Pink Bell Peppers Sauce Pasta - Salsa Rosa di Peperoni

This sauce may do with any short type of pasta: fusilli, penne, tortiglioni, maccheroni.... I served "pipe" with the delicious sauce prepared with red bell pepper, tomato and cream.
One of the anvantages of this sauce that it adds some more vegetables to your diet even if you don't notice it....  




INGREDIENTS:
Servings: 2

160g short pasta
1 big red bell pepper
100ml tomato puree
100g thick cream
1pinch of sugar
salt
chilli
EVO oil


 
1. Roast red bell pepper in the oven, HERE you will find how to prepare it.


2. Bring water to boiling, salt it and cook pasta till "al dente". 

3. Meanwhile, blend peeled bell pepper into puree.

4. Pour some oil into a pan and add both bell pepper and tomato puree and 50ml of water, chilli to your taste, pinch of sugar and salt.
5. Cook the sauce over low heat for 5 minutes to reduce it a bit.

6. Add thick cream to the sauce and cook in for 5 more minutes over low heat till it gets thicker.

7. Drain pasta and add it to the sauce.



Serve the dish with some parsley chopped finely and added before serving.    

  

ENJOY !!! Buon Appetito!!! 

Tuna, Salmon and Green Peas

I had some fish fillet leftovers from sushi cooking so this dish came out really handy using these small pieces of salmon and tuna. 
You may serve it as  main dish or as a condiment for short types of pasta. 


 

INGREDIENTS:
Servings: 2

~100g tuna fillet
~100g salmon fillet
~100g shrimps
200g green peas
1/2 medium onion
2 garlic cloves 
salt
EVO oil

   
1. Chop onion into pieces.
2. Lay a large knife blade flat over the garlic cloves and strongly press it with the palm of the other hand.
Note: You don't need to peel garlic to do so.
Note: This way garlic will release it's flavour slowly and it won't prevail over the other flavours.
3. Cut salmon and tuna into 1-1.5cm cubes.
 
4. Heat 3-4 tbs of Olive oil in a frying pan and add garlic cloves and chopped onion.
5. Cook over the medium heat till onion gets transparent.


 6. Add tuna and salmon and stir carefully, keep cooking over the medium heat till the fish gets lighter in colour.

7. Add green peas and cook for 5 minutes, still over the medium heat.

8. At the end add shrimps and salt the dish to your taste.
Note: Shrimps are very fast to cook so don't cook too much, couple of minutes will be enough. 

9. You may sprinkle the dish with some pepper or chilli if you like it, but I left it's natural flavour to delight my palate...
     

 

ENJOY !!!

Linguine alle Cozze - Mussels Linguine

 You may cook this dish with just mussels or you may mix mussels with clams...
You may also remove all the mussels out of their shells or keep some mussels WITH the shells, the dish presentation will be much more dramatic!!! 
You may even avoid using the cherry tomatoes.... 
The result will still be very rewarding !!! 
 


INGREDIENTS:
Servings: 2

~700-800g mussels
160g linguine 
cherry tomatoes
2 garlic cloves
chilli 
parsley 
salt
EVO oil




1. Put pasta (linguine) into salted boiling water and cook them till almost ready: if the package instructions indicate 11 minutes of cooking, then cook for about 8 minutes and drain.

2. While the pasta is cooking, pour 2-3 tbs of EVO oil into a large pan and add garlic cloves cut into halves and some chilli.
3. Add washed and cleaned mussels to the pan, splash with some white wine and cover with a lid. Cook over high heat till the mussels are open.

Note: If you buy uncleaned mussels, you need to clean their shells from the seaweeds and tear the "beard" of the mussel away: hold the mussel firmly and tear he beard away with a sharp yank towards the hinge end.
Discard any mussel that is broken or opened.  
Cleaned mussels are to be cooked immediately.

   
4. When the mussels are open drain their water into a bowl and keep it.



5. Remove half of the mussels out of their shells and keep aside.

6. When the pasta is halfly ready drain it and keep some of it's water.
7. In the same pan you used to open the mussels, pour the mussels water back and add drained pasta, cook over medium heat for 2-3 minutes.

Note: If the sauce gets too dry, add some water from the pasta cooking.

8. Wash and cut cherry tomatoes into halves and add them to pasta.
Note: Don't cook cherry tomatoes too much as their skin will become harder and the pulp will secede from the skin and it's not nice....

9. Add the unshelled mussels to pasta and stir. 
10. At the end add the mussels with their shells to pasta to heat them up a bit. 
Serve with some finely chopped parsley and a glass of chilled white wine.... cheers!!!        

Buon Appetito!!! 

Cherry Tomatoes and Buffalo Mozzarella Pasta

Very fast and very Italian dish with the colours of the national flag... This dish can be served warm as a Main dish or cold as a Salad. 
An the use of the fresh basil will add a Mediterranean touch to dish.

 


INGREDIENTS: 
Servings: 2


160g farfalle pasta
100g cherry tomatoes
100g buffalo mozzarella 
fresh basil
salt
EVO oil


1. Bring water to boiling, salt it and cook pasta for the time indicated on the package.
Note: It's nice to use Farfalle pasta for this dish but you may also choose from Fusilli, Penne, Rigatoni or other short types of pasta. 
2. While pasta is cooking, wash cherry tomatoes and cut them into halves.
3. Drain mozzarella from it's whey and cut the cheese into cubes with 1.5cm side.

