Sunday, January 19, 2014

Spaghetti and Salad - with a bit of brand ranting


It was time to make spaghetti sauce again.  I had Italian sausage in the fridge so I only needed ground beef and tomato sauce.  I also picked up a bag of mixed lettuce. I find I will whip up a little vinaigrette for a salad if I have a bag of lettuce.  I tend not to make a salad if I have to wash and dry all the ingredients. Also, I will use up a whole bag of cut lettuce but I won't usually finish a head of lettuce or cabbage etc. So there is much less waste with ready made salad fixings. 

The sauce was the usual.  Sweat a diced onion, carrot, celery, garlic (smashed, minced), mushrooms and peppers.  Remove from pot and brown ground beef and mild Italian sausage. Add the veggies back in and add a can of tomato sauce (I usually use Hunt's) and a can of Aylmer Tomato soup (must be Aylmer, available at Mitchell's in Powell River or smaller chains elsewhere). Simmer for an hour or three and serve over spaghetti. (Barilla pasta tastes best.)

I needed white wine vinegar so I tried a bottle of Maille brand because I like their Dijon Mustard. 
I put one teaspoon olive oil in a bowl and added two teaspoons vegetable oil and two teaspoons Maille white wine vinegar. Salt, mixed pepper and dried chives. Whisk it into an emulsion and toss the salad in it. The proportions of 3:2 oil to vinegar are standard. Too much vinegar won't form an emulsion and too little will taste oily. Just about anything you like can go into the vinaigrette to flavour it. Yesterday I used rice wine vinegar which is very bright and crisp. The Maille was also bright but had wonderful fruity wine overtones. I like it.

Fresh Parmesan grated over top of the spaghetti and serve.


No comments:

Post a Comment