Apparently this is the Cook-For-Self-And-Eat-Alone-Week at home, starring yours truly.
So instead of sitting and moping around the whole weekend all by myself like a lazy bug on the couch, I’ve lined up a zillion activities to do, most important of them being a spa appointment and planning to make an entire Lasagne for myself :) And when one has such important activities to do in a jam-packed weekend, one has to plan in advance. And that planning started tonight.
All through the drive back home from office, I kept on thinking on what I’d like to have for dinner (oh yes, food is on my mind ALL.THE.TIME! Either am thinking about what to cook, or how a particular dish tasted or generally craving for food. Basically, I think I only think about food! :))
Something that I really love to eat which the husband doesn’t greatly love. Something savoury , coz after having polished off an entire loaf of Banana bread this week I was in no mood for any more dessert. And Providence gave me the answer – Pasta, of course! :-D
But tonight, I wanted to make something I haven’t made before, something new. I scrounged through the Must Try page of my Recipe notebook in OneNote (a very clever product placement, right? :)), and found some pasta recipes that I had wanted to try. And when you have great plans like this, and zero patience to stop at the farmer’s market en route home and your fridge tells you in not so many words to STFU about making anything fancy and stick to something basic because it can provide only for that, and you gotta listen to it, which is what I did, obediently.
What I could salvage from the fridge could provide for a tomato based pasta. So I decided to go ahead with it, but with a slight twist. Something creamy, and yet tomato-ey. And with lots of herbs. And something that will be done in 10 mins flat.
The recipe is a very basic creamy tomato sauce recipe, and I did nothing new except of course alter the amount of ingredients to suit my taste. Which means, more garlic and oregano and aaaah basil!
Ingredients
Fusilli – 1 cup
Tomato paste – 1 cup (I just put the tomatoes in a mixer to get the paste)
Thick cream – 1/4 cup
Olive oil – 1 tbsp.
Mozzarella cheese – For garnish
Garlic cloves – 4-6, chopped very small or crushed in a mortar-pestle
Oregano, Red chilli flakes, Basil, Black pepper, Sea salt – All per taste
Instructions
Boil a pot of water, and add salt to this once the water starts boiling. Now add the fusilli to this and let this boil for 8-10 minutes.
Meanwhile, in a pan, heat the oil and sauté the garlic. Add some oregano, chilli flakes, pepper and basil to garlic and let this mixture become roasted in the oil.
Now add the tomato paste to the oil, and let it boil. Once the paste starts boiling, add the cream and boil more till the paste thickens. You can add the herbs and spices again now if you wish, for some enhanced taste.
Season this sauce with some salt and add the boiled pasta to this sauce. Toss this well till the pasta is coated with the sauce.
You can garnish this pasta with any of the following - fresh basil leaves, parsley, cheese, pepper.
Serve hot.
And when I was making this pasta, I also made a big bowl of red sauce, hoping it will ease my first time lasagne efforts. Lots of onions and garlic, the tomato paste and all the herbs I could lay my hands on yielded me this sauce, and I cannot wait till I try it out.
The entire house is now smelling of fresh tomatoes and basil, I just licked off the remaining sauce from the plate, Kolaveri is playing in the background on the laptop as I am typing this, and I have enough books that will take another 20 years for me to read.
Life is good! :-)
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