Cooking Express

Farmer's sausage with penne pasta cooked with tomatoes and herbs. The tomatoes are cooked until they become a thick and sauce-like. This makes it stick to the pasta. I can't remember the Italian name for this method of cooking at this moment.

Ingredients:

Tomatoes

Garlic

Basil Leaves (Both dried or fresh works fine)

Italian farmer's sausage

Lettuce

Steps:

Cook penne separately.

Boil tomatoes until skin begins to peel. Remove and put tomatoes into cold water. Peel off skin and chop tomatoes. Remove the stem. Heat up a pan with olive oil and fry the garlic until it changes colour. Toss in the chopped tomatoes and cook. Keep cooking until tomatoes start to turn into a thick paste. Toss in basil and stir. Season the paste to your tastes (sugar, salt and pepper). Often ketchup is used to provide some acidity. Personally, I prefer balsamic vinegar.

When the paste is seasoned, toss in penne. Cook a while to reduce the water from the penne. When the paste sticks to the penne, it is ready. Garnish with lettuce and serve immediately. You can replace the sausage with other meats, or have the penne with the tomato sauce as vegetarian dish.

This dish goes really well with meatballs. More on my meatballs recipe soon...