Fresh made pasta sauce

All that canning I haven't done any pasta yet.  I shall remedy that tonight.

However, instead of using a jar of my just canned tomatos I went into the garden and picked some fresh ones.  Just enough for a two person meal.  About 10 medium tomatos.

I also picked a nice orange bananna pepper and a beautiful yellow bell pepper.

I peeled and seeded the tomatos and prepared my mise en place. (French for getting your stuff ready before lighting the burner).

Above you see my bowl of whole peeled and seeded tomatos.  Carrots, sweet peppers, onions, shallots, and garlic.  I chopped the tomatos and threw them in my big skillet, added oregano, basil, kosher salt and brought to a good bubble.

Meanwhile I melted some butter (1/4 stick)  in my saute pan and lightly sauted the vegetables until the carrots were tender.  I added them to the tomatos and let everything simmer together.

Two more basil leaves added to simmer away. A 1/4 stick more of butter and a splash of Merlot.

Then I prepared some mostaccioli and cheesy, buttery garlic bread and while the sauce was simmering away  enjoyed a glass of the Merlot. (Review on Aged grapes if your interested)

I added the pasta to the sauce and let simmer awhile longer.

Here is a tip:  Do not rinse the pasta.  The starches that are clinging to the pasta will help hold the sauce to it.

If you rinse it then it gets too slippery.  Drain the pasta (I use the pot that has the strainer lid) then return the pot to the burner and stir frequently for a few seconds.  The hot burner will evaporate any left over water that is on your pasta.  That way your sauce doesn't get watered down.

Plate and add a chiffonade of fresh basil, a sprinkle of mozzarella and enjoy.

This was all done after working a ten hour day.  It was not a lot of work and the rewards were well enjoyed.

You can add your favorite meat as well.  I would say it took about 30 minutes to prep, bread was 15 minutes while sauce simmered and pasta boiled.  Simmer time was about 40 minutes.  So in roughly an hour you can enjoy fresh, homemade pasta dinner.  I could've saved time by using my canned garden tomatoes to and that would have saved 20 minutes.  I know it's not fancy but I guarantee you'll love it.

Simple, Fresh and Easy