Pasta Primavera

Primavera means springtime, and the fresh ingredients in "Pasta Primavera" (page 206) really shine, allowing this dish to live up to its name.  Colorful bell peppers, delicate shades of green from zucchini and asparagus, green onions and parsley, all tossed together with rainbow rotini, and this dish ends up being as nice to look at as it is to eat.  I used only half the amount of pasta called for (8 oz instead of 16).  It's been my experience, or perhaps just a personal preference, that the amount of grains and pasta called for in most of these recipes can be reduced by half, yielding a more balanced proportion of ingredients. There really is no sauce to speak of in the recipe as written; rather it seems to rely on the two tablespoons of olive oil to bind everything together.  In order to keep it McDougall, ala oil-free, I prepared a cup of light vegetable broth, using some of it to sauté the veggies, and a little more to moisten the dish once everything was combined.  Perfect results!  The next day we ate the leftovers straight out of the refrigerator like a cold pasta salad, which worked equally as well.