Cooking Fresh Food - breaking the jar/can/bottle habit...

[Olive]

This thread is making me so hungry!

Just thought I would add my two cents in on pasta forno (pasta bakes) and pasta sauces.
Being Italian I can't go more than a couple days without pasta.
There are heaps of quick sauces out there that you can make but I love the long slow cooked ones.

Bolognese Sauce

Olive oil, enough to cover at least 1cm of the pot, 2cm even, heaps.
Half quantities of beef and pork mince about 500g
Onion, diced
Garlic, if you like it, I add about 6 odd cloves, I like it
salt, pepper
Passata, couple bottles
Water if needed

Just warm the oil in the pot, add the onion and garlic, cook them really slowly, don't let them brown, keep them transparent. I cook them for about 20 mins sometimes less if I am pressed for time.
Add the minces, fry til brown, but not over too high a heat.
Add your passata and salt. pepper to taste.
Simmer for at least a couple hours, the longer you cook the, the better it tastes. If it's getting to thick and dry just top up with water.
Serve with parmasen and as Bear said not the pre grated crap. I won't tell you what I call it as it's crass and I'll probably offend someone.
Growing up we used grana padana on pastas, we would have been shot if we put the good parmasen on it, That was strictly after the meal, mind you it was the awesome Reggiano.
If you haven't tried it BUY IT, expensive but you will never go back to pre grated!

As for pasta bake
I use that sauce, with some cooked pasta, al dente, a couple eggs and some pecorino, or mozarella or parmasen, or all three.
Bake it for about half an hour on 200. It's awesome and lasts for ages.

if you make a heap of the sauce you can freeze it and use it to make a quick pasta bake, I do that sometimes.

ETA If you are PG be careful with the Italian cheeses as most of them use unpasturised milk. I'm dying for some good parmasen right now!!

i made your bolognese sauce on saturday and it was awesome! i used same 1/2 jar passata and made up some, tin of toms and tom paste blended together, actually used the sauce to make cannalloni !! thanks will be making it again this way!!

[Janie]

Oooooh yeah, I have to kick my Reggiano habit It's getting too expensive, back to the old Padano for us I think! But the Reggiano is sooooooooo good mmmmmmmmmm

ETA Thanks BG, they sound great!

[briggsy's girl]

Janie, the best thing with them is that i always cook in bulk, and freeze probably a dozen meals at a time (for one person - love chinese take out containers - stack nicely in the freezer!). i also "hide" lots of vegies in stuff like that. it's not that DH doesn't like vegies (far from it) but if he doesn't have something like this while he's away in the truck, he doesn't, IMO, get enough veg. as "convenient" as the average truck stop is, steak and chips, or whatever (even if they throw a grilled tomato on the plate) just isnt a substantial meal to be eating on a regular basis!!

i hide masses of vegies in everything i cook in the slow cooker for him to take away - have not had a complaint yet... lol

i really just need to get back to basics for things like the sauces and stuff (which i'll be starting soon - but i'm not gonna waste what is in the cupboard already)

[ll80]

i made your bolognese sauce on saturday and it was awesome! i used same 1/2 jar passata and made up some, tin of toms and tom paste blended together, actually used the sauce to make cannalloni !! thanks will be making it again this way!!

my pleasure, glad you enjoyed it!
I often use tin tomatoes as well if I am out of passata.
I just buy the cheap no name brand, I don't find it makes any difference at all to the sauce and they are only 49c.

I also use this sauce for lasange I just add a fair amount of water to it so that the pasta cooks. I tend to use the dried pasta if I haven't been bothered to make my own.

[Netix]

Astrid, great article. Confirms a lot of what I already thought. Maybe I could get the Man to read it, and he will stop buying me cake mixes and learn to just ask or point out something in one of my books....
Chicken nuggets.... tempura batter is very crispy yes? What about crumbing small pieces of chicken in the corn flake crumb sort of thing? Would that work for you? Then they could still be frozen raw, and cooked as needed. I don't imagine a batter would thaw and cook well, unless it was put into a deep fryer. Yuk. (Yuk for me atm)

Bear, I had to read your bit a few times before it dawned on me that you actually do mean opening the jar 2 or 3 times, not filling the jar . I can see the need to use proper preserving jars. Are they expensive?

I am building up my stock of different herbs and spices, and desperately trying to get rid of other things. Like onion and garlic. I can't eat them atm, so think I will just hand them to my Mum.

I must be very lucky with my family, I don't have to hide veges. Most of the plate is taken up with veges every night, and my Mum can't believe how many veg our family eats. Even if they are just steamed, they all go.

Ok, dumb question. What is passata?

[Astrid]

I do feel a bit guilty after posting the article as I do have some packet mixes in the cupboard I have though in the past couple of months been building up some more baking basics.

[sloane]

my mum uses farmers direct (i think that's what they're called) & they get a parcel of whatever is fresh that week. at the moment they're getting loads of small potatoes & she keeps passing them on to me.

DP doesn't like plain boiled potatoes (and it would take us around 8 days of eating them every night to get through them) & now i have about 1.5-2kg of small potatoes (about the size of an egg) to use up....can anyone help me with some ideas of what to do with them?!!!

[Netix]

• Mashed potatoes (I put an egg or two in mine, along with butter, salt, pepper, and a dash of milk if needed) or try mashed with another vege, like pumpkin/sweet potato/carrot
• Fritters/croquettes (with corn/ground meat (good way to use left over meat)/carrot, etc)
• Gnocchi (have lots of recipes, very simple but a bit time consuming)
• mashed as topping for sheperds pie (sprinkle with nutmeg before putting in the oven)
• Jacket potatoes (you know, cooked in foil, serve with grated cheese, bacon bits, sour cream, homemade chunky tomato sauce/salsa, corn kernals, herb or garlic butter)
• Chunky wedges sprinkled with herbs or spices and a bit of oil done in the oven, serve with sour cream or chilli sauce

hope that helps...
I love spuds, will definately be cooking some tonight!

Thanks ll80, I really had no idea! I just use the tins of diced tomatoes (yep, the el cheapo ones). Thanks again!

[briggsy's girl]

ooh, i think i made that sound bad - i don't hide vegies in that i think DH wouldn't eat them - i "hide" them withing casseroles and stuff that will allow them to heat up properly in the little travel cooker DH has in the truck! if he can heat a full meal in an oven bag while he drives, and then stop to eat, it's a lot easier than setting up numerous cookers and things on the side of the road. so yeah, i "hide" them for his convenience while he's driving. it's ultimately easier for him to eat like this than it is to stop and go into a truck stop. but only if it's all in one and heats while he drives - if he has to stop to cook, especially this time of year, i don't blame him for giving it the flick for convenience food (he still has a proper meal) in the truck stops. he also can't have masses of fresh food for cooking meals while he's away - he has to resort to tinned food from a storage standpoint...


it's also a lot cheaper! i work it out it costs between $3 and $5 for a meal when i cook in bulk (depending on the cut of meat and what veg we've grown, what we have to buy, and including things like the cost of oven bags, and the semi-disposable containers i don't care if he damages on the road).

a similar meal at a truck stop would be minimum $13, and only half as nutritious!

[ll80]

Ok, dumb question. What is passata?

It's just pureed tomato basically, like tinned tomato only smooth. You can get it at the supermarket, don't go by price though as the cheap stuff is just the same if not better than the $$ ones.