Chicken & Mussels Fusili in Spicy Chilli Bean Sauce - Food Blogging Events Fever

Food blogging events. Wow! There are just sooo many of them nowadays...check them out here, you will find sooo many different topics you can choose to participate in. You name it, they got it. Hats off to those food blogging events creators. Despite all the fun, it is a hard work to host an event, unless you are having other people hosting for you, which I think is very clever. Pure genius! ^_^

Do I like food blogging events? To be honest, I LOVEEEEEEEEEEE them! Probably a little too much...that sometimes I kept thinking about what I could come up with before I fall asleep and as soon as I woke up (SC, no worries. You were also there in my thoughts - pranching around amongst all the ingredients in ballet tights hehe).

Why do I love participating in food blogging events so much?
- I am a natural born virtual party animal. I sniffed a party, I got all itchy to join :). I got to know many cool food bloggers from everywhere from these virtual parties!
- I'll never get out of ideas. The events are stimulus for me to build ideas around various themes. Plus, they gave me the necessary nudge to try new things. Without participating in food blogging events, I probably wouldn't have known what leek is ^_^
- I know participating in events boosts hit rate, linky links and stuff like that, but I'd rather not get too focused on that. It could spoil all the fun for me :)

One of my favorite food blogging event in which I try to participate regularly is Presto Pasta Nights, created by Ruth from Once Upon A Feast. This event motivates me to should create a new pasta/noodle dish, at least one day of the week ^_^...and here's my spicy pasta this week:

Chicken and Mussels Fusili in Spicy Chilli Bean Sauce

Recipe
(serves two)
- 5 handfuls of mini fusili pasta (they are smaller than your regular fusili)
- approx 8 medium sized mussels, deshelled, marinate in lime/lemon juice
- half lb of skinless, boneless chicken breast meat, whacked and cut into bite sized chunks
- 4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
- 2 cloves of shallot, thinly sliced
- a sprig of fresh corriander, chopped
- 3 tbsp of chilli bean sauce (dau ban jiang)
- olive oil, salt, pepper, sugar, corn starch

Marinate chicken pieces in a bit of lime/lemon juice, salt, pepper and 1 tsp corn starch. Start cooking pasta as instructed in the packet. Saute garlic, shallot, some of the fresh corriander, add chicken and mussels, add the chilli bean sauce, mix well, cook until the meat is almost done. Drain pasta, use some of the pasta water to thicken sauce, pour the pasta into the sauce mixture, mix well, add seasoning if necessary, garnish with freshly chopped corriander.

Now it is my turn to go pranching around in pink ballet tutu in SC's mind while SC's thinking about video games