As a culinary instructor, I always give careful thought to the recipes I select for my students. What is their skill level? Will they think the recipes are too simple? Too difficult? Either way, it makes it for a less than ideal classroom situation. If the recipes are too simple, they might feel patronized or that they have wasted the class fee. Yet if they are too complex, they might never replicate the meals at home. And as a culinary instructor, my number one goal is that I’ve instilled in them some culinary confidence that they go home and replicate the dishes we’ve prepared in class for their loved ones. One of the dishes I try to incorporate whenever possible is a simple tomato sauce. If you’re reading this and are Italian you’re probably thinking, “Tomato sauce? Who doesn’t know how to make that?!” Well, it turns out, that many people don’t! Sometimes we take our skills and abilities for granted and assume others can prepare the same things we can. We don’t give ourselves enough credit, but the reality is that everyone’s upbringing is different and the gifts we all bring to the world vary greatly. Just like I can’t be trusted in making Chinese fried rice, (despite my many failed attempts, including one in which I grabbed a large bottle of vanilla extract instead of soy sauce, I’ve all but given up future attempts!); some folks need guidance in making a tomato sauce. Because tomato sauce has so few ingredients, it’s of utmost importance to make sure you’re using the best quality ones you can find. Whenever possible, imported is best. For tonight’s recipe, I used Migliaresi’s Passata Di Pomodoro. I was very excited to see that this bottle of precious tomatoes was bottled in Soverato, Italy, just a half hour away from my home in Italy! How delighted was I?! For me, there’s something about using bottled sauce that makes it feel extravagant. It brings me back to my days in Italy, particularly knowing it was bottled so close to my home! And while many people in Southern Italy make their own sauce using fresh tomatoes, bottling and conserving it for winter, my family was not one of them. For various reasons, we just never made it from scratch so my mom would always buy bottled growing up. So this was nostalgic tonight! For tonight’s dish, I decided to fancy it up just a bit since I was using imported ingredients and I made three-cheese farfalle. Don’t let the number of steps below scare you, this is really easy to do and while I made it on a weeknight, this is fancy enough for Sunday lunch! I ended up having about a cup of cooked sauce left over, all the better to cook up some eggs in purgatory for tomorrow’s lunch! (More on that in the near future!) ;-) Ingredients for the sauce: 3 Tablespoons olive oil (I used Migliaresi EVOO) ½ small onion, diced 2 cloves of garlic, thinly diced 2 Tablespoon chopped parsley 3 – 5 basil leaves, chopped or left whole to remove Salt to taste – about 1 teaspoon 1 bottle tomato sauce, I used Migliaresi Passata di Pomodoro 1 cup of water Ingredients for the ricotta mixture 2 cups whole milk ricotta ¾ cups freshly grated parmiggiano cheese 3 – 4 slices provolone cheese, cut into small squares 1 teaspoon salt 1 tablespoon finely chopped parsley 2 eggs, slightly beaten ½ pound of dry pasta, I used farfalle (increase this to one pound for 4 – 6 servings) Directions
*Refrigerate leftover sauce for up to 4 days. (This is why we used a clean spoon when spooning the sauce, we’ve kept it clean from any ricotta mixture!) You can buy the tomatoes and oil I used at: https://www.pastaandvino.com
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Hi there, thanks for visiting my blog! Here you will find recipes, short stories, tales, rants and whatever else is on my mind with regards to food, Italy, travel and along those lines. Drop me a line, I'd love to hear from you! Archives
December 2020
|
MORE FROM US |
|