A Quick Pasta Dinner

sometimes quick isn’t just easy, but also good!

A fast pasta dinner sounds like it'll be less than good, but there are times and ways to make a quick pasta dinner in under 30 minutes and still taste great.

Last night we wanted something quick and somewhat easy for dinner, so I took out a little leftover sauce from the freezer. I added another can of Cento whole tomatoes, more basil, red wine, salt and pepper, and instant sauce.

I made a cucumber salad consisting of two cucumbers and some cherry tomatoes. The right cherry or grape tomatoes are always good to use, especially during the winter and even mid-spring when the selection isn't the best.

I found organic cherry or grape tomatoes since they seem to be the sweetest of the bunch. They are also suitable for making tomato sauce when the selection isn't that good. I've written a few times about my recipe for a cherry tomato sauce here at 'DelPaggio's.

The cucumber salad was the perfect match for dinner. The ingredients included olive oil, basil, oregano, crushed red pepper flakes, balsamic vinegar, and of salt. That's it!

I used some pasta we bought at Costco called Lumaca Rigata; they're like little curled shells that trap sauce inside them. They were perfect for the sauce I had made.

As I stated above, this was a quick pasta meal compared to my usual pasta dinner, which takes all day to make the sauce how I like it.

Prepping the salad took the most time peeling the cucumbers, which you don't have to do, but I do. All in all, the salad took about 20 minutes.

The sauce took about 20-30 minutes after adding the can of tomatoes, and while it was cooking, I prepared the pasta water and dropped in the pasta when boiling.

Maybe I was exaggerating above when I stated 30 minutes in total. It seemed like that, but it may have been more like 45 minutes which is still quick for an evening—pasta meal.

Of course, this was made easy and quick due to the frozen sauce. Having sauce in the freezer for nights like this is always handy.

Buon Appetito!

Mark & Patti