Creamy Tomato Pasta

Any colored pasta turns into a orange/red hued one as soon as it hits my husband's plate. He adds oodles of tomato based condiments to his pasta and tells me that he is making it more flavorful. I stopped complaining long ago and keep making tomato based pastas more often instead. Today's recipe is the standard one I make but added some evaporated milk to make it creamier. I used evaporated milk instead of cream / milk just because I had some leftover evaporated milk that had to be used. The evaporated milk lends a nice, creamy background for the tomato sauce based pasta and makes it more flavorful. I used twisted elbows that was a carrot, corn, squash pasta blend. Penne, shell pasta or any long pasta can be substituted for elbow pasta.

Ingredients:
1 & 1/2 cups twisted elbows
1 to 2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely minced
8 oz / 225 gm / 1 cup tomato sauce (I used store-bought sauce.)
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
About 1/2 cup evaporated milk / cream
1/4 cup grated Parmesan (optional)
Chopped basil leaves to garnish (optional)

Method:
* Heat oil in a saute pan and add minced garlic and onion. Saute until light golden. Add tomato sauce and ground pepper to the pan and let it simmer on low flame, just to let the flavor build up. Taste and adjust the salt if needed.
* Bring a big pot of salted water to a boil. Add the pasta to boiling water and cook until al dente. Drain the pasta in a colander and return it back to the pot in which it was cooked. Add evaporated milk or cream and gently give a stir to mix.
* Pour the tomato sauce mixture over the pasta and stir to combine.
* Garnish with Parmesan and basil and serve warm.

This goes to Blogging Marathon #50, under the theme of "Pasta". Check out the link to find out what other marathoners are cooking.

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Garbanzo Bean - Veggie Pasta

My younger one turned a teenager this weekend. And officially, I am now a mother of two teenagers, who happen to be the opposite ends of a spectrum in every aspect. The older one cannot throw a tantrum for his dear life while the younger one doesn't know how to stop from throwing one. She gets upset at the drop of a hat and so the situations demand a lot of tactful & patient parenting, cajoling and threatening from my side where she is concerned. And even though she is not little anymore, lunch box is still one mini struggle since the stuff she doesn't prefer comes home untouched under the guise of "being not hungry". I therefore involve her while planning lunches and we decide it beforehand what she gets to carry in her lunch box.
If given a choice, my daughter would survive on a salad and pasta diet. She loves pasta so much that she carries it to school at least 2 - 3 times in any given week. I therefore could not avoid from posting a pasta recipe for the lunchbox themed blogging marathon today. I wanted to try something on Mediterranean lines but it got changed into something else as my daughter was hovering around as it was a holiday here. I went according to her whim and choice of ingredients since it was her lunch and got a thumbs up from my kids. 

Ingredients: (2 servings)
1 cup pasta shells of your choice (I used sweetcorn, carrot and squash blend of twisted elbow macaroni.)
1/2 cup cooked / canned garbanzo beans
1 small tomato, chopped
1 small grated carrot
1/4 cup black olives
1/2 cup white cheddar cheese or any other cheese of your preference
2 -3 tbsp milk (optional)
Salt & pepper to taste 
1- 2 tbsp minced parsley / cilantro

Method:
* Cook pasta al dente according to the directions on the package and drain.
* Transfer the pasta to the pan and add all the ingredients except the parsley / cilantro. Just heat until the cheese has melted and blended into the mixture.
* Turn off the stove, transfer the pasta into a serving platter and garnish with parsley/cilantro.

This rice dish goes to 
1. Blogging marathon #40
2. Srivalli's Kids' delight event, hosted by Jayanthi this month with the theme - Lunch box.

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Simple, Sunday Meals - Soup and Sandwich

Salad:
Carrot, cucumber, lettuce & tomato

Veggie Burgers sans Cheese:
Soy patties toasted with a little butter, shredded lettuce, tomato slices, cucumber slices, dill pickle along with mustard and ketchup gave company to toasted, multigrain, thin sandwich bread.

Minestrone Soup:
This wholesome Italian soup doesn't follow a standard recipe and can be either a vegetarian or a non vegetarian soup. It is prepared with the ingredients at hand and usually contains vegetables, beans and pasta.

Ingredients required for 6 servings:
1 - 2 Tbsp oil
1 small onion - peeled and diced
1 small carrot - peeled and diced
1 small potato - peeled and diced
1 tomato - diced
1 celery stick - diced
1/4 cup of zucchini cubes
A handful of chopped green beans or frozen green peas
Celery leaves
1/2 cup of tomato sauce
1/4 cup small shell pasta (I used elbow pasta.)
1/4 cup any white beans, cooked (I used navy beans.)
1 tsp - Italian seasoning
Salt & pepper to taste
(Also add garlic, if preferred.)

Making soup:
* Heat oil in a deep sauté pan and add the onions. Sauté them on low heat till they turn translucent. Then add carrot, potato, tomato, celery, celery leaves, zucchini, green beans or peas and add sufficient water. Cook on medium flame till the vegetables soften.
* Then add tomato sauce, seasoning and simmer for some more time.
* In the meantime, cook pasta al dente and drain.
* Stir in the cooked pasta and beans. Adjust the consistency of soup adding water, if needed and season with salt and pepper. Let it simmer for a few minutes more so that all flavors mingle.



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