(OT Food) I nee a pasta sauce for tonight!

[Cedric]

No matter what else I plan to make with it, each and every special dinner* has to have my Spinach Salad...

* - For the purposes of this topic, special dinner is to be assumed to mean that:

1. In some way I have screwed up again and am trying to apologize, or

2. I am trying to win a girl over so the relationship can be taken to new and interesting places, which since I am married would eventually lead back to number 1, or

3. Recognized special occassion, (anniversary, b-day, etc).

Spinach Salad

Baby Spinach clipped of stems, washed and gently patted dry with a paper towel (you don't want it wet, but don't bruise it while drying it either)

3 boiled eggs, sliced with an egg slicer

4 pieces of bacon, fried crisp and torn by hand into smaller pieces

1 medium red onion (try to get a sweet one) cut into strips, not too long, not too short.

1 container, small mushrooms, sliced thin lengthwise

Poppy Seed Dressing

2 Chilled Salad bowls, moderately large (not just your typical soup or cereal bowl)

Add in spinach until the bowl is half full, liberally apply the poppy seed dressing. Then fill the bowls to almost the top with the onions and mushrooms. Cover with Saran Wrap and chill for an hour.

Before serving add the bacon which has been pressed between paper towels to 'degrease' and add the egg. Toss very lightly to mix some of the top ingredients, then add more poppy seed dressing to coat. Mix again lightly. Top off with dressing, serve.

Cedric

 

[LightPhoenix]

Man, this is a blast from the past!

I'm a simple guy, I'll be happy with just tomatos, herbs, and some good pepperoni in the sauce. I've actually found that carrots are pretty good in a sauce too, especially for vegetarian ones. And I'm not sure how it would be, but I've always wanted to try puting okra and andouille sausage into a sauce with a bit of chili powder.

As for quantities, I pretty much stopped measuring exacts after a while. However much you like is best.

And an aside for all of you with tomatos (which would include me, we have about a dozen sauce tomatos and a dozen regulars), a great thing to make with them is a fresh salsa. Just peel and dice the tomatos, add in some onions, some hot peppers, and whatever else you might like. It's sooooo much better than store bought stuff.

 

[Pielorinho]

I am so freakin envious of your tomato garden.

Recently, I made tomato soup from scratch, and it was the best soup I've ever eaten. The recipe was something like this:

-Saute a handful of green onions in a couple tablespoons of butter.
-Very roughly chop up 5 lbs of tomatoes (I think I cut each one into 8 pieces).
-Add the tomatoes and 1 cup water to the onions. Season with salt and a little pepper.
-Simmer for three hours, stirring occasionally.
-Put the end result through a food mill. A food processor or blender will probably work almost as well.

The end result was beautifully fresh, tomatoey, and delicious. I stirred some cream into one bowl of it, to see how it affected the flavor; honestly, however, I preferred it straight.

(The recipe was from a very good cookbook, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. I found a similar-looking recipe here).

Enjoy!
Daniel

 

[Voadam]

I'm making dinner for seri tonight as kind of a belated 6 month aniversery present.

I just spent a bunch of time goofing off in class searching the net for a recipe I liked with no luck, so I thought I'd ask you guys

Does anyone have a simple but good pasta sauce? Something that will take an hour or less to make?

Pasta Carbonera

1/2 lb pasta
2 large eggs
1/2 pound bacon

Chop and cook bacon (usually 11 minutes on medium heat)

Cook pasta. (usually 10 minutes)

Beat eggs.

Pour out water from pasta, leave pasta in pot.

Pour on eggs and mix, adding in salt and pepper. The eggs will cook from the hot pasta.

Pour on cooked chopped bacon and bacon grease, mix.

Serve.

Total cooking time, about a half hour including preparation.

Optional extra:
Adding cooked frozen peas (not in the pod) is a great little extra. just microwave and then mix in.

 

[Larcen]

Whatever your sauce is, if you have the time, try slow cooking it in a crock pot all day long. My wife makes it this way and it comes out thick, rich and dark with that wonderul over-cooked taste. It's awesome. And it's even better the next day.

To this day, I still blame her for the 60 pounds I've gained since I met her.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

My suggestion is go toEpicurious.com, they have tons of great recipes from Gourmet and Bon Apetit magazines. All top notch, as oppose to the "Collected recipes" websites which can be very hit and miss.

It's highly searchable, and I've gotten at least one awesome Lasagna recipe that includes a good pasta sauce recipe.

 

[Maerdwyn]

Pasta Carbonera

Optional extra:
Adding cooked frozen peas (not in the pod) is a great little extra. just microwave and then mix in.

I definitely reccomend the peas. Also, a goodly amount of coarsely ground black pepper is wonderful

 

[Pielorinho]

Epicurious is wonderful! They were the first place I went to look for a tomato soup recipe, and they had several -- but all of them were complicated, and the recipe I liked so much was notable for its simplicity.

Daniel

 

[LightPhoenix]

One of my roommates swore by Epicurious.

 

[kenjib]

And an aside for all of you with tomatos (which would include me, we have about a dozen sauce tomatos and a dozen regulars), a great thing to make with them is a fresh salsa. Just peel and dice the tomatos, add in some onions, some hot peppers, and whatever else you might like. It's sooooo much better than store bought stuff.

Cilantro, garlic, salt/pepper, and a bit of lime juice are good additions. Also, you don't really need to peel the tomatos, but you do need to clean out all the seeds and excess fluid. If you like it smooth you can run it through a cuisinart/blender.

About tomato recipes, you might also want to make some bruchetta. It's good stuff that you can eat all the time.