Basic Marinara

I feel like I owe a recipe, because it’s been a while since the last time I was able to get on here.  I really want to go to bed (it’s been a long day), but I promised some friends I’d get a basic marinara up soon, so here it is.  I made a dish with this tonight, but I don’t have enough time for that one.  Hopefully soon I’ll post what I’ve been up to the last few days.

This sauce is great to make in bulk and to freeze in separate containers for later use.  It’s tasty on spaghetti noodles with a little parmesan cheese, or use it as a dipping sauce.  Use meat if you like, or throw in bell peppers, more onion, carrots and zucchini (and mushrooms if you like them – I’m not a fan of them myself) for a chunky primavera.  Let it simmer on the stove all day to reduce some of the water content and make your house smell good.  It’s quite versatile.

The measurements for this are perfect for one dish.  Double, triple or quadruple to keep it on hand (frozen) for use later on.  Sorry there are no pictures on this one, but I needed to whip it up for the other dish (stuffed zucchini – I promise I’ll get that up soon!), and I’ve only got the pictures of that.  This is pretty simple though, and it uses basic measurements, and techniques we’ve already covered in other recipes.

Ingredients

• 28 oz can tomatoes (we like the Hunt’s Garlic, Basil and Oregano).  You can also use the smaller cans for other flavors depending on what you are making, but this is perfect for a basic marinara.
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1/4 small red onion
• 1/2 tsp Crushed Red Pepper (optional)
• 1 1/2 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 Bay leaf
• 1 tsp (dried) Oregano
• 1/2 Tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
• 1/2 Tbsp white sugar
• 3/4 tsp Salt
• 1 tsp (dried) Sweet Basil

Tools

• Stick blender
• Cutting board
• Knife
• Saucepan
• Cooking Spoon
• Measuring spoons

What To Do

1. Blend tomatoes in can until they are at your desired consistency.  (Refer to step 2 in the Farfalle with Arrabbiata recipe), and set aside.
2. Peel paper from garlic cloves and mince (refer to step 3-4 in the Capellini Pomodoro recipe) and put in saucepan.
3. Dice onion (just like steps 6 and 7 for the Arrabbiata) and put in saucepan.
4. Add crushed red pepper (optional).
5. Pour on olive oil, and apply medium heat.
6. Score Bay leaf by pressing your thumb nail lightly into it and creating small cracks.  Add to saute mix.
7. Oil should be sizzling by now – stir the ingredients and add the oregano.
8. When onions start to get clear, pour in  tomato puree.
9. Simmer and add balsamic vinegar, sugar, and salt (more or less to taste).  Cook for about 10 minutes to heat thoroughly (you can simmer longer if you like, but make sure you reduce the heat to low and check the liquid every 20 minutes or so as to not cause burning), stirring regularly.
10. Add the basil about 5 minutes before you remove from the heat to serve.
11. Remove bay leaf before serving.

All done!  Enjoy!

Eminoodle’s Pasta Salad

I normally won’t write about my coworkers here (unless I happen to mention one of my best friends who works with me AND lives next door, but she’s a special circumstance), but I want to give a little background on this pasta dish.  One of my coworkers is thinking of changing some lifestyle habits, and I had the pleasure of having lunch with her yesterday and talking about it.  Today we had a surprise pot luck at work for her, because she is going away for a little while.  I’m fairly new to the team where we work together, but I love this lady.  She is so sweet, and accepting, and she’s smart and funny and just a great person.  She’s a little younger than my mom would have been (my mom passed away 8 1/2 years ago), but I think they would have been great friends if they had met.  i don’t know if you’ve ever met someone who you just know adds something to your life, but this coworker of mine does this for me.  She is a very special lady.

So, she is new to eating more vegetables, and I wanted to show her how good they can be if done right.  I had another coworker (who ate with us) ask for the recipe, and being as this has been becoming one of my signature dishes at work, I’d like to share it (next time I’ll make something else for the pot luck!).  She also gave me this nickname, and since I’m struggling to come up with a name for this dish, I thought this was fitting.

My apologies for lack of pictures on this one.  However, a lot of the steps that we’ll go through we did on previous recipes, so I’ll link back to those for visual aids.

Eminoodle’s Pasta Salad

Prep time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 box rotini.  Barilla makes this excellent line of pastas now that have veggies in the mix.  For this one I really like the green rotini.  It’s made from spinach and zucchini puree, so it adds even more veggie goodness.
• 1/2 small red onion (1/4 if a large onion)
• 3 roma tomatoes (2 if you use on-the-vine)
• 1 can quartered artichoke hearts
• 1 cup green salad olives
• 1 package sweet basil
• 1 block of mozzarella
• 1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 2 Tbsp red wine vinegar
• 4 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 Tbsp salt
• 1 tsp garlic powder

Tools

• Cutting board
• Knife
• Stock pot
• Colander
• Large bowl for serving
• Cooking spoon

What To Do

1. Fill stock pot with water and heat at medium high to boil.
2. Clean tomatoes and basil.  You can use the 3 parts water, 1 part vinegar mix to clean the tomatoes and basil.  Rinse well and dry the tomatoes and blot the basil to dry.  Set aside.
3. Your water is probably boiling by now, if so, add your pasta.  If not, revisit this step when the water is boiling.
4. Dice onion, but cutting into small slices and then doing a radial cut (like we did in this recipe.)  Place in large bowl.
5. Don’t forget to stir the pasta.
6. Cut tomatoes in half, remove vine belly button, and remove the seeds from the tomatoes (like we did in steps 6 and 7 of this recipe.)
7. Dice the tomatoes and place in the large bowl.
8. Stir the pasta.
9. Open the can of artichoke hearts, and drain the water.  Cut into thirds (leaves, and then half the base).  Discard any leaves that seem too tough.  Put cut up artichoke hearts in the bowl.
10. Stir the pasta.
11. Add olives to the mix in the large bowl.
12. Also referring to the capellini pomodoro recipe, remove the basil from the stems, and do that fancy chiffonade cut (steps 9 and 10).  Add to the bowl.
13. The pasta is most likely done now.  Test to make sure it’s cooked thoroughly, and drain in colander.
14. Cut mozzarella chunk into 1/4″ cubes.  I recommend cutting into approximately 1/4″ slices, then cutting the slices in stacks of 3 – cut in half lengthwise, and then in quarters.  Add to bowl.
15. Test the pasta to see if it has cooled down.  If not, you can rinse it with cold water until it is cool.  Once the pasta is cooled, place in the bowl.
16. Drizzle on olive oil, balsamic vinegar and red wine vinegars.
17. Sprinkle on salt, and garlic power.
18. Mix thoroughly until oil/vinegars are spread throughout the dish and everything is coated.

Serve immediately or refrigerate overnight and serve the next day.  This is a versatile dish that can be used as a main course (Carl and I will eat this sometimes for a meal), or share as a side dish.

Sadly I have no pictures of this one, but I’ve made other varieties, using cherry tomatoes instead of diced tomatoes (I prefer the diced/deseeded tomatoes, because I will eat those – I don’t eat cherry tomatoes because of the goopy inside, as you know if you read the full entry for cappelini pomodoro), kalamata olives (with no pits) in place of artichoke hearts, and tri-color rotini.  Here’s a picture of that one.

The recipe in this blog entry is my preferred way to make this dish, but pasta salad is great because you can add whatever veggies you want for different flavor combinations.