For those who are not regulars in the kitchen, and you want to impress someone for the first time with your cooking, there is one secret ingredient that will never disappoint – BUTTER. Unfortunately, I learned this the hard way and when I first began cooking up a storm, I also ate my way through endless sticks of creamy, salty, butta.. literally, biting off big chunks like it was a candy bar.
Luckily, after many pounds gained I came up with a new plan cooking both fat meals and skinny meals. Basically, I started making the same meal two ways, with minimal extra cost, clean up, and time spent slaving over a hot stove. This is my version of a Roasted Tomato Cream Pasta / Roasted Tomato & Zucchini Pasta. I first got the idea from Ree Drummond on her blog The Pioneer Woman (her blog is supposedly turning into a movie starring Reese Witherspoon) when she posted a recipe for the ridiculously delicious farfalle with zucchini pasta.
After chopping up onions and garlic, divide in two piles sautéing half in butter, the other half in olive oil (or cooking spray to be extra skinny). Add chopped up zucchini to the light version. Pour some white wine and simmer.
Mix whole cherry/grade tomatoes with round tomatoes (in 1/4s) in a bowl with salt and olive oil (again, no oil is necesarry). Throw on to a roasted pan with some garlic cloves and cook for about 20 minutes until soft.Here comes the divergence. Fatty version gets a can of crushed tomatoes, few roasted tomatoes, chopped roasted garlic and cream.. a lot of cream.
For the skinny version, toss in roasted tomatoes and garlic. OK, almost finished. Boil pasta water (saving about 1/2 cup water for the sauce). Mix all together. Serve with basil, parsley and parm cheese. Next, mix the fatty tomato cream with the pasta, serve with basil and liberal amounts of shredded and shaved parm cheese.
Ingredients
Fatty Pasta:
– Bow Tie pasta
– 2 Cans crushed tomatoes
– 1 chopped onion
– 2 cloves garlic
– Cream
– Parm cheese
– Butter
– 1/3 cup white wine
Skinny Pasta:
– Bow Tie Pasta
– 1/4 kilo cherry tomatoes, 1/2 kilo round tomatoes (roasted)
– 2 zapallitos (or zucchini)
– 1 chopped onion
– 2 cloves chopped garlic
– Chopped parsley
– Chopped Basil
– Sprinkle of parm
– 1/3 cup white wine
– 1 tablespoon olive oil / or cooking spray