Last Sunday I made Pasta Marinara and vegetable soup. My parents were busy in the garden so I just started cooking while they were out. I think if I had not cooked we would have gone out to eat. We rarely get good gardening days these days because of the rain in the evenings so my parents took this opportunity to catch up on gardening.
Anyway I followed a recipe for the Marinara sauce and cooked it with Penne pasta. Below is the recipe for the Marinara the way I prepared it. We happened to have Basil and Oregano in the garden but you can use dried herbs also.
Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
3 cloves garlic
Half an onion
1 can plum tomatoes, whole
Handful of fresh herbs like Basil and Oregano
1/4 tsp salt
Cooked pasta of any sort, maybe Penne or Spaghetti
Instructions
- Chop the onions and garlic finely. Chop up the herbs finely too.
- Fry the onions and garlic in 2 tbsp olive oil until fragrant
- Add in the can of plum tomatoes and crush up the tomatoes in the pan with a spatula
- Simmer for 10 minutes
- Add salt and herbs.
- Simmer another 5-10 minutes
- Boil pasta according to packet instructions.
- Drain pasta and add to Marinara sauce and serve.
It turned out really well. I am glad the pasta was al dente. And the sauce was good and herby. I am glad I put lots of garlic and onion.
I also made a vegetable soup. Below is the recipe for the vegetable soup. I just improvised it and you should too. Vegetable soups are really healthy and no matter what vegetable you put it will always turn out well because vegetables are so tasty.
Ingredients
quarter to half of a cabbage
1 white radish
1 tomato
half an onion
chicken stock granules to taste
salt
soy sauce
Instructions
- Chop up all the vegetables above
- Boil around 1.5 litres of water in a pot
- Once boiling, throw in the vegetables
- Simmer until vegetables are tender maybe 30 mins
- Season to taste with chicken stock, salt and soy sauce
So there you have it, my normal and rather simple and fuss free dinner I cooked for my parents. I like to cook simple food and I like eating simple food too. So this suits me just fine. I am not sure about nutritional value of this meal as it has no protein but maybe one meal without protein will give our kidneys a break. And get the nourishing goodness of veggies and herbs. Thanks for reading!
Labels: dinner, home cooking, pasta, recipe
