I've been making fresh pasta lately. Although both dried pasta and fresh pasta both have their merits (fresh pasta aka egg pasta is just a different type of pasta to dried pasta, as opposed to dried being unfresh), there's something wonderfully warm and wholesome about fresh pasta. Or maybe it's just that I haven't made fresh pasta for a long time.
Anyway, last night I cooked a parmesan sauce pasta for lunch today:
Freshly grated parmesan (40 g) was added to melted butter (50 g) in a saucepan, then heated and stirred for 5 minutes. The freshly cooked pasta was drained, to which double cream (4 tablespoons) and freshly grated parmesan (40 g) was combined in a fry pan over low heat. The butter and cheese mixture was added and combined with the pasta, then served with cracked pepper in a pure white dish.
It only took one bite to reaffirm my decision to never have pasta from a restaurant, because I can make it for so much less money and better at home.
For dinner, I tried a tomato based sauce. Canned roma tomatoes (400 g, along with the juices), salt (half teaspoon), sugar (half teaspoon) and garlic (3 cloves, crushed) were added to a saucepan and heated on a very low heat, with lid covered, but without stirring, for 40 minutes. The tomatoes were mushed, then cooked for a further 20 minutes. The sauce was allowed to cool, followed by addition of extra virgin olive oil (4 tablespoons).
The silver spoon also says to add basil, but I didn't have any. It sounds so simple but it's an absolute classic sauce. You can taste the flavours of each ingredient because of its simplicity, and when served with fresh pasta, it also allows the flavours of the noodles to speak for itself. The addition of olive oil at the end is somewhat analogous to the addition of sesame oil at the end of asian dishes. The combination of the sweetness of the tomatoes, boldness of the garlic, and the fragrance of the olive oil is just simply superb. The addition of basil to add that extra aroma would have been delightful. Don't overlook this simple sauce!
So, to explain the meaning of the title: the pasta I made were very thin, very delicate and light, and takes literally 2 minutes to cook. Since you can store fresh pasta in the freezer, and this tomato sauce in the fridge too, this could be an ideal healthy substitute for 2 minute noodles!
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3 comments:
Hi Jeff!
Wow you're really into Italian cooking, aren't you? I wish I was brave enough to make things that I like the look of - as always, I am still working on the baking side of things (or will be, coz I haven't made anything for months, due to uni). One of these days I'll convince myself to stop just reading those recipes and get myself in the kitchen to physically make them!
Your pasta-making reflection makes me feel like making pasta myself! I definitely will get my act together and try it out this summer - it seems so fun and rewarding!
Re your previous post, is it the butchery called "Heinz meats", which is sort of near the Bottle shop? One problem for me is that... I don't like going into meat shops: fisheries, butcheries, you name it. I can't stand the smell of raw meat. I have to work on that, before I can learn to cook. By that time, you will be really good at cooking, so you have to help me out, ok?
Your post on restaurant hygiene reminds me of yesterday's visit to Sizzlers: I don't know what happened there, but like, all the crockery were so dirty. You know how they're in these cylindrical metal holders? WELL, there were food remnants in all of them, and also on some of the crockery, which, for the most part, had stains on them. I know it's not a flashy eatery, but atleast exercise proper hygiene? I have a lot of criticisms about the food too, but I'll leave that for another time coz I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post negative remarks?
Happy cooking! oh and have fun in Hong Kong!
Gday Joanna
Hehe, pasta is awesome :D and yes you should get into pasta making: the 'Multipast' pasta maker is 110 AUD on ebay i think, and you can make 10 types of pasta with that I think?? including ravioli, with the machine automatically filling the raviolli with filling, which I think is pretty cool.
Yes the butcher is Heinz meats, and it's worth going! I'm still quite... nauseus handling raw meat... especially after looking at quartered pigs and other not-so-pleasant sites in HK markets... but you'll get used to it :D
and speaking of restaurant hygiene, ignorance is bliss :) at least it is in HK... I haven't tried the street vendors yet even though they are reputed to be quite a delicacy. they just look too unhygienic (but smell fantastic)
oh, you're in HK already?? I hope you're having fun! hehe I hear that they have fried gigantic cockroaches available there in little open eateries, as well as those half-formed unhatched chicks. A city a bit further from HK - shenzhen - apparently sells really weird stuff as well, like goat fetuses in soups (they reportedly monitor the pregnant goat through gestation and cut the fetus out of the goat at the time the features are just developed - i suppose animal rights don't really exist in asian countries), and monkey brains, which are meant to be delicacies: if you feel adventurous and decide to try some of these things, let us know how it goes, eh?
Regarding hygiene matters, you should have heard lisa (zhou)'s recount of her restaurant experiences when she went to china (not sure which part). It was quite funny actually; I think it included finding grass in her noodles :P Hopefully you won't encounter any of that.
mm yes I've heard about street vendor food too; I say try it out anyway - if anything goes wrong, pop into the closest pharmacy :) How cool would it be to have takeaway cooked potatoes and stuff at asian shops here? Personally, I'm getting a bit bored of just being able to get the same "restaurant" or "yumcha" style food when I go out. I'd very much like to see a restaurant selling "home-style" chinese food (ie the non-lard stuff).
By the way, the pasta maker you described sounds fantastic! however, I've already got a pasta maker (which I haven't used yet). It costed me atleast $100 (but I think that was on sale from $120+?)but it only has cutters for tagliatelle and the other strip-type pasta - attachments that are required to make ravioli and other types of pasta are sold separately :( it's a good brand though ('atlas' - it's made in italy!)
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