"Those who eat well, eat Italian." I got that from Italianni's in Trinoma and saved it on my phone a couple of months back. I finally found the right opportunity to share it with you.
Two night's ago, we had a pre-Christmas dinner with UP and Pep friends. I prepared pasta arrabiata and meatless "meatballs".
I guess one nice thing about living in affluent countries is that you can get nice fresh ingredients that are of high quality. I don't want to go into the whole GMO-stuffs but visually, the vegetables in the produce section here in HK always look nicer than the ones I see in Manila. The tomatoes are almost seedless (I'm guessing they've been genetically-modified not to produce a lot of seeds) and bigger.
Anyway, so for the arabiatta, since I was preparing for a party of 12, I used 1kg of ripe tomatoes, deseeded and sliced into cubes, 1 white onion (again here it's humongous!) chopped, 5 cloves of garlic, minced, 1 large red bell pepper chopped (I think this can be omitted if you already have red pepper flakes), dried Italian seasoning, 3-4 tbsp of tomato paste, several fresh basil leaves, white wine, and salt and pepper.
Heat some oil in a saucepan, saute garlic and onion until fragrant, add red bell pepper. Saute for a minute. Add the chopped tomatoes. Stir and season with Italian seasoning. Simmer for 1-2 minutes. Stir in the tomato paste. Add white wine. Simmer for 3-5 minutes. Add red pepper flakes. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer for another 3-5 minutes until all ingredients have integrated into a thick sauce. Turn off heat and stir in the chopped fresh basil leaves.
For the polpette senza carne, I used two 15 oz cans of chickpeas, drained for about 30-60 minutes. It took really easy to drain it here, maybe because of the dry atmosphere. Mash with a fork then add 8 cloves of minced garlic, 1/2 to 3/4 cup of minced onions, season with Italian seasoning, sugar, and salt and pepper. Add two eggs to bind the ingredients (the formula is one egg for every 15oz can of chickpeas). Set aside for at least 15 minutes before forming into 1 tbsp balls. Fry until golden brown in a pan with 1-inch deep vegetable oil over medium heat. This was similar to the falafel that I made a couple of days back but instead of using the curry powder as seasoning, I used Italian dried herbs. It was very savory and was an instant hit to my non-vegetarian friends.
Buon Natale!
Two night's ago, we had a pre-Christmas dinner with UP and Pep friends. I prepared pasta arrabiata and meatless "meatballs".
Again, photo is not mine. You can click on the image to view its source.
I guess one nice thing about living in affluent countries is that you can get nice fresh ingredients that are of high quality. I don't want to go into the whole GMO-stuffs but visually, the vegetables in the produce section here in HK always look nicer than the ones I see in Manila. The tomatoes are almost seedless (I'm guessing they've been genetically-modified not to produce a lot of seeds) and bigger.
Anyway, so for the arabiatta, since I was preparing for a party of 12, I used 1kg of ripe tomatoes, deseeded and sliced into cubes, 1 white onion (again here it's humongous!) chopped, 5 cloves of garlic, minced, 1 large red bell pepper chopped (I think this can be omitted if you already have red pepper flakes), dried Italian seasoning, 3-4 tbsp of tomato paste, several fresh basil leaves, white wine, and salt and pepper.
Heat some oil in a saucepan, saute garlic and onion until fragrant, add red bell pepper. Saute for a minute. Add the chopped tomatoes. Stir and season with Italian seasoning. Simmer for 1-2 minutes. Stir in the tomato paste. Add white wine. Simmer for 3-5 minutes. Add red pepper flakes. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer for another 3-5 minutes until all ingredients have integrated into a thick sauce. Turn off heat and stir in the chopped fresh basil leaves.
For the polpette senza carne, I used two 15 oz cans of chickpeas, drained for about 30-60 minutes. It took really easy to drain it here, maybe because of the dry atmosphere. Mash with a fork then add 8 cloves of minced garlic, 1/2 to 3/4 cup of minced onions, season with Italian seasoning, sugar, and salt and pepper. Add two eggs to bind the ingredients (the formula is one egg for every 15oz can of chickpeas). Set aside for at least 15 minutes before forming into 1 tbsp balls. Fry until golden brown in a pan with 1-inch deep vegetable oil over medium heat. This was similar to the falafel that I made a couple of days back but instead of using the curry powder as seasoning, I used Italian dried herbs. It was very savory and was an instant hit to my non-vegetarian friends.
Kindly click on the image to view its source.
Buon Natale!
2 comments:
I so want to make this, or even just eat it!
I so want to make this Jon, or even just eat it!
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