Me: "You hungry?"
Dad: "Not at the moment."
Me: "Okay I cook."
I'm half Sicilian, on my mother's side. Food has always been plentiful. Since most of my extended family is Jehovah's Witness, we didn't celebrate birthdays, and instead that side of my family had get-togethers for anniversaries. Everyone brought at least one covered dish for the get-togethers, and we would congregate at my grandparents' house or at the house of one of my aunts. There was always plenty of food to go around and leftovers to take home. However, learning to cook wasn't a big deal in my family. To be honest, I've never had a fantastic relationship with my mother, so I didn't really learn to cook until... now? So in my quest to learn to cook, I wanted to try a good Italian dish, simple to start out with, to pay homage to my heritage. A while back my Dad said something about seeing a recipe for one-pot pasta, so I searched online and found one from Damn Delicious. I was really bad about taking photos since I was really hungry and just wanted to get it done, but here's my take on it:
1 lb spaghetti (I used thick spaghetti)
12.8 oz package of smoked andouille sausage, sliced
1 large onion, thinly sliced
3 c halved grape tomatoes
2 c fresh basil leaves (I chiffonaded them, if that's the correct past tense, because whole leaves floating around would annoy me)
4 cloves garlic (I minced them instead of slicing them)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 c grated parmesan (I got the GOOD stuff, the stuff recognizable as cheese, not the powdery stuff, and I just threw in the whole container, roughly 1 c)
In a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium high heat, combine spaghetti, sausage, onion, tomatoes, basil, garlic and 4 1/2 cups water; season with salt and pepper, to taste. I love everybody-in-the-pool meals! The only minor change I'd make is that the recipe states 5 minutes of prep, and it was more like 15, between slicing the onion, sausage, and basil.
Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, until pasta is cooked through and liquid has reduced, about 8-10 minutes. I was mildly concerned about the pasta cooking evenly since it didn't fit the entire length in the pot, but in the end I had nothing to worry about. I just kept stirring to make sure the other ingredients cooked through in the water, and eventually all of the pasta was underwater, and then I cooked ten minutes more from that. Stir in Parmesan. Serve immediately.
I also got a Caesar salad from the deli counter, frozen breadsticks, and cheesecake. Okay I'm not going to lie, I cooked an entire healthy meal simply because I wanted to eat cheesecake. I love cheesecake, so sue me.
Oh my goodness, this turned out so good! The andouille sausage is a little spicy, and I'm not a fan of sausage or spiciness, but I LOVED it! I loved using fresh ingredients. I really enjoy using fresh produce. (My brother works at the new Hy-Vee grocery store in town and says the produce section is phenomenal so I can't wait to go and die of happiness there.) I liked how the grape tomatoes got all wrinkly, and how the texture of the dish didn't get weird from the skins being on. Everything cooked down really well. I think a yellow onion would have worked better than a white onion in this case, but that hardly affected how much Dad and I loved this dish. He skipped salad and had two plates of pasta instead! I like the thicker spaghetti in it. I think it suited the more substantial flavor of the sausage more than thin spaghetti would. We both ate our fill, but it wasn't a sluggish sort of full feeling. We were full but still felt like we could get up and do some work. We didn't, but we could have if we wanted to! I have a digestive disorder and can't eat a lot at once, so being able to fill up on something healthy that won't drag me down makes me super happy.
It was a really good Saturday. We had a good lunch, then we listened to oldies radio and had coffee and cheesecake before I went to bed in the early afternoon (I work nights). I posted the above photo on Facebook and said I might have made too much, but between the two of us eating on it and taking it in work lunches, it was gone by Wednesday! So, oh darn, I had to cook something else! Which brings us to the next post...
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