Italians believe that spaghetti sauces are more important than the spaghetti itself. Spaghetti is a type of Italian pasta. Long thin "knitting needles" made of durum wheat flour are familiar to almost everyone. Quick and easy to prepare, spaghetti is very versatile - goes well with dozens of sauces and foods. Spaghetti goes well with both white and red wine, meat, fish, seafood, vegetables, cheeses and herbs. But the most important thing in any spaghetti dish is the sauce.
The main rule for spaghetti sauce is that it should be liquid. We will describe traditional Italian spaghetti sauces, sauces that are usually served outside of Italy, and play a little tricky - we will try to combine sauces intended for other types of pasta with spaghetti.
Italian masters recommend not draining the water completely at the end of cooking spaghetti, but leaving a couple of tablespoons of liquid. So the spaghetti will be moist, silky and not overdried. The easiest sauce to start experimenting with is creamy. It is not even prepared separately, but added to the spaghetti pot.
Ingredients (1 serving):
20 g butter,
1 st. l. olive oil,
1 st. l. dried basil.
Cooking:
Cook the spaghetti by leaving some water in the pot. Add a piece of butter and basil. Shake and let sit for a couple of minutes. Place on a plate and drizzle with olive oil.
Creamy sauce can be the basis for adding boiled or fried porcini mushrooms, grated cheese, a mixture of nuts and fresh herbs. This is exactly the case when Italian housewives can let their imagination run wild and make spaghetti sauces “on the mood”. But the base is always identical - butter, dried herbs with the obligatory basil. Olive oil is optional, but in Italy it is added to almost any pasta sauce.
Spaghetti Sauce with Pine Nuts and Parmesan (White Pesto)
Ingredients:
120 g pine nuts,
2 lemons
1 bunch of parsley
200 ml olive oil,
150 g of grated parmesan,
50 g pecorino cheese
black pepper,
salt.
Cooking:
Crush half of the nuts into gruel, transfer to a heat-resistant dish, add the zest of two lemons, chopped parsley, whole pine nuts, pour in lemon juice and olive oil. Stir and add parmesan and pecorino. When cooking spaghetti, simply place the bowl of sauce over the simmering spaghetti pot instead of a lid. Drain the spaghetti in a colander, reserving some of the liquid, and immediately transfer to the sauce, mix thoroughly and serve. If it seems too thick, add the water in which the spaghetti was cooked.
Pesto is the second most popular spaghetti sauce. Everyone cooks it differently, which creates the famous variety of Italian cuisine. Pine nuts can be replaced with cashews, but not with walnuts (they can be bitter).
Pesto
Ingredients:
15 g basil
2 cloves of garlic
4 tbsp. tablespoons pine nuts or cashews
6-7 art. spoons of olive oil,
50 g parmesan,
black pepper,
coarse salt.
Cooking:
Put garlic, basil and nuts in a mortar, sprinkle with coarse salt and rub with a pestle. Add olive oil and parmesan, stir. You can use a food processor: put everything in a container and turn it on for 2-3 seconds. Put the cooked spaghetti into the prepared sauce, leaving a little liquid, mix and put on plates. Additionally, you can sprinkle the dish with grated parmesan and moisten with olive oil.
Parmesan and olive oil are often added, regardless of the recipe, to each sauce. For example, sprinkle with grated Parmesan a ready-made dish with sauce and sprinkle with olive oil. This, as they say, to taste and desire.
Spaghetti sauce with basil and olives
Ingredients:
1 bunch fresh basil
¼ nutmeg
5 olives,
20 g grated parmesan,
20 g butter,
1 garlic clove
300 g ripe tomatoes,
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
black pepper,
salt.
Cooking:
Place the smallest and prettiest basil leaves in cold water. Rinse the rest and chop finely. Rinse the tomatoes, remove the seeds, chop coarsely. Heat olive oil in a saucepan with a dollop of butter. Add garlic, olives, vinegar and chopped basil. After a couple of minutes, add the tomatoes, let them boil and cook over low heat for about 5 minutes. Pepper and salt a minute before cooking. Transfer cooked spaghetti to saucepan, mix thoroughly and serve. Garnish the finished portion with whole basil leaves.
