Real Pasta Primavera

I love Pasta Primavera.  Whenever I've had it in a restaurant it's usually veggies in a light tomato sauce.  I have since learned from Jacques Pepin what real Pasta Primavera is.  When I read his book "The Apprentice" he shared Ed Giobbi's original (1976) recipe that was served at Le Cirque.  I marked it in hopes that my tomato plants would actually produce enough tomatoes this year to make this dish.  Low and behold, it may be the end of September but I finally had enough red tomatoes to give this dish a try.  

(I have no idea why this picture is sideways....)

Pasta Primavera
Serves 4

Ingredients:
1 lb tomatoes
1 tsp finely chopped garlic
1/3 cup olive oil
salt and pepper
1 cup basil leaves, shredded
1 lb pasta, rotini, penne or bow ties
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Instructions:
Cook pasta according to the package directions. Save 3/4 cup of the pasta water!
While the pasta is cooking cut the tomatoes in half, lengthwise, squeezing out the seed and dicing the tomatoes into 1/2 pieces
Toss tomatoes with the garlic, olive oil, salt, pepper and basil leaves
Drain pasta, reserving 3/4 cup water!
Add the pasta water to the tomato mixture and stir well
Return the pasta to the pot, add the tomato mixture and stir well
Toss in the Parmesan and serve immediately

You want nice sweet tomatoes for this dish.  My garden tomatoes are amazing (well worth the blood, sweat and tears it's taken to finally get some tomatoes out of my garden!).  This dish got RAVE reviews.  I'm hoping to make it again if I can harvest enough tomatoes....