Recovering From All The Feasting
08 January 2008
After all the heavy feasting over Christmas and New Year Simon and I were really longing for just a very simple meal. Some quickly prepared pasta with sauce bolognese would do. I always keep a good amount of minced meat in the freezer for such purposes, but this time I had only a small package left, too small for two full portions. In the aftermath of the Christmas season we were however reluctant to actually leave the house and go shopping, so I checked the fridge for any leftovers I could use to extend the sauce. I found a carrot, half a red pepper, a few mushrooms, a bunch of basil leaves and of course I had a lot of paprika powder left from my New Year’s goulash. It might sound like a weird combination, but the result was really enjoyable. I served it with some wholegrain fussili (the spirals), but any other pasta would work just fine.
Extended Sauce Bolognese
| serves 4 as a main course |
| 250g minced meat |
| 4 shallots |
| 3 cloves of garlic |
| 2 carrots |
| 1 red pepper |
| 250g mushrooms |
| 3 tablespoons of tomato purée |
| 2 tablespoons of sweet paprika powder |
| some fresh basil |
| 2 cups of vegetable stock or water |
| some olive oil for frying |
to accompany: |
| 500g wholegrain fussili (or any other pasta) |
Finely chop the shallots and sweat them in a little bit of olive oil. Shift the shallots to the side of the pan, add the garlic (mashed through a garlic press), let it fry a little bit and stir with the onions just before it gets dark. Add the minced meat and sear it until slightly browned.
Consecutively add the carrots and the red pepper, both diced into very small pieces of about 3mm. Sauté everything for a few minutes, then add the paprika powder and stir in the tomato purée. Pour in 2 cups of water or vegetable stock, stir well and season to taste with salt (particularly if you used water instead of stock).
Partly cover with a lid (i.e. leaving a gap open) and let it simmer for about 15 minutes, just until the vegetables are soft but with some bite remaining, and the liquid has boiled down to a creamy sauce. Just before serving add some coarsely chopped fresh basil.