Harvest Tomato Sauce

With summer here and extra tomatoes grown in the garden this is a fabulous recipe to make and then either bottle or freeze. It is so versatile, but I usually use it as a pasta sauce base. I must give credit where credit is due as it is adapted from an Annabel Langbein recipe, from the book A Free Range Cook!

Ingredients

1kg tomatoes, cred and cut into wedges
1 red capsicum
1 onion, cut into thin wedges
3-4 cloves of garlic
1 Tbsp chopped rosemary leaves
1 small chilli, seeded and chopped (optional)
2 Tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp olive oil
ground black pepper

Method
1 Preheat oven to 160oC. prepare the tomatoes, capsicum
and onion and place in a lined roasting dish in a single layer so they roast and caramelise rather than stew. You may need two roasting dishes.

2 Add the garlic, rosemary, and chilli. in a small bowl mix together the tomato paste, sugar, olive oil, salt and pepper. Spoon this mixture over the vegetables and stir through them to coat evenly.

3 Bake for about 2 hours or until vegetables are starting to caramelise and shrivel a little.

4 Allow the vegetables to cook then puree in a food processor or blender. The sauce will keep in the fridge for up to a week or can be frozen or bottled while still hot.

Spinach and Two Cheese Ravioli

I know, they are not pretty, but I did get better at it and they tasted superb!  Next purchase will be a proper ravioli maker. I was told once you start making your own pasta you never go back to the bought stuff... and I think they are right.

So, if you need the recipe for the dough, it is on the page with the pasta maker.  You can always, buy your own pasta sheets and roll it out yourself also.

These were made using the pasta maker to the thickness of 6. Because I was trialing a few different options, I made a small batch, but here are the ingredients for a bigger batch (24-30 depending on how big you make them).

Ingredients
1 bag baby spinach
150 grams ricotta cheese (I used the Clevedon Valley Buffalo Ricotta and it was amazing).
1 cup grated parmesan
1/4 red onion chopped up finely
1 clove garlic chopped finely (optional)
1 pinch of nutmeg (optional, if not using garlic)

Method
1 Saute the garlic and onion for 2 minutes and then add the spinach until wilted. Let cool.
2 In a food processor combine the spinach mixture with the parmesan and ricotta.
3 Now, don't improvise and make them like I did, find a ravioli maker so you can't be embarrassed by the way they look!
4  Let dry on a lightly floured piece of kitchen paper. Alternatively, if you are going to freeze them, they can go directly into the freezer on the sheet.  Once frozen they can be put in a snap-lock bag.
5 If you are cooking them, boil a pot of lightly salted water and add the ravioli.  They should take approximately 5 mins. Drain carefully before adding to sauce for serving.

Today I served them with the Sabato Pasta Sauce with Rocket, which is delicious - yes, I cheated, and also a sprinking of parmesan.   But who wants to be in the kitchen all day, right???!!!

The Mercato Atlas Pasta Maker

Another New Year's Resolution was to make my own pasta, particularly ravioli.  So my new gadget is the Marcato Atlas pasta maker, which is made in Italy.

You can find one of these in Stevens for $149, or The House of Knives for $142.

I must admit, the instructions that come with it are pretty poor.  No-where can you find how thick the pasta should be for any type of pasta you are making. So, my first efforts have been a bit of trial and error.

However, saying that, the pasta maker works well, and although there is a bit of technique needed to master (wait till you see the picture of my first attempt!), one afternoon's effort from one batch of dough has made enough fettucini for 2 meals for 2 people, and enough ravioli for two meals for 2 people as well.  Check out the what's cooking tonight - pasta section for the recipes.

For a simple pasta dough recipe, use 2 cups and 2 Tbsp 00 flour, a pinch of salt and 3 large room temperature eggs. Create a well in you flour and add the eggs.  Mix with a blunt knife, mixing in the flour gradually.  Use your hands to form a ball and knead for 5 mins.  Alternatively, you can put the eggs into your food processor and gradually add the flour to it (which is what I did). But still follow the kneading process.  Add a little flour if it gets sticky. Have fun!

Gnocchi with spinach, bacon and tomato

I always try to cook at least one dish out of every monthly issue of Taste magazine and one of my recent favourite dishes comes from the October 2009 issue. I have changed it slightly by replacing the prosciutto with bacon (cheaper and easier) and halved the amount of mascarpone they suggest (thinking of our waistlines). I have had loads of compliments for this dish, so try it as the carb component of your meal. It works well with a BBQ.

Ingredients:
1 x packet of Gnocchi (once again, you don't need to make this yourself. A good alternative can be found at Nosh, in the dry pasta section - it is much better than the supermarket kind, but use whatever you like).
half a packet of Mascarpone - about 125g (this is a soft cream cheese)
200g of bacon, cut into small pieces
half a bag of spinach (use more than you think it needs as once it cooks it disappears)
1 punnet of cherry tomatoes, halved
Parmesan grated for the top

Method
1 Preheat your oven - fanbake on 200 Celsius
2 Pre-cook bacon so it is crispy
3 Cook gnocchi according to packet instructions - usually only for a couple of minutes, or until it floats to the top.
4 In an oven-proof dish toss all of the ingredients together.
5 Top with Parmesan
6 Place in oven for about 15 minutes and grill the top if it needs it.

Don't expect any leftovers as there never are any in our house!