Tortellini with Gorgonzola and Walnuts

The second item on our quick Italian dinner is tortellini in a creamy Gorgonzola and walnut sauce. Definately not on the weight watcher list, but if you drink a glass of red wine it cancels out the calories. At least that is what my Italian grandmother taught me. 

I don’t know why blue cheese and walnuts go together so well, but they do. A few years ago I wouldn’t have touched this dish with a ten foot pole. Mostly because of the walnuts, I hated walnuts for years.

Now I know why, the only walnuts I ever had growing up were the ones that were still in the shell in the nut dish on the sideboard. They sat there for years, and always tasted foully bitter and rotten. Many of them were rotten, I think the bowl only got filled up at Christmas and then spent the rest of the year gathering dust. Plus the darn things are so hard to crack. Brazil nuts were my favorite followed by hazelnuts, I only ate the darn walnuts when I was forced to. Oh well, I got over it, I now know that walnuts are not supposed to be black and powdery…

Ingredients:

1 Package of tortellini, 12-16 oz (Pesto, Cheese, Chicken whichever, it is up to you!)

1 Cup of half and half

4oz of Gorgonzola or other blue cheese 

½ Teaspoon of cornstarch mixed with a teaspoon of milk (if necessary)

3 Tablespoons of chopped walnuts

Method: 

Cook the tortellini according to the package directions. Meanwhile heat the cream or milk in a large skillet over medium low heat. Do not boil. Add half the cheese and stir until thickened, remove from heat as soon as it is thick. If it is not thickening to your liking add the cornstarch mixed with milk. Toss the tortellini into the pan and stir gently so as to coat the tortellini but not break any of them. Portion out into soup plates and sprinkle with the walnuts and the remaining blue cheese.