of 2 fresh tomatoes.
• 2 small brown onions,
• 2 cloves of garlic.
• lessened the chilli to 1/2 - we're not a spice-centric Asian family.
• added 1/2 smoked chicken breast and 1 cooked chicken breast.
• chopped some fresh parsley.
• used risoni instead of ditali pasta, and
• added baby spinach in the TM server.

Method:

I did poach the smoked chicken a little bit, the smokey flavour is quite strong and you should add it in last with about 3-4 minutes to spare on the final cooking time. This just mixes it through and allow the subtle smoke flavours to mix in but not permeate all the risoni.

I also added 1 minute to the onion cooking time. And at least 2-3 mins to each batch of cooking time due to the increase in ingredients. The risoni remained al dente upon serving into the TM server.

The smokey flavor completely changed what sometimes can be a plain dish. Other alternatives to add flavour included placing more parsley in the initial stages and red onion. I'm not a huge fan of parsley so I usually like to refrain from using it too much. Other than the chicken this could be made into a vegan dish :)

Recipe success: 5 out of 5 stars. My father ate it! Ok, he eats most things I cook but he's "picky". He liked this, so I'd say the variations worked out fine!
Taste: 4 out of 5 stars. Personally, I don't like smoked chicken that much. It's mom's favourite.