I love pasta, especially penne, ziti, rigatoni, lasagne, rotini and fusili and a host of others. The shape of the pasta determines how the sauce marries it and what the result will taste like. I feel that the more compact the shape of the pasta, the more justice it is able to do to the sauce. Hence, bite-sized pasta works better for me. So, of course there is pasta that I don't like to use at all. Fettucine is ok, spaghetti is blah and boring, and linguine and angel-hair pasta just put me off!
I also adore concocting pasta sauces from scratch. A lot of experimentation has resulted in some weird combinations that actually tasted good or some fairly regular ingredients tasting plain weird.
This one time I was making an alfredo sauce and by the end, it tasted...well, quite different from an alfredo. I had added walnuts and some vodka to the sauce and the result was brown-pink in colour. Luckily for me, it tasted quite good, creamy and nutty and sweet.
Another time I made a pesto with pine nuts, basil, garlic, olive oil and blanched peas. I served it with some rigatoni topped with grated cheddar. Unfortunately, it did not taste as exotic as it had sounded in my head. Somehow, the peas and basil combination did not taste good.
So what kind of pasta and sauces do you like?
I'm an old fashioned mac-'n'-cheese girl. I do love pesto sauce though, so a little fettucini in pesto works wonders for me. There's this place in my hometown that makes that combination really well. And I'd have to agree with you about the bite-sized pasta, I prefer it as a rule. The only excpetion in my case is fettucini. I really quite strongly dislike spaghetti, and spaghetti and meatballs is quite possibly my least favourite pasta combination. And finally, I prefer cream-based sauces to tomato-based ones, even though I know that the latter is the very essence of Italian cooking.
ReplyDelete@Chelsea Dagger I like cream based sauces too. Contrary to what it seems like, I feel like tomato sauces are a bit more tricky to make than the cream based ones. I've had very few genuinely good ones. I adore sun-dried tomatoes though. Sun-dried tomatoes with hot pasta and a bit of grated cheese...voila! Serve it with a basic salad and crunch bread. Makes for one of the simplest and tastiest meals ever. :)
ReplyDeleteWhat about making a simple bruschetta? Take 1 day old French bread (cut out the mouldy bits!), rub fresh garlic vigorously, pan fry it with a little EVOO and then drizzle lots of parmesan and diced sun-dried tomatoes. I tell you, heavenly!
ReplyDelete@Itishree I adore bruschettas. And while we are talking of 'simple', what about just fresh tomatoes and mozerella together? I know from experience that some people are addicted to the combination!
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