Pasta with Veggies & Sausage
Serves 4-6

Ingredients

• Pasta of your choice
• 2 cups Italian sausages – cut into large chunks
• 2 carrots – cut into small pieces
• 1 onion, large – diced
• 3 shallots – diced
• 1 bulb of garlic – peeled, minced (we love garlic so adjust amount to own preference)
• Italian herb mix or any other combination of spices of your choice as seasoning
• pepper flakes for some heat if you like it spicy

1. Boil water to cook pasta. Once you’ve added the pasta to the water, heat up a big pot with about 1/2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil. Add sausage and cook for about 2 minutes. Remove from pot and drain of excess oil, leaving about 1 tbsp.
2. In medium-high heat, add the garlic and shallots. Cook for 2-3 minutes. When it start to turn brown (caramelize), add in the onion and carrots with about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of water or stock. Scrape up any brown bits on the pot. Cook the veggies for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally and adding water if pot is too dry. Add in the sausages, spices and pepper flakes. Cook for another 3-5 minutes or until carrots are soft and sausages are heated. Remove from heat.
3. The pasta should have finished cooking so drain it, reserve about 1/2 cup of the liquid. Add the drained pasta to the sausage and veggie mixture. Toss it up with a dash of fresh pepper (optional) and it’s ready for plating. If it’s too dry, add a bit of the reserved pasta water to give it some moisture.

Note: This is the first time I’ve made pasta without sauce so let me know what you think if you try it. The twins said it was good but I don’t really trust them (they might only say that because they don’t want me to stop cooking!). Oh if you notice, I didn’t add any salt in the mixture because I find that the sausage is already salty enough for my preference.

My solution to a quick meal is one pot dinners. Well ok, that’s not exactly true. It’s actually two if you count the rice cooker as a pot. On Monday night I made a chicken and sausage stew with tomatoes served with rice. I found a recipe on Rachael Ray’s website and modified it. It turned out pretty well and I’ve made enough to last for next day’s meal also.

Yesterday was pasta night. I didn’t want to make tomato sauce because we already had the it for the stew for two nights. So it was pretty much a basic toss pasta with veggies and sausages. Just throw everything in a huge pot and toss. Again it turned out better than I thought considering the fact that I didn’t have a recipe to work with.

Wild sockeye salmon were on sale this week (2 for 1!) so we got two fillets which I’m planning on pan searing tonight. It should be enough for tomorrow’s dinner as well unless the twins decided to eat it for midnight snacks. Will update on how it turned out later.

This tomato meat sauce is really easy to make. So easy that I don’t even have a recipe written down for it (I think I threw away my notes from cooking class already). There is minimal chopping and all you really need to know is how to use a can opener.

Basic Tomato Meat Sauce (makes about 3 – 3.5 cups)

1/2 lb lean ground beef/turkey/chicken (whatever you feel like having)
1 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1-2 tbsp oil
1 can (28 oz.) whole tomato (cut them up in the can with a pair of scissors)
1-2 cans (6oz.) tomato paste (use 2 cans to thicken sauce faster or if you like a thicker consistency)
1-2 tbsp dried oregano
1 large bay leaf
salt
pepper
sugar

1) Heat a heavy sauce pan or a pot. Use a little bit of oil to coat the bottom and add in the ground beef. Cook the beef throughly, about 5-7 minutes. Remove from the pan and set aside. Use a piece of paper towel to wipe the pan if it is too greasy.

2) In the same pan over medium-high heat, add garlic and stir for about a minute. Add in the diced onion and cook until they start to get brown and translucent. Pour in the can of tomatoes, breaking it up with a wooden spoon or giving it a few more cut with the scissors. Add in the tomato paste, bay leaf and oregano (to bring out more flavor, crush the oregano in your hands before sprinkling them in the sauce). Mix well. Once the sauce begins to bubble, reduce heat to medium-low and let it simmer thicken to desired consistency. This usually takes about 1-2 hours.

3) When the sauce is almost done, add in salt, pepper and sugar to taste. The sugar will make the sauce less sour so be sure to add it a couple of tbsp at a time and continue tasting until the right sweetness/sourness is achieved. I think I used about 5 tbsp. Add in the cooked beef and let it simmer for another 15-20 mins.

Tips:

1) Use a big sauce pan. When the sauce bubbles, it might splatter all over the stove and on yourself if your pan is too shallow. Using a lid is also a good way to avoid the splatters.

2) Instead of using ground beef, try Italian sausages. Adding some crushed pepper flakes will spice it up nicely.

3) I like to add mushrooms to the sauce sometimes but beware that it might make the sauce a bit more runny as it releases water while it cooks.

4) I actually add more than 1 tbsp of oregano. I just follow my nose and add until I can smell the spice.

In preparation for Valentine’s Day dinner (we decided to eat at home this year), I’m trying to make a yummy lasagna for Al. My brother loves lasagna but my mom never makes it at home. The only time we get it is when we have dinner at my Aunt Kit’s place because it’s always part of the Christmas menu. Last year, however, we didn’t go to her place for Christmas dinner so Dave was starved of his favourite pasta dish.

Anyways, I didn’t expect to get the barista job so quickly so instead of having all day today to make the sauce, I had to go in for training. Thank god lasagna is a lovely make ahead dish, so I did all the work for it on Saturday night. The basic idea of making lasagna is pretty simple, here’s the “formula”:

(layer of sauce, noodle, cheese) x 3 + 40-50 minutes baking time = lasagna

Easy right?! I had learned how to make an easy tomato beef sauce before so I made that first. While the sauce is cooking, I grated this block of mozzarella cheese. I had a hard time grating it because it was too soft so I ended up slicing it. Once the sauce is done, I cooked the noodles and then it’s off to the easy assemble part. Aside from using mozzarella cheese, I also added spoonfuls of ricotta cheese in between for more flavor. After it’s all done, I sprinkle the grated cheese on top (I placed the sliced cheese in the layers) and wrapped it up with plastic wrap and foil before sticking it in the fridge. All this took about 2 hours.

Today after I came home from standing 7 hours at the mall, I heat up the over, popped the dish (plastic wrap removed!) into the oven for 40 mins. Then I took out the foil and boiled the lasagna for 3 mins to melt the cheese on top. It turned out quite nicely except that since I used sliced cheese, there are “holes” where there were no cheese in between the layers. If I’ve added more cheese it would’ve tasted better. The sauce was really good and it’s just the right amount. I don’t like too much sauce (it looks like soup…) with my pastas.

Recipe will follow in up coming posts! For now enjoy the photos.