Making good spaghetti?!
Making good spaghetti?
I am not all into spices and variety, I cook blah food. I like spaghetti. I usually only do pasta and regular spaghetti sauce (sometimes I add ground hamburg - but I don't really like any meat besides chicken) Someone told me once to add a little oil to my boiling pasta to keep it from sticking, but then the sauce doesnt stick to the pasta. Also, I just heat the spaghetti sauce in a saucepan on the stove, but its always too thin and watery. Any suggestions?
Answers:
I've been using this sauce from Ragu called "mamm's meat sauce" it already has all the meat, seasonings, everything's in it, just like homemade meat sauce:)
Add sauteed green pepper and onions to it. Also, you could saute some green peppers and onions. Add a can of crushed tomatoes with some garlic, salt and pepper. It's thicker than regular spaghetti sauce. Since you're not really into spices, use Prego, it's thicker.
Sauces are so good now that you dont really have to worry about adding spices. You can buy other flavors of sauce that you might like and there are many without meat in them. I also like to serve mine with garlic bead. As for cooking the spaghetti, you might be over cooking it (which is possible). I eat a noodle every few mintues until I think they are done. Another test is to toss one against the wall. They pasta is ready when a noodle sticks to the wall. As for the thinness... you should probably try buying a different brand of pasta.
Some zucchini type veggies sliced (tahnks to another post for making me remember this), add some chicken (think chicken parm which is spaghetti sauce and chicken), add some tomato paste to the plain tomato sauce as it thickens it without changing the tomato flavor (I would suggest at least a little salt and pepper or something). Put things you like in it, experiment a little bit each time. You will find something you enjoy.
To be quite honest the oil only really helps if it's fresh pasta. For dried commercial pasta just use a little salt in the water, and stir it regularly. As far as your sauce is concerned, you can always add herbs & spices, but you can't take them out! Be brave! Garlic is your friend, pepper is your pal and basil is you buddy.
If it tastes "blah"...well, fix it, it's never too late.
If it's too thin, add tomato paste to it or thicken it with a little corn starch. Oh, an old timers trick is to add a bit of sugar to your sauce, it wakes up the herbs & tomato.
Abondanza!
Hi, I love spaghetti (i'm Italian) so i can give you very tasty recipes: first of all, never, ever, put oil into the boiling water, it does no good. trust me. Try this one: buy cherry tomatoes, put them into very hot water and leave them there for like 10 minutes so you can peel them easily afterwards. In the meantime heat the water for the spaghetti in a different pot. While you wait for it boil, take a big (frying) pan, put 2 tablespoons of olive oil, a clove of garlic cut in half and chili pepper (if you like it). Let it heat until the garlic turns golden, not brown (otherwise it tastes bitter). Add the peeled & chopped cherry tomatoes, salt and pepper to taste and let it all cook for like 10 minutes, not longer. Once the pasta water boils, put the spaghetti in, let them cook (if the cooking time on the box says 10 minutes, you wanna cook them for 7 minutes and try one before draining them, don't overcook pasta, it's awful). Once the spaghetti are ready, drain them into a colander and put them into the pan with the tomatoes and all the sauce. Sautee the whole thing for 2 minutes and you're done! I cooked this dish for an American family and they LOVED it! You can add some basil in the sauce if you like it or sprinkle some parmesan cheese... Enjoy!!
If you want other recipes (I love cooking), email me!
garofolifrancesca@yahoo.com