I was struggling to come up with a title for this recipe, and so I ask for your forgiveness. It's quite... un-inspired. But really, what else can I say about this dish? There are tomatoes. There is some beef. And some other spices. And voila! A beefy, tomato-y sauce. It's adapted from this recipe from Real Simple. I leave out the fresh mozzarella because I found it didn't really need it, and I don't always have it around. Also it doesn't really add any flavour. Parmesan is much more flavourful and not so bad with the sodium if you don't dump it on. Just use a little. Like, less than a tablespoon's worth. There's enough flavour here already that you don't really need any at all. But you can add some if you really feel it's necessary. You won't die without it, I promise.
I also add some canned/jarred pasta sauce to this recipe, because otherwise it isn't really saucy enough for me. And so, this recipe is a wonderful mix of home-made and pre-made. I hate to take things out of cans or jars, heat them up, and just eat them as is. This might be because we didn't really do this at my house growing up. I was fortunate enough to have a mom that valued eating fresh food, and so hardly anything came out of a can--even our holiday cranberry sauce was made on the stove, a simple mixture of sugar, water and fresh cranberries boiled down into a mush. This is probably why I prefer to add things to pre-made sauces and make it my own. Or you could see it as using these convenience items as helpful aides in the kitchen, since I don't have time to be simmering a pot of home-made sauce for hours. ANYWAYS.
I really love this recipe. I've been meaning to write a post about it for quite some time. I've made it at least four times in this past month alone, and every time, I think "Crap! Should've taken a picture for the blog," including this time. Apologies for that, too.
It's really quite simple to put together. The ingredients are staple items which you would usually have lying around, looking uninteresting and lonely in their natural state. However. Don't be fooled by all this normalcy. Because inside each of these ordinary, boring ingredients is the potential for something delicious. Beef. Onions. Garlic. Tomatoes. You can make these ingredients sing. They'll mingle and make love in a hot pan, and conceive delicious flavours for you to enjoy.
Alright, enough of that business. Let's get down to it.
Ingredients
olive oil
1/2 of a white onion
3 cloves of garlic
1 lb ground beef
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 large beefsteak tomato
1/2 a can of plain pasta sauce
3 basil leaves
A pinch of Italian Seasoning (I only cheat a TINY bit here because I don't have any other nice fresh herbs and spices. This does the trick.)
Salt and pepper
Method
Do my fancy water-boiling trick (which isn't really all that fancy. It's more time-saving than fancy) and put some pasta on the boil. Since this sauce is quite chunky, I like to use pasta that is in shapes instead of long strings. Shapes like rotini or penne are great for holding lots of thick, chunky sauce. I've preferred using whole-wheat pasta lately since it's extra filling (and you won't be eating a whole bowl of simple carbohydrates, which basically turn into sugar in your digestive system), BUT HEY. It's your thing. Do what you wanna do.
Meanwhile, heat some olive oil over medium-ish heat in a large skillet. Turn it down if you need to. I always do, since my garlic tends to burn in a matter of minutes on medium. I go for medium-low. Chop some garlic and throw it in. Let it simmer while you chop your onions. Throw them in the pan too. Add some salt and pepper and let the onions simmer for a few minutes until they get soft. Add the ground beef and brown. Drain any extra fat in the pan. Add the tomato paste and stir it around so it gets on most of the beef. The pan might seem a little dry right now, but that's alright.
Let it all simmer while you chop your tomato, then throw it in and mix everything up. Your tomato should add enough liquid that all these ingredients can mingle sufficiently. If it doesn't, add a little water to the pan. But not too much. Add your basil and/or Italian spice mix. Stir occasionally. Let it simmer for a few minutes, until the tomatoes look soft, and then add the pasta sauce. Turn the heat right down at this point, almost to the lowest setting. You want the sauce to heat up and obtain the flavour you just coaxed out of all the lovely ingredients in the pan. You don't want the sauce to boil and bubble and leave streaks of sauce on your walls that you'll still be finding weeks later. Heat slowly. Let it simmer for at least five minutes. My pasta had to sit in the pot all drained and dry, waiting to get sauced. It's worth it if you have the time. If you don't, it isn't the end of the world.
Taste the sauce. If you like the way it tastes, throw in the pasta and mix it around and call it a day. If it's not done yet, let it be, or adjust your seasonings if you like. This recipe makes enough sauce for approximately 2-1/2 cups of prepared pasta, which will feed two people twice. Or four people, once. It makes a bunch, how about that. Bonus of cooking in large amounts: it's even better the next day.
Note: Feel free to experiment with the amount of tomatoes you add, and even the type. Last time I did this recipe I used some grape tomatoes I had in the fridge that weren't getting eaten and were about to go soft.
And there you have it. An easy yet delicious and filling meal that comes together in under 20 minutes.
Hooray for minimal effort in the kitchen!
No comments:
Post a Comment