It's great. Don't get me wrong - there's nothing wrong with your Italian nonna's penne all'arrabbiata - but I was looking to take it a little step further. The base for example. Canned tomatoes are wonderful, and definitely have their place, but I had two huge bowls of fresh, ripe, sweet orbs still warm from my garden out back. Dried chili? Well, okay, if you don't have anything else... but I had three types of fresh chiles to choose from - cherries, fingers and the aforementioned Scotch bonnet (AKA habañero). Really, it was a no brainer what I was going to use! A few more minutes out back and I had an interesting two-legged carrot (a purple one, FTW!), two sweet peppers and a couple bunches of herbs perfect for t
his pseudo-Italian sugo.
his pseudo-Italian sugo. The story behind our crop of habañeros is a funny one, to me at least: my rather overtly Italian stepfather, who prides himself on his garden knowledge, bought 4 or 5 of the pepper plants because he believed that "Scotch Bonnet" peppers were simply a small version of a bell pepper. Flash forward to the first (generous) crop of them, where he plucked one right off the vine a popped it whole into his mouth. The look on his face is one I will not soon be forgetting! A few days later found him with sliced fresh ones on a sandwich, followed by hours of moaning and groaning about how his mouth burned. I'm not immune either, though - while making this, I discovered a few cuts on my hands I never knew about, as well as learning the hard way that capsaicin has a nasty habit of lodging under one's fingernails. You've been warned!
It's all a worthy price to pay, though, if you're a chile-and garlic-head like me. While you only need a small serving for a punch of flavour, it's a lingering experience you'll never forget!
The Lazy, Angry Woman's Pasta Sauce
Makes 5 1/2 cups, 22 1/4-cup servings
2 tsp olive oil
1 large, sweet onion, peeled and quartered
1 large carrot, roughly cut
2 sweet bell peppers (I used 1 cubanelle, 1 Shepherd), seeded and quartered
2 habañero peppers, seeded and halved
6 cloves garlic
3 lbs fresh tomatoes (mostly plum if you can), halved or quartered
1/4 cup red wine
1 sprig fresh thyme (I used my lemon thyme)
1 small sprig fresh rosemary, leaves stripped (about 1/2 tbsp)
1 tsp dried basil (was all I had, you could definitely use fresh at the end instead)
1/2 tsp sea salt
2 packets stevia (or 4 tsp sugar)
1 tsp lemon juice
- In a large pot over medium heat, warm the olive oil.
- In a food processor, place the onion quarters and finely chop (do this by hand if you dont have one, or really like chopping!).
- Add to the pot and slowly cook, stirring, until golden and meltingly soft (about 10 minutes).
- In the food processor, finely chop the carrots and add to the cooked onions.
- Raise the heat to medium-high and cook, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes.
- Process all the peppers and the garlic until minced (especially the habañeros!) and add to the pot. Cook, stirring, 7-8 minutes.
- Puree all the tomatoes in the processor.
- When peppers are tender, add the wine and stir well, then stir in the tomatoes, thyme sprig, rosemary, basil and salt.
- Lower heat to medium low and cook, stirring occasionally, 1 1/2 - 2 hours, until no longer "liquidy".
- Remove from heat.
- With an immersion blender, regular blender or food processor (since it's out), puree the sauce until smooth (or the texture you like).
- Stir in the stevia (or sugar) and lemon juice and serve or store.
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 28.9
Total Fat: 0.7 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 63.1 mg
Total Carbs: 5.3 g
Dietary Fiber: 1.3 g
Protein: 0.9 g
Calories: 28.9
Total Fat: 0.7 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 63.1 mg
Total Carbs: 5.3 g
Dietary Fiber: 1.3 g
Protein: 0.9 g
P.S. Today is your LAST DAY to enter my giveaway! Pop over to this post and enter to win some awesome Cookin' Greens coupons!
0 comments:
Post a Comment