4. Drain pasta and transfer it to a big bowl.
5. Pour 3-4tbs of EVO oil over the pasta and stir.

6. Add mozzarella and tomatoes to pasta.
7. Chop some fresh basil and season the dish.
Note: You may use the home-made frozen basil, check it out how to freeze the herbs HERE.   
 

Buon Appetito!!!

 

RAGU alla Bolognese - Italian Meat and Tomato Sauce

One of the most famous Italian sauces is RAGU. It's also known as Ragu alla Bolognese or sometimes even just Bolognese (abroad and not in Italy).
In Italy every dish has it's own regional origin, Ragu comes from the Italian region called Emilia-Romagna with it's main city - Bologna, from which Ragu takes it's name: Ragu alla Bolognese.
Ragu is a meat-base sauce with the add of tomato and not vice versa as it's cooked in other countries. So there's more meat then tomato in this sauce. The other difference is that the original Ragu is simmered for many hours and believe me you will feel the difference.... They used to cook Ragu on a wood stove even for 6 hours! 
Ragu traditionally dresses the wide long formats of pasta as Tagliatelle, Fettuccine, Pappardelle. It is also very popular as an ingredient of Lasagna. Sometimes you may find the short pasta like Rigatoni, Penne or Paccheri (on the photo) with Ragu. And as a very special way of using ragu is to stuff the big formats of pasta like Lumaconi (snails) and cook them in the oven with mozzarella and Parmigiano cheese....
Two more things to let you know:
1. Some people think that Ragu is a kind of meat stew... it's not! It's a sauce.
2. Ragu is never served with Spaghetti in Italy as the meat pieces will not stick to this kind of pasta. 
Be patient with this sauce and the taste will be rewarding!!!
  
 
INGREDIENTS:
Servings: 1.8-2l of sauce
 
800-900g minced mixed meat (beef-pork)
4 sausages (400g)
700ml tomato puree
2 carrots
1 big onion
2 celery stalks
1 bay leaf
1 rosemary sprig
200ml red wine
veg. stock cube 
salt
pinch of sugar 
100ml EVO oil

The quantity I prepare is very generous, but as this sauce is very laborious to prepare I prefer to cook a bit more and then store it...

Note: Before you start cooking, as for the pan, use a thick bottom one, as the cooking process is long and we don't want the sauce to stick to the bottom of the pan....
  

1. Chop onion and celery finely.
2. Grate the carrot. Or as an option you may chop everything with an electric chopper.
3. Pour some EVO oil into a big sauce pan and add carrots, onion, celery and simmer till the vegetables are golden brown.

 4. Peel the sausage and break it into tiny pieces, add it to the meat that you put in a bowl and mix well.
5. Add the minced meat to the veges, stir vigorously to have a homogeneous mixture.

6. Splash with some red wine and let the alcohol evaporate, smell it to feel if there's still some alcohol.

7. Cook till the meat will become lighter in colour, for about 15 minutes at a medium heat.
8. Prepare vegetable broth (use a stock cube).  

7. Add tomato puree and half a glass of vegetable broth to the meat mix and stir. Add a pinch of sugar together with tomato puree to neutralize the acidity of tomato.
8. Add a bay leaf, rosemary sprig and vegetable stock.

 9. Cover the sauce with a lid and cook at a low heat stirring from time to time (every 10-15 minutes). When you notice that the sauce becomes too thick, add half a glass of broth (better unsalted veg. broth) and stir.

10. Add 1/2 teaspoon of salt and try if you feel the sauce needs more.
11. From the moment you added tomato puree, cook for at least 2 hours, constantly stirring and adding broth to dilute.
Note: I usually cook this sauce for 2-3 hours but traditionally it was cooked for 6-8 hours.

Note: The secrets of this sauce are:
- using mixed mince,
- stirring constantly, about every 10 minutes,
- cooking at a low heat,
- adding some water or better vegetable broth (unsalted) when needed,
- cooking from two to three hours. 

12.  When the sauce is ready it will have a thick and granular consistency, reddish brown colour and a rich flavour that will fill in the whole your house....

Note: You may divide the sauce into portions and freeze them, then you will have a ready sauce when you need it! 
   
  
 

Salmon Penne Pasta

I really love spaghetti but how can I eat them all the time? Impossible!!! This time I cook PENNE. 
This dish was very popular in Italy in the 80's and now it's considered to be kind of old-fashioned. But it's delicate and creamy and easy to prepare, a real solution to your lunch problem when you are short of time!

INGREDIENTS: 
servings: 2

160g penne pasta
100g smoked salmon
1/2 onion
50ml white wine
100 ml thick cream  
EVO oil 
chilli / black pepper
salt  


1. Start cooking pasta in boiling salted water.
2. At the same time chop the onion and sautèe them a bit with some EVO oil in a frying pan.

3. Cut salmon into small cubes and add it to the onion, splash some white wine over the mix and cook till the alcohol evaporates.
4. Add thick cream and 50ml of water from the pasta, chilli (black pepper if you prefer) and cook till the cream is thickened.


5. Drain pasta and add it to the sauce, mix well and serve. You may add some chopped parsley to the dish...

      P.S. My friend Giulia F. loves it...