You guessed it, Italian sauces often use cheese and olive oil. Of course, you can use any cheese or other oil, but grated parmesan combined with quality olive oil creates the very taste of Italian cuisine that we would like to repeat at home. Two more optional, but very common ingredients are tomatoes (or tomato paste) and basil. If an Italian were offered to lay out the flag of his country from food, then most likely it would be a basil leaf, a tomato and pasta.
There are also very simple spaghetti sauces with a uniform structure and simple composition. Shallot can be replaced with green onion feathers.
Ingredients:
1 eggplant
2 cloves of garlic
10 cherry tomatoes,
1 bunch of shallots.
Cooking:
Cut the eggplant into small cubes, add salt and let stand for about 15 minutes. Drain the released liquid. Finely chop the onion and 1 clove of garlic. Crush the second clove. Heat up 2 tbsp. tablespoons of oil, fry the onion and chopped garlic for 2 minutes. Add the cherry tomatoes cut into quarters and simmer for 10 minutes over low heat. In another skillet, sauté the crushed garlic and eggplant cubes in the remaining oil for 10 minutes. Transfer eggplants to tomatoes, mix, pepper, salt, add cooked spaghetti to them, mix and put on plates.
Another simple sauce with zucchini native to the heart, or rather, with zucchini. Vegetable broth can be borrowed when cooking soup, but it is permissible to replace it with the liquid left over from cooking spaghetti.
Sauce for spaghetti with zucchini and ham
Ingredients:
1 onion
1 garlic clove
200 g zucchini
2 tomatoes
½ sweet pepper
80 g ham,
4 tbsp. spoons of vegetable broth.
Cooking:
Cut the tomatoes crosswise, place in boiling water for 5 seconds, remove the skin and remove the seeds. Cut ham, onions, peppers, tomatoes and zucchini into small slices or cubes. Finely chop the garlic. Fry in hot oil first garlic, then ham, then vegetables, about 2 minutes. Add broth and simmer for another 5 minutes over low heat.
Spaghetti is always in fashion. Now in Europe it is extremely fashionable to serve a dish called Spaghetti Vodka. If the addition of rum to sweets improves the taste of dessert, then in some strange way vodka improves the taste of tomato paste sauce. Try it.
Ingredients (for 500 g spaghetti):
2 tbsp. tablespoons of olive oil
300 ml tomato paste,
1 st. a spoonful of sugar
4 tbsp. spoons of vodka,
125 ml cream
1 st. butter spoon,
Salt,
Pepper.
Cooking:
Fry crushed garlic in olive oil, add tomato paste, bring to a boil. Add cream, sugar, salt and pepper. Let simmer on low heat for 20 minutes. At the very end, add 3 tbsp. spoons of vodka and cook for another 2 minutes. Add cooked spaghetti to saucepan, add butter, 1 tbsp. spoon of vodka, mix everything and serve immediately. Pepper and salt serve separately in salt shakers.
Frozen shrimp is now in every supermarket. Seafood and spaghetti are old friends, Italians always use mussels or shrimp in pasta sauces.
Shrimp Spaghetti Sauce
Ingredients (for 250 g spaghetti):
2 tbsp. tablespoons of olive oil
16 medium sized shrimp, peeled
1 onion
6-7 garlic cloves,
½ st. chopped chili spoons
125 ml dry white wine
50 ml cream
3 art. tablespoons chopped parsley
Pepper,
Salt.
Cooking:
Boil the shrimp in salted water for about 3 minutes. Drain and keep covered to keep warm. Fry chopped onion in oil, add chopped garlic and chili. Pour in the wine and simmer for 4 minutes, add the cream and simmer for about 3 minutes until thickened. Add chopped parsley and shrimp. Transfer boiled spaghetti to a bowl with sauce, mix and put on a dish.
Ingredients:
100 g champignons,
250 ml cream,
50-70 g of red smoked fish,
1 onion
3 garlic cloves,
2-3 tablespoons of olive oil,
black pepper,
salt.
