Penne Pasta with Tomato Sauce and Cheese

This is a tasty dish, which can be prepared with relative ease and is a good way to introduce one self to making tomato sauce. 

Photo Source: Myrecipes.com

Ingredients:
1 celery stick finely chopped
2 shallots finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
2 tbs of tomato puree
2 tsp of olive oil
25g of butter
100g of Parmesan cheese
400g can of sliced and peeled tomatoes
Penne pasta - about 200 to 300g
Salt to taste
Sugar to taste
Cracked pepper to taste

Place the oil and the butter into a frying pan. Melt the butter. Now place the celery stick, shallots, and the garlic cloves into the pan and fry on medium heat for about 5 minutes until the mixture is starting to reduce. Now throw in the canned tomatoes and the tomato puree, bring the mixture to boil and reduce heat to medium. Add sugar, cracked pepper, and salt to taste. Simmer for the next 10 to 15 minutes while stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile prepare the pasta in a pot of slightly salted water. Take the pasta out of the boiling water when it is almost cooked but still firm. Rinse it under the cold water and set aside. 

After your are done simmering your sauce, place the pasta into the frying pan and add the cheese. Mix everything together on medium to high heat until the pasta is evenly covered with the sauce and the cheese has melted. Check that the pasta has heated right through before completion. Serve and enjoy!

How to make Alfredo Pasta

You will need the following ingredients:

1 cup whipping cream
1/4 cup butter
1 egg
1/2 cup fresh, finely grated Parmesan cheese
1 garlic clove, minced or crushed
1 tsp parsley
Broccoli (any amount you like)
Chicken (any amount you like)
Cooking oil
Grounded black pepper
Salt

Start up a boiling pot of water and throw in some pasta. Leave this to boil until the pasta is fully cooked. Remember to stir once in a while. While the pasta is cooking you can do the steps below:

In a bowl mix together the whipping cream, butter, egg, Parmesan cheese, garlic, and parsley. Mix until all the ingredients are all nicely combined. Put the mixture to a side. This will be our pasta sauce.

Take the chicken and fry on a pan until fully cooked and slightly brown, then put it to a side. Now take the broccoli and fry on a pan until fully cooked and still crunchy. Remember to put in some cooking oil to help the chicken and the broccoli fry. Put the broccoli to a side.

Your pasta is probably cooked by now. Check by tasting. If it is ready, pour out the water and put to a side.

Now take the sauce mixture we made earlier and pour onto a pan on medium heat. Stir the mixture until the butter and the cheese are fully melted. Now we can put the broccoli, chicken, and pasta into the sauce in the pan. Mix everything together until everything is evenly distributed. Now add salt and grounded black pepper to taste. I find that at the end some salt is definitely needed but be careful not to over do it. 1 to 1 and a half teaspoon of salt should do it. That's it! Finished! Very easy pasta dish but looks and taste so impressive.

Chorizo Sausage Pasta Recipe

Ingredients:
Pasta (any amount you like)
2 decent size chorizo (or just one large one)
8 tomatoes
6 cloves of garlic
Chopped up rosemary (as much as you like)
1/4 cup of cream
100g Parmesan cheese
1 tablespoon of olive oil
Ground pepper
Salt

I saw this on Market Kitchen show and decided to give it a go. First we are going to start up a pot of boiling water and throw in the pasta. After it is cooked drain the water and set the pasta aside.

Next we are going to peel the tomatoes. In order for the skin on the tomatoes to come off easily we need to boil them for about 3-5 minutes. Take the tomatoes out of the water and make a cut in each one. Now pull the skin off, it should come off with relative ease.

Next we chop the tomatoes into quarter slices. Pre-heat a frying pan on medium heat and pour into it some olive oil. Next throw in the tomatoes and some chopped garlic and leave on medium heat for about 5 minutes. After this time the tomatoes should begin to break down and it will look almost like a uniform, thick mixture.

The next step is to chop up the chorizo sausages into slices about 5mm thick. Now throw the sausage slices into the frying pan with the tomatoes and the garlic. Next chop up some rosemary and throw it into the frying pan. Then we add about one quarter cup of cream, and the 100g of Parmesan cheese. Mix everything together and add salt and pepper to taste. Leave the pan on simmer for about 10 minutes. Our chorizo sauce is now complete. Next throw the pasta into the sauce and mix well. The dish is now ready to be served.

This is probably the yummiest pasta dish I have made so far. The chorizo sausages give off an amazing flavour, which is soaked in by the entire sauce mixture. 

Sun Dried Tomatoes and Mushroom Pesto Pasta

I saw Giada De Laurentiis prepare this on Food TV once and decided to give it ago. It is a super easy dish that only takes a few simple steps and tastes fantastic. In the ingredients photo you'll see that I used garlic paste instead of fresh garlic. This is simply because this is all the corner store had. Always use fresh garlic, it just has a much better flavor.

You will need the following ingredients
(serves 2):

3 cloves of garlic
150g of sun dried tomatoes
200g white button mushrooms
250g pasta (any type)
1 cup fresh basil
Olive oil
Kalamata olives (optional)
Salt (to taste)
Cracked black pepper (to taste)


Step 1
First cook the pasta. Once it is done rinse with cold water and set aside.

Step 2

Chop up the olives into slices and set aside. These are optional. I find that the olives give a nice bitterness, which complements the pesto.

Step 3
Dice up the mushrooms. Drizzle some olive oil into a frying pan on medium heat and fry the mushrooms for about 5 minutes.

Step 4

Take about 1/3 of the mushrooms that you just fried up and place them into a food processor. The remainder of the mushrooms we will put into the pasta later. Next place the sun dried tomatoes, the garlic, and the basil leaves into the food processor as well. Add a tbs of olive oil, a pinch of salt, and plenty of cracked black peeper. Grind everything into a paste. Have a taste and add more salt and pepper if required. 

Step 5

Fry the paste for about 2 minutes in a frying pan on medium heat. Now add the pasta and the olives you prepared earlier, and the remainder of the mushrooms. Mix everything together until the pesto is evenly distributed. Serve on a nice plate with some basil leaves for decoration and enjoy.