Green Tea and Smoked Salmon Pasta Salad

More About This Recipe

• I can't get enough Green Tea lately, and when I get obsessed with something, I need to try and figure out how to cook with it.  
  
  One of my favorite ways to cook with liquids is to boil or braise something in them!  I have cooked pasta in coffee in the past, so I thought it would work nicely with Green Tea.
  
  I looked around online to find some suggested Green Tea pairings, and saw that it goes well with smoked salmon, poppy seeds, and obviously lemon.  The pasta salad was born!  The flavors in here are all very subtle, but I didn't want to cover up the green tea.  It came out really good and would be perfect eaten outside on a plate next to some grilled meats and veggies!
  
  The detailed Green Tea and Smoked Salmon Pasta Salad recipe can be seen here, but there are some photos of the process below.
  
  Lemon and Ginger for the dressing
  
  That is a lot of teabags.  Make sure you use the powder that builds up as well.  Matcha green tea is the best type of tea to use.  That isn't a brand, but actually a type of tea.
  
  Teabags into the boiling water before the pasta.
  
  Teabags out, Pasta in.
  
  A little of the pasta cooking water goes into the ginger-lemon dressing.
  
  Smoked Salmon
  
  Do the noodles look green to you?  The color is very subtle, as is the flavor.
  
  Very tasty!
  
  Dan Whalen is a blogger at The Food in my Beard; check Dan's Tablespoon profile often to try his recipes with creative international spins!