CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The grocery store used to be my happy place.
And I’m sure I’m not alone. Those of us who love food sometimes love spending time leisurely walking up and down each aisle to carefully pick what you want. My idea of a perfect date is visiting as many neighborhood markets, butcher shops and bakeries as possible, and checking out what kinds of goodies they are hiding on their shelves. I would go shopping at least three times a week, usually whenever I had an inkling to try a new recipe with ingredients that weren’t in my panty.
Coronavirus obviously changed that.
We’re all trying to stop the spread, limiting our shopping trips and planning so that each stop at the store is worth our while -- because who knows when we can come back. Stopping at the store to pick up a missing ingredient isn’t really a thing anymore. And it’s causing home cooks to get creative.
One staple many people probably have on heavy rotation is some kind of pasta. Noodles are universally loved, and plenty of cultures have different ways of putting their own spin on the pantry staple. In times of pandemic, it’s perfect because it’s cheap, it feeds a lot of people and it doesn’t expire quickly.
However, you can only eat buttered noodles and marinara so many times before you start to go crazy. I’ve come up with some ideas to help you feel inspired to eat more pasta, and how you can get creative with whatever you have on hand to make a delicious meal that your family will love.
Think outside the can of tomatoes
Many tomato-based pasta sauce recipes call for whole, canned tomatoes and/or some kind of tomato paste. If you are out, you still make something with what you have on hand. If you’re still dying for tomato flavor, get creative and try to cook down fresh tomatoes or use hints of tomato products, like salsa or even ketchup. Just make sure you are constantly tasting your sauce to make sure it’s balanced and add seasonings as needed to make it taste like pasta sauce. It might sound intimidating, but you’ll be surprised what kind of amazing pasta sauce you can make with a leftover jar of salsa and a bit of creativity.
Utilize rotting produce
The best way to use up produce that’s about to go bad is with a big-batch meal, like pasta or soup. Slowly cook down eggplants, zucchinis, bell peppers and more until they are tender. Then, puree them and transform into a pasta sauce with the help of some fat, like olive oil or butter, and other flavor components, like broth, pesto, heavy whipping cream and more. This is even easier to do if you have an immersion blender that can go right into the pot, but a food processor or regular blender will work, too. Also, the longer you cook everything down, the better, especially with tough veggies.
Canned fish are your friends
Fish from a can doesn’t necessarily sound like a mouth-watering meal. But canned salmon, anchovies, sardines and tuna are flavor bombs. Aside from their other uses, this is the easiest way to make a protein-packed meal without worrying about needing to buy fresh meat or seafood. For example, tuna noodle casserole -- while it might have been a polarizing dish for you as a child, it’s a perfect pandemic meal.
The simplest sauce for any pasta, but that is particularly good with stuffed varieties like ravioli, is a garlicky butter and anchovy sauce. Cut up your anchovies very small, to fool those in your house that may be skeptics. Brown some butter in a pan, but don’t let it burn, then add the anchovies, garlic, salt and a bit of water from the pasta you’re boiling, and that’s it. It takes less than 15 minutes, and you will be surprised at how rich of a sauce you were able to create with such few ingredients.
Experiment with fats
It’s probably common that when people hear pasta, the first thing they think of are Italian flavors. Parsley, garlic and particularly olive oil are staples in Italian sauces. However, if you don’t happen to have any on-hand, that doesn’t mean you can’t experiment. If you’re really in a pinch, vegetable oil will provide a similar textural element to your sauce without the signature olive oil flavor. Avocado oil is a great fat with a flavor that compliments vegetables and meat in a sauce. Or take an Asian-inspired route and use sesame oil to make your sauce, complimenting it with flavors like soy sauce, rice wine vinegar or fish sauce. Aside from oils, don’t be afraid to try atypical sources of dairy for cream sauces, like a spoonful plain greek yogurt into a Tex-Mex-style sauce with beans, or a little cottage cheese in your tuna noodle casserole.
Re-imagine your pre-packaged meals
The classic Top Ramen noodles, complete with their various flavor packets, are delicious as it is. However, they’re even better with an upgrade. Toss the packet to the side, and make your own sauce with ingredients you have on-hand. A simple recipe is mixing together garlic, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, a little brown sugar and some garlic chili sauce for a spicy variety. Or, go a totally different direction and have ramen noodles with pesto, alfredo or even salsa. A great tip also is don’t throw away your flavor packets -- they actually make great seasoning for chicken breast and other meat in a pinch.
Ramen isn’t the only pre-packed meal you can upgrade. Take boxed mac and cheese, bread it and turn it into fried mac and cheese balls. Or, just throw out the cheese packet and make your own cheese sauce with whatever cheese you like, some milk and a little patience. If you’re trying to do minimal effort, just throw in some add-ons to the boxed stuff, like chili garlic crisp, bacon bits or frozen vegetables.
Create a new dish out of your leftovers
Pasta is delicious, universal and I could probably eat it close to every day if I had to. However, that doesn’t mean that when you make a big batch of sauce that you should be stuck eating leftover pasta for 7 days straight. You can be creative with how to use your sauce -- meaty red sauces are just as good over mashed potatoes or even inside a baked potato for a quick meal. You can use leftover alfredo sauce to make a white pizza, or if you make a spicy pork sauce for ramen, throw it on top of rice or dumplings.
NEVER throw your pasta water down the drain
Your pasta water is liquid gold. A mixture of butter and garlic is a great basic sauce, but it sticks to the pasta better and has a more luxurious consistency when you add pasta water. Make sure that when you salt your pasta water, you’re overly generous -- most of it will go down the drain anyway, and there’s no easier way to take your pasta dishes to the next-level through well-seasoned noodles.
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April 24, 2020 at 11:53PM
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7 ways to make pasta sauce with ingredients you have on hand in your pantry - cleveland.com
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