Garlic-tomato (paste) pasta with peas and basil

Once in a while, you find yourself at home without a lot of groceries on hand and you need to make a quick dinner.  You haven't thought much about it in advance so you need to come up with something using what you have in the house and you want it to be relatively quick to prepare.

Using tomato paste is not only convenient but gives the sauce a deep, rich flavor

That was me last Sunday night.  It was a busy weekend, mostly because my husband and I were tackling a little home project of painting one of our rooms in preparation for new carpet installation.  

Even when it's busy, I still like to cook for my family on the weekends as much as I can.  In recent years, our cravings for take out and eating out has dwindled so much and weekends are when I get the chance to make hot meals we can all dig into together at the same time.  So last Sunday, I started thinking about dinner and remembered a pasta recipe I'd pulled out from a magazine recently.

Here's what I like about this pasta dish...you use tomato paste as the basis for the sauce.  So no tomatoes, no problem!  When I buy a new container of tomato paste, I like to portion out the extra in tablespoon mounds and freeze them.  This way, I can grab what I need from the freezer when a recipe calls for it.  I often use tomato paste - loosened with a bit of hot water and seasoned with some olive oil, salt, pepper, and dry oregano - to make a tomato "sauce" base for pizza at home.

This dinner comes together in under 30 minutes.  Olive oil, thinly sliced garlic, tomato paste, and some red pepper flakes get cooked down with some pasta water.  Finish cooking the pasta - thin spaghetti in this case - in the liquid and stir in some peas (always in my freezer) and a handful of fresh basil (which I snip from my little herb box).  If you like and have time, add a little protein like I did with shrimp.  I also grabbed that from the freezer and simply cooked it up in the same pan before starting the sauce.

The pasta turned out flavorful and hearty.  I served it with garlic bread, which I'd made a few days earlier and tucked away in the freezer (maybe I was subconsciously planning this meal, but my son loves garlic bread).  That went in the oven while I made the pasta and we had a fortifying dinner!


Most of the elements for this dinner came from the freezer - the tomato paste, peas, shrimp, and garlic bread.  There's always a variety of pasta in my pantry so whenever I need to make dinner that I hadn't planned for, I'm likely to consider it.  All of this reminds me it's worth the effort to maintain a well-stocked pantry and a full freezer so that you can always put together a meal without a lot of advance planning or grocery shopping.

I had no time to take any proper pictures but the meal was such a tasty and handy one, I wanted to save the recipes here.  I know I'll be making this meal again.

Recipe:

Garlic-Tomato (Paste) Pasta with Peas and Basil
Adapted from Food Network magazine, June 2015 issue

- Makes 3 to 4 servings - 

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
6 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
3 tablespoons tomato paste
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 cup frozen peas (I use petite peas), thawed
10 ounces thin spaghetti (or angel hair pasta)
Large handful (about 1/2 cup) fresh basil, roughly chopped, plus more for topping
Salt and pepper, for seasoning
Optional: grated parmesan, for serving

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.  

In a large skillet, heat oil over medium heat.  Add garlic and cook, stirring, until edges begin to turn golden, about a minute.  Add tomato paste, stirring and cooking, for about a minute.  Add red pepper flakes, and 1 1/2 cups of the salted boiling water. Stir to dissolve the tomato paste.  Simmer until reduced by half, about 5 minutes.  

Meanwhile, cook pasta about 2 minutes shy of al dente.  Reserve about 3/4 cup of the pasta cooking water and drain pasta (or simply use tongs to transfer pasta into the sauce).  Add pasta to the skillet, followed by the basil and the peas, and cook over medium heat until pasta is al dente.  Add the reserved pasta water, as needed, to make a loose sauce.  Taste, and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper, if necessary. Remove from the heat, ladle into serving bowls.  Top with a little more fresh basil, and parmesan cheese (if desired).  


Garlic Bread

- For one loaf (4-6 servings) - 

1 loaf baguette or ciabatta bread (baguette or ciabatta)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 large garlic cloves, pressed or finely minced
Salt and pepper
Chopped fresh parsley (about 2 tablespoons)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Split bread in half horizontally.  

In a small bowl, combine melted butter and olive oil.  Add garlic, a little salt and pepper, and stir together.  Stir in chopped parsley.

Brush the bread evenly with the garlic mixture.  Place the halves together and wrap in foil (you can freeze the bread at this point).  Bake until bread is warm and crusty, about 12 minutes or so.  Open up the foil during the last few minutes of baking.  For extra crispy garlic bread, run bread through the broiler for a minute or two (open up foil and place bread, spread-side up, under the broiler).