Cooking:
Chop the garlic, fry it in olive oil, add the onion and thinly sliced champignons. After the mushroom juice has evaporated, add cream (room temperature). As soon as the cream boils, add pieces of red smoked fish. Let it simmer for about three minutes, add pepper, stir, taste and salt if necessary (don't forget the salted fish).
Spaghetti can be sweet too. See what a wonderful spaghetti sauce people like to cook in Poland. Cottage cheese can be replaced with cream cheese.
Ingredients:
80 g cottage cheese,
2 tbsp. spoons of milk
1 teaspoon cinnamon
a handful of raisins,
1 st. a spoonful of grated ginger
1 teaspoon of honey.
Cooking:
Mix part of the cottage cheese with raisins, ginger, honey, cinnamon and milk. Add freshly cooked spaghetti to the sauce, reserving some of the liquid. Mix thoroughly and serve. Decorate the dish with a piece of cottage cheese and sprinkle with cinnamon.
They say that spaghetti is just an excuse to eat a delicious sauce. In this case, the amazing abundance of this sauce is understandable.
Ingredients (3-4 servings):
1 large carrot
1 large onion
2 celery stalks,
3-4 garlic cloves,
4 tbsp. tablespoons of olive oil
250 g minced beef,
150 ml dry red wine
150 ml milk
200 g tomato paste,
Bay leaf,
salt.
Cooking:
Finely chop the carrots, onions, garlic and celery. Sauté garlic in olive oil, add chopped vegetables and sauté for 3-5 minutes. Add minced meat, fry until it breaks into small pieces and brightens. Pour in the wine, stir and pour in the milk. Reduce the heat and, stirring, boil down. Add tomato paste, put bay leaf and salt. Reduce heat to low and simmer covered for about 40 minutes.
But bolognese sauce is prepared not only in Bologna and not only for tagliatelle or lasagna. The academic quality of local recipes is successfully compensated by popular versions in ready-for-everything London or experimenting New York. Do not be surprised if bolognese with turkey has long been a registered American brand. Do we use?
Ingredients (6-8 servings):
3 art. tablespoons of olive oil
1 onion
2 medium carrots
2 celery stalks,
3 garlic cloves,
600 g turkey
1 cup dry red or white wine
¼ cup tomato paste
400 g cherry tomatoes,
2 bay leaves,
1 teaspoon salt
1 st. a spoonful of oregano
2 teaspoons thyme.
Cooking:
Heat the oil in a saucepan with an ovenproof bottom. Saute the chopped onions, carrots and celery for about 10 minutes. Add garlic and fry for 1 more minute. Add chopped turkey meat and fry for about 10 more minutes. Pour in the wine and let it boil down. Add tomato paste, tomatoes, bay leaf and salt. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about an hour. Add thyme and oregano and simmer for another 30 minutes. Add pepper and salt to taste. Put the finished spaghetti in the sauce, mix in a saucepan and serve.
Surprisingly, spaghetti sauces often turn into masterpieces of culinary art. Simple and complex, multi-component and simple from one or two ingredients, sauces are often prepared in order to pamper yourself and loved ones with new tastes and aromas. And spaghetti is just a side dish, an excuse, if you will. Spaghetti sauces are like cream for a cake, like butter for porridge, or like filling for a hamburger. Cook with heart!
Properly prepared pasta sauce ensures the success of the whole dish. Pasta is perfectly combined in taste with cream-based gravy. The sauce is very easy to prepare at home, even for a beginner. This dish is ideal for those who do not like to spend a lot of time cooking. In just half an hour, you can create a real culinary masterpiece, tasty and satisfying to feed guests, the whole family.
In cooking, it is customary to call pasta made from wholemeal flour pasta. Italians, for whom pasta is a traditional dish, call various pasta products such as ravioli or lasagna so. Sauce plays a huge role in serving pasta. It gives the main taste and color to the whole dish. Along with tomato sauce, the easiest to make, but no less tasty, culinary specialists call cream sauce for pasta.
Delicate creamy sauce is prepared on the basis of heavy cream, butter with a small addition of fine flour and spices. The basic recipe of the dish is often supplemented with other ingredients, such as tomatoes, carrots, mushrooms, cheese, chicken or bacon. Sometimes white wine is added to the gravy. Sauces go well with many types of pasta, be it spaghetti, fettuccine, rigatoni, tagliatelle or regular noodles.
The preparation of a delicate cream-based sauce takes only 20-30 minutes of time. This is a great option for a quick lunch or dinner for family and guests. All recipes use 20% cream, sometimes they are replaced with sour cream with a similar fat content. Like pasta carbonara, pasta with cream sauce is often served with runny egg yolk, a technique that adds flavor and nutritional value to the dish.
A basic creamy pasta sauce with a minimal amount of ingredients will help out in a situation when guests are on the doorstep. It well impregnates any pasta, giving the dish a delicate taste. The classic recipe does not involve a large set of spices. Optionally, in addition to salt, you can add a little black pepper, it will add piquancy to the sauce.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
Pasta is often served with grated or sliced hard cheese. For a more delicate texture, the dish can be melted directly into the sauce. It is important to choose cheeses that melt well and do not turn into "rubber" when cooled. The ideal option is parmesan - thanks to it, pasta with cream will acquire a pronounced cheesy taste and aroma.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
Mushroom Spaghetti Cream Sauce is another winning pasta gravy option. This recipe uses mushrooms. There is no need to worry that there are a lot of them; during roasting, they decrease in volume by almost three times. It is important to finely chop the mushrooms so that it is a sauce, and not mushrooms in a creamy sauce. From spices it is better to give preference to black ground pepper.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
Fragrant creamy pasta sauce with oyster mushrooms will not leave anyone indifferent. Nutmeg and fresh herbs add a spicy flavor to the gravy. Parsley, cilantro, green or purple basil will go well with oyster mushrooms and a creamy sauce, and garlic gives a spicy note. It is cut into large pieces and fried in butter. If desired, after frying, garlic can be removed from the gravy, as it has already fulfilled its function.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
This mushroom cream sauce recipe uses dried porcini mushrooms. They require preliminary preparation, that is, soaking for 6-8 hours. If you have fresh porcini mushrooms, this will significantly reduce the cooking time. To make the mushrooms soft, they are boiled, then stewed together with other ingredients. The sauce is very tender, with a rich mushroom aroma and taste.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
If it is difficult to choose between classic tomato or cream sauce, then you can prepare an original tomato-cream sauce. It is important to peel the tomatoes so as not to disturb the delicate texture of the gravy. To make the tomato flavor of the sauce more pronounced, you can add a few tablespoons of tomato paste. Fresh and dried spicy herbs, such as basil or oregano, will go well with such gravy.
Ingredients:
Cooking method:
To make your pasta in a creamy sauce perfect in taste and appearance, pay attention to the list of useful tips used by professional chefs and experienced amateur cooks:
Any pasta is just a piece of dough without the addition of sauce. It is a well-prepared sauce that is the basic component of the entire flavor composition. Among the whole variety of sauces, the classic tomato sauce is ruthlessly ahead of its creamy counterpart, fatty and creamy, it has long been loved by all those who prefer a delicious meal to counting calories.
Let's start with a base in the form of a simple classic creamy béchamel sauce, which has been a constant companion to most pasta-based dishes since the advent of lasagna.
Ingredients:
Cooking
Having melted the butter, fry the flour in it for about a minute, and then pour it all with a mixture of milk and cream. Make sure that there are no flour lumps left. Add a pinch of nutmeg to the sauce and a few more not-so-traditional additions like Italian herbs and dried onions and garlic, they will give the classic French sauce that taste of Italy, which no pasta dish can do without. When the sauce starts bubbling, gradually add portions of grated parmesan to it, completely dissolving each piece of it.
This creamy spaghetti sauce is a variation on the classic Alfredo pasta sauce with lots of garlic.
Ingredients:
Cooking
Having melted a large amount of butter, quickly fry the garlic passed through the press on it until it releases aroma. Pour garlic butter with cream and add grated cheese. Reduce the heat under the saucepan and simmer the sauce, stirring, until it is smooth and thick. At the end, you can supplement the dish with chopped parsley.
Despite the fact that all previous recipes were based on a combination of cream and cheese, this sauce deserves special attention.
Ingredients:
Cooking
Boil the pumpkin pulp and puree it with spices and thyme. We heat the cream and mix them with mustard. Add pumpkin puree, mix and begin to gradually add cheese, constantly stirring the sauce. When all the cheese is melted, remove the sauce from the heat before it has set, and immediately stir in the cooked spaghetti.
As the basis for the sauce, you can use any mushrooms or a mixture of them, but we settled on the most affordable option - champignons.
Store shelves are full of an abundance of various flavors for lunch dishes. However, we all know very well that their composition does not shine with benefits for the body. Therefore, the best solution would be to prepare an addition to the side dish yourself. For example, pasta sauce.
Cheese sauce for pasta is usually a traditional option for preparing an addition to a side dish. Few have tried it. Try the following step by step recipe.
Heat up a frying pan well by pouring vegetable oil into it. Give preference to a device with a deep bottom: this will make cooking easier and the result better. Add flour to the butter, mix gently and fry until the mixture acquires a slightly golden color.
Pour milk into the future sauce in a thin stream. Stir again and bring to a boil. After that, pour the cheese, grated on a medium grater, spices and soft butter. It is better to get it out of the refrigerator in advance, as an icy piece will not be the best ingredient. Pasta is poured with hot sauce immediately after it is ready.
Tomato paste sauce is a simple, but at the same time very tasty recipe for making an additive to even the most mediocre side dish.
The onion is finely chopped and sautéed in a frying pan with oil until it becomes transparent. Tomatoes are poured with boiling water, peeled, cut and added to the onions. Simmer the mixture and stir, bringing it to a thick state. After that, put the tomato paste, salt, spices and sugar. We continue to cook on low heat for 15 minutes or until a certain saturation or density is reached, depending on how you like it.
A well-known national Italian dish - spaghetti is often served with a variety of dressings. For example, creamy sauce goes perfectly with pasta. There is a wide range of recipes for such a dressing, thanks to which there is a great chance to diversify a boring standard diet.
A traditional appetizing addition to pasta is a sauce made using cream and various other ingredients. The main component of the filling must be chosen correctly: the higher the fat content, the softer and more airy the dressing. Creamy spaghetti sauce is prepared with mushrooms, cheese, bacon, nuts, any vegetables, herbs. Sometimes milk and butter are used for its preparation, in some cases a little water is poured. For a rich and spicy aroma, it is better to add garlic, lemon, spices.
There are many recipes for creating creamy spaghetti sauce. Among gourmets, the following fills are popular:
Spaghetti with creamy sauce is easy to prepare, but the result is incredibly tasty. Filling of this type is considered universal, because it goes equally well with meat, fish, vegetables, seafood, pasta. Below are some of the most popular methods for making creamy gravy. These dishes are medium in calories, so sometimes you can treat yourself.
Try making a creamy mushroom sauce that transforms classic pasta into a gourmet, mouth-watering and delicious dish. You can use any seasonal mushrooms for this recipe. Ingredients:
Mushroom gravy preparation technology:
Another good seasoning option for Italian pasta is garlic cream sauce. This savory dish is perfect for a family dinner or will be a profitable addition to the festive menu. Required products:
Garlic cream sauce for pasta is made as follows:
To get a dressing that can perfectly and advantageously complement an Italian traditional dish, you need a minimum amount of products and a little inspiration. To make a simple but insanely delicious pasta gravy, you need the following ingredients:
Cooking technology:
Pasta with seafood is a favorite food of most gourmets. Making this dish is very simple, the main thing is to follow the recipe. The result is a juicy, appetizing dish. To prepare shrimp gravy, you need to stock up on the following products:
Method for creating fill for pasta with shrimp:
Italians love pasta with the classic creamy Carbonara sauce. Our compatriots also appreciated the taste of this dish. To prepare a classic spaghetti filling, you will need the following ingredients:
How to make carbonara sauce.