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May 26, 2005
What did you have for dinner last night?
Spaghetti arrabiata with hot Italian sausage, red peppers, onions, tomato and organic thyme, oregano and torn basil, topped with grated Parmesan cheese.
A lot of people are intimidated with making pasta dishes like this because they haven't learned how to make a simple pan sauce. It's important to know how to do this, it's so much simpler than making tomato sauce.
Once you've sauteéd your meat and veg, deglaze with a 1/4 C or so of white wine (I keep a bottle of leftover wine in the fridge specifically for this), and gently stir to incorporate the browned bits in the pan. Note I said browned, not blackened, if you've scorched anything get the nasty bits out before you start your sauce.
Once you've done this, add a 1/2 C of stock and 2 chopped Roma tomatoes, whatever fresh herbs you want to use and simmer a few minutes. Taste for seasoning and add crushed red peppers, salt and pepper accordingly. Add your cooked 1/2 pound of pasta, give it a few minutes to come together and plate it up with some grated Parmesan.
A quick time-saver I want to make sure you know about. If you're cooking pasta for 2, cook the whole pound and save 1/2 of it, lightly oiled in a 1 quart zip-lock bag for later in the week. It will hold for days like this and it makes for a quick second meal, which is what I did here. Actually, I made this whole meal from leftovers, we had the sausage, peppers and onions earlier in the week so this whole dish took less than 10 minutes. Gotta love that...
So, what did you have for dinner last night?
Posted by The Pragmatic Chef at May 26, 2005 8:12 AM
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Pasta
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Recipes/Techniques
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What did you have for dinner